Month: August 2008

I just read this story about a hit-and-run. As I read over the story, I feel as if I am missing something. It claims that this man hit the child on the left side of his vehicle. I would think of this as the drivers side, and others agree with me. If that be the case, there are only two ways the child would have gotten hit… either they were in the median, or that one particular child was in the road itself. I suppose the man could have gone off the side of the road and hit the one child while the other’s dove out of the way. I certainly would not want them to be my friends if they couldn’t pull me out of the way with them or warn me. Now, I am not claiming that this man did not hit the child. Just that the stupidity of the children should be taken into account. Walking in the road or median at night on a major highway is not the smartest thing to do. I really feel as if this story is trying to say “this horrible thoughtless man killed this child” instead of just reporting on the facts.

I don’t understand why business want to be like every other business. I was reading a recent Ledger article about rent increases in a building in downtown to meet “market rates”. “Dye said all of this is standard business practice.” That statement ticks me off. I don’t want my business to be “like everyone else” and I strive to be different. If I was like everyone else, then why would my customers bother to use me? Why can’t they just go somewhere else if we are all using the same “business practice” or the same rate. Needless to say, this Dye character will soon be trying to find new tenants and not receiving ANY rent, as they just can’t afford to stay there, or more likely, in business.

Ok, so I have a lot of customers with AOL. Some of them want to get rid of it. So they ask if there is a way to get their favorites out, and their contacts. Nope. AOL does not have an export function so to speak. So I am making one. I discovered you can take your AOL Favorites, and back them up into a “PFC” file. Well, I’ve been looking at this file. The contents is some soft of plain text flatfile database. I’ve found the pattern in the file in the hex code. I should be able to easily write a PHP file that uploads the file, then decodes it, and then can generate either an HTML file to import into Firefox, or a ZIP file containing a bunch of .url files for IE. Then I can develop it into a website so that there is an actual FREE tool for people to do this. Then I will find out more about the AOL Address Book. I don’t see how I could be breaking any law, unless it is the DMCA. I am certainly not breaking any terms with AOL, as I am not an AOL user. The only thing that makes me question it is… why hasn’t someone done this sooner?