The Weather Network - Tofino from Reason Partners on Vimeo.

The Weather Network - Calgary from Reason Partners on Vimeo.

The Weather Network - Saskatoon from Reason Partners on Vimeo.

The Weather Network - Winnipeg from Reason Partners on Vimeo.

Hammy's Pizza 'Pompous Snob Intro' from Brian Belefant on Vimeo.

Major network television production company is casting for a new series surrounding the lives based around the hottest Ad Agencies in America. Looking for MAD MEN type of agencies full of larger than life personalities and creativity. Think "The Office", not in the scripted sense, but in the sense that the home base is the office and surrounding the office are unique, individual characters. Understanding client confidentiality is a must, we believe with the right cast of characters and the right agency this can make for a groundbreaking show! If you are looking for the most authentic and innovative outlet to promote your biggest clients - take this television series as a commercial branding opportunity to promote like no other.

The effort, "Somos Muchos Latinos. Somos Muchos Toyota" ("Somos muchos" means "We are many ") focuses on a series of 100 or so limited-edition decals specific to dozens of Latin American cultures of origin. The Torrance, Calif., automaker says it created the decals as a way to tie owners' pride in their origins to pride in their car. The decals say things like "Somos Muchos Chilenos" and "Somos Muchos Hondurenos." The effort includes Spanish TV spots shot as short documentaries showing Toyota street teams handing out the decals in target cities in the U.S. In the ads, people put the decals on things like cars, bicycles, and food trucks, or whatever transit they have when they show up for the decals.

Writing was not a childhood dream of mine. I do not recall longing to write as a student. I wasn't sure how to start...One night I wrote "Chapter One" at the top of the first page of a legal pad; the novel, "A Time to Kill," was finished three years later. The book didn't sell, and I stuck with my day job, defending criminals, preparing wills and deeds and contracts. Still, something about writing made me spend large hours of my free time at my desk.

Unfortunately, much of the creative industry -- design and advertising in particular, but also photography, literature, the art world -- has become an industry of ego. And its currency is industry awards. Awards are awful. Awards breed ego, create false meritocracies and ultimately stymie innovation at every step of the award-granting process -- from entry to evaluation to owning the win.

Over the Rhine is playing in Omaha tonight. Over the years, they have slowly climbed the rank of my favorite bands and as of now, they sit at the very top.

In preparation for their concert, I’ve been working my way through their catalogue on my iPod. The other night, as I listened to “Live from Nowhere, Vol. 1,” the song “Spark” spoke to me:

Obsessions with self-preservation
Faded when I threw my fear away
It’s not a thing you can imagine

You either lose your fear
Or spend your life with one foot in the grave
Is God the last romantic?

I can’t get that question out of my head.

The song connects the shunning of self-preservation with romance. It’s safer to feel nothing than to risk the chance of being hurt by someone we love, but in essence, feeling nothing is living with one foot in the grave.

Contrast that with the way God loves. He woos us, and courts us and draws us to himself, knowing full well we’re going to shun him, reject him and deny him.

I’m traveling to the United Kingdom (York, England, to be specific) in September, joining Brent Ozar, Brad McGehee, Kevin Kline, Simon Sabin – and a host of other top-notch speakers. They will be covering deep technical topics ranging from server health checks to SANs and Virtualization. So what will I be talking about? SQL Server 101.

Every time I attend a conference like this, I’m amazed at the depth of technical information you can learn about. And for those of us who make a living at SQL Server, they are a great bargain – you get a “knowledge accelerator” that helps you do your job.

But there’s a segment of folks that don’t always get served at these events. There are lots of technical professionals that work as system administrators, developers, or all-around technical professionals that have been asked to manage a SQL Server system. And there’s also a segment of technical folks that want to learn to be a data professional, but don’t know exactly where to start.

I’m giving a one-day session on Thursday, September 30th at SQL Bits called “SQL Server for the Technical Professional”. It’s an intense, one-day immersion into the world of SQL Server, and will give you a hands-on, lab-style class that takes a technical professional from zero to sixty (kilometers per hour) on SQL Server. You’ll take this concrete information with you:

• SQL Server Architecture

• Server and Database Components

• Tools and utilities for working with SQL Server

• Designing a simple database project

• The Basics of Transact-SQL

• A security primer

• Maintenance and Monitoring basics

During the session, you’ll create a full database project that encompasses all of these concepts.

I’m sure that the folks that read this blog already have a lot of this information – but you probably know a technical professional who has to manage a SQL Server, or who wants to become a  data professional. If they know what a Windows Service is, then they’re ready to come. Just have them bring a laptop and tell them to be ready to learn:

I’m also speaking to the SQL Server professionals as well – on Friday the 1^st of September I’ll show you how to create a Business Continuity Plan, and on Saturday we’re planning on a panel discussion on the DBA career – something you don’t want to miss! It’s cheaper than the college course I teach, and for many other conferences and training events. For £450, you get this pre-conference session on Thursday plus full days of training on Friday and Saturday.

Sign up here: http://sqlbits.com/information/Event7/SQL_Server_for_the_Non_DBA/TrainingDetails.aspx

Full conference agenda is here: http://sqlbits.com/information/Agenda.aspx

I hope to see you there!

Because two solid stadium financing proposals were brought to those charged with leading Portland -- and two times, the city leaders wilted. A wonderful Rose Quarter baseball stadium plan got snuffed out when the mayor and the City Council withdrew its support after pressure from some sentimental architects and the Trail Blazers, who are so insecure they don't want a hint of competition. A second proposal, in Southeast Portland, got squashed by a lack of vision and an unwillingness for the council to work together. Beavers owner Merritt Paulson wrung his hands into a bloody pulp trying to get a stadium built, copying the successful blueprint that worked for other cities. He pleaded. He promised as much as $25 million of capital. He even guaranteed that he'd cover any construction-cost overages. In the end, he realized what the rest of us who have been paying attention already knew -- Portland needs stronger city leadership.

I was visiting New York and decided to drop off my résumé and portfolio at this shop. Later that day, they called and wanted me to come in and talk later in the week. I told them I had to fly back to Texas the next day, but the flight wasn't till the afternoon so I would be able meet them in the morning. Then he said, "Oh...you don't live here? Ok...well we just wanted to let you know that we got your stuff."

"If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in five years there'd be a shortage of sand." - Milton Friedman

• At left tackle, I'm leaning towards Jeremiah Sirles over Jermarcus Hardrick. Call it a gut call here, but I would have figured Hardrick would have claimed this spot by now otherwise.
• At wide receiver, I think that freshman Quincy Enunwa and senior Will Henry will be the receivers to watch off the bench. That being said, Niles Paul, Brandon Kinnie, and Mike McNeill ideally will take most of the snaps.
• At linebacker, I think Lavonte David earned a starting job a couple of weeks ago. My gut feel suggested that perhaps Eric Martin might have been close to edging out Will Compton on the field. Now that Compton is out for a while, that's probably a no-brainer at this point.
• I still don't know what to think at safety.  My best bet is P.J. Smith and Anthony West, but that's a wild guess.
• Oh, and that quarterback thing. I'd like to say Zac Lee, but the buzz around Taylor Martinez is just getting too strong. Only one thing is for sure to me, as I don't think we'll truly know who'll start until after kickoff. If you aren't going to name a starter at this point, there's no point in making a formal announcement at all.

