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Explaining the 2015 Internet to 1995 Me

Dear Erich from 1995,

I can listen to whatever I want whenever I want. When you’re 20 you’ll get excited about being able to share MP3 files with complete strangers on the Internet, but in 2015 music is streamed over the Internet whenever I want.

Go find some music to play. I’ll wait. Get the From the Muddy Banks of the Wishkah album and put it in the CD player. Play “Sliver”. It’s track 8. I’ll listen with you. Because I can. I looked that up on Wikipedia.

Whenever I want, whatever I want. That’s what I need you to understand. Let’s say I want to know what a street corner on a remote island in the Atlantic looks like. I can see it in 5 seconds using Google Street View.

This is Erich from 2015. It’s different here, but most of the stuff is the same. For now, lets focus on how the Internet, or more specifically the way we access the Internet and how people are using the Internet has changed.

You’re still on dial-up and your favorite browser is Netscape. AOL is still popular and information is still hard to find. Well now Netscape doesn’t exist anymore (thanks to AOL) and now we have so much information we have to use software to help us sort it all out.

Instead of dial-up we have broadband, which I think you heard was coming. Strangely enough I still use the tech you were looking forward to: cable modems. But once it gets in the house or business it’s broadcast over “WiFi”.

You may be wondering how our desktops are wireless or how I could afford to have a laptop. Well laptops are like $250 now and the phones are the more expensive items to own. They are equally powerful, they just vary in screensize (but they are increasingly equalizing).

You’d think everyone would be taught and know how to create their own web pages by now, but programmers made it so they never had to learn. For example, I’m typing this in a “Word”-like document and the software adds the code on the back end automatically.

But the biggest change is the phones. Everyone has a cell phone. Everyone. And all cell phones get online and run “apps” like browsers, but there are MANY apps and many don’t talk to each other. Its kind of like all of the CD-ROM software you have at Wal-Mart now, except they all cost 99 cents.

Let’s compare our days for a sec:

1995: You might wake up around 6:30 to catch the bus around 7, arrive at school at 8, go to 7 classes (of course there’s lunch), and then repeat the bus ride on the way home. You might get online in the school library, but if not you’re dialing up at home with Windows 95 on your Gateway 2000 desktop.

2015: My phone wakes me up around 6, I check my text messages (short messages made of text sent to phone numbers or email addresses) and email on my phone. I might check social networks (I’ll get to that in a second) or check the news. And then I’m basically always online for the entire rest of the day.

Social Networks and Cell Phones

The Internet is like a utility now. How much time do you spend thinking about how electricity works? The President just asked the FCC to start treating it as such and now one of the biggest companies in the world (Google) wants to take broadband wireless global with a private space company named SpaceX (more on SpaceX and Google later).

Nowadays people think “Facebook” is the Internet and they demand access all of the time. By the time you’re a grandpa, it will be added to the Bill of Rights. Facebook is a social network. That’s a place online for people to share things with anyone or very specific people. Almost everyone on the planet is on Facebook.

By 2009 Facebook had either connected everyone you know or ruined your life. Those who survived went on to trim their friends list to actual friends and their kids moved on to new social networks like Instagram, Tumblr, and direct message systems like Whatsapp, Skype, and Snapchat. But who cares, right? Because phones.

“Grandma take me home…Wanna be alone.” I love that song. But it’s so true. We are more connected than ever, but we never talk anymore. Why visit an old friend when you’re already caught up to date on Facebook? Why call someone when you could just text?

When I get a phone call I have to assume someone has died. Unfortunately I’ve gotten 2 phone calls this month. Don’t worry, it was your wife’s family. She actually had the same Nirvana album when you first met her. That’s partly why you liked her. But she never listed to it. Not once.

But seriously, the phones

I could be inside a building I’ve never been in my life, do one Google search, and get the layout of the building. I could be stuck in traffic and know exactly what’s happening 1 mile ahead. I can see exactly where my wife is at all times. I can even pay for things with my phone.

That brings me to SpaceX and Google. When you’re busy going to college, a South African man is coding up a way for people to email each other money while two other college dropouts are making the worlds best search engine. The first guy sells Paypal and creates a private space company to replace NASA and the other two later give him 1 Billion dollars to give the world Internet access.

