beer planet

If you haven't heard of Digsby yet, you have probably been living in some kind of a virtual cave or have no friends. Digsby is a multi-network instant messenger application, similar to Trillian, Pidgin (GAIM), or Miranda. I said 'similar', so what makes Digsy special? Reviews I read so far don't give the real reasons and don't dive into the features in depth. Instead, you get a standard load of marketing BS and in the end to you, the user, Digsby may end up being "yet another IM program." Some reviews describe certain features, but so far I haven't seen one that highlighted THE MAIN REASON why Digsby is different. And may I preface it with: finally somebody got a clue. I never before wanted to write about any other IM client, which already indicates that on the "this is the most awesome meter ever" meter, Digsby is floating somewhere at the top.

The main reason to use Digsby

1. Digsby saves all information, including IM names, groups, nicks, its own client settings, themes, etc (of course this excludes the password). If I'm logged in from two places, Digsby shows both away messages (at least in the widget). It just god damn works. Remember Trillian or Pidgin? You make 10 groups on your home PC, stick 50 people in each, then go to your laptop at work and nothing is the same as it is at home! Digsby to the rescue.

Notice how I'm logging into a Digsby account, which will be used to retrieve and sync all of my settings.

Other reasons (everyone on Digg loves top 10 lists, right?)

2. Digsby seems to have great fast developers really in touch with the community. Any time there is a problem, they push a message to all users that comes in a form of a Digsby announcement popup. They try to fix problems and usually do it fast. There are bugs here and there but they're nothing critical. If you tried Digsby a few months ago and didn't like it for some reason, I encourage you to give it another try - they really do develop fast. From revision numbers, it seems Digsby developers use SVN in the 15,000 revision number range (that sounds pretty active) - hooray! I can monitor how relatively active Digsby is by comparing this number from time to time. When was the last time Trillian released anything that wasn't a miniscule bug fix? Trillian Astra reminds me of Perl 6 (ha ha, programmer joke).

3. For the first time ever I feel comfortable combining the same people that have multiple IM accounts into one entity (and renaming them whatever I want). I don't really care what IM pops up on their side as long as it reaches the destination. I can also arrange the IM accounts for that person in the order of IM preference, so if AIM is on top and MSN is on the bottom, Digsby will show the AIM icon next to their name, and if they're not on AIM, then MSN. You get the point. I can always pick which account to send from and to at any point during the conversation.

Thaya, you're now popular (Sorry!). And a freak, with so many accounts. Do I give a crap which of his 7 accounts Thaya is logged into? That's right, I don't.

4. Digsby supports Facebook chat just as if it were AIM or MSN (except people sign on and off a lot more often and you can't delete them from the list). It also supports Facebook, twitter, and MySpace (ugh) mini-feed-like updates straight to my desktop. In fact, I get to actually see every Facebook update, which is not the case with the mini-feed (it filters way too much). Additionally, I can set my current status without logging into facebook.com.

5. The Digsby widget, yeah, check it out on the right. There's no need for you to be logged into anything to send me a message. And the cool part is that all visitors show up right in my list the moment they enter the site and disappear the moment they leave, so I know how many people are online at any given time. Feel free to try it out. I already had a few interesting discussions with visitors who are complete strangers and I'm loving it. You can even consider it a mini live tech support.

6. I LOVE how you can customize where and which icons show up in your IM list. Online status, IM network, and a mini buddy icon, left, right, any combination. Such a fine grained seemingly small feature but a very nice touch.

7. Reply box in IM popups. I just type my short answer in there if I don't want to bother popping the main chat window back up. Now if only there was a keyboard shortcut to activate that little box (who wants to mouse any more?)…

8. The first client where updating my Winamp status to all the networks actually works. Yes, others may have it too but so far everything I've tried was buggy. For example, Google talk updates once, and then forgets about it. Digsby never forgets.