• Does anybody really think Nebraska will lose to Western Kentucky, Idaho, or South Dakota State?  Didn't think so.
• As for Washington, I think they are better than I thought last spring...but not as good as others think. I think Nebraska stands a 70% chance of winning this one. For all the hype about Washington's offense, remember that the Huskies only averaged 1 more point a game (26.1) than the Huskers woeful offense (25.1) in 2009.
• Kansas State may have Daniel Thomas and a solid offensive line, but they've got a few questions to answer at receiver. Again, I think this is a game Nebraska should win, even though it's on the road. I give the Huskers a 75% chance of victory in this game.
• Texas? Well, the Huskers were :01 away from victory in Dallas last year. Nebraska loses Suh, yes...but Texas lost McCoy and Shipley. I still believe Nebraska's offense will be much better than last year, and this game is in Lincoln. My prediction: 55% chance of a Husker win.
• Oklahoma State has to break in a new quarterback and a new offensive coordinator, and replace too much on defense.  But this one is a trap game, on the road between the Texas and Missouri games. 60% chance of a Husker victory.
• It's a good thing that Missouri charters their transportation to the game, because the way things are going, very few Tigers will still have a driver's license by the time they need to get to Lincoln. Seriously, Missouri needs to find a playmaker on offense now that Danario Alexander is gone. Blaine Gabbert at times last season could just fling it towards #81 and Alexander would almost always make a big play. My prediction: 65% chance of a Husker victory.
• Iowa State? I love Paul Rhodes...but the Huskers want those eight turnovers back.  85% chance of a Husker victory.
• Kansas has too many holes to fill in 2010.  90% chance of a Husker victory.
• Texas A&M? Mike Sherman.  70% chance of a Husker victory.
• Colorado? Dan Hawkins.  95% chance of a Husker victory.

We have added a new sample solution to our samples package on CodePlex. This sample uses the StreamInsight extensibility framework to implement a pattern detection application. The solution can be found in Applications\PatternDetector contains - apart from the used adapters - the following projects:

• AugmentedFiniteAutomaton (refers to a project in UserExtensions), which implements a pattern matching user-defined operator.
• PatternDetector, which uses the user-defined operator to look for a V-pattern in a stock ticker stream

Our pattern matching user-defined operator is based on an augmented finite automaton (AFA) - which is basically a non-deterministic finite automaton (NFA) with additional information, called a register, that can be created and maintained as part of the automaton during runtime.

The PatternDetector example uses a sample input stream of stock prices as point events (read from a file with the SimpleTextFileReader input adapter), and defines an AFA that detects a sequence of downticks followed by an equal number of upticks. We detect the pattern over a tumbling window of one hour. The corresponding AFA is shown in the file AFAexample.pptx (included in the solution), and is implemented in AFA_EqualDownticksUpticks.cs. The output is simply dumped on the console.

For more information on pattern matching using AFA, see:

Badrish Chandramouli, Jonathan Goldstein, and David Maier. High-Performance Dynamic Pattern Matching over Disordered Streams. In VLDB 2010.

Regards,
Badrish

I've been reading a fascinating article about the Large Hadron Collider, or LHC facility. It's a scientific research facility that houses a particle collider, which generates an incredible amount of data. Their original plan was to stream the data to tape, then sending the data to "islands" closer to the users, offloading the network as quickly as possible. But they found that the network could handle the streaming better than they thought - so they now stream the data directly to the users, saturating the network. It's a new way of thinking about moving the data around.

Another interesting data concept is that they filter it before they store it. We're not talking trivial reductions here - they are filtering a petabyte (PB) of data a second to a gigabyte per second! That's incredible. In fact, an overwhelming majority of the CPU power there doesn't go to computing numbers and so on in the scientific exercises - it's used to filter the data.

Most of us concern ourselves with data storage. We fret over space, the cost of drives, and backing up. But the LHC staff deals with that as well - but they are more concerned with network and CPU. To be sure, their data profile is different than yours or mine - but there are still things we can learn from their efforts. You can read the whole article yourself here: http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2010/08/lhc-computing-grid-pushes-petabytes-of-data-beats-expectations.ars?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=rss

Summary: A detailed look at costing, and more undocumented optimizer fun.

The SQL Server query optimizer generates a number of physical plan alternatives from a logical requirement expressed in T-SQL.  If full cost-based optimization is required, a cost is assigned to each iterator in each alternative plan, and the plan with the lowest overall cost is ultimately selected for execution.

Costing Details

Graphical execution plans show the total estimated cost of an iterator, and the I/O and CPU cost components:

In the simplest cases (like that shown above) the total estimated cost of an iterator is a simple sum of the I/O and CPU components.  In other circumstances, the final cost may be modified by other considerations – perhaps as a result of a row goal.

The I/O and CPU costs are calculated based on cardinality estimates, data sizes, statistical information, and the type of iterator.  Iterators may also be costed differently depending on context.  For example, a Merge Join iterator has a zero estimated I/O cost when performing a one-to-many join.  When running in many-to-many mode, a worktable in tempdb is required, and an associated I/O cost appears:

The cost values represent expected execution times (in seconds) on a particular hardware configuration.  The interested reader can find an in-depth look at some of the ‘magic numbers’ used by the costing component in an excellent article by Joe Chang, who also blogs on this site.

It is important not to take the costing numbers literally.  They are obtained from a mathematical model used to compare candidate plans in a consistent fashion.  It is a practical certainty that your server has very different performance characteristics from those assumed by the model.  The great thing is that it does not typically matter, since it is relative plan cost that drives the final plan choice.

Although very detailed, the costing model does make a number of simplifying assumptions to prioritise speed and consistency over a more accurate reflection of reality.  One good example of this is that costing assumes that all query executions start with a cold cache.

Why Use a Cost-Based Model?

Consider the task of choosing between possible physical join implementations.  Most people are aware that Nested Loops is a good choice where both inputs are relatively small, Merge works well on suitably-ordered medium to large inputs, and Hash join is particularly suited  to very large joins, particularly in a parallel execution plan.

One optimization approach is to code a detailed set of rules based on that sort of reasoning.  This is known as rule-based optimization, and has featured in a number of database products over the years.  Experience has shown, however, that rule-based schemes lack flexibility and extensibility: introducing a new iterator or database feature, for example, might require a large number of new rules, and many specific changes to existing ones.

An alternative approach is cost-based optimization, based on a common, relatively abstract framework.  Adding a new iterator becomes as easy as implementing the required interfaces to the existing model, reusing features which provide base cost information (such as the cost to retrieve a page from disk) and contextual data (like cardinality estimation and average row size).

Using this more object-oriented approach, relatively simple costing rules can model complex behaviours.  For example, Nested Loops can be modelled with no start-up cost, and a relatively high cost per row.  Hash join can be given a significant start-up cost (to build its hash table) but a lower cost per row after that.  In each case, the exact cost may further depend on row size and distribution information – the key point is that the cost is context-sensitive and dynamic.

Costing Example

Let’s look at a query written to return the quantity of products in stock at the AdventureWorks warehouse, which have names starting with the first five letters of the alphabet:

SELECT  P.Name,
        total_qty = SUM(I.Quantity)
FROM    AdventureWorks.Production.Product P
JOIN    AdventureWorks.Production.ProductInventory I
        ON  I.ProductID = P.ProductID
WHERE   P.Name LIKE '[A-E]%'
GROUP   BY
        P.Name
OPTION  (RECOMPILE);

We get the following plan, where SQL Server has chosen to compute SUM(Quantity) for all products, and merge-join those results with the products that have names starting A-E:

I have deliberately chosen to feature a plan where each iterator’s total cost (‘Operator Cost’) is close to being a simple sum of the I/O and CPU cost components.  Just the Sort and Merge Join iterators add a small amount for overheads: the Sort adds 0.000038, and the Merge Join adds 0.0000031.  One final thing to notice is that each iterator knows the cumulative cost of all iterators below it (its subtree cost).

Let’s now force a Nested Loops plan with the same query, and compare the costs:

Looking at the highlighted top-level subtree cost, we can see that the Nested Loops plan is very slightly more expensive than the Merge equivalent overall, which explains the optimizer’s choice.

We can also see that the Stream Aggregate and Nonclustered Index Seek have Operator Costs equal to the sum of their I/O and CPU costs.  The Nested Loops iterator adds a small overhead of 0.000038 to its stated CPU cost.  The costing of the Clustered Index Seek is somewhat more complex:

Costing the Clustered Index Seek

CPU Cost

The CPU cost is calculated as 0.0001581 for the first row, and 0.000011 for subsequent rows.  In this case, SQL Server expects each execution of the Clustered Index Seek to produce 2.47454 rows, so the CPU cost is 0.0001581 (for the first row) plus 1.47454 * 0.000011 (for the remainder).  This calculation produces exactly the 0.0001597 CPU cost seen in the plan.

