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Griflet.com >> News >> Computer

| 6-9-04 @ 9:57 pm |

I'm re-thinking my decision to become a computer programmer. While it still sounds like fun, I often find myself without the energy. I think that with the end of school, however, I will be able to better appreciate it. I guess I'll just have to see when the time comes. I think I still want to go to Oregon State University, though. As part of my CAM (Certificate of Advanced Master -- it's an Oregon thing), I'm required to have an internship that lasts 40 hours. It should be a good experience. Hopefully it will help me decide what I want to do with my future. I don't think I want to do web design (there's too much of an emphasis placed on beauty as opposed to functionality), but programming may still be in the bid. It combines a lot of things that I really enjoy.

| 4-14-03 @ 10:22 pm |

I've sort of taken a break from web design lately. I just haven't really found the time or motivation to take care of all the updating that needs doing... or I just haven't found much updating to do. Overall I'm pretty short on news. You'd think that after a few months away I'd have something to say, but not much has changed, at least in this department. I signed up for some computer and business classes for next year. Some of them will be easy hoops to jump through in order to get my CAM (Certificate of Advanced Mastery--it's an Oregon thing) whereas others will contain valuable information that will prove necessary to my future financial survival. I may be taking "Web Design" at the end of next year or the year after that. The main factor is scheduling. It's mainly another hoop-class that will also look good on a resume. It will also give me some in-school time to study my Java book and practice the other languages while earning credit. Yay. The business CAM teacher also wants me to take an "Advanced Business Concepts" course that will include some web design for teachers and other faculty. We'll see how that goes. I'll probably take it.

| 11-5-02 @ 5:11 pm |

I've been writing a few PHP scripts lately. If you want to check out some of my code, you can go to griflet.com/php.

| 5-12-02 @ 5:16 pm |

As I write this, I'm using MS-DOS. I started playing around with it yesterday just for fun to see if I could figure it out. I wasn't quite sure what I was doing. Eventually I found this site at ComputerHope.com. It's helped me learn some commands and through trial and error I've figured out how to make things work. It's just another new thing to play around with :) I'm FTPing with it, editing files, deleting and creating files... It's great fun!

I've also made it farther in my PHP4 book. It's becoming more complicated but it's still fun. Hopefully I can have some great fun with it later once I learn all of its capabilities. Exciting!

| 4-28-02 @ 9:41 pm |

Great news! As you've already seen, I've moved to Griflet.com! I'm settled in and everything should be up and running just fine now. If you encounter any problems, please let me know so that I can resolve them.

I put down my "Perl and CGI for the World Wide Web" book. It was one that said, "Type ___, ___, and ___ if you want ___" -- not my style. The good news is, though, that I just got a new book, "Beginning PHP 4". I've only read seventy pages in it so far, but I can already see the advantage of PHP over other languages. Writing the date to a webpage using PHP is much easier than with JavaScript!

| 4-8-02 @ 9:52 pm |

I'm going to be switching to another domain soon! Instead of going to www.geocities.com/kate2587/, you'll go to www.griflet.com. The switch should be complete within two weeks, I hope. The main page of this site will remain available, and perhaps all of the files, so you can keep the main one bookmarked, but, in my humble opinion, it's easier to go to Griflet.com.

I've also started reading "Perl and CGI for the World Wide Web." So far it's more confusing than the other books I've read on HTML and JavaScript; perhaps its the subject, perhaps its me, or perhaps its the book. I'll make it through somehow :-)

| 3-29-02 @ 11:48 pm |

Someone sent me the link to a great hosting service, CyberWings, and I'm going to switch my site to their service as soon as I can come up with a site name. I'm looking for something that's (a) easy to remember; (b) an acronym so I can change its meaning based on the content of the site (ex: I may use it for business if I one day decide I'd like to make webpages for a living); (c) something that doesn't have my name in it; (d) a word or set of letters that's easy to spell; and (e) a name that doesn't allow for misconceptions about my site. In other words, I'm a perfectionist and I'm eventually going to have to settle for something I don't like at the time but will like later. Any suggestions would be welcome, though!

As you can see, I've been practicing what I know of the different languages there are for creating and manipulating webpages. I now feel confident with my ability to write HTML and JavaScript. I just finished The Book of JavaScript last night, but I'll be reviewing it and practicing coding during the next week or so. I can write CSS well although I haven't used and consequently don't remember most of the tags. I do, however, have them written down on a cheat sheet =) The other day I ordered a book on Perl and I'm eager to start my training once it arrives, which should be on Thursday, April 4th.

| 3-18-02 @ 10:23 pm |

Well, it would appear as though I can't sit still. I've redesigned my site... again! This time, though, you will be able to see both designs. In the future, I plan to keep all (well, at least most) designs open for viewing -- and they will be updated along with the other pages. If you'd like to view the new version, you can do so here and the old version is available here. Enjoy!

