The Ivory Tower of Pure Thought

I’m still a relatively young man. However, during my time in this world I’ve lived a fairly rich life. I’ve seen a lot and done a lot both bad and good to be frank. From time to time people ask me questions. I will not give people advice because they don’t listen. However, I have had success by simply giving people my $0.02 on the matter in question and they usually find what I have to say to be quite useful. I’d like to add a a regular section to my blog where people can send me an email with their topic in question and I can give you my unbiased thoughts. Any thing is game just shoot me an email vtoms@vinnyt.org and I’ll let you know.

I think I will begin using my blog not only as a soap box for my ideas on the subject of computer science but I will begin to use it as a place to archive my dreams. I’m sure my dreams are like everyone else in the levels of realism of the experience, but honestly I have dreams that are so out there that frankly it scares me. So starting this week I might drop a few tidbits to see what I can see

I’ve been developing applications in C and C++ now for probably about 10 years. It has only been in the last 7 years that I started developing C++ applications for Microsoft Windows based computers. First and foremost I’m going to say that in no case would I ever make an effort to developer server grade applications on Microsoft Windows. Windows makes a decent platform for the client, but frankly their server platform leaves a lot to be desired. So as of late there has been a massive push from Microsoft to support their new .NET( dot Net ) framework. If you are reading this then you probably have a good understanding of what .NET is and your looking for a way to optimize your .NET development with out using IIS. I am a very big fan of the PHP/MySQL development model, and I’ve found that it scales greatly and using FreeBSD as your serving platform you can have security too. So I was given the task of porting an application from C++ to .NET. My C++ application talked to several PHP pages that I had created and the logic in those pages had been solidified years ago and had required no recoding up to this point. So now with .NET direct access to these same web data sources was possible, but with the addition of a little overhead I could open up the gateway to my application quickly and easily.

So the trick is how to effectively expose existing PHP code with out a significantly modify your code. As of late I’ve really began focusing on the object oriented aspect of PHP. The framework they’ve developped has become quite robust and is really alowing for very clean and efficient designs. So here’s where the trick begins by downloading this SoapDiscovery Class. You then create a file that sits infront of your existing class, this file will look similar to the follwing.

setClass( “ClassA” );
$servidorSoap->handle();

}
else {
require_once “SoapDiscovery.class.php”;

$disco = new SoapDiscovery(’ClassA’,’soapClassAManager’);
header(”Content-type: text/xml”);
if (isset($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING']) && strcasecmp($_SERVER['QUERY_STRING'],’wsdl’)==0) {
echo $disco->getWSDL();
}
else {
echo $disco->getDiscovery();
}
}

?>

This looks at the incoming request and will either actually handle the call to the method or produce a WSDL suitable for use with the .NET development environment.

So I recently came into possession of this Sun Enterprise 420. This picture is not quite right that’s a SunFire 280, but the form factor is the same so it’ works. I initially began by trying out Solaris. It recently became open source, and so I figured I give it a shot. I used Solaris all through college, and became very familiar with it, and felt that it would run pretty nicely on this hard ware. The Box I have is a dual 450Mhz, with 2 gigs of RAM, and 2 18Gb SCSI drives. Not the fastest thing in the world, but frankly it’s 64Bit, and should run pretty well considering what it is. I downloaded Solaris from Sun, and got through the install. I began toying with it a little bit, and really it was just not very friendly I think they’ve changed a few things, or perhaps I’ve become rusty it’s hard to say exactly. So I decided to toy with something I have a little more experience with. I decided to try FreeBSD 6.0 for SPARC64. I started out by downloaded the release candidate, and burn it to a CD, and did the install. I then built mysql, then apache, then PHP, and finally eaccelerator, and got it all together and it’s now serving up the blog you’re currently reading. So my goal is to put a pretty heavy load on this machine to see what kind of mileage I get from it.

I hate days like today. It began with miles of promise. I woke up feeling great and felt as though I was on top of the world. I worked out in my head solutions to several of the problems I’ve been struggling with over the last couple of weeks, and had plans of attack that would allow me to knock everything out in a matter of minutes. However, I’m a chronic procrastinator. I did solve one problem which had been bugging me for quite so time. This was in regards to a opensource piece of software I’d been using, and I needed to modify it to use the backend credit card processing system that I use. I was able to finish this with out much effort, but now I’m sitting here with a google maps project looming in the distance, a project involving file synchronization over multicast, and a java project all waiting for me. Not to mention I have to put together several pages of documentation around a development methodology that I am going to develop for use at my job. Last week was for the most part a bust. I drove out to California, and spent about 30 hours in a car and then ended up with a delayed flight home. It was just bad from start to finish, but that’s over I’m looking at a good start to the week tomorrow and then I should be in business. I’m now alone in my house just me and cricket, my dog, and I should be able to catch up, and get this rocking. I think I work on the google maps stuff first that is right now what is interesting me the most. I also have a this java project that works with GPS so that might be an interesting one to tackle too. However, it’s Sunday night I’m tired and so I think I might just end up crashing out, and listening to some music, and hit it hard tomorrow in the AM. Good evening all. I’m looking for suggestions for creating traffic to my blog if anyone can give me a suggestion or two I’d be forever in your debt.