9. Skin support with many customizations. http://digsbies.org/site/project/Skins is a good place to start.

10. New email notifications support for Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo, AOL, IMAP, and POP3. The last 2 are of special interest.

Now my wishlist

Come on Digsby, you can do it!

• a Linux client. It's supposedly coming soon, but how soon? Windows is the only platform supported today.
• Edit: steve from digsby messaged me with this: MSN reconnect bug is fixed and will be pushed in the next update. Reconnect doesn't always work when I get my network back or come back from sleep mode. Just make it work, Digsby. Especially bad is MSN, it just never wants to reconnect (but hey, that was my main complain with Trillian for the past 3 years). I see this a lot:

• RSS feed integration, similar to how Facebook integration works. I want to read planetmysql.org posts as soon as they get there.
• transparency. What's up with that? I want everyone to at least squint trying to read my messages behind my back. Ideally, a window would solidify when it gets focus and go transparent again when it loses it (put it all into settings, though, let me control it).
• I can't italicize, bold, etc a word or a selection. It just does it to all the text I'm typing. That should be common sense.
• Added 06/15/08: off the record mode + encrypted conversations would be really sweet.
• sometimes the contact list changes don't sync fast enough, so if I close Digsby and reopen it, they won't be there. I'd like to see a live save status, something that turns green once everything is synced.
• minimize to tray. I can already close to tray, but I want to minimize to it too - hey, I'm used to it from AIM. Wanna fight about it?
• I'd like to have a setting to not show Digsby in the task bar, like Trillian. There’s a setting for this already that I missed, it’s under ‘Buddy List’, thanks steve from digsby.
• It's not always obvious inside the chat window when a friend goes offline, for instance for AIM. It's also not always obvious if you're IMing someone who is not available (there should be a warning back in response to an IM).
• it's not clear if a person who IMed me is in my contact list. I'd like to know if it's so and which group.
• the close button that suddenly shows up on each tab when I hover is very annoying and sometimes I close IM windows by mistake.

So take Digsby out for a spin, I guarantee you'll like at least something about it.

Updated: July 3rd, 2008

I want to get opinions from outside of my daily circle of people on the best server hardware to use for MySQL. I remember from the conference somebody (Pipes?) mentioning a particular Dell server with multiple disk RAID10 that could supposedly be had for about $6k but I completely misplaced the model number (Frank, did you get my email?).

I know that a multi-disk RAID array with a bunch of fast disks (15k RPM?) is probably the most important method of improving performance, followed by the amount of RAM, so I'm trying to find the best combination/balance of the two. However, server prices on the Internet range so much that I don't even know where to begin to tell a good deal from a bad one. I don't think SSDs can play a role here, because we need at least 200GB of usable space per machine. For comparison, we currently use the following spec: Dual quadcore Intel, 16GB RAM, 200GB RAID1 + 1TB RAID1 using SATA drives (eww?) in a 2U rack (a bit too chunky, isn't it?) made by Zantaz. It performs quite nicely but I think it chokes on the amount of writes way too early.

So, what does everyone think the best configuration is under $10,000? Bonus points if you can provide a link to the vendor site or at least a model number!

Spasibo.

Edit: so, here's the final configuration and quote I got from Silicon Mechanics, which I'm quite happy about. It is way under the $10k budget, so mission accomplished:

• RakX 2U chassis
• 2x Intel Xeon E5420 Quad-core 2.5Ghz, 12MB cache CPUs
• 32GB (16x 2GB) 667Mhz Fully Buffered RAM
• 2x integrated gbit NICs
• IPMI 2.0 remote management card with KVM over LAN
• 3Ware 9690SA-4I RAID controller with 512MB cache and battery backup
• 12x 74GB Seagate Cheetah 15K.5 15KRPM SAS drives
• redundant 700W power supply
• sliding rail kit
• 5 year advance component exchange warranty
• OS RAID: 73GB HW RAID1
• DATA RAID: 365GB HW RAID10

Total price: $6176 + tax, free shipping.