4-24-02 - Note: This is no longer the case. I will be keeping all files from the old versions but they will not be published online. If you wish to see the designs, please talk to me and I may be able to send you a file or two. I plan to have pictures of the designs online soon.

| 2-03-02 @ 9:48 pm |

Good evening! I have some happy computer news for you! Since my last entry, I've completely redesigned my site! Well, you may have noticed this already. I hope you like the new look! Any comments are welcome!

I also got a new book on JavaScript for my birthday! Well, it's an early birthday present since my birthday isn't until the 5th. It's called The Book of JavaScript. So far it's pretty interesting and informative. Maybe I'll be able to improve my site some more with the new information I'll be armed with!

| 1-26-02 @ 5:00 pm |

Hey there! Well, it's only been 15 days this time--I'm getting better at writing on a regular basis. Now to computer news:

I've pretty much finished my book, "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Creating a Web Page." That book taught me a lot and now I'm writing almost all of the HTML (HyperText Markup Language) code for my websites myself. If you don't know what HTML is, it's the set of characters that tells a web page what to look like. I recently (last night and today) redesigned the look of my News Center. Before, if you don't remember, it had a bunch of "soothing" colors and the columns popped up on the far left of the page.

I'm considering redesigning the actual homepage part of my site. I've already decided to remake the blue section of the aforementioned page so that I can feel free to edit it myself. I initially made it with a HTML editor (a program that allows you to click and drag stuff around your website instead of writing the HTML yourself) and now it looks foreign since the program tends to put in a lot of unnecessary HTML. Once I redesign it, it should look almost the same as before... except the HTML code will be different. In other words, you shouldn't notice a difference if I change it. Who knows when I'll get around to that...

| 1-11-02 @ 7:00 pm |

My uncle, cousin, and grandmother (all on my mother's side) visited for Christmas. I can talk more about that in the other columns. My uncle got my computer working marvelously and set up our wireless internet connection (a Christmas present)! Oo!

| 11-24-01 @ 8:45 pm |

Is anyone really reading this? That's my main reason for the delay... If you read the newspaper, please send me an email saying so because I may be discontinuing it due to a lack of attention.

Back to computer junk... I fought with the computer today and won again. Well, somewhat. I managed to put up a new link on my homepage for a friend in exchange for a link on their site to mine.

| 10-24-01 @ 9:20 pm |

Gee, it's kinda been a while, huh? Sorry for the delay. I'll provide more of an explanation in the Other column. On to computer stuff...

Well, we've gotten used to the G4 now and it's working fine. I just recently got semi-addicted to SimTower, a computer game (as you may have guessed).

Other than that, I'm not sure there's a lot of other news (at least in this column).

| 9-24-01 @ 8:00 pm |

Well, guess what! We now have a new computer! It's a PowerMac G4. It has 30 gb (gigabytes) of hard drive space (roughly 30,000 megabytes, I believe) and, at present, we have 128 mb (megabytes) of RAM (email me if you don't know what this is and I'll give you a "translation"). We have an extra 512 mb which we know how to install, but something just doesn't fit right. Do you have any suggestions?

We're also trying to transfer our files from our old computer to its replacement, the G4. We're using the Iomega zips... if you think you might know how to help, please contact me and I'll give you a detailed description of what's wrong. Any help is appreciated!

9:00 pm - I just remembered that I forgot to tell you about our CD burner! We do have a CD burner that is built into the CPU (Central Processing Unit... the brains of the computer), software to burn CDs, and both types of CDs, but the software we have right now (iTunes, which came with the computer) only allows us to record on a CD once, regardless of type. We may be downloading a piece of software called MusicMatch, which should help with that. I'll keep you posted on this issue.

| 9-18-01 @ 10:00 pm |

Well, there's good and bad news. My father's main computer has a "green leaf error," an error that just happens to some computers and can only be fixed by completely erasing the hard drive and then putting everything back on. The good news is that we caught it in time and we were able to back up every file on the system. It's also still operational, but for how long, we don't know.

Now the best news... we're getting a G4! For those of you who don't know what it is, it's a Mac computer... look it up at Apple.com. We're also getting a Compaq monitor... contact me if you want more information. I can't wait until it comes!

| 9-14-01 @ 11:45 pm |

Woohoo! I got my internet to go again! If you're interested in knowing how I got my internet up to speed, check out the Special Report column. I'm just happy that it's working!

| 9-12-01 @ 7:00 pm |

My internet connection is still very slow. I've tried downloading IE 6.0, but have been unable to find a link on their website. I thought Microsoft was supposed to be a good, easy-to-use company. Guess not!

One has no idea, until the actual experience, how frustrating computers can become. I'm not sure how long the mouse on one of my computers will last, as it was repeatedly abused earlier tonight.

7:30 pm - I've just received a suggestion of switching ethernet cables... hopefully that will help! But, that still doesn't explain how I keep getting disconnected when I use a portable phone within 10 feet (about 3.3 meters).

9:40 pm - I tried switching the ethernet cables, but it hasn't worked. It's still slow, but a little faster. Then again, I also used a program called System Mechanic to optimize my internet connection before restarting, so that could be the cause of the change, too.