So I’m going to have to back peddle just a little bit. Recently I’ve based ACID and flavored cigars like that with reckless abandon, and based on my recent experiences with the CAO flavors and as of late with this gem. I’d have to say I’ve found 2 that I like. I’m still firmly of the opinion that ACID is no good and that flavored cigars are meant as candy for yuppies who can’t handle a real smoke. I will stand by that opinion until I’m proved wrong, and that is going to be a very very long time. So several months ago when I first got into cigar smoking as a hobby, my good friend the doctor gave me a tin of these beauties. I remember smoking them no wait relishing them as they where to that point in my then immature smoking career one of the better cigars I had smoked. Since that time I’d like to believe that my cigar smoking palette has become slightly more sophisticated, and as a result I wasn’t sure that I would appreciate these cigars as much as I once had. So as usual I pointed my web browser ( Fire Fox ) towards www.jrcigars.com and clicked on cigars, navigated their list and found them. I was at first disappointed because I wanted to try the Jamaican Blue Mountain variety, but due to recent events in Jamaica, I was not able to buy these. So I bought the Kenya AA Serengeti, this was simply because it was the first one in the list on the site, and frankly because of my initial trepidation when buying these cigars I was exercising some level of caution I believe. So with several days of anticipation under my belt the package arrived. I quickly opened the box dumped out the packing materials and dug into the box of tins as quickly as possible. I quickly removed a single cigar removed it from it’s wrapper which released a very pleasant scent that what a treat to my nostrils. I cut the cigar and placed it in my mouth, I tasted a light hint of coffee flavoring. I then lit the cigar which was the key to unlocking the true beauty of this cigar. The smoke is smooth and creamy with a rich yet pleasant coffee flavor. This is where this cigar distinguishes itself from other flavored cigars. Some flavored cigars like ACID come in unnatural flavors that are just down right unpleasant the cigars smell like aged Dakar Noir or some other brand of wal-mart cologne, that is reminiscent of working with Portable toilets for a living. Then others come with flavors like cherry and honey which frankly if that is what you are looking for in a “cigar” I’d highly recommend you just go to the store and buy those items and eat them you’ll get more of what you are looking for and you won’t come off looking so foolish in the process. The Mayoga Coffee infused is a totally different experience, the flavor is one that I believe compliments the taste of the tobacco, and often times I’ll find myself drinking coffee while smoking a cigar because the two flavors compliment one another so well. Hence why I find having both flavors in a single package so appealing. This is why I highly recommend this cigar. Now granted it is a smaller cigar and flavored I would say even to the most sophisticated of palettes this cigar will be a pleasing smoke.

Well, I’ve been on a bit of a hieatous if you will. The cat that had been living with me for a while who got me into cigars in the first place really. He moved to California this week and so he and I spent 30 straight hours in a truck rolling across the lower half of the US. It was fun I have to say, and I’ve honestly only been this tired about 2 times in my life. So any way before he left we’re sitting around the house partaking in a few stogies and I came across one of these bad boys sitting in my humidor. Now I have to be honest here, the Mayoga High Octane is a good cigar and I had bought a box at the beginning of the summer and I have been slowly smoking them over the last couple of months. I slowed down on them because I had a bad experience with one right after I bought them, and so I’ve been taking my time. So far knock on wood I’ve had no problems. So any way, I first encountered the Mayorga last winter. The cigar was given to me with no pretense as to flavor or strength, because the giver had never smoked one either so it was fresh to both of us. I’ve only smoked the Maduro, so I can’t say for certain if the others are good bad or what, but I think I might try them to find out…. This cigar is quite strong, and quite frankly not as polished as what I’ve recently come to expect from smoking my Montecristos. So if that is what you are looking for in a cigar I would avoid the Mayorga cigars probably all together. However, this cigar is still a good cigar. The flavor of this cigar and the others that I have smoked hints at a coffee taste, but these are not infused with coffee, it is simply the nature of the tobacco blend that is used in these smokes. The cigar has a lost lasting finish which makes it very rewarding to smoke. This combined with the price makes this a very good cigar choice. The Mayorga high octane is a very strong cigar, and if this is not your cup of tea, then I’d suggest you try the regular Mayorga cigars they can be found at a great price on www.jrcigars.com. Just as a suggestion make sure you have plenty of time when smoking these bad boys, because they create an experience worth savoring.

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