Mike Meyers goes from Wayne’s World to making a hilarious set of “Austin Powers” comedies, but he makes most of his money from voice acting a green ogre for kids. The world does not make sense, but this is the world you find yourself in 20 years later.

Software is eating the world

Our daughter is 10 years old and she’s learning to code. You know those guys who were coding instead of chasing girls in college? You know, the ones who made Facebook, Google, and Paypal? You didn’t do that. You didn’t even invest in those companies. Bad Erich. Bad Erich!

In 2015, money is not earned, it is created by writing software. We have a new type of currency called “making apps.” One requires learning how to develop for Apple (yeah, they don’t suck anymore) and the other for “Android” (Google’s mobile operating system).

Android is like “Windows” and Apple’s “iOS” operating system is like a Mac. Mac’s still exist, but they are shiny and cool. They are cooler than Nike. I asked my 8 year old what “Nike” was and she had no idea. I asked her what “Apple” was and she said, “A computer and phone store.” Get it?

Microsoft is still around and still making a boat load of money, but they’re doing it the same way they’ve always done it: by selling Windows and Office. All attempts at making new products have failed (Xbox gaming console, Bing search engine, and the Surface tablet PC).

The elephant in the room is of course, Amazon. Imagine an online store where you can buy anything and have it delivered to your house next day (sometimes same-day) for free. You know them as a place to buy books. You can still buy those too. I just bought one last week.

Some advice for you, Stauffer

Get a job, any job, then put all of the money into buying Apple stock. Work there until the year 2015 and you’ll be a millionaire. Seriously. The stock goes up like 1400%. You could work at McDonald’s for 20 years and be a millionaire.

Learn to code. Knowing how to write software is like knowing how to type in 1995. Your local library won’t have books on it so you’ll have to go to the university library and get around people in the computer science departments.

Don’t go to college. There is nothing there for you but heartache and student loan debt. (SEE working for McDonald’s above.) By 2015 if you didn’t invest in Apple, but instead learned to code, you could make 2x your student loan debt a year easy.

Final words

Are we better off? The movies are better. I can time travel letters back to you. That’s pretty cool. But I don’t know. I kind of miss having to get home to call someone rather than getting off the phone because I’m home. I kind of miss having to stop at the gas station to buy a paper map to get where I’m going and not exactly knowing how I’ll get there.

I suppose me telling you all of this kind of proves that point. You’ll never get this letter because you use Juno to check your email and they lost your email when the server crashed. You’ll go to college, get on CollegeClub.com, and get married. Life will happen exactly as it happened. And the world won’t care.

January 21, 2015
If You’ll Have Me

The living room glowed with excitement. They had bought bagels and cream cheese. It was a historic moment.

Two weeks ago I had walked into my job, poured a cup of coffee, and been escorted out the door. Now I’m sitting on a couch.

As Matt went around the room he mentioned each of the team members. Jennifer and Joy were sales. Michael was outreach and product development. Marcella was wholesale. Madeline was Marketing. Madeleine was finance. Joseph was logistics. And I was IT.

“If you’ll have me!” I said, immediately embarrassing myself. Why couldn’t I keep my mouth shut? Turns out it didn’t matter.

I worked there full-time 6 weeks while I continued to look for another job. Eventually the job ended and I was still looking.

But the bagels were good.

January 21, 2015
Freestyle – A Country Musical
This jukebox musical is on Spotify. I’ve weaved a story out of the following country songs. It’s something I do for fun. Previously I’ve done it with pop/rock songs, but this is my my first attempt at country (by request).

Listen to Freestyle on Spotify

[Act I]

1. Freestyle by Lady Antebellum – Thursday night, Charles, Pete and Kelley are rolling down a river road in a Chevy van listening to their favorite songs from Fleetwood Mac and Macklemore.

2. Down This Road by Cam – Unbeknownst to them, Hillary passes the boys as she is driving to her childhood home. She lives in the city now, but has come home for a long weekend to visit her parents.

As night falls on the town, one by one the lights go out. Just before Hillary turns her light off we see her pour an engagement ring out of a white paper envelope and look at it through the light.

3. Drinking Class by Lee Brice – A rooster crows. Charles gets up for work on Friday while looking forward to going out to drink after work with some friends. To him, every night is “Friday”.

As Charles opens his lunch pail and begins eating his lunch, he secretly opens a small paper notebook full of plans and diagrams for opening up his own business, but quickly puts it away when someone walks by.

