Netflix streaming sans PC

Not too long ago, Netflix streaming was limited to PC’s. I shrugged that feature of Netflix off considering a) the movie selection was mediocre at best, and b) I didn’t feel it was worth firing up VMware Fusion or Boot Camp. A few weeks ago, the clouds opened and instant streaming was made available to Mac users (Silverlight required). Finally. Shortly thereafter, the Xbox update rolls through and you no longer need a computer to stream, all you need is your game console.

The integration comes by way of a Netflix "game" download. Once installed, you associate your Xbox with your Netflix account using a unique code submitted to Netflix activation. Once completed, any movies in your Watch Instantly queue are displayed on your television. I was surprised at how quickly movies loaded and began playing. I can’t wait for HD content.

Clouds overhead

Those clouds that cleared when Netflix provided streaming support for both PC & Mac users started rolling back in after the Xbox update. Sony had to rain on the parade. Chalk it up to the rivalry between the PS3 and Xbox, politics, or simple playground bitterness. Sony knew Netflix streaming support for the Xbox was on the way, why wait until after the rollout to request Sony / Columbia Pictures be unavailable on the Xbox? Sony, until you fix your slow as molasses content delivery network, support third party services directly on the console, and fix your sad browser, your living room supremacy will struggle to see the light of day.

Noted

Microsoft, please include a disk properties info panel so we know how much HDD space we’re going to sacrifice installing a game to disk. Kevin found out Call of Duty, World at War required roughly 5 GB. Calculating disk usage now means checking your HDD stats before and immediately after a install.

If you are an existing Xbox user - yay or nay to the current update? If you are not an existing Xbox owner, are you getting the itch to drop some coin a new system? If you are an existing Netflix customer, are you looking at an Xbox if you don’t already have one?

From my own experiences over the last two months, there isn’t a whole lot to like about intermittent account access - both via web or IMAP client. Previously, I preached the goodness of Gmail, often looking for ways to embrace and integrate the service into every day use.

• 5ThirtyOne - Google Hosted Email (2006)
• Mailplane, Gmail will replace your desktop email client (2007)
• Rich HTML email signatures straight from Gmail (2007)
• How-to: Proper Gmail IMAP for iPhone & Apple Mail (2007)

Gmail is still a great email option over the likes of Hotmail or Yahoo. In reality, I have been making very little use of my actual Gmail email address for communication. I relied on the service as a central repository to index and manage multiple email accounts / aliases. I realized that if the "cloud" went down for maintenance or was disabled without warning, I was or would be SOL. Paranoia? Sure. But if you have the power to administrate your own services, why wouldn’t you? Email habits and requirements change. Mine have changed so much so that I’ve returned to self hosted email. Media Temple email + IMAP support.

Meet SpamAssassin, the frontline defense against internet scum

Back in August 2008, Media Temple deployed the Cloudmark Authority plugin for SpamAssassin.

The Cloudmark Authority plug-in for SpamAssassin increased Media Temple’s catch rate of spam, phishing and viruses by 80 percent and drove down false positives to almost immeasurable levels. Cloudmark’s high accuracy is due to a unique combination of Advanced Message FingerprintingTM technology and real-time corroborated feedback from Cloudmark’s Global Threat NetworkTM system, the world’s largest live threat monitoring system.

Back when I initially transitioned 5thirtyone.com from Dreamhost to Media Temple (2006), I tried the self hosted email route. It was as if the spam floodgates from hell had been opened. I had no choice but to rely on SpamSieve to clean-up where the server filtering fell short. Well short of expectations. Around that time, I had just begun hearing about Gmail and soon after adopted the service.

Fast forward to the present. Media Temple email is in top shape, IMAP support is working flawlessly, and all of my non-Gmail accounts reside on a server that I control. The improved SpamAssassin is working well enough for me to access my accounts via IMAP in Mail.app without the need for Junk Mail filtering or SpamSieve (server side filtering required! - see below). I may have just jinxed everything with that statement, but filters will continue to be trained to offset the increase of potential spam.

Server side filtering with procmail

A SpamAssassin installation that is properly identifying and tagging spam is of little help if tagged emails continue to land in your inbox. There are no automated filters out of the box with self hosted email. While you could setup a desktop filter to properly sort spam, what about mobile devices like the iPhone? One solution would be a desktop client running 24/7 applying rules on emails (IMAP). An obvious waste of resources. The second more logical solution is server side filtering.