The final CPU cost contribution is obtained by multiplying this per-execution CPU cost by the expected number of executions.  In this case, SQL Server expects the Index Seek on the Product table to produce 43.2 rows, so the final CPU cost of the Clustered Index Seek is 43.2 * 0.0001597, which comes to 0.00689904.

I/O Cost

The I/O cost of 0.003125 is exactly 1/320 – reflecting the model’s assumption that the disk subsystem can perform 320 random I/O operations per second (each fetching a single 8KB page).  Again, this estimate needs to be modified to account for the expected 43.2 executions.

However, the costing component is smart enough to recognise that the total number of pages that need to be brought in from disk can never exceed the number of pages required to store the whole table.  The Product Inventory table uses only 7 pages, so the modelled total I/O cost is approximately 7 * 0.003125, which comes to 0.021875.

Total Operator Cost

Adding the CPU and I/O subtotals, we get a total operator cost of 0.02877404.  This is not quite the 0.00287423 cost shown in the plan, because I have simplified the calculation slightly to more clearly illustrate the process.

Undocumented Features

So far, we’ve seen how the I/O and CPU costs contribute to plan selection.  In this last section, I want to show you a couple of undocumented features which allow you to change the I/O and CPU cost calculations.  As usual, this is presented for entertainment and educational reasons only – never use these tools on anything other than a personal test system.

There are two undocumented DBCC commands, SETCPUWEIGHT and SETIOWEIGHT, which apply a multiplier to the cost values normally produced by the costing component.  By default, both are set to 1, which produces the unmodified I/O and CPU costs you normally see.  Each command takes a single parameter of the real floating-point type.  The easiest way to enter a literal floating-point value is to express it in scientific notation.

A third undocumented DBCC command, SHOWWEIGHTS, can be used to display the effective settings for the current session.  As usual, we also need to enable trace flag 3604 to see the output from these DBCC commands.

Let’s say we want to see the effect of making I/Os cheaper.  We can adjust the base I/O costing to 60% of its default value by executing this command:

DBCC    TRACEON (3604);     -- Show DBCC output
DBCC    SETCPUWEIGHT(1E0);  -- Default CPU weight
DBCC    SETIOWEIGHT(0.6E0); -- I/O multiplier = 0.6
DBCC    SHOWWEIGHTS;        -- Show the settings

If we now run the query used in the costing example, we find that the optimizer now chooses the Nested Loops plan, because it now has a lower overall cost than the Merge join plan.  We can achieve the same affect by raising the CPU weight to 1.7, while resetting the I/O cost multiplier to 1.

Conversely, we can produce a plan based on a Hash join by lowering the CPU cost multiplier below 0.8, or raising the I/O cost multiplier to 1.3:

There is a great deal to be learned about the workings of the costing component and the optimizer as a whole, by playing around with these settings.

One particularly interesting combination is to set both cost multipliers to zero.  This can cause the optimizer to reveal some of its internal workings, as in the following example:

SELECT  S.Name,
        COUNT_BIG(*)
FROM    AdventureWorks.Production.ProductSubcategory S
JOIN    AdventureWorks.Production.Product P
        ON  P.ProductSubcategoryID = S.ProductSubcategoryID
WHERE   EXISTS
        (
        SELECT  *
        FROM    AdventureWorks.Production.ProductInventory I
        WHERE   I.ProductID = P.ProductID
        AND     I.Shelf = 'A'
        )
GROUP   BY S.Name
OPTION  (RECOMPILE, MAXDOP 1);

With both multipliers set to zero, the optimizer produces a plan containing three consecutive sorts:

Notice that all three sort in the same way, and all operator costs are zero.  The extra sorts are the result of the application of enforcer rules, and are normally removed from the final plan by other rules.  Setting the costing multipliers to zero removes the advantage in doing this.

Have fun with this, and don’t forget to reset everything to the default when you have finished experimenting.  Finally, my apologies to anyone expecting a post about memory grants today – I’ll get to that shortly.

Paul White
email: SQLkiwi@gmail.com
twitter: @PaulWhiteNZ

Five years ago today, Little Nuances was born. It seems much longer than that.

Maybe it’s because I’ve written 997 posts since the day I started this blog. Maybe it’s because so much has happened in my life over the past five years. Or maybe it’s because my tastes, preferences, and thought processes have changed over the years. My guess is, it’s all of the above reasons, and more.

Thanks for putting up with me as I write about the moments in life that move me. And thanks for taking the time to leave comments to tell me about the moments in life that move you.

I saw a thread on the SSIS forum today that went something like this:

I have the following dataset:

AccountNo	Date	DailyMovement
00000001	28/08/2010	10
00000001	29/08/2010	5
00000001	30/08/2010	7
00000002	28/08/2010	8
00000002	29/08/2010	6

for which I want to compute a running total per [AccountNo] & [Date] like so:

AccountNo	Date	DailyMovement	RunningTotal
00000001	28/08/2010	10	10
00000001	29/08/2010	5	15
00000001	30/08/2010	7	22
00000002	28/08/2010	8	8
00000002	29/08/2010	6	14

How do I do that using a script component?

That last comment:

How do I do that using a script component?

is a fairly common question. People assume that if a calculated value is dependant on prior rows then a script component needs to be involved because that running total needs to be tracked somewhere, but that isn’t necessarily the case. Ask yourself, how would you do this if the data were residing in a database table, would you do this?:

OK that works, and here’s a screenshot to prove it:

But really, would any of you actually do this? Hopefully not, the use of the correlated subquery has simply turned what should be a nice set operation into a cursor-in-disguise (something I have talked about before) because that subquery will be getting executed for every row in the table. Instead you could run the following on that same dataset:

SELECT b1.[AccountNo]
,      b1.[Date]
,      b1.[DailyMovement]
,      SUM(b2.[DailyMovement]) AS [RunningTotal]
FROM   #balances b1
INNER  JOIN #balances b2 ON  b1.[AccountNo] = b2.[AccountNo]
                           AND b1.[Date] >= b2.[Date]
GROUP  BY b1.[AccountNo],b1.[Date],b1.[DailyMovement];

and you get the same result but with a much more amenable execution plan (execute with SET STATISTICS IO ON if you don’t believe me)!

The same principle applies in a SSIS dataflow. Often there is no need to resort to a script component, the same result can be achieved using some smart dataflow design. You can use, for example, the same approach as in the second SQL query (above) using a combination of SSIS’ Sort, Aggregate, Merge Join and Conditional Split components. That is not to say that one will be quicker than the other but at least you’ll have something that is more intuitive and arguably more maintainable. Of course if performance gain is your primary goal then the correct advice is, as always, “test and measure, test and measure, test and measure”!!!

Ask yourself “If I could, how would I solve this using T-SQL?” and see if that influences your dataflow design at all. Invariably script components should be the last choice, not the first!

@jamiet

The opening night ceremonies for the US Open tennis tournament tonight included stories about tennis players who have overcome obstacles and adversity. One of those athletes is somebody I’ve been reading about lately. Her name is Esther Vergeer.

She’s been wheelchair bound since she was 8. She’s 29 now. She picked up a tennis racket at the age of 12 and took to the sport. She competes against other wheelchair players all around the world and is on an incredible 391 match winning streak. She hasn’t lost since 2003. Her career record is 599-25.

Beyond her incredible won-loss record and her stunning winning streak, I think I’m most impressed by her desire to see other wheelchair players do well. In an interview with the BBC a couple of years ago, she said this:

“I have several sponsors and that’s how I earn my money. The prize money on the ITF Tour is not that big. The winner’s cheque for a Grand Slam is usually between $1500 and $2000.

“Sometimes I feel guilty because I feel like I steal the sponsors away from the other wheelchair tennis players in Holland.”

Here’s to hoping that the attention she is getting for her winning streak will lead to more sponsorship money for her and wheelchair tennis in general.

I was recently brought in at the 11th hour to an issue where a web service worked fine on an older 32 bit install of ColdFusion, but was not working on the new 64bit install. All the keystore certs were up to date and the client was scratching their collective heads. The web service in question used SSL and presented a client certificate. Now in order to do this in CF you have to manually construct your SOAP request and pass it as XML using CFHTTP. This is because only CFHTTP has an attribute for clientcert and clientcertpassword (as of CF 8 I believe).