4. Everything to You by Caitlyn Smith – Hillary is eating dinner with her father and she notices how gray his hair has become and she wants to tell him about the ring, but instead sings her father a song.

She gets a phone call from “Joe”, but she declines the call.

5. Country Bumpkin by Cal Smith – Her father detects that something might be wrong so he tells her a story about how he met her mother and what she said to him on her death bed. He wanted to know that they had a good life.

6. Neon Light by Blake Shelton – When Hillary finally listens to the voicemail, she hears Joe singing about how he misses her. He tells her he was looking for a sign and he’s finally found one, in the window of a bar.

[Act II]

7. Medicine by Shakira, Blake Shelton – Hillary tells her dad she’s going out for the night and she heads to bar for “medicine”. At the same time, Joe is sitting at a bar back in the city.

At the bar she runs into Charles and before he can hide his notes, Hillary asks him about them. He quickly hides them before recognizing her and embracing her with a big hug. They begin to talk about old times.

8. When the Right One Comes Along by Striking Matches – Hillary explains to Charles that she’s only home for the weekend to visit her dad, but the real reason is that she’s running away from her boyfriend, Joe, who asked her to marry her.

9. Mess is Mine by Vance Joy – Charles tells her that he will take her problems from her for the night and that her “mess” is his. After the song, Charles asks Hillary to sing karaoke with him for fun.

10. Momma Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to be Cowboys by TR Dallas – Charles chooses “Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” and eventually the whole bar joins in with them as they sing together.

11. Dirt by Florida Georgia Line – Charles asks Hillary if she’d like to take a walk and as he’s walking he kicks the dirt and starts telling Hillary about a time when he almost got married, but didn’t.

12. Remind Me by Brad Paisley, Carrie Underwood – Hillary asks Charlie if he was talking about her. She reminds him that they used to date and it was actually him who took her to the airport when she first left town.

Charlie asks her to remind him. She said, “We didn’t sleep. I remember I’d wake up in one of your old t-shirts. You’d kiss my neck. I can remember that, but I want you to remind me.”

13. Drunk Americans by Toby Keith – Instead of kissing her, Charlie says their all just “Drunk Americans” and that, “We just came here to drink.” He walks back into the bar and begins singing with all of the people in the bar.

Act III

14. Can’t Get Away from a Good Time by Logan Mize – Saturday afternoon Charles is working on his truck when his friend, Pete, stops by on his way to the gas station. He tells Pete how he “can’t get away from a good time.”

15. Feelin’ It by Scotty McCreery – Pete drops off Charles and calls up his girlfriend, Kelley to say he’s feelin’ like going out to the beach this afternoon. She’s friends with Hillary and invites her to the beach.

Pete texts Charles to meet him there that night for beer and a bonfire. Charles responds “I can’t get away from a good time,” and we see him incorporating his new business online before grabbing his keys.

16. Make You Miss Me by Sam Hunt – Hillary calls Joe and tells him she wants to break up. He says he will make her miss him and that she’ll miss sleeping in his t-shirt. She puts down the phone and cries into her hands.

When she pulls her hands down she sees her bikini laying on the bed.

17. Sunshine & Whiskey by Frankie Ballard – Pete sings to his girlfriend on the beach, reminiscing about the good times they had cruising around in his Chevy. Charles arrives and sees Hillary coming out of the water.

18. Cruise – Remix by Florida Georgia Line, Nelly – Charlie asks Hillary if she’d like to take a ride in his Chevy and they go for a cruise. Charlie tells her he doesn’t want to be a blue collar worker anymore.

19. Where Your Road Leads by Garth Brooks, Trisha Yearwood – Hillary thanks him for being there for her last night and tells him she’s broken up with her boyfriend. She said she would help him with his dreams if he would love her.

20. Love You Like That by Canaan Smith – Charles tells Hillary that he can love her the way she wants him to and they ride off into the country sunset in his Chevy. As the taillights grow dim, the music fades into the night.

1 Hour, 12 Min

If you liked this, you might also like this rock musicals:
- One Night
- Sleepless
January 4, 2015
2014 in Review
Winter is Coming

When I shut up the heavens so that there is no rain, or command the locust to devour the land, or send pestilence among my people, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. -2 Chronicles 7:13-14

2013 was a time of contraction, but I failed to grow in 2014. I was in the summer of my life, but winter was coming. This is a story of what I learned and how I was redeemed in 2014.

