News archive 2001
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December 11th, 2001
Big news today! My son Christopher got promoted down at Nordstrom and will be relocating to Durham, North Carolina to take a manager's position!! We will miss him very much here *sniffle*, but we're totally excited by this great opportunity!

in other news, during the course of testing the site on various linux browsers i got a few screenshots of the home page here, looks remarkably similar from one to the other. Also, we are officially server-side-include free now as those files have been converted to php, this should improve performance, umm yay!

December 10th, 2001
Got a few pics of our annual Family Christmas Tree Cutting excursion over in the family pics area. Once again, if you're suppposed to be there (and you know who you are) just enter your first name (lower case) as user/username and your last name (lower case) as the password, you should get right in. exception: Donna S, my apologies to you girl as i spelled your last name wrong in the password file, just use your sister's info until i can correct it. And once again...if i've forgotten you (or spelled your name wrong, heh) mail me and i'll correct the oversight.

December 9th, 2001
After messing around with PHP (Pre-Hypertext Processor) for a while I've decided to go with it, whole-hog. It's very impressive, extremely widely used, well supported and the syntax is even more similar to the old familiar C/C++ than PERL. Good news is any time invested in learning PERL, especially those nasty regular expressions is not wasted as compatibility is superb. As a matter of fact PHP is so useful/powerful I'm gonna be able to abandon the SSI stuff (*.shtml files = Server Side Includes) there's just nothing like embedding your stuff right into the html file(s) and since PHP is from the Apache Software Foundation it's *probably* gonna stay compatible with the Apache Web Server, ya think?. So, you'll be seeing less and less links in your status bar with "somename.cgi?someparam=somevalue" and more and more with "somename.php?param(s)" in them. Webmasters, go check out PHP, but of course, statistically most of you already have, heh. This is not to say I won't be using PERL anymore; not at all, it's still very useful for maintenance/mass-changes things offline.

December 4th, 2001
Wow, the news updates are coming so close together i'm beginning to mistake this page for a diary or something...hehe. but seriously folks, did i mention just how much fun a person has who doesn't backup their linux config files?. no? i didn't think so. let me recommend to all: back up your key config files! even if, like me, you feel that maybe newer versions of some apps will obsolete your configs, at least you have some point of reference from the old file, ya!

ahh, but we here at the House of Craig are looking forward to much, much better things. yep, the Craig is about to take his annual end-of-the-year 2 week vacation!, "where is he going?" you ask? that's the beauty of it all...nowhere and fast! ahh so many days-in-a-row of blissful abandon, free to work on whatever lingering project catches my fancy, *sigh*, Nice!

December 3rd, 2001
And we're back...heh ok, probably nobody noticed but the ole house of craig was offline last night and today. yep, went ahead and updgraded to Mandrake 8.1 (Vitamin) and have been enjoying the recreation of all of my key config files since, like a major idiot, i didn't back up and therefore lost all of them, oops, *DOH!*. there may still be some glitches since i've also *hopefully* increased security too.

November 28th, 2001
Ok: for all you linux-distro snobs out there who scoff at my lowly mandrake as a server platform check out this ZDNet review of Mandrake 8.1 as a server platform, (which, by the way, i've already downloaded and burned and will upgrade to shortly) hah! and to think: i just picked Mandrake for it's spiffy installer, who knew? and...*shameless plug* i just joined the Mandrake Club to continue to help support the cause, check it out here, seems like a good thing.

Also, you may have noticed the yellowish tinge the site's taken on of late, no, it's not the natural result of aging, heh. actually i just got tired of the glaring white background so we're gonna enjoy the yellow for a while...(actually more of a *butter* color dontcha think? hmmmm, *butter*, hmmmm)

November 25th, 2001
Well, it's official: as of today the HouseOfCraig.com is *live*. that's right folks, finally coughed up the bux to register with the InterNIC. now you can just type houseofcraig.com into your browser and you'll be whisked away to this very place, full of insight, strange humor and everything that has come to represent the Craig.(whatever THAT is...heh)

November 24th, 2001
Coupla things, nothing major. First off, at the request of certain persons i have *sniffle* removed the definitions page from the side menu area until i can get a less offensive pic/definition up, don't know what i was thinking there, heh, just seemed funny to me and my rather odd sense of humor...
Second, finally got around to upgrading my internal network to 100tx, wow, the performance really seems to be 10x faster than before, was able to burn a cd over the network at 12x without errors, very nice, and as an added bonus it was my first experience in changing hardware under linux-mandrake, again wow, very easy; at least for the RealTek chip my card is using, had to stop/start the server but only to physically change the hardware otherwise no reboots required. i'm currently looking into finding additional ways to get here along with my keyword:houseofcraig since not all browsers are supporting the internet keywords.