In any case, the code our customer was using was straightforward. It assembled a soap request and then issued a call to CFHTTP like so: On the "old" Coldfusion 8 "standard" server this worked fine. But on the brand spanking new, freshly patched and upgraded ColdFusion 8 enterprise server it was failing.

The Issue

The problem here is that a vulnerability in TSL (that's "SSL version 3.1" - see my previous post to learn more about the various SSL versions) was discovered in fall of 2009. This vulnerability allowed a "man in the middle" attacker to force a "renegotiation" of the handshake - thus allowing the insertion of arbitrary code into the request. Obviously this is a serious flaw. The fix was for vendors to simply disable the renegotiation feature in their products. So, for example, IIS 7 does not allow renegotiation by default.

So why is this issue not out there in the CF blogging world yet? First, I think that the use of client certs is a fairly small universe of ColdFusion applications. Second, Sun followed suit and fixed this issue with version 1.6.0_19 by disabling renegotiation. I think that many CF Servers are still using 1.6.0_18b or below - so this issue has yet to really rear its ugly head.

In any case, regular SSL requests continue to work as always with renegotiations disabled. A client certificate driven request is different however. It often requires renegotiation because of the complexity of the handshake (with 2 certificate pairs involved. That means client certificate driven CFHTTP SSL requests using the 1.6.0_19+ JVM will often fail to successfully negotiate a secure session. I want to say they will probably or certainly fail, but I'm not positive on that score.

The Fix - Such as it is

You have two ways of fixing this. You can roll back to 1.6.0_18. Seeing as how the current build is _20 you may not want to do this. Or, if you want to stay on 1.6.0_19+ you can add the following argument to your JVM.config file or files. -Dsun.security.ssl.allowUnsafeRenegotiation=true Obviously this allows for the server to renegotiate successfully. Your JVM will be vulnerable to the TLS exploit, but depending on your situation it may be a fairly low risk proposition. Still, you should take it into account. Consider running a separate JVM instance just for your web service. Some edge security devices can sniff out this issue as well.

Many thanks to my good friend and troubleshooting colleague Vlad Friedman from the Edge Web for figuring this out. I would also recommend that your read Chris Mahns blog entry on TLS Remediation.

“Hi Ho! Kermit the Frog, here!”

Can’t tell you how many times I sat down in my grandparent’s kitchen to watch “The Muppet Show” with my grandpa over the years and heard that phrase.

Grandpa was partial to the two elderly muppets, Statler & Waldorf, who sat in the balcony and provided commentary throughout the show. Grandpa would smile and laugh at their comments. That made me smile and laugh.

I was always partial to Kermit. I understood his humor better. I also liked Fozzie Bear, Beaker and Animal. I wasn’t really a Miss Piggy fan, but I loved the “Pigs in Space” skit.

All of this is why the “Original Kermit the Frog donated to the Smithsonian” story in the USA Today caught my eye. Jim Henson’s widow, Jane, recently donated 10 of her husband’s original characters.

The original Kermit was made from an old dull-green coat that Henson’s mother threw away initially (see the above pictures). His eyes were made of ping pong balls.

You have to love creative types.

This trip down memory lane today, led me to YouTube where I found this adorable clip of Kermit interviewing Animal:

Continuing with the 100 life-enriching little nuances series . . .

Ten years ago, I decided to shop online for all my Christmas gifts. I logged into my AOL account and as I browsed various websites, I knew I was close to the cutoff deadline, but as long as I ordered in the next couple of days, my packages would arrive before Christmas.

I placed my order from one website and waited. Two days before Christmas only a few packages had a arrived and I started to panic. I called the company and a representative told me they had been overwhelmed and were behind, but my gifts should arrive at their various destinations the day after Christmas.

That wasn’t the answer I wanted to hear. I think the company sent me a voucher for future purchases, but that didn’t do me much good at the time. In the big scheme of things, it wasn’t that big of a deal. Nobody freaked out because their gift showed up a day late. But the experience made me gun-shy about online shopping for a while.

I tend to jump into trends early if I think it will make things simpler. Of course, the problem with jumping into trends early is that they often contain kinks that haven’t been worked out and thus, it doesn’t make things simpler at all.

Ten years later, online shopping is much more dependable and I find myself gravitating toward it more and more. But there’s a new twist  –the ebook. I love downloading a book from anywhere and then having the ability to read it a minute later on my Kindle if I want to.

But I find myself in a quandary. On one hand, I have no desire whatsoever to go to the mall to buy a gift if I can buy it online. On the other hand, I never want the ability to download ebooks from the comfort of my living room to replace the bookstore experience.

According to an article I read recently, “Amazon reported sales of digital books were much stronger this quarter than old-fashioned books, with 143 ebooks selling for every 100 hardcovers.”

From what I’ve read, Barnes & Noble gives NOOK owners incentive to visit their brick and mortar store by offering them in-store discounts, e-coupons, etc. This is a great idea – one I’d love to see catch on at other bookstores.

But it can be sort of complicated – maybe too complicated.

The Kindle has a proprietary aspect so it is exclusive to Amazon.com and best I can tell, they don’t have any established relationship with brick and mortar stores. Barnes & Noble has its aforementioned Nook. Borders has the Kobo.

So what happens when a Kobo owner meets a Nook owner for coffee on a Saturday evening at Barnes & Noble and wants to give Barnes & Noble some money to download the in-store ebook special but he can’t do it because he doesn’t have the correct e-reader?

I understand the proprietary aspect and I love the fact that Amazon.com warehouses all of my downloads so that if my Kindle is lost or stolen then every ebook I’ve ever purchased from them will be easily replaced, but at the same time, I want the freedom to purchase ebooks from anywhere.

But I guess that’s like asking Microsoft and Apple to play nice. Come to think of it, I don’t own any Mac computers, but I do have an iPod and Mac, rather smartly, has figured out a way to make iTunes available to PC users.

For the good of the book publishing industry, I hope the powers that be can sort out all of the compatibility issues.

The funny thing is, here I am ten years down the road from my first experience with online shopping and the process is still going through a transition. I still love the convenience enough to deal with the transition. And besides, there is very little in life that isn’t experiencing transition.

I love this idea:

Sharing a long meal with friends, without ever looking at the clock, is one of the most satisfying things I know. Had the pleasure of doing just that over the weekend.

Speaking of eating, I went to see Eat Pray Love over the weekend. I expected more. I just didn’t like the protagonist much. I didn’t sense any real internal struggle and her motives didn’t seem believable – two deal killers for me.

So the veterinarian I use gave me a package of “snacks” for my 11-month-old cat, Latte, who can be a bit spastic at times. The snack is supposed to calm her nerves. After giving it to her for a couple of days, I returned home one night to find that she had attacked the package. Talk about irony.

Fall is coming. I can feel it. I’m so ready. Milder temperatures, football, the US Open tennis tournament – it’s my favorite season.

Video games have a Hall of Fame now? Who knew? I guess it’s fitting that Pac-Man was the first game to enter the hall. If you are over 40 like me, this video will probably bring back memories and crack you up at the same time:

This is a follow up to my post titled 64bit on Windows 2k3 Web Edition. In that post I did a play by play of an issue trying to install 64 bit ColdFusion 8 Enterprise on a Windows 2003 "Web Edition" platform. I have just finished a troubleshooting session with a nearly similar issue on Windows 2003 "Data Center" edition. If you have this problem you will know it because the install will silently fail after the files are extracted. Check in your temp directory and you will see a cryptic folder beginning with "I" containing two folders "windows" and "installdata". These 2 folders contain the extracted install files. Inside the "windows" folder you will also see an hotspot error log. It looks like "hs_err_pidXXX.log". You may have seen such files in your ColdFusion8/runtime/bin directory. They occur when the hot spot compiler has an unhandled exception.

