place of nathan.

I have previously talked about my involvement with Joomla!, the most popular open source CMS in the world.
The Joomla! family of sites get a load of traffic–and by a load, i mean, the family of sites is run on three dedicated servers.
Well, this weekend, several of the Joomla! websites were hacked–this included:
joomla.org
help.joomla.org
shop.joomla.org

As you can imagine, this created quite a stir in the community–and created a lot of worries, too, such as, “Is my Joomla! site vulnerable?’

As it turned out, it wasn’t an issue with Joomla! core at all (as is normal when a Joomla! site gets hacked), but was the combination of two things:
1. a faulty custom component used on the shop
2. register globals emulation was on

Each of these three sites which was hacked were all on the same physical server. the other physical servers were not touched.

Pretty interesting little happening on Saturday morning!
All was back up by early Sunday morning. You can read the official core announcement here.

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I’m hardly an Oprah fan, but i thought this post on Opera’s site (from Life coach Cheryl Richardson) was worth sharing with you: Types of Toxic People.

Do you know anyone who fits in to one of those categories? How about someone who fits in to multiple categories? Would it be a true statement to say that the more of Oprah’s categories a person fits in, the more toxic they are? (or, is there only one level of toxicity when dealing with Toxic people?

Are there other types of Toxic People Oprah has omitted?

How do you deal with Toxic People?

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I recently posted this, but thought it was prudent to post again. Please read, and figure out why i posted this again.

500 Bonus Points to the first person who correctly identifies (and posts a comment) as to why I am posting this again!

Vision leaks.
- Andy Stanley

Just because someone bought into a vision at one time, it does not mean they will always remain in tune with that vision, because vision leaks. The excitement slows down, and eventually become frustration.

It is impossible to present the vision too frequently. Vision large and visions for smaller segments of the whole as well.

You can’t share the vision enough. Try it.

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Earlier this week, I had a report that my site was loading at an average of 19 seconds.
The report claimed this was confirmed on multiple computers, Mac and PC, on different browsers and on different Internet connections.
I have tested multiple times and under diverse situations, and the site continues to load quickly, as it always has. I can’t even begin to confirm a slower load. So I bring this to you…

Would you be so kind to leave a comment and let me know if this site loads slow for you. If so, please answer these questions:
1. Are you accessing the Internet via dialup, DSL, cable? (Do you know the name of your ISP?)
2. Are you using a MAC or PC?
3. What browser are you using?

If you’re reading this post via an RSS reader, I would greatly appreciate if you would please take a moment and visit my site and let me know if it’s slow (or fast) for you? Link here.
Thanks so much!

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Earlier this week, Purdue University announced a minature version of the Sharper Image Ionic Breeze, for Computers.

The research, funded by Intel, may be introduced in computers in three years…

The experimental cooling device, which was fabricated on top of a mock computer chip, works by generating ions - or electrically charged atoms - using electrodes placed near one another. The device contained a positively charged wire, or anode, and negatively charged electrodes, called cathodes. The anode was positioned about 10 millimeters above the cathodes. When voltage was passed through the device, the negatively charged electrodes discharged electrons toward the positively charged anode. Along the way, the electrons collided with air molecules, producing positively charged ions, which were then attracted back toward the negatively charged electrodes, creating an “ionic wind.”

This breeze increased the airflow on the surface of the experimental chip.

Link to the Purdue research site.

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Tonight was the Republican Caucus for Waterloo Town Council.

On the first ballot, William (Bill) Hubartt was selected.
On the second ballot, Nathan Diehl was selected.
On the third ballot, Randy Bice was selected.

I am very much looking forward to getting to learn from these men, and look forward to the coming months and years.

Bill Hubartt is actually a distant relative to my wife, whose maiden name is Hubartt. I think, Bill’s grandfather and Emily’s greatgrandfather were cousins once removed. (i think i have that right?)

Anyway, I am very glad the caucus is over. It’s good to move on, and soon you’ll be seeing a sign in my yard…

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I saw in our local paper last night there is a local guy, Matt Ellis, who is getting signatures of all members of the 2007 Super Bowl Champion Indianapolis Colts tattooed all over his body.

He has Tony Dungy’s signature tattooed on his upper arm. So far, he also has tattoos of Hunter Smith, Aaron Moorehead, John Standeford, Keith O’Neil, Bryan Flectcher, Jim Sorgi and Coach Dungy.

His goal is to have the signatures of every single player tattooed on his body.

How weird is that? To have other people’s signatures all over your body? Would you do such a thing?
What would you tell your grandkids in 40 years?

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Tonight is my big night–my first ever political speech.

I am running for Waterloo Town Council, and tonight’s Republican Caucus will choose three of the four candidates to represent the Republican party on the November ballot.

Tonight’s caucus is at 6:30 p.m. at the Waterloo Depot on Van Vleek Street. I would love if you are able to come out and support me. Or, if you don’t like me, please come out anyway and vote for someone else. They are all great people, too.

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Yesterday, I started getting some spam E-mails to my inbox and junk folders.

This would be normal, you’re probably thinking…Well…no, not exactly…I am using a server-side spam filtering software, and it has worked great–I get an average of one spam message a month.

But not the past two days…I have received about ten spam E-mails in the past two days–a 150% increase.

So I’ve been looking into the issue, and it seems my spam filter isn’t working all the time. Sometimes it works fine…sometimes it doesn’t work at all. It’s being jerk to me.

This issue also has seemingly stumped tech support @ my hosting solution…they haven’t been able to provide any concrete solutions at this point, other than to say it doesn’t make much sense…

How many spam messages do you get in your inbox? loads or not loads? (when answering, don’t forget to tell if you use gmail, hotmail, a company account, etc.)

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Emily is on a business trip today to Saint Louis, where she’ll meet with some people from Edward Jones. She’ll be giving a presentation on a new system which they are rolling out.
Emily flew out last night, and will return tonight. So I have been missing her. I greatly enjoy Emily’s company, and it’s been lonely and quiet without her. I tried to keep myself busy by campaigning a bit for Town Council and reading Frontier (thanks to Todd for allowing me to borrow this book!.

But bottom line–I miss my wife and am looking forward to her arrival back home again tonight!

In other news today, My sister Jenny and her two children will be arriving tonight as well–perhaps around the same time as Emily is arriving back. I am looking forward to seeing Jenny and Lauren again, and also seeing and holding my nephew Ruben, whom I haven’t yet met!

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When I ran the 4 sets of 5-minute repeats last night, I ran them with Isaac, who is of very comparable shape to myself. We push each other.

But what if I had done those 5-minute repeats with you? Would you have been pushing me like Isaac was able to? Or, would you be too fast for me (Mike), leaving me unable to keep up? Or, would I not have been pushed at all by your presence on the repeats?

Isn’t this like Christian Community? Not all people are equally in ’spiritual shape’, and this leaves us with the question–do we have community with people in less or more spiritual shape than ourselves?
I suggest the answer is a balance. If you surround yourself with only new, immature Christians, I think you’ll soon find yourself back-peddling to immaturity yourself. Likewise, if you surround yourself with only spiritual giants, it’s quite possible you have a hard time relating to their spirituality, and feel unable to keep up–inadequate.
Which is why, i suggest a balance in community. When you have community with some who are more immature and at the same time, with those who are more mature, you find yourself being challenged, while also able to challenge those under you…Sometimes you challenge, other times, you get challenged.

Never getting challenged to move up yields to stagnation, and stagnation disgusts me.

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