November 18th, 2001
Alright, da BeaV is a more than a bit miffed!. check out this blatant rcon abuse (small pic [99k]/large pic [211k], my expletives deleted, heh.) which occurred Nov 7th on the WKA server, notice how *WKA*Meathead denies having anything to do with it at the bottom and yet tells me near the top how he "tried to slap me out", an obvious reference the admin_slap command from the popular admin_mod which he says he tried to use when i got stuck coming up out of the water around back on cs_docks. of course you must have rcon to use it, *DUH*. of course it was obviously *WKA*RoachMaker who did the deed since i wasted him first. check it out, i must have "broke the rules" as i kept on wasting both WKA guys...hello? WKA? PERHAPS *WKA* HAS BEEN A BIT TOO LIBERAL WITH RCON!. also notice how the admin runs commands for me so's i'll drop both my guns and *freeze* in place, gee, thanks admin! by the way folks, start checking your CS console from time to time as you play, WKA is certainly not the only server where the admin "runs commands for you" and some advertised punkbuster servers have an interesting habit of turning pb off randomly during the game. cheating takes on yet several new dimensions, *sigh*.

Ok, in other news: for those of you who really admire the pic from my first definitions entry, good news! the very same pic is available as an 800x600 bitmap (1407k) ready to drop right onto your desktop as an inspirational background image, or get the zip file (924k). also, got yet another batch of screenies ready to go from my latest cs escapades which should be up by 8pm est or so, they, for the most part, reflect that my cable's back to it's old self, thanx adelphia.

November 12th, 2001 - editors note: page has been removed temporarily
Ok folks, got a brand new section over on the side menu, heck, it's even got that cutesie animated thingy in front of it. What is it? heh. Well....ok, it's the first entry in my "definitions" page, a strange yet graphic and sometimes distasteful explanation of terms created by me over the years, sort of a *word or phrase of the week* type of thing, heh, don't say I didn't warn you...

October 21st, 2001
Hmmm, "been a while..." just a quickie to let ya'll know there are some new screenies over in the latest CS action area, check 'em out, if you can tolerate the download time, heh.

September 30th, 2001
Couple of changes, nothing major. First off you may be wondering what these keys icons are for: they indicate a password protected area, if you're supposed to be there just enter your first name as user and your last name as password all lower case!, otherwise go away, heh. if you feel you should be included in these areas and can't get in, mail me and i'll send you your user/password info. Secondly, i have begun to migrate the things i've been doing with javascript to cgi, since i'm serving this site from my own box now i can finally use some cgi as well as server side includes, yay. My ip address does change from time to time so use the houseofcraig keyword to get here, it should always point to the correct address:port combination. commentary on the latest cs update (v1.3) is on the way...

September 14th, 2001
Was going to actually date this entry September 11th, because that's what it's about, but then i thought how misleading that would be. The fact is, it's taken me several days to respond mentally and emotionally to what occurred on that day. I want retribution, retaliation, in short: REVENGE. I also don't want any misfires, only those who actually assisted these terrorists in some way should be punished. Have been pondering for these last couple of days an "open letter to the hijackers" type of thing, but somebody sent me this today and it's just so good that anything i would do now would be like re-inventing the wheel, here it is.

August 26th, 2001
Well, it's been a while without any real news, however 1 week ago today got the wife her very own Notebook computer, yay! check it out here. It's a Sony and the specs are quite impressive considering the low price, (secretly, i've always wanted a laptop). It's got the ATI Rage Mobility chip onboard, evidenced by how it runs the latest Sachs Aquarium release, check out the new starfish in the lower right corner, it moves real slow and actually casts a shadow on the sand, nice work.

June 7th, 2001
Can i get a whew-yeah!!? That's right theCraig is now a registered HVACR Journeyman!! wheeee! (took long enough didn't it, heh) anyway, check it out here.

May 29th, 2001
Once again, big doin's at the House of Craig! Yee-Hah! Got me a Sony Perfect-Flat 19" monitor with built-in 4-port usb hub, sweet. Check out this pic, look at how that puppy dwarf's the keyboard, frankly, it's scary. in other news check out this link regarding asus' wall-hack drivers for their video cards, the author finds it a "magical wound" even when playing an "online war game", WHAT A PUNK! ASUS IS ACTUALLY PROVIDING THEIR CUSTOMERS WITH A MANUFACTURER-DEVELOPED WALL-HACK AND SUPPORING IT!

obviously, i have bought my last asus product.