The trip to Mexico (May 22-26) was a total success. I absolutely loved everything about it (except the flight with 2 connections): the resort (link), the people, the ocean, free booze (hello tequila) and unlimited food, climate, service, the Mayan ruins - everything!

The highlights of the trip include:

• visiting Chichen Itza
• Cancun and the Coco Bongo club, (man, that was fun, I've never seen a show like that in a club, even in Vegas). $50-60 buys a ticket in with open bar (it's a good deal judging by the amount of tequila poured into me)!
• walking around Playa Del Carmen, there are a lot of little stores, with a ton of tequila and other presents to buy. The atmosphere on the beach at night, next to a beach-side club was amazing
• did I mention unlimited free alcohol and buffet at our Grand Sunset Princess resort?
• cost effectiveness: $400 plane ticket, $400 resort for 4 nights
• company of my awesome girlfriend and 3 friends (Andy, Sergio, and Serena)

Please proceed here for more pictures.

Our room in Grand Sunset Princess resort in Playa Del Carmen, Mexico:

2005 Honda Accord EX V6 4D Graphite Sedan Leather FULLY LOADED 29K miles

http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/car/715723311.html

Private seller, NOT a dealer:

$17,900
Original owner
Still under Manufacturer's Original 36,000/3 Year Warranty until end of July
29,000 freeway miles (I used to freeway commute to work, use MUNI now)
Clean record - no accidents, absolutely clean
Graphite Pearl exterior / Gray LEATHER interior
An aftermarket iPod adaptor/charger that hooks directly into the audio system, professionally installed (see pics)
Save $$$ - Honda suggests changing oil every 5000 miles (not 3000) and fill up with only Regular 87 gas (the cheapest grade, not Premium), as the engine has been configured to use Regular gas best

VIN: 1HGCM66595A071143, feel free to carfax it

Additional Information:

5% Black tint on rear windows
5 speed Automatic transmission
6 Cylinder 240HP 3.0L SOHC VTEC engine - a V6 that's not a gas guzzler
Drive-by-Wire Throttle SystemÖ
Cruise control
Dual-Stage Front Airbags (SRS)
Front Side Airbags with Passenger-Side Occupant Position Detection System (OPDS)
Side Curtain Airbags
Anti-Lock Braking System (ABS)
Electronic Brake Distribution System (EBD)
Traction Control System (TCS)
Air Conditioning with Dual-Zone Automatic Climate Control System
Power windows
Power door locks
Power mirrors
Power Moonroof with Tilt Feature
Driver's Seat with 8-Way Power Adjustment
Driver's Seat Adjustable Lumbar Support
Driver's Seat with Power Height Adjustment
Passenger's Seat with 4-Way Power Adjustment
16" Alloy Wheels
Security System
Remote Entry System with Power Window Control
Tilt and Telescopic Steering Column
120-Watt AM/FM/6-Disc In-Dash CD Changer Audio System: with 6 Speakers, including a Subwoofer

Various points:

Very well maintained with all service records, performed mostly at the Honda Dealers.

There are no engine, body, etc mods - everything is factory installed except for the tint and the iPod adaptor.
You will definitely love this car, it drives really well and produces just the right amount of power for city driving. There is nothing wrong with the car, I'm selling it because I just bought a house right on a MUNI line and can't justify owning a car anymore.
Note that there's a small scrape on the left side of the front bumper, which can be see on one of the photos, but it's really quite minor.
Buyer (you) takes care of all financing separately - I need cash/cashier's check in my hand, again this is a private party sale, not dealer.

Take a look at the pics below! (click them to see larger size)

Contact me to arrange a test drive (serious buyers only):

Cell: (415) 366-0447 (any time) *preferred*
Email: use the contact form on the site

via http://www.flickr.com/photos/11192901@N06/1317037389/ and http://www.makeuseof.com/tech-fun/i-see-something-called-internetpic/.