Under the hood the ColdFusion install is firing off the "adobe_cf.exe" from that same windows folder. This exe file uses the adobe_cf.lax file as a launch settings file. Taking a closer look at the lax file and you will see some Java settings including two important settings. One is lax.nl.current.vm and the is lax.installer.win32.internal.property.0. Both of these settings point to a Java.exe file. By default the Java.exe file it points to is contained in that other temp folder called 'installerdata'. My guess is that the reason that the ColdFusion fails because the 64 bit JVM in the /installerdata folder is not compatible with something in the windows installation. In particular I think that there is a missing 64bit class or object.

The Fix

The fix is as follows.

• Download and install the 32 bit 1.6 JDK.
• Edit the adobe_cf.lax file to point to the java.exe file inside the jre folder of the newly installed 32 bit JDK.
• Run the Adobe_cf.exe file.

As someone who attends a ton of baseball games, more so as a writer than a fan, foul balls come my way on occasion. Just last week, a ball came straight back into the press box while I was sitting in there with my laptop open. The ball struck the wall of the section just below me. No harm, no foul.

I have no desire to try to catch a ball in the press box. It’s just not in my mindset. I’m always thinking, protect the computer, don’t lose a finger trying to catch a line drive. The ball is going to hit a wall any way, so I can just pick it up after it is done rattling around.

When I sit in the stands, I have a different mindset. Barring a blistering line drive, I try to catch it. A few years ago, I had a foul ball come my way while I was in the stands with a friend. I’m a terrible judge of where the ball is going – that’s why I always played the infield when I was younger – but I could see that this ball was headed right for us.

Ironically, the game was being televised and the person I was talking to on the phone saw us coming into the shot on his TV. With my phone in one hand, I leaped and stretched out my free hand. The ball landed in the row behind us and the friend I was attending the game with reached back and grabbed it. At least I gave it a shot.

Have you seen the video on YouTube yet of the couple who had a foul ball come their way in Houston on Monday? If not, you have to see it. I don’t know how this guy is ever going to live this down.

On a recommendation, I recently downloaded The Accidental Tourist by Anne Tyler to my Kindle. I’m only three chapters into the book, so I don’t have much to say about it yet, but I did come across this passage that totally brought back some long buried memories:

Macon often recalled that director. Jim, his name was, Jim Robinson or maybe Robertson – a burly, white-whiskered man with a crew cut, wearing a suit coat, as if in respect, over a Redskins T-shirt. He’d seemed uncomfortable with silence and did his best to fill it with abrupt little fragments of chitchat. Macon hadn’t listened, or he’d thought he hadn’t; but now all the fragments came back to him. How Jim’s mother had been a Baltimorean herself, born the year Babe Ruth was playing for the Orioles. How Jim’s tomato plants had been acting queerly, producing only tiny green marbles that fell off the vines before they ripened. How Jim’s wife was terrified of driving in reverse and avoided any situation that required it. Macon gave a lot of thought to that now, lying in his bed at night. Could you really drive a car without reversing? What about at intersections, where a bus driver pokes his head out his window and asks you to roll on back a few yards so he can turn? Would she refuse? Macon imagined her, staunch and defiant, glaring straight in front of her and pretending not to notice.

In the late 1980s, my dad let me use a car he owned after my car died. It was an orange, boxy looking Fiat (it looked a lot like the one in the photo below, except I think it was a 4-four door – photo used under Creative Commons license. Credit: Stuart Caie).

It had a stick shift and that was okay. I had already owned a car with a stick, so I didn’t have any problems driving another. Except, this car didn’t have reverse. The gear was broken and I didn’t have the money to get it fixed.

So I improvised. I did everything Macon imagined and more. I pulled into parking lots, always looking for either (1) a slight incline I could park on so the car would roll backwards automatically when I put it in neutral or (2) a parking spot that wasn’t boxed in by another spot in front of me.

If I visited a friend, I couldn’t pull into his or her driveway unless the driveway was inclined toward the street. If I parked on the street with a hill, I had to make sure I parked facing down hill. And I had to make sure I parked somewhere that another car couldn’t box me in.

It led to some rather comical parking situations. A couple of times I didn’t think all of my options through, so I had to put the car in neutral and push it backward just so I could get out.

So, to answer Macon’s questions – yes, you really can drive a car without reversing. I did it for more than a year. And I never encountered a bus driver who needed me to back up at an intersection, but I could have pulled it off if necessary by simply putting the car in neutral, opening the door, and pushing it back a few feet – unless of course I was at an intersection that was facing uphill. I guess the bus driver would have been out of luck in that situation.

Last Thursday, I interviewed Contemporary Christian Music artist Rebecca St. James on the phone for a newspaper feature I’m writing about her. She was coming to Omaha for a concert for faith and family night at Rosenblatt Stadium.

Since I also cover the Omaha Royals for Examiner.com, the Omaha Royals staff was nice enough to include me in the meet-and-greet before the concert. The team photographer snapped this photo of Rebecca St. James and me (if they ever re-release Beauty and the Beast on DVD, this will be the perfect cover):

Interviewing and meeting Rebecca made me think a lot about my early days as a Christian.

A few years after becoming a follower of Christ, I happened across her album, called God, and it quickly became one of my favorites. It still is. Then I picked up a devotional book she wrote called 40 Days with God. One of the questions she posed in the book had a profound impact on me: “What parts of my life do I have to admit I do for ‘my name,’ ‘my glory’ and ‘for me?’” She based her question on 1 Corinthians 10:31, “So, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God.”

Her question dogged me for quite some time. It caused me to sit down, make a list, and then re-prioritize my life. I discontinued the things I believed I was doing for my own glory and, as I did, I began to sense I was supposed to be writing. I had no publishing credits at the time and I really couldn’t explain the sense of urgency I felt, but I knew God was in it somehow. 

I attended my first writer’s conference shortly thereafter and the calling was confirmed. I met an editor there from Decision magazine (Billy Graham’s publication). Soon thereafter I submitted an article to him about the process God brought me through after wrestling through the Bible verse and question Rebecca shared in her devotional.

To my amazement, Decision decided to publish the article and it appeared in their February 2000 issue. It was called “For My His Glory” and it included the Bible verse and question Rebecca shared in her devotional.

After receiving my copies of the magazine, I was both surprised and not surprised to see that Rebecca St. James also wrote an article in the same issue. It was called “Adjusting Our Vision.” It was about keeping our eyes on Christ. I’m not one who often feels certain when it comes to hearing from God, but this sure felt like one of those times. So, I kept writing. And I haven’t stopped.

And yes, I have often wondered if Rebecca happened to flip through her copies of Decision and saw my article—the one inspired by her. I didn’t think to ask her that question on Thursday or Saturday. But if I ever get another chance to talk to her, I’ll ask her if she remembers.

The story doesn’t end there though.

My dad was a writer in his younger days. He wrote some short stories and a few articles. He never pursued writing as a profession as far as I know, but he had the writing bug and, as is usually the case for writers, he loved to read. He seemed quite happy when I told him I was pursuing publication.

Sadly, he died in April of 2000, but not before I handed him the February 2000 issue of Decision magazine with my first published article in it.

After he died, my siblings and I began the emotion task of sorting through his stuff. My eyes were drawn to his bookshelf. I pulled a few books down from the shelves and flipped through them looking for any sort of notes he may have written in them or underlined passages. Not long after I began the process, I came across his copy of Decision I’d given to him.

Yes, I cried.

All of these events can be traced back to the day I read Rebecca St. James’ devotional book. So, to have a chance to meet her some 14 years later was quite an experience. And quite a trip down memory lane for me.

Since posting this idea last week as part of the Web ME.0 concept, I have been asked a few times about the term Social Equity. It seemed to be coming up often enough that I wanted to start working through a full description. Now, this idea in a state of evolution, so I cannot give you a concrete definition. I will provide a sense of the term.

I love looking at the key words people google to end up here. Here are a few of the recent searches:

“willie’s shins glow in the dark” – I had no recollection of writing such a phrase, so I googled it and found that indeed I did blog about it back in 2007 as part of my “Alf quotes” series. Anybody who googles Alf quotes in a friend of mine.

“identifying loneliness in a novel” – I write about loneliness and novels quite a bit here, so I’m pleased to see a kindred stopping by.