Highlights of the Year
- Attended the annual New Year’s Day Game Day at Jason’s house with Cullen and friends.
- In February I began going swimming at the YMCA in Fishers.
- One of my clients, Skinny Coconut Oil, had their first $10,000 day in March.
- My youngest daughter, Amalia, started walking in April. By December she was getting her molars in.
- I joined Launch Fishers and went to King’s Island in May.
- In June, Kevin completed soccer at White River Christian Church and he created KevinTheRockStar.com.
- I attended MixWest in July, the Global Leadership Conference in August, and the Storyline Conference in October.
- My wife made Silver in her Young Living essential oil business in November.
- I started a new job at GoServicePro on December 1.
In January my family and I got the flu. This time of year is normally populated with client requests for web changes, but I ended up doing a lot of IT work instead. One client upgraded 5 Windows XP computers to Windows 7 to avoid the end of Windows XP Support in April of 2014. I renewed my contract with the Han Institute and increased my contract with Indianapolis Dentistry and Skinny and Company.

In February, Jason, Justin, and I started a book club and corresponding podcast. I started learning more about web automation systems from IFTTT and Zapier, which I used to help automate marketing at Skinny and Company. This allowed me to do a presentation on the topic at the Indianapolis Quantified Self Meetup and planted the seed for a possible future podcast about information systems. Unfortunately the podcast was short lived and did not continue.

In March my family and I started playing Minecraft together. It helped my wife and I get to know our kids better because we could see how they interacted with their friends and the “world” through Minecraft. But the kids were learning too. They were learning about math, how to solve problems, and how to work with other people. There were also business lessons like, ‘you have to work for something of value’.

In April I started learning about making online courses and used Learning Sets as the project name, but after Jason and I made our first online course on Saturday, April 12, Jason convinced me to name the project Bold Bros instead. I purchased a membership to Launch Fishers and we had our first meeting there on May 3. Launch Fishers is a coworking facility that gave me a place to work outside of home. With the kids taking over more of the computers at home, it was easier to work in an office building.

In May, side work began increasing. My wife’s business selling essential oils was taking more of my time and I still had client work outside of my day job at Worksmart. I decided to take a break and so Jason and I took a day off to go to King’s Island like we used to do when we were in high school. The park seemed much smaller now and the rides left us feeling old. We left early in the afternoon for home, exhausted. Between playing video games and riding roller coasters, I was starting to regress in life.

In June I worked less on Bold Bros. and began working more on my wife’s business with her. Kevin was in soccer and there was grass to be mowed. I started going to Launch Fishers after church on Sundays a few times I took Kevin. He wanted to create his own website called “Kevin the Rock Star”. Kevin and I were also working the Tipton Farmers Market selling bread on Saturdays. I tried to use it as an opportunity to teach him about sales and business. This was the summer before the fall, but I didn’t know it yet.

In July instead of learning new SQL skills, working on a business, or investing in time with my kids, I began playing Civilization V with my co-worker and friend from Worksmart, Andy Rose. In the hundreds of hours of play that month, I only won 3 times: twice a Scientific Victory and once a Domination Victory. I was determined to do better. By the end of the month Worksmart put me in charge of social media right before I headed off to Mixwest, a local conference covering Marketing, Technology, and Design.

When I came back from the conference I was laid off from my ob at Worksmart, but that same day I got invited to attend the Global Leadership Conference in Indianapolis for free. This was something I would not have been able to do if I still had a day job so I was happy to go. Meanwhile, I began working full time temporarily at Skinny and Company helping their digital marketing team update their website and push forward on marketing projects. All the while I was still applying for jobs and going to interviews.

In September I helped Jason and Justin launch Sycamore Creative. Jason and I traveled down to Justin’s house in Kentucky with an aspiring film producer, Chris. I was his production assistant. After the video shoot, we all drove to Madison, Indiana to eat at Harry’s Stone Grill. The Colts were playing their first game so we asked if we could sit in a room with a TV. They cleaned a room with TVs just for us. At the end of September, Skinny and Company laid me off from full-time temporary work. I was out of a job again.