Russ shares the two step process for automatically filtering spam tagged by SpamAssassin [server side] with procmail. Shared here for my own personal archiving. You’ll need access to your DV account via SSH. Enable developer tools from within your Media Temple account (if you have not done so already).

The first step requires the creation of a .procmailrc file within your email user account. I prefer vim over vi so:

vim /var/qmail/mailnames/your-domain.com/your-user/.procmailrc

Insert the following. Take note of the .Spam directory that I’ve specified (change if necessary).

MAILDIR=/var/qmail/mailnames/your-domain.com/your-user/Maildir
DEFAULT=${MAILDIR}/
SPAMDIR=${MAILDIR}/.Spam/
LOGFILE=${MAILDIR}/procmail.log
LOG=”— Logging ${LOGFILE} for ${LOGNAME} “
# All mail tagged as spam (eg. with a score higher than the set threshold)
# is moved to the designated spam folder
:0
* ^X-Spam-Status: Yes.*
${SPAMDIR}

The second step requires editing the existing .qmail file for the user account:

vim /var/qmail/mailnames/your-domain.com/your-user/.qmail

The content of the file should look like this:

| /usr/local/psa/bin/psa-spamc accept
|preline /usr/bin/procmail -m -o .procmailrc

With server side filtering, you no longer have to worry about a barrage of junk mail making it to your inbox for manual sorting. A huge relief especially for mobile users.

The price of self hosted email vs. hosted services like Gmail

Let’s all be honest. The reason why Gmail spam filtering is so awesome is because of volume. The sheer volume of users continually teaching Google which emails are spam, and which emails are not. When you’re running your own email server, there is quite a bit more work involved to teach SpamAssassin - Spam vs. Ham.

Like any other spam filter, there is some training required. For each IMAP enabled account, I’ve created unique mailboxes / folders for training SpamAssassin. sa-learn comes in handy for training the Bayesian classifier. Media Temple uses the Maildir format (source).

sa-learn --no-sync [--spam or --ham] [folder/{cur,new}]

In my case since I’ve setup LearnSpam (for emails that slipped by SpamAssassin) and IsHam (for safe emails to learn):

sa-learn --no-sync --spam ~/Maildir/.LearnSpam/{cur,new}

and

sa-learn --no-sync --ham ~/Maildir/.IsHam/{cur,new}

Are you still using Gmail as your main email service? Or, are you utilizing your own hosted email, server side and desktop filtering?

I’ll be honest and say that the 8 GB SSD, 512 MB RAM, 3-cell battery configuration on sale is nothing to brag about. But $50-$60 on eBay will score you a nice 1.8″ HDD and extra ram to bump the performance up. Replace the Linpus OS for Ubuntu or OS X (if you have access to an external DVD-ROM drive) and then you have something to brag about.

Do you already have a netbook? Are you living in the "cloud" with an Acer, Asus, HP, or something else?

01. Optimized code for maintainability & indexability

Invest time (and research if necessary) in writing clean code. Doing so will reduce the amount of time wasted on debugging, ensure browser consistency & compatibility, allow for search engines to crawl your pages more effectively, and save time (no wasted time if code is easy to traverse and you know where everything is).

• W3 Schools - Resource for anyone interested in dropping all-in-one editors like Dreamweaver. Online tutorials & references.
• Break or prevent bad habit(s) - plain text editors: BBEdit (Mac), TextMate (Mac), or Notepad++ (Win).

02. Code indexability taken a little further - SEO

There is a lot of chatter concerning "search engine optimization". The SEO goal is to maximize traffic referral from search engines. Fortunately, WordPress - by default - provides a lot of the basics to ensure that search engines see your content. Yoast put together a thorough guide on WordPress SEO for reference.

• All in One SEO Pack (plugin) - Automatically generates meta tags and titles.
• Google XML Sitemaps (plugin) - verytime you edit or create a post, your sitemap is updated and all major search engines that support the sitemap protocol, like ASK.com, Google, MSN Search and YAHOO, are notified about the update.
• Google Webmaster Central - Better understand how Google works + tools to optimize your site.

Recommendation for code organization in templates: (1) header / navigation, (2) main content, (3) secondary nav + extras.

03. Simplify WordPress site administration

The WordPress admin dashboard works well when you’re in front of a computer. But how about when you’re mobile? Rather than sitting down at a Hotspot, why not simplify the management of your site? It’s all about rich mobile handsets and mobile internet.