“tips for writing a message in a bottle” – I’m intrigued. Would love to know who is planning to write such a message and I’m even more interested in knowing what he or she has to say in such a message.

“twitter for writers” – I did write a post about that here a while back and I recently updated it for the A Write Start Communications website. Twitter is a powerful tool for writers.

“moleskine sermon” – A moleskine notebook is the perfect place to jot down sermon notes.

“how many days till fall” – I feel your pain. In the past week my grill has been taken over by hornets and my face has been bitten twice by mosquitoes while I was sitting in my living room. Death to all bugs.

“Big 80's combs in back pocket” – Oh yeah. I wrote about big combs a while back. And what exactly was wrong with carrying a huge chunk of plastic in your back pocket? We had to use something to rake our long, feathered hair back, didn’t we?

“the incredible new shmoo cartoon picture” – There have been four such searchers recently who have found Little Nuances looking for more info about Shmoo. And why not. Shmoo was the the bomb.

“lee warren, God” – Surely the person who googled this phrase was looking for articles I’ve written about God. That’s both humbling and cool to see.

So, I’m minding my own business, driving down one of the major streets of my home town. I pull up to a stop light, glance over at the Walgreens sign and I see something that makes my heart flutter. Okay, not flutter, but I’m interested in what it has to say:

“Pilot G2 Pens 19 cents”

No way.

I look up again, and the sign has moved on to advertise notebooks or some other back to school special.

The light turns green and I punch the gas.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see it again: “Pilot G2 Pens 19 cents.”

No way. Those things normally cost $5.99 for a pack of four at Walgreens.

I arrive at my destination and forget all about the best pen sale ever.

Okay, probably not.

A couple of days later, I’m in that area of town. I drive by again and there it is. Same sign. So, I go in, prepared to buy 20 or so, fine point, blue ink, Pilot G2 pens. I go to the back-to-school aisle, 5A, and begin to skim.

Glue, nope.

Scissors, no.

Tape, rulers, pencils, highlighters, book covers.

No, no, no, no, no.

Wait a minute, where are the G2s?

Maybe they are in the “regular” office supply aisle.

I get there and see the aforementioned pack of four G2s for $5.99, but no 19 cent G2s. So I go up to the counter, the clerk points me back to aisle 5A, saying the G2s are back there.

I check it out again – and no, they aren’t there.

I find another clerk and ask her about the 19 cent G2s. Maybe I wasn’t specific enough with the first clerk.

“We’re out of those.”

“But your sign says . . .” I point rather weakly.

“Nope, we’re out of ‘em.” She walks away.

Disillusioned, I stumble to my car, pull out my Blackberry and snap a photo of the sign advertising G2s for 19 cents just to remind myself about the sale I missed out on .

But wait. There’s hope in the form of another Walgreens about a mile away.

Off I go.

I pull in, glance at the sign, hope begins to diminish. They have lots of items on sale, but no G2s that I can see.

I walk in, ask the clerk about the 19 cent G2s.

“Had them last week for 19 cents,” he says, “but we ran out.”

“Ohhhhhhhh.”

I couldn’t help but wonder if he pulled out his iPhone and tweeted about the delusional, older dude who came into the store solely to stock up on G2s.

Trends intrigue me. The way we track them intrigues me too.

The USA Today has an article on their website reporting research that indicates “people are the happiest during Sunday mornings and saddest during Thursday evenings” based on some 300 million tweets over a three year period.

Researchers used “happy” and “sad” words to gauge moods, using a process called “Affective Norms for English Words.”

Here are the top words on their lists:

Happy words
1. paradise
2. laughter
3. friendly
4. sweetheart
5. affection
6. excellence
7. romantic
8. pleasure
9. treasure
10. rollercoaster

Sad words
1. betray
2. grief
3. headache
4. failure
5. sick
6. debt
7. fearful
8. upset
9. bomb
10. seasick

Looking over this list, I’m not convinced I buy their conclusions.

Someone might have tweeted, “It’s just another day in paradise” while meaning he is stuck inside his cubicle walls again. Another person might have tweeted, “Just a little friendly advice, you better get out of my way.” In both cases, “happy words” would be anything but happy.

Someone might have tweeted, “Avatar was da bomb” or “I might have experienced failure recently, but it was all just part of my journey toward success.” In both cases, “sad words” aren’t at all sad.

Context matters.

What if everything we thought about how the web worked was wrong? Suppose we had been duped into believing things are intended to work one way, when it really should have been another? That might very well be the situation. This space is still so new, how could the rules be clearly defined? Particularly when change happen so frequently and new terms come around daily to keep us spinning and confused. I think the time has come to reassess what we've experienced to date. I think the time has come to take the internet in directions it needs to go.

Most movies I watch, have little impact. I watch them, laugh a little, and then move on. That’s okay with me. But Management was not one of those movies. I’m still processing it even though I watched it 24 hours ago. I may watch it again this weekend to pick up things I missed. But there’s one scene I want to talk about now. I just can’t get it out of my head.

First, the plot of the movie: it’s about a woman named Sue (played by Jennifer Aniston) – a traveling art saleswoman who is trying to cut ties with a motel manager named Mike (played by Steve Zahn). Sue is aloof, unsure of what she wants, and going through the motions in life. She needs Mike, but she just doesn’t know it. Mike is immature, unsettled, and a bit of a wreck. But he’s in love with Sue and it makes him want to be a better man. Mike needs Sue every much as Sue needs Mike.

About a third of the way into the movie, Mike takes Sue to visit his mother, who is lying on her death bed. After all three share a visit, Mike’s mother asks to speak with Mike alone. Here is their conversation:

“I like her,” Mike’s mom says.

“Really?”

“She’s a bit of a long shot. But she’s logical in an emotionally annihilated kind of way. But that’s okay. Underneath there’s a heart of –”

“Gold?” Mike says.

“No I wouldn’t say gold. Maybe made of leather. But, if it works out, she’ll be good for you when I’m gone. Needless to say, what would make me happy is for you to find something for yourself before my checkout time. Just so I know it’s not you and your father alone here walking around like robots.”

“Ma, Dad’s not a robot.”

“He is, but I was mostly talking about you … unless you find a way out.”

“Of what?” Mike says.

“Of whatever it is you’re stuck in. You get it from your father. He came back from the war stuck. Been talking about joining a gym every since. Never has. But that doesn’t have to be you.”

His mother gave him permission to chase his own dreams – to not feel like he must continue on with the family business if he doesn’t want to. And while he didn’t need her permission, having it freed him from feeling the weight of expectations – real or imagined. And he took advantage of it.

Freeing somebody of expectations is one of the most empowering things we can do for one another. By doing so, we are saying, “Be free. Pursue your passion. Live. Breathe. Cry. Laugh. Dance. Contemplate. Go with God.”

Continuing with the 100 life-enriching little nuances series…

Windstorms are becoming more frequent in Omaha in the past couple of years. We had one in 2008 that nearly crippled the city – knocking down trees, pulling down power lines and knocking out power for days. We had another one a couple of months ago that wasn’t as severe and then another one last night that was accompanied by sheets of rain.

My sister and I were in the car together, heading to the hospital to visit a relative, when, all of a sudden, the sky turned black, debris fluttered through the air and traffic signs swayed violently. The radio report we tuned into said the temperature was too hot for hail (a major plus, given that I’m leasing a new car), but we could expect winds up to 70 mph. They were correct. Winds reached 70 mph and 40,000 people lost power.

We made it to the hospital parking lot, then dashed inside. We were soaked, but happy to be inside somewhere. After our visit, we exited the lobby doors and were blown away by what we saw – two full rainbows. A peaceful, orange calmness replaced the violence we witnessed just an hour earlier.

People pulled out their cell phones and snapped photos. I took quite a few myself. This one was probably the best of the bunch:

Most of us who were shooting pictures tried in vain to capture the two rainbows. We kept backing up, but they just wouldn’t be contained in our feeble technology. I shot a video, but even that didn’t do them justice.

