1 year ago today the quality of the Internet diminished just a tad

Dude,

Happy anniversary.

Thanks,
Other Dude

P.S. I totally had to back date this post, but I was thinking about it on the day.

Life Rule: When in doubt, stick with what you know

I've had this one come up a few times recently.

When in doubt, stick with what you know


It became worthy enough to write down when I discovered this indecent, which of course has a corresponding XKCD. Seemed appropriated since the other dude just got back from California. I can only hope your return trip will be better than theirs.

Just saw Google's touching Dear Sophie commercial

Dude,

I just saw Google's "Dear Sophie" commercial and maybe there was some kind of emotion evoked deep inside. Judging by the Youtube comments, the emotion evoked in me was very different from other viewers.

Everyone else apparently cried, but I couldn't help but be appalled at the blatant violation of the Gmail terms of service.

It's not really that the TOS was violated. Clearly this happens every day, but I am disappointed that the "do no evil" company would use a TOS violation as an add campaign. I honestly don't even know how to interpret it. It brings up the deeply philosophical question, "does a company that vows to do no evil, commit evil if it is against themselves?" I don't know the answer. All I do know is I can't look at that toothless grin without stirring some latent childhood nostalgia.

Maybe it has nothing to do with TOS. Maybe the anger stems from some jealousy that I'll never be able to relive my child hood memories simply by logging on to my Gmail account. All I do know, is it upsets me when a television commercial makes me cry my eyes out like a little girl.

Thanks,
Other Dude

The Ergophobia Continues... (go ahead, look it up, I dare you)

Dear Dude,

So I was sitting here thinking about how you're my dude, and I'm your dude, but we haven't shared anything in a while. For the eavesdroppers I'll recap (the following should be read with the announcer voice from
Idiocracy);

Last time on 2dudes1blog -- James was trying to code some javascript, but he didn't know anything about it. Michael, his ever faithful cousin and sometimes sidekick, loaned him a plethora of books on the subject in question. To date, James has only read a single chapter in one of the books. Now the not so climatic continuation of this anti-drama will unfold before your eyes.

Thanks for the books, I'll get to those when I get a chance.

The end,
Other dude

Not really. Here are some links in a random order of things I think everyone should see.

• A blog, arguably more interesting than ours.
• Yet another thing I invented after it's been around for years.
• Something cool I'm going to find a reason to use some day.
• This link could save your life.
• and this link could end it if you don't know how to swim without the use of heavy machinery.
• Also, I made two posts in the same day.

For real this time,
Other dude

Dude,

There aren't many video games that excite me these days. At least not without some nostalgic references to games I grew up on, but I have to share this one with you. I got Just Cause 2 as a freebie from something I bought and finally entered the code into Steam for the lols. There have been a number of games the only reason I'd ever play was because they were free, and almost every one only gets about 20 minutes of play time before I forget about it (looking at you STALKER with all the periods).

Just Cause 2 was entertaining enough to get me through the first few levels, skipping all the cut scenes because they are a little long and pointless. I was even able to overlook the cheesy main character's overly macho all black outfit. Once I got into the main game, I was impressed with it's open ended play style. I have no idea what the story is or what I am supposed to do, but just roaming around stealing cars and jets and just generally blowing things up and causing "chaos" has kept me up until 1am for the first time in a long time. I think it helped that I didn't take the game seriously when I started playing and had no expectations.

It's on Steam for $20, but there is a free demo. I recommend checking it out when you are in the mood for mindless entertainment of the explosive kind.

Thanks,
Dude

We did Something Right

A Google search for "tron trench coat" puts our blog post as the first result.

At first I thought it was Google working it's cookie magic on me, but I'm starting to think it's legit.

What little I've learned so far

Dear Other Half of 2 Dudes 1 Blog,

I am writing to inform you that I'm making a blog post.

More seriously, I am writing to save you time. Your time is valuable to me. Like gold; it mysteriously appreciates.

Based on a conversation we had earlier today, I thought I'd take the time to share with you what I have found to be a useful setup when making websites by hand.

FileZilla
When I first started, I did everything through our hosting service's WebFTP (for the nosy, yes we share a web hosting service). That was fine until I started working with PHP and many files. I had to step up my game. Also, don't be a fool like I was and just let it save your log on credentials. Save time, be happy, live longer.

Useful things I like about FileZilla
- synchronized browsing
- set files to open in notepad++ - go to Edit > Settings > File editing > Filetype associations paste something close to this (your setup might need minor changes--I have faith you can make it work):

php "C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\notepad++.exe"
html "C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\notepad++.exe"
txt "C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\notepad++.exe"
css "C:\Program Files (x86)\Notepad++\notepad++.exe"

Things I wish it could do
- useful file compare - you can compare by size or time, both of which will be slightly different between your local copy and server copy.
- Automatic upload of Changed files - When you open a file through FileZilla and save your changes in Notepad++, FileZilla is smart enough to say "Hey dude your file changed, do you want to upload the new version?" This is cool, until you are making a lot of minor changes to a file to see the differences. You'll have to hit save, alt-tab to FileZilla, click okay, alt-tab again to your browser, hit F5.

Notepad++
I know you already know the wonders of Notepad++, but for our eavesdroppers I'm going to include it in this letter.

One thing I do like about Notepad++ is it's ability to change the Language (of the code not to Russian). I've started the bad practice of using PHP files as style sheets, and it's nice to be able to tell Notepad++ I want to see it as a CSS instead of what it is.

Websites
http://htmledit.squarefree.com/ - I like to use this if I'm trying to make a site look right. I'll copy and paste the css inside some <style> tags, and paste the code at the bottom. Once I get what I want out of it, paste it back into Notepad++.

http://jsfiddle.net/ - Just discovered this one the other day. It's a lot like the first one, but lets you do more. You'll see.

http://www.w3schools.com/ - Almost every Google search result of "html + something I want to use" begins w3schools.com. I follow that link because they are most likely the have what I am looking for.

Browsers
They don't display the same (despite the plethora of standards available). I blame Lamecrosoft, but it doesn't matter. It is something that has to be dealt with even though we know who to point fingers at.

Curvy Corners - You may have noticed in my webdesign I'm a big fan of border-radius. Who's not? Really? Because if you're not you're wrong. This script allows border-radius to work on browsers that don't support CSS3.

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://yoursite.com/where/you/stash/scripts/curvycorners.js"></script>

JQuery - While I'm on the scripts and making browsers work subject, let me include this one. I'm not smart enough yet to know all about it, but I know it's a good thing.

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.6.4/jquery.min.js"></script>

F12 - While you are viewing your masterpiece through Chrome or IE (can't speak for others), hit this button to make magic happen. It will show you a number of things. So far I've found it most useful for tweaking margin and padding settings, but I am sure it can do more.

That just about covers what I've learned about setting up to make websites the hard way. Hopefully it gives you a little bit of a jump start, you will surpass me, and write me a letter that kindly explains how I'm doing it wrong. It will be great. We'll share the things we learn and be better for it. Might even help out some of these lazy eavesdroppers.

Thanks,
Other Half of 2 Dudes 1 Blog