• Clean Notifications (plugin) - Mike Davidson contributes his solution to heavy comment moderation emails. Notifications are reformatted with a reduced visual footprint.
• iPhone / Mobile Admin (plugin) - Together with Clean Notifications, mobile users can now manage their WordPress site(s) from their back pocket.
• WordPress for iPhone - Write posts, upload photos, and edit from your iPhone. Still no comment moderation though.
• Moderator (plugin + desktop) - A WordPress plugin + Adobe AIR desktop app for that brings comment moderation to your computer desktop via Blogging Pro.

04. Improve the built in WordPress search bar

For some, the integrated search feature in WordPress falls short. By default, search queries are limited to posts with no support for booleans or indexing pages. The resolution / solution (depending on how you look at it) requires installing plugins or opting to use an external search service to index content.

• Search Everything (plugin) - Picking up where WordPress left off, Search Everything offers configuration options to index pages, categories, tags, drafts, excerpts, custom fields, and attachments.
• Google Custom Search - Use to replace or supplement the existing WordPress search. The power of Google.. Without the aesthetic coherence.
• Lijit (plugin) - Search powered by Google + the addition of providing your "other" social sites as search results. E.g. a query for baseball on your WordPress site will display results from your blog and photos tagged baseball on your Flickr account. Also lacks visual coherence with your design - results are displayed as an overlay.

05. Understand traffic

Analytics data is no longer for statistics junkies. Understanding your visitors is vital to the growth and success of your website. Compare traffic figures prior to and after the implementation of new featured content containers, advertising links, design changes, and or content focus. Understand where readers are coming from, know how long they’re staying, and see where they’re going. Are visitors landing on your home page and promptly leaving? Or, are they reading and exploring older content? Questions like these can be answered by collecting and understanding visitor data.

• Mint - Beautiful analytics package + extensions via Peppers.
• Google Analytics + Google Analytics for WordPress (plugin) - Google Analytics cann be run sans plugin but without loses the ability to track outbound links from within posts, comment author links, links within comments, blogroll links and more.
• Crazy Egg - User behavior tracking and visualization.

06. Promote similar, related, or completely random content

Congratulations, you have fresh eyes on your site. Why not try and lead your new visitor into the archives to continue reading?

• The content "explore" block - Utilize built in WordPress functions to promote related content to a visitor. Link to content which shares similar categories and tags.
• WordPress Related Posts (plugin) - This plugin goes beyond using tags as links to similar content. Add a list of related posts to your RSS feed, or anywhere else in your template to link with titles.
• Random Redirect (plugin) - Create an attractive button to click + this plugin to link to random posts in your archives.

07. Improve the discussion

Visitors are more inclined to explore content which has corresponding comment activity. The current iteration of WordPress supports Gravatars by default. Custom avatars coupled with select plugins and visual accoutrements transform comments into a valuable aspect of a published article.

• Subscribe to Comments (plugin) - At some point or another, we have all contributed to a discussion and never gone back to check for a reply or rebuttal. Subscribe to comments provides visitors with an option to follow a comment conversation from their email inbox.
• DISQUS (plugin) - A comment aggregation service with support for threaded replies. A direct replacement for the standard WordPress comments backend.

08. Combat spam

As of this post, the site has has over 5,500 comments / trackbacks. A small percentage in contrast to the number of spam filling up the moderation queue. WordPress ships with Akismet by default, but there are recommendations.

• Generally spam tends to offer up a nice collection of links mixed in with random garbage. For added moderation protection, reduce the number of permitted links in comments. Settings > Discussion > Comment Moderation - "Hold a comment in the queue if it contains 2 or more links". Change 2 to 1 if you’re willing to make sure safe comments are erroneously left in the queue.
• Defensio (plugin) - Similar features as Akismet. A spam filtering service which cross references flagged comments against a database of known spam.
• Postable (pre-comment) - If you anticipate discussions which might include code examples from readers, provide a link to Postable which converts code into a blog comment friendly format.

09. Offer more opportunities to connect & meet readers

The web is social. Providing the means for readers to connect and interact with you outside of your blog creates a stickiness that may translate into increased traffic. Use your WordPress site as a platform to represent your online footprint.

• Brightkite Location (plugin) - Fire Eagle and Twitter integrated Brightkite lets users update their status + whereabouts in real-time. Brightkite Location adds your most recent check-in to your site (links to your Brightkite profile).
• Twitter Tools (plugin) - two way integration of Twitter. Pulls a digest of Tweets down as a blog post, or pushes Tweets to the Twitter service.
• ShareThis - Provides readers with a myriad of options to push your content to their favorite social services.
• SimpleLife (plugin) - A "lifestream" of your social activities - Last.fm, Facebook, Delicious, Flickr, and more.