As my sister and I left the parking lot, we talked about Genesis 9:8-16, that says:

Then God said to Noah and to his sons with him, “Behold, I establish my covenant with you and your offspring after you, and with every living creature that is with you, the birds, the livestock, and every beast of the earth with you, as many as came out of the ark; it is for every beast of the earth. I establish my covenant with you, that never again shall all flesh be cut off by the waters of the flood, and never again shall there be a flood to destroy the earth.”

And God said, “This is the sign of the covenant that I make between me and you and every living creature that is with you, for all future generations: I have set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and the earth. When I bring clouds over the earth and the bow is seen in the clouds, I will remember my covenant that is between me and you and every living creature of all flesh. And the waters shall never again become a flood to destroy all flesh. When the bow is in the clouds, I will see it and remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.”

After I got home, I looked up the passage and thought about it for a few minutes, happy to bask in God’s mercy. Then I looked up what Matthew Henry had to say about it and he put words to my emotions. This comes from his concise commentary:

The rainbow appears when we have most reason to fear the rain prevailing; God then shows this seal of the promise, that it shall not prevail. The thicker the cloud, the brighter the bow in the cloud. Thus, as threatening afflictions abound, encouraging consolations much more abound. The rainbow is the reflection of the beams of the sun shining upon or through the drops of rain: all the glory of the seals of the covenant are derived from Christ, the Sun of righteousness. And he will shed a glory on the tears of his saints. A bow speaks terror, but this has neither string nor arrow; and a bow alone will do little hurt. It is a bow, but it is directed upward, not toward the earth; for the seals of the covenant were intended to comfort, not to terrify. As God looks upon the bow, that he may remember the covenant, so should we, that we may be mindful of the covenant with faith and thankfulness. Without revelation this gracious assurance could not be known; and without faith it can be of no use to us; and thus it is as to the still greater dangers to which all are exposed, and as to the new covenant with its blessings.

Print and broadcast journalists are using the word “integrity” a lot these days when reporting about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico – not so much as it relates to BP, but more so as it relates to the well itself.

BP plans to do an “integrity test” on the new cap, which according to this article, includes closing valves on the new cap and then checking them to make sure the cap can handle high pressure.

If the pressure readings are too low, it’s an indication that oil is leaking into the surrounding mud and rock formations below the gulf floor.

An article on the EngineerLive website makes this point about well integrity:

After many years in services well structures may become unstable due to corrosion of the conductor, surface and production casings. Many of these areas are unseen and corrosion can go unnoticed. To prevent potential structural failures, which in many cases can lead to disastrous consequences, casings need to be strengthened and protected from further corrosion. Densit provides complete solutions for reinstatement of the well integrity using UHPC (Ultra High Performance Cementitious) material.

Densit UHPC material provides structural integrity of the well conductor and casings, together with effective protection against corrosion. These benefits are usually achieved without any adverse effects on production rates.

I’ve been thinking about integrity in this context and it has given me a better understanding of what it means. Integrity not only stands up under high pressure, but it requires high pressure to test for unseen areas of corrosion.

I don’t think this means we ought to go looking for high pressure situations, but I also don’t think we ought to go running from them either. When they come, they make for good opportunities to learn our true weaknesses, and then, hopefully, to do something about them.

As someone whose home is being overrun with books, I read this article on the NRP website with interest: Stanford Ushers In The Age Of Bookless Libraries.

A “bookless library” seems like an oxymoron. But in this case, it makes a lot of sense. The library is an engineering library and according to the article, information in that field becomes obsolete quickly, as evidenced by this excerpt:

The new library is set to open in August with 10,000 engineering books on the shelves — a decrease of more than 85 percent from the old library. Stanford library director Michael Keller says the librarians determined which books to keep on the shelf by looking at how frequently a book was checked out. They found that the vast majority of the collection hadn’t been taken off the shelf in five years.

Keller expects that, eventually, there won’t be any books on the shelves at all.

“As the world turns more and more, the items that appeared in physical form in previous decades and centuries are appearing in digital form,” he says.

It makes sense to digitize such a library as much as possible as part of the Google Books Library Project given that text books cannot keep up.

I have a set of encyclopedias in my basement that haven’t been used in 30 years. They are from the late 1940s. They were great at the time, and even for school reports when I was a kid since they were all I had, but as information changes, we need to have access to it.

But what does this mean for mainstream libraries?

Seems that the writing is on the wall. The article goes on to say, “According to a survey by the Association of Research Libraries, American libraries are spending more of their money on electronic resources and less on books.”

But, as I said in a post back in January:

What about the feel and smell of books?

I’m starting to believe both are over rated.

A couple of years ago, I edited a novel for a publishing company. They sent it to me in a .pdf file and I printed it – all 500 or so pages. Five pages into the novel I was completely engrossed in the story. I didn’t miss out on the experience. It was a great book even though it wasn’t bound and printed.

Whenever I buy a book, I look through the stack of that particular title for the one in the best physical condition – no blemishes on the book cover, no visible dent marks, no bent pages, no pages with lighter printing than other pages, etc. The truth is, nearly ever book I’ve ever purchased has a blemish somewhere. I just don’t see it right away. Sometimes the binding breaks, sometimes the paper doesn’t feel right, sometimes the book doesn’t even smell like a book.

We like the notion of feel and smell, but in reality, neither offer a pure experience. In a sense, I’ve treated bound books like I do with a lot of things in life I over romanticize. Books are about information and/or entertainment. Information and entertainment happen as a result of the words in the book, not the packaging.

Since writing these words, I have purchased a Kindle. I’ve read two books on it and I have purchased and downloaded several more. It feels a lot like a book. I take it to bed with me at night and it’s just as easy to read, if not moreso, than a book book.

But the other day, I saw book in a bargain bin that caught my eye and I bought it. I don’t expect to ever stop buying book books for various reasons such as this.

In a way, this transition period feels like the 8-track/LP/cassette/CD transition that occurred when I was a kid. I’d just begin to accumulate music in one format and the next one would come along, which would require me to buy a machine that would play music in multiple formats.

You make the transition and deal with multiple formats because that is the age in which we live.

As a friend and I were leaving Buffalo Wild Wings last night, I glanced inside the claw crane machine and saw a rather cute little fellow that resembled Shmoo – only this guy was blue and didn’t quite have the same bowling pin shape.

“What is Shmoo?” my friend said.

“You don’t remember Shmoo – the cartoon character? He sort of looked like a ghost.”

“Never heard of him. I think you’re making this up.”

“I’m so going to Google it when I get home and then blog about it tomorrow.”

I found all sorts of information, pictures and video clips. I didn’t know that Shmoo actually first appeared in the Li’l Abner comic strip in 1948 which lead to Shmoo-mania according to a couple of websites I visited. He even appeared with Li’L Abner in a print advertisement for US Savings Bonds in 1949.

In the late 70s, Hanna-Barbera Productions produced The New Shmoo for NBC. Apparently Fred and Barney from the Flintstones had a few run-ins with Shmoo as well. And to bring everything full circle, Shmoo even has three Facebook pages. There’s a fan page for The New Shmoo (yes I clicked on “Like”) and one called “i remember the new shmoo” and one simply called “Shmoo.”

There’s quite a bit of Shmoo memorabilia available. You can buy books, such as The Short Life and Happy Times of The Shmoo (which seems like a rather odd title given how long Shmoo has been around). You can even buy a hardback book called Al Capp’s Complete Shmoo: the Comic Books.

And what coffee mug collection would be complete without an I Love Shmoo coffee mug? If the heart wasn’t pink, I would so order one.

Thanks to YouTube, we can even watch the intro to the show:

I don’t remember a lot about Shmoo, which is probably apparent if you go back to the top of the post and look at the photo I took of the blue character who I thought looked a lot like Shmoo. I do remember him saying “Uhhhhhh Ohhhhhhhh” a lot. And I remember him transforming into different objects to help the three crime fighting teens he hung out with. But that’s about it. Do you remember anything else about him?

A week or so ago, somebody on Twitter asked this question: “Are you the type of person who knows a lot about a little or a little about a lot?” I’m definitely the type who knows a a lot about a little.

I find no satisfaction in knowing bits and pieces of information. I must know and understand the journey.