In October I continued applying for jobs, had several interviews, but no job offers. Things were starting to look bleak. I still had client work to do, which I did, but it wasn’t what I was making before and so I was starting to run a monthly deficit. I began reaching out to dentists for new client work and began actively reaching out to network with others. At the end of the month I attended the Storyline Conference in Chicago with my friend, Jason. That’s when I realized that playing games instead of learning skills was a mistake.

In November I started rapid skill-building to help my job-hunting efforts. I was learning JavaScript, SQL, Business Analysis, Regular Expressions (RegEx), and XML. I started wishing I had spent some of the time I spent playing Civilization in July or Minecraft in March upgrading my skills instead. While Warren Buffet does play Bridge every night, he didn’t start out that way. I was worth exactly how much my bank account said it had, so I had to work on improving my skills. The winter was starting to get cold.

On December 1 I started a new full-time job at GoServicePro in Indianapolis. It was the answer to a lot of prayer – from me and others who had been praying for me. I am thankful for the friends and family who helped give me part-time work and for all of the lessons I learned. The biggest lesson I learned this year was that God is in control and that it was necessary to obey his commandments. In 2014 winter started early for me, but I’m hopeful for an early spring in 2015 as I continue to follow God and work on my skills.

When you have eaten and are satisfied, praise the Lord your God for the good land he has given you. Be careful that you do not forget the Lord your God, failing to observe his commands, his laws and his decrees that I am giving you this day. Otherwise, when you eat and are satisfied, when you build fine houses and settle down, and when your herds and flocks grow large and your silver and gold increase and all you have is multiplied, then your heart will become proud and you will forget the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery. He led you through the vast and dreadful wilderness, that thirsty and waterless land, with its venomous snakes and scorpions. He brought you water out of hard rock. He gave you manna to eat in the wilderness, something your ancestors had never known, to humble and test you so that in the end it might go well with you. You may say to yourself, “My power and the strength of my hands have produced this wealth for me.” But remember the Lord your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your ancestors, as it is today. If you ever forget the Lord your God and follow other gods and worship and bow down to them, I testify against you today that you will surely be destroyed. Like the nations the Lord destroyed before you, so you will be destroyed for not obeying the Lord your God. -Deuteronomy 8:10-20

After 10 years, the Pontiac Vibe pictured at the top of this post was traded in for this Pontiac Torrent.
December 31, 2014
How to Install WordPress on Root Folder & Sub Folder on a Windows IIS Server at Godaddy
One of my clients uses Windows hosting on Godaddy. They wanted to host a new WordPress website on a new subdomain when a WordPress website was already installed on the their primary domain. I wasn’t familiar with Windows IIS hosting at the time (WordPress is normally hosted on Linux servers), and so gathering this information took several days and a call to Godaddy Support before I figured it all out.

Here are the 4 steps to install WordPress on a subdomain in Windows IIS in Godaddy when a WordPress installation already exists on the primary domain:
1. Upgrade to Deluxe or Ultimate Hosting
2. Setup the Subdomain and Subfolder
3. Create the web.config file in the Subdirectory
4. Install WordPress Like Normal
1. Upgrade to Deluxe or Ultimate Hosting

Because they used Godaddy, they first had to upgrade to a deluxe hosting package as the base, “Economy” hosting plan does not allow you to host websites on subdomains. An upgrade was an extra $2 a month. Thanks to Chip O’Toole for this tip.

2. Setup the Subdomain and Subfolder

In Godaddy, this is done in the hosting control panel under “Manage Domains”. Click the domain you want to manage, and then create a new subdomain. It will prompt you to create a folder with the same or different name after that. Once a folder is created, go back to the control panel and setup a new FTP user account to access that folder if needed.

3. Create the web.config file in the Subdirectory

Once the hosting was upgraded, the subdomain still did not ‘show up’, but simply redirected to the primary domain’s website. To fix that, you have to create a web.config file in the subdirectory you created in step 2. To do that, go back to the hosting control panel and click on “File Manager”. Browse to the subfolder and then click new. Copy and paste the following code:

[xml]

[/xml]

Thanks to Samrat Saha on the WordPress Forums for this solution, which is based on this “Install WordPress on IIS” tutorial from Microsoft.

Note:Be sure to change the “www” to your subdomain name, “youranotherdomain.com” to your primary domain name, and “\your\sub…” directory path to the actual path.

PS. The “R:0” are “back-references to condition patterns“.