10. Reduce load times, prepare for traffic

Whether you’re planning a site for constant high traffic or throwing a site together for friends & family, WordPress performance plugins will improve load times and reduce server resource requirements - which is never a bad thing.

• What is web caching and why is it important? - Wikipedia
• WP Super Cache (plugin) & WP Cache (plugin) - WordPress caching benchmark results for both vs. a vanilla WordPress install.
• Paged Comments (plugin) - Technically, not a performance plugin. However, paged comments will reduce page load time for articles which attract hundreds of comments. Example post with 382 comments.

What do you generally do after a vanilla WordPress install? [digg this]

The problem? A recent Time Machine restore which failed to recreate the following directory:

/private/var/log/apache2

The fix was quite simple. Apparently restoring from a Time Machine backup is not as complete as Apple would have you believing.

sudo mkdir /private/var/log/apache2

The fix is rather simple, but altogether an extra step that Time Machine users should not have to bother with.

Personally, while I continue to let Time Machine with a WD 750GB external connected to a Apple AirPort Extreme do its work in the background (on my home network), I’ve rolled SuperDuper & Jungle Disk into the backup mix. Redundant you might say? Maybe… But complete peace of mind.

Are you backing up data regularly? Keep an eye on Reserve Chute for backing up your data in the "cloud".

Without going into detail concerning elements that your site should have, let’s look at one element that all blogs can leverage for increased page views. How do you get readers to explore content beyond their current view? By including a simple block element that introduces content before / after the current post, or articles deep within the archives. What is this simple block element comprised of?

• Previous post - reverse chronological (if one exists)
• Next post - chronological (if one exists)
• Posts sharing the same categories
• Posts with similar tags

If you browse the WordPress codex, or explore the individual files inside the default theme each installation includes, you’ll notice all of the required functions needed to create a simple "explore" - similar to what I have implemented on 5thirtyone.com. It really is just a matter of collection the functions, adding a little semantic markup, and styling to taste. The functions necessary are:

	<?php previous_post_link('%link') ?>

Codex: Used on single post permalink pages, this template tag displays a link to the previous post which exists in chronological order from the current post.

	<?php next_post_link('%link') ?>

Codex: Used on single post permalink pages, this template tag displays a link to the next post which exists in chronological order from the current post.

	<?php the_category(', ') ?>

Codex: Displays a link to the category or categories a post belongs to. This tag must be used within The Loop.

	<?php the_tags( '', ', ', ''); ?>

Codex: First available with WordPress Version 2.3, this template tag displays a link to the tag or tags a post belongs to. If no tags are associated with the current entry, the associated category is displayed instead. This tag should be used within The Loop.

Put it all together

Four simple functions placed together create an invaluable resource for readers to explore your archived content from various slices.

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8

	<?php if (have_posts()) : while (have_posts()) : the_post(); ?>
	<ul class="exploreThese">
		<li>Previous: <?php previous_post_link('%link') ?></li>
		<?php /* if next post exists */ next_post_link('<li>Next: %link</li>'); ?>
		<li>Category: <?php the_category(', ') ?></li>
		<li>Tag: <?php the_tags( '', ', ', ''); ?></li>
	</ul>
	<?php endwhile; else: endif; ?>

The markup above generates an unstyled unordered list which when rendered provides:

• Line 1 & 8: Standard WordPress loop - required if you are re-using this code outside of the standard loop in single.php.
• Line 3: Title (link) of a previous post.
• Line 4: Title (link) of the next post. If there are no newer posts, the entire line is ignored. Thanks Ronald.
• Line 5: Renders assigned categories (comma separated). Links to an archive page for posts sharing the same category.
• Line 6: Renders assigned tags (comma separated). Each tag links to an archive page for posts sharing the same tags.

Drop the block of code somewhere inside single.php so that WordPress knows to generate the proper links. Note that if you do plan on inserting the code outside of the standard loop, lines 1 & 8 are required.

Expand on the explore block

Looking for more options to offer your readers? Check out some of these functions and plugins to add to the explore block: wp_dropdown_categories, wp_get_archives, wp_tag_cloud, Related Posts, or Random Redirect. Hopefully there is enough to expand on the idea of the reader explore block on your own. Feel free to drop any questions in the comments. [Digg this]

The Android Market business and program policies also include an item that says users can return any application for a full refund within 24 hours of the time of purchase. In the absence of a trial version of applications, this offer will let users return an application that might not deliver exactly what they expected.

