The Boston Diaries

The ongoing saga of a programmer who doesn't live in Boston, nor does he even like Boston, but yet named his weblog/journal “The Boston Diaries.”

Go figure.

Tuesday, October 19, 2010

We were experiencing technical difficulties …

I finally get back into the blogging mode when the server my site (and email) is on goes offline when its power supply flames out.

Sigh.

It was weird today—I felt lost without access to my server, mainly because of the loss of my personal email (yes, I still run my own email server; yes, I'm masochistic like that) but yes, the website being down was also weighing on me—until yesterday (Monday) I don't think any server my site has been on has been down for more than three or four hours (oh, there have been some times recently when the site has been down for over 24 hours but that's because various processes on the box were inadvertantly killed and I didn't realize it, but that's different than the actual server being offline).

But things seem to be back to normal, and I would like to thank the crew hosting my website for their hard work in getting it back up quicker than I expected.

Your complete boating resource

I received this last week:

From
MXXXXX XXXXX <XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX>
To
sean@conman.org
Subject
Website Inquiry
Date
Tue, 12 Oct 2010 15:32:04 +0800

Dear Webmaster,

I recently discovered your "Uhg … sushi for breakfast" page here:

http://boston.conman.org/2002/05/03.4

I wanted to let you know that the “PublixDirect” link on your site points to a website (http://www.publixdirect.com/) that is no longer working. Would you please consider replacing it with a link to my website called Boating.com? It is a resource that provides hundreds of used and new boats for sale, as well as reviews, tips and buying guides for anyone interested in boating.

If you think it would be of use to your visitors, would you please consider adding a link to my website on your page here:

http://boston.conman.org/2002/05/03.4

Or in any of the pages of your site that will be most appropriate.

Here is the HTML link you could add: <a href="http://www.boating.com">Boating.com</a> - the complete boating resource.

Will look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks!

MXXXXX

Boating.com
www.boating.com

My original thought was to post it immediately, but I thought better of it at the time. I mean, it's nice that M pointed out a dead link on my site, but given that that particular entry is eight years old that is to be expected (also, PublixDirect was discontinued in August of 2003).

But I found it really odd to suggest replacing the PublixDirect link with a site about boat sales. It doesn't make sense in the context of the entry and it tells me that M probably has some piece of software that looks for sites with broken links that have a certain page rank and spams any address found on the page asking to replace the dead link.

Nice, except I'm not a link farm. The links in each entry provide (or at least, I hope they provide) a context for what I'm writing about and frankly, having the text “PublixDirect” go to a site about boat sales doesn't serve me, or my readers, any good purpose (hmm … but what to do about links that have since changed since I wrote an entry … but that's another show entry). It's also obvious that M never bothered to read the entry in question or else M wouldn't have bothered to suggest replacing the PublixDirect link with some spam site.

I replied to M (but without quite the snarkiness here) but have yet to receive a reply, so a week later, it's fair game. And heck, if I'm lucky, perhaps this entry will become the complete boating resource; that'll show M.

“NPA” seems to be a popular party these days …

I received the sample ballot in the mail today (okay, technically yesterday but I'm still in “today” mode) and I'm excited to see all the non-Republican/non-Democratic candidates in the eight races I can vote in on November 2nd. There are eight Republicans, eight Democrats (figures the Republicans would have a .com and the Democrats a .org), one Libertarian (Alex Snitker), one Constitutional Party of Florida (Bernie DeCastro), one for the Tea Party (Ira Chester), two Independance Party candidates (Peter Allen and his running mate John Zanni) and fifteen (count them, fifteen) non-party-affiliated candidates.

I find that wonderful for some reason.

Do I really expect the non-Republicans/non-Democrats to win?

Not really, but a guy can hope, right?

Obligatory Picture

[The future's so bright, I gotta wear shades]

Obligatory Contact Info

Obligatory Feeds

Obligatory Links

Obligatory Miscellaneous

You have my permission to link freely to any entry here. Go ahead, I won't bite. I promise.

The dates are the permanent links to that day's entries (or entry, if there is only one entry). The titles are the permanent links to that entry only. The format for the links are simple: Start with the base link for this site: https://boston.conman.org/, then add the date you are interested in, say 2000/08/01, so that would make the final URL:

https://boston.conman.org/2000/08/01

You can also specify the entire month by leaving off the day portion. You can even select an arbitrary portion of time.

You may also note subtle shading of the links and that's intentional: the “closer” the link is (relative to the page) the “brighter” it appears. It's an experiment in using color shading to denote the distance a link is from here. If you don't notice it, don't worry; it's not all that important.

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