That’s why I’m not a big highlight guy when it comes to sports. I don’t care what the score was if I don’t know how the score got that way. Who scored? How did he score? What were the circumstances?What sort of resistance did he face? What is his story? Did he overcome something? What did he do when he wasn’t scoring? What are his strengths and weaknesses and how were both on display throughout the game?

When I know the story and the background, then I care. Otherwise, I don’t even look at the scoreboard.

Sometimes people ask me my opinion about a certain event going on in the news and I am not even aware of it. It’s not because I don’t care about the news or about what’s going on around me. I just can’t comprehend it all, so I take smaller bites.

So, what type of person are you? Do you know a lot about a little or a little about a lot?

Continuing with the 100 life-enriching little nuances series…

As much as I love technology, I don’t think there will ever be a time in which I don’t have a paper calendar hanging on my wall.

They aren’t all they necessary any more – given how easy it is to pull up a calendar on a smart phone, but there’s nothing like looking up at a calendar that has a full page photo of the season you are currently experiencing.

Nostalgic calendars are my favorite. A few years ago, I had a nostalgic calendar in my office that had photos of the American Flag being flowing in various places – from the sides of barns, to little country villas, to parades. Every month as I flipped the page, I wanted to crawl inside the picture and visit the person who was flying the flag to listen to his or her story.

In typical guy fashion, I’ve had tons of sports calendars over the years. Last year, somebody gave me a huge NASCAR calendar. It contained the birthdates of various drivers and some great photos. Although, it’s not quite as enjoyable when you flip it to a photo of a driver you aren’t crazy about.

A couple of years ago, I picked up a nostalgic car calendar from the shop that changes my oil. It contained drawings of old cars in their natural surroundings. One month had a drawing of an old pickup truck parked by a barn with a hound dog sitting on the hood.

This year, I picked up a Psalms calendar. For June, it quotes Psalm 17:7, “Show the wonder of your great love …” and it shows a waterfall. To me, it’s a symbol of the way God pours out his grace on us. It’s so vast, and quick, we miss most of it. But when we stop to ponder it, we get a glimpse of it’s enormity.

How about you? What has been the theme of your favorite calendar over the years and why?

Have you ever seen this television commercial?

My mom loves this commercial, so sometimes when I’m visiting with her I’ll start to sing it: “There ain’t no bugs on me, there ain’t no bugs on me, there may be bugs on some of you mugs …”

“ … but there ain’t no bugs on me,” she finishes with her head swaying back and forth and a smile spreading across her face. She’s a sucker for animals, so that adds to her enjoyment of the song, but my enjoyment comes from seeing her enjoyment.

That Other White Meat?

Sustainability is a priority for our firm. We also believe environmental stewardship and effective client service are fundamentally connected. When Faegre & Benson participated in a sustainability pledge campaign in April, more than 500 employees promised to add three environmentally friendly actions to their work habits. The result? More Together.

Last Friday, I began covering the College World Series for Examiner.com (here’s a link to the articles I’ve written so far). Even though the press is there for 12 hours or more on some days, only one meal is provided.

So, at lunch I’ve ventured out into the crowds on the main concourse at Rosenblatt Stadium to find something good to eat.

Twice, I’ve met friends by the Famous Dave’s BBQ tent. Both times I got the pork sandwich and both times I added a couple of squirts of “Devil’s Spit” sauce. The name of the sauce sort of grosses me out, but the first day I ate there, that was the only sauce they had, so I gave it a try. Looking back, I’m pretty sure now that it was not labeled properly. It wasn’t hot. In fact, it sort of had a sweet taste to it.

The next day when I visited the Famous Dave’s BBQ tent I squirted a couple of more rounds of Devil’s Spit on my sandwich and I joined my friends. As we were talking, my throat started to constrict and I started choking. Not because there was food caught in my throat but because Devil’s Spit is hot! Pop didn’t help. Coughing didn’t help. I was just left in my misery to wait it out as my friends watched, half-amused, half-concerned. But I survived. 

I’ll be back at the ballpark today and I might be there all the way through the last game next week – depending on whether or not one of the other guys for the website I work for is going to fly in and do some of the coverage. But I’ll guarantee you one thing – no matter how many more lunches I eat on the main concourse, and no matter how many more times I stop by the Famous Dave’s BBQ tent, I will not be going near the Devil’s Spit again.

Castro Monument

After reading the Standard-Times' recent editorial regarding legislative efforts to lift the travel ban to Cuba, I felt the need to respond. This is an issue that my colleagues and I on the Agriculture Committee continue to examine and in the newspaper's analysis of the issue, I believe some pertinent concerns were overlooked.

The U.S. Declaration of Independence asserts with no equivocation that liberty is an inalienable right, granted to us by our Creator. The government of Cuba unequivocally disagrees with us on this point.

Fidel and Raul Castro have erected, as their own sister once said, "an enormous prison surrounded by water." According to the U.S. State Department, Cuba is a state sponsor of terrorism, one of only four in the world.

The Cuban government, along with Syria, Iran and Sudan, has repeatedly provided support for acts of international terrorism and engaged in the trade of prohibited materials with other state sponsors. It has allied itself with Hugo Chavez, FARC rebels in Colombia and Basque separatists in northern Spain, and it continues to harbor U.S. fugitives.

Further, the government of Cuba consistently ranks as one of the most repressive, draconian and abusive regimes in the world.

Our relations with Cuba are not merely an economic question, but a moral question as well.

I support our current agricultural export policy with Cuba because I believe that supplying this nation with foodstuffs lessens suffering among the citizens and drains the Castro regime of funds to spend on more belligerent uses. The humanitarian goal of feeding innocent people and the strategic goal of exhausting the funds of a totalitarian government outweigh the moral hazard of trading with a nation as corrupt as Cuba.

Our agricultural producers should rightly be proud of the role they play and the profits they earn in helping to protect the Cuban people.

However, the question of lifting the travel ban presents a different set of moral concerns. Tourists traveling to Cuba to spend their money will enrich the Castro regime, largely without ever seeing the desperate poverty and crushing oppression that the average Cuban faces. The tourism industry in Cuba is, in fact, run by their military and they will, without question, enact and enforce laws restricting the interaction of the Cuban poor with Americans on travel.

The money American tourists would trade for sandy beaches and quaint, old hotels will be funneled into the state-run business and the Cuban government's coffers, where it can be used for malicious activity.

It is possible that this money could be used to buy food from Texans or Georgians, but the Cuban government has a proven track-record of violent political repression, financing Marxist revolutionary movements in Latin America and arming terrorist organizations.

In your editorial, you cited a letter written by 74 members of Castro's opposition who support lifting the travel ban. It is unfortunate that you were not able to also consider a response letter sent to the chairman of the Agriculture Committee, Collin Peterson, by several hundred former prisoners of Fidel Castro.

In their letter, they explained to Chairman Peterson: "We are former Cuban political prisoners, who have spent a combined 3,551 years in Castro's gulag. We are living testimony of the unspeakable tortures, cruelty and deprivations of the military dictatorship of the Castro brothers. (E)very dollar (this) legislation seeks to place in the coffers of the Castro regime will only be used to further repress the Cuban people."

The letter is a powerful statement about the true nature of the Cuban government and the lengths to which military dictatorships will go to maintain their grip on power.

As a Christian, I have a deeply held conviction that the oppression of the Cuban people by the brutal Castro regime is morally reprehensible. While I am a strong supporter of existing and improved agricultural export relations with Cuba, lifting the travel ban and opening Cuba to American tourism is an issue separate from those exports. Lifting the ban would strengthen the Castro regime and enrich a state-sponsor of terrorism.

In my travels and meetings in Congress, I have met with many Cuban refugees. I have heard the depths of their suffering and I look forward to the day when all Cubans live in a nation free from fear, repression and retribution.

However, unilaterally lifting the travel ban, with no commitment from the Cuban government to improve its record on human rights, political freedom and economic openness, will not meet this goal.

Our nation should work toward free elections in Cuba with every tool and resource at our disposal. When that day finally does come, Americans and Cubans alike will enjoy the freedom to travel between our countries; but most importantly, Cubans will finally get to enjoy true liberty, a God-given human right.