May 22nd, 2001
Anyone out there want to donate a phat pipe to the H.O.C.? heh. After running a CS server over my cable connection for over a month now, i've come to the conclusion that my pipe just ain't phat enough. So, further appearances of BeaVis' Bunghole in your server listings are going to be few and far between. Inevitably, i'll be able to get more bandwidth as time marches on, stay tuned. In other news, been playin' around a bit with WML, (wireless markup language), i'm thinkin' it's gonna prove to be quite useful...

April 8th, 2001
Finally got my linux box up and running a Counter-Strike server, procrastinated it long enough. It's not "up" 100% of the time so do an update and look for "BeaVis' Bunghole" in your listing. First screenshot is on the sidemenu.

April 2nd, 2001
Ok, i've been busy. Was going to add a "pic of the day" type thing to the homepage but opted for the small area in the sidemenu instead. (you'll find it just below the cmf icon) just wanted a quick-click for latest CS screenies, nuthin' fancy. ahh, well the venting calculator in the hvac area is on hold whilst i whip-up an application to enforce some win98 security and log some activity. if it turns out to be generally useful i'll post it in the downloads area.

March 3rd, 2001
Alright, am giving netscape another chance, i'm sure they'll be quite relieved to hear...my influence spreads far and wide ya know *wink*.

March 1st, 2001
Ok, i give up... i am now officially NOT supporting netscape browsers, way too quirky. the good news is that the latest version of Opera works very well and is free indefinitely, anyone looking for a really nice and fast browser that opens multiple pages at the same time (an MDI app) go and get Opera. also, coming soon: another calculator in the HVAC area which will tell you exactly what size flue liner to run, or what size chimney you need for that orphaned appliance, in fact it may just print out a foldable vent tag for you too! YAY! i also added a logo for a great site: AnalogX to the home page, at last check i have over 6 of his apps in use, thanx dude!

February 22nd, 2001-- Happy Birthday to the Craig!
Well, i've begun testing my scripts and such with some other browsers and ya know what? different browsers do things quite differently. *duh* you say? perhaps that was a bit understated, anyway, downloaded netscape and opera and am in the process of fixing things so all 3 browsers display my pages/scripts similarly. i must say i was a bit shocked to see the huge differences between the browsers, especially the way they handle scripts. so, the vbscript which was driving the calculations behind my online combustion air calculator has now been re-written in javascript and works on all 3 browsers, there are only minor differences now. good news is, that for the most part HTML displays the same everywhere, it's mostly the scripts that need work. found some useful links regarding javascript and i'll share them with you: a javascript guide, a reference and a very thorough html reference, all from Netscape, thanx guys. also, don't forget microsoft's excellent scripting reference material mentioned below.

February 16th, 2001
Just wanted to let you know that the WSSC Online Calculator is up, check it out here. My first foray into vbscript, kudos to microsoft for their excellent online resources.

February 10th, 2001
Did some sprucing up of a few things, like splashing this spiffy New!pic here and there as well as adding a couple new logos to the home page. One is for the fabulous Fish Tank Screensaver from Jim Sachs the best i have ever seen. Let's see...oh yeah, cleaned out the AngelFire site and placed a redirection script on the homepage there to send people over here to MSN, had to do it because the site's over the space limit now. Finally, removed updates page, just doesn't seem to have any real use anymore, everything fit-to-print is here in the news, yay!

February 4th, 2001
Just a couple of quick notes: Got a new recipe up of my latest creation: Tuna Melt Pizza, yummy! Stumbled onto this Review of my map converted for the Scientist Hunt Mod, all in all a decent review. Planet Half-Life has a couple of screenshots of my map up on their Scientist Hunt Page here, check 'em out.Also last of the January killboard shots are up.

January 14th, 2001
Greetings for the first time this year! Wow, lots of stuff to catch up on. First off, any new family pics are going to be posted on the Family Photo Album (editor's note: link is now dead), New Year's Eve and the ski trip and also Deb's 42nd Birthday at LaPaz are on there now with more to come, check it out! Secondly, me thinks there will be quite a few more pics up and in a more timely fashion thanx to deb's Christmas present this year: a Canon PowerShot S100 Digital Elph, check it out! By the way my current rig's mainboard/cpu/ram/video is Sharky's recommendation now for the 3rd month in a row, how 'bout that?!! Also, in other news, you may have noticed the "Links" page is gone, there are so many links both on the home page and here in the news area that a separate links page is kinda silly, so find 'em (umm, they are bold and blue) and use 'em liberally.