4. Install WordPress Like Normal

You may not be able to use the one-click install application in Godaddy for a subdomain, but you can still manually install WordPress. First create a MySQL database. Record all of the info from setup such as database name, username, password, and host name. You’ll need all of that to configure WordPress. Next, download the latest installation files from WordPress.org. Unzip the file and upload to your sub-folder using FTP. Once the files have been uploaded, go to [subdomain.primarydomain] and follow the prompts to create a configuration file.
December 16, 2014
How Can I Get Microsoft Office for Free?

I get this question a lot. People assume either Microsoft Office comes with their computer or that it’s free. It’s not free, but there are some pretty good options out there that are free or that allow you to pay over time.

I have a question for you… Do you or we have a disk that I may use to put Microsoft Word/Works on a personal laptop at my home? We just got our laptop back from a guy that my husband had “fix” it, but he just dumped everything on it & we do not have the discs to re-install Microsoft. If you or we do, just let me know.

Microsoft Office isn’t free, but there are a couple of other Office-like solutions for you.

Web-Based:

Microsoft Office Online – go to onedrive.com and login with (or create a new) Microsoft account. Once there, you can upload, edit, or create new Microsoft Office files for free.

Google Drive – similar to Microsoft OneDrive, Google Drive is an online storage and file editing program based in the browser. It can read and create Microsoft Office files for free.

Download and Install:

OpenOffice.org – both the name of the website and the name of the program – like Google Drive, OpenOffice.org has it’s own format, but also can create and read Microsoft Office files

Microsoft Office 365 – office.com is a subscription service for Microsoft Office that lets you pay for it as you go – it starts at $9.99 a month for up to 5 devices. I use this at home.

December 4, 2014
Normalization, Unions, Joins, and Locking in Microsoft SQL
What is a normalized database?

Database normalization is the process of organizing the fields and tables of a relational database to minimize redundancy. Normalization usually involves dividing large tables into smaller (and less redundant) tables and defining relationships between them.

What is a SQL union/join?

Unions combine rows. Joins combine columns. UNION combines the results of two or more queries into a single result set that includes all the rows that belong to all queries in the union. By using JOINs, you can retrieve data from two or more tables based on logical relationships between the tables. Joins indicate how SQL should use data from one table to select the rows in another table.The UNION operation is different from using JOINs that combine columns from two tables.

What is SQL locking?

Locking prevents simultaneous changes to the data in Microsoft SQL Server. Locks are managed internally by the Microsoft SQL Server Compact Database Engine.

How to open the Performance Monitor?

On a Windows computer, click Start, click in the Search box, type perfmon.msc, and then press ENTER. In the navigation tree, expand Monitoring Tools, and then click Performance Monitor.

What does the Performance Monitor do?

The “Performance Monitor” under the “Microsoft SQL Server” entry under your Start Menu is the same “Performance Monitor” under the “Administrative Tools” entry under your Start Menu. They are the same programs. What is different is that when you bring up Performance Monitor from under the “Microsoft SQL Server” entry, is that it comes up already running several pre-configured SQL Server performance counters.

Here are the key counters to watch on a regular basis:
- Memory — Pages/Sec: To see how much paging my server is doing. This should be close to zero on a dedicated SQL Server. You will see spikes during backups and restores, but this is normal.
- Network Interface — Bytes Total/sec: To see how much network activity is going on.
- PhysicalDisk — % Disk Time — _Total: To see how busy all the disk drives are.
- PhysicalDisk — Current Disk Queue Length — _Total: Also to see how busy the drives are.
- System — % Total Processor Time: To see how busy all the CPUs are as a whole.
- System — Processor Queue Length: Also see how busy the CPUs are.
- SQLServer: General Statistics — User Connections: To see how many connections (and users) are using the server. Keep in mind that one connection does not equal one user. A single user can have more than one connection, and a single connection can have more than one user.
- SQLServer: Access Methods — Page Splits/sec: Lets me know if page splits are an issue or not. If so, then that means I need either to increase the fill factor of my indexes, or to rebuild the indexes more often.
- SQLServer: Buffer Manager — Buffer Cache Hit Ratio: To find out if I have enough memory in the server. Keep in mind that this ratio is based on the average of the buffer hit cache ratio since the SQL Server service was last restarted, and is not a reflection of the current buffer cache hit ratio.
- SQLServer: Memory Manager — Target Server Memory (KB): To see how much memory SQL Server wants. If this is the same as the SQLServer: Memory Manager — Total Server Memory (KB) counter, then I know that SQL Server has all the memory that it wants.
- SQLServer: Memory Manager — Total Server Memory (KB): To see how much memory SQL Server actual is using. If this is the same as SQLServer: Memory Manager — Target Server Memory (KB), then I know that SQL Server has all the memory that it wants. But if this is smaller, then SQL Server needs more available memory in order to run at its optimum performance.
December 3, 2014
10 Online Learning Courses and Class Resources

We live in a unique time where information is free (or nearly free) and the problem is no longer access to information, but organizing it and finding it in the form we need it. Many organizations are taking up this challenge by curating online learning courses for public consumption.

Some are geared towards a particular industry, while others are general. Some are “pay monthly for full access” and others are “pay for each course individually”, while still others are totally free.

The following is a list of links to resources where you can search for online learning classes and courses:

General Courses

Red Hoop – a search engine for online learning courses. It searches sites like Udemy, Lynda, PluralSight, Skillfeed, Tuts+, Learnable, Treehouse, Code School, TrainSimple, Udacity, Digital-Tutors, SkillShare, creativeLIVE, edX, Coursera, General Assembly, Khan Academy, Craftsy, CreatorUp, Grovo, MIT OCW, NovoEd, Open2Study, and creativebug.

iTunes U – you can’t actually search iTunes from the web – you’ll have to download and install the app on your computer – but it’s a great resource for free classes from Stanford, Harvard, MIT, UC Berkely, and Oxford. Mashable has their list of the top 10 classes on iTunes.

Indiana Career Connect Education Resources – contains links to Training Providers and Schools, Training and Education Programs, Education Program Completers, Financial Assistance Links, Online Learning Resources, and Education Profile Informer.

Coursera – Take the world’s best courses, online, for free. Coursera has a lot of business, science, and technical classes.

Udemy – Your place to learn real world skills online. A mix of general, business, and technical classes – some are free, some are paid. When paid, you pay per course. You can also get paid to make your own class.

Skillshare – Online classes and inspiring projects that fit your schedule. Enjoy unlimited access to hundreds of classes for $9.95 a month – includes a 7-day free trial. Classes range from business to technical.

Khan Academy – Math, science, computer programming, history, art, economics, and more. For free. For everyone. Forever. No ads, no subscriptions. They are a not‑for‑profit because they believe in a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.

Lynda – Online video tutorials to help you learn software, creative, and business skills. Starts at $25 a month.

YouTube – despite the large amount of information, courses can be hard to find on Youtube unless you use some filtering. After doing an initial search for your keyword, click the “Filters” dropdown and then click “Playlist” to see curated content.

Technology Courses

Treehouse – learn to make websites, apps, and code. Learn as much as you want for $25 a month.

Codecademy – Learn to code interactively, for free.

October 13, 2014
Woodworking

This morning I visited Purposeful Design in Indianapolis, a furniture-manufacturing facility that helps train workers with job skills while giving them a job. David Palmer, one of the founders, uses it as an opportunity to not only help people find work, but also teach them about God. They start and ending each shift in a huddle, reading Bible scripture and offering prayer.

Walking around the facility, as Dave was pointing out the table saw, buzz saw, jointer, planer, sander, nail guns, and piles of wood, I started to remember that I too used to be a woodworker. There was a time around 2004 when I wanted to know how to make furniture. This blog post is to help me remember.

One of my first woodworking projects was making wooden flags for a corporate client. It required me to buy a drill press, which took all of the money from doing the job. After that I began experimenting with making wood shelves. Eventually I realized I needed a router to help make the shelves more secure.

Once I had a router I got a woodworking job making custom trim around some old doors for an old home in Greenfield. I started looking into how to do mortis and tenon joints and how to make table-tops. My woodworking experience culminated with me giving everyone wood furniture gifts for Christmas.

Everyone hated them.

One person took the table I made and placed it in the woods under some white pines. Another person briefly displayed the small cabinet I made in their living room. A bench I made was donated to Goodwill. The corporate flags are no longer in use. Coincidentally I was the one who ended up throwing them in the trash when I later worked there full time doing business analysis work. It’s a small world.

October 9, 2014