A 24 hour window for Android users to act on buyers remorse by returning applications which fail to meet expectations if a trial version is unavailable. I see two great one-ups over Apple’s execution of the app store here: 1) trial versions of software, and 2) 24 hour period for refunds. Common consumer right(s).

Despite enjoying the iPhone 99% of the time, the final 1% when I receive a bank statement - which reminds me of app store purchases screaming FAIL - is not so great. I’ve learned to offset bad apps by skipping the morning coffee run and drinking drip instead.

The choices for finding worthwhile apps relies heavily on feedback from others:

• Trust reviews within the App Store. Until recently, app reviews were open to anyone. Apple smartened up and now requires that customers purchase / download before reviewing. I may be wrong, but the overall weighted ratings for apps may still be calculated based on prior reviews from potential non-users.
• Trust reviews on blogs. With the increasing number of fluff apps making their way into the App Store, it is hard to keep tabs on applications with real value. Generally, if an app is good enough for an honorable mention or review on high traffic blog it must be worthwhile. Right?

Feedback and reviews from others are great, but actual hands on time before making an assessment of whether or not that .99 cent tip calculator to the $999 joke of an app I Am Rich (removed) is worth keeping gives the consumer real control.

When I first started reading stories similar to Trism raking in $250,000 in a little over 2 months, I began to wonder what percentage of these hefty take homes should have been refund credits had the model been in place.

One man’s garbage is another man’s treasure… Or so the Cliché goes. I have bought a lot of apps. A couple keepers, a few mehs, and a couple pages worth of garbage. Some remain on the phone just because I feel guilty. $140. The total racks up quickly. A lucrative business model for both Apple and developers.

What are your thoughts on the App Store? How much have you dropped? And of the total dropped, what percentage would you have gladly accepted a refund for?

Yes, I am aware of the fact that most of the high profile App Store releases offer "lite" versions. To those developers, thank you!

Things that make me want the updated MacBook:

• New manufacturing process for the aluminum case.
• A design which blends the MacBook Air + iMac.
• Increased graphics power with NVIDIA.
• Multi-Touch glass trackpad

Things that make me bury the idea of getting the updated hardware:

• Constantly reminding myself that I am never content with a purchase. Not "buyers remorse", it’s the itch to have the NEW.
• The card that would carry the weight of the purchase is now going in a glass of water. Soon to be buried under lima beans in the freezer. Note to self, buy lima beans and brussels sprouts.

So come out and admit it. Are the updates appealing enough to warrant a purchase, or nothing more than a shoulder shrug? By the way, Apple… Please come out with a netbook. My frankenstein Acer Aspire One with OS X falls short.

That Apple LED Cinema Display looks mighty tasty… must resist.

So what’s going on with 5thirtyone.com?

• Quite busy with work at Cirqe (the reason for recent lack of activity).
• Migrated the site - Media Temple DV 3.0 to the DV 3.5 server.
• Moved back to Mint for site stats.
• Experimented with Amazon S3 as an external image host. Quickly dropped because of latency issues. Integrated as an automated backup target for my personal computer though.
• Took a break from Google Adsense. More on why later.
• New look uploaded today. Thanks to Brand Spankin New for the mini icons & Blueprint CSS for the PSD grid.

The site is still missing some core features. Specifically "search". I’m experimenting with a few different options, one being Lijit. Anyone have feedback? Plenty more to update but being 2:00 AM, it’s time to call it a night.

I did all that. Like the average mid twenty year old, I had only scratched the surface of traveling for vacation. I have visited California… a puddle jump away from Seattle. I had gone International. Then again, driving 2 hrs. to the Canadian border is well, like driving to Portland. I assumed that my real travels would not happen until the later half of this century.

Fortunately, my assumption was all wrong. I had a rare opportunity to travel [now]. A real vacation that would take me outside of the country and into a completely different world. An opportunity to experience food, culture, and people in three countries - Vietnam, Thailand, and Korea.

It has been a full week after the fact. 34,000+ miles flown / driven in 2.5 weeks through 6 cities in 3 countries. Sans jet-lag and body / mind fully recovered, I can now sit down and share thoughts, highlights, sights, and experiences.

Pre-departure preparation and planning

Malaria laden mosquito’s, street vendor food triggered travelers diarrhea, and extreme hot / humid weather. Call Syl and I overly cautious, but [looking back] we were "duped" hook, line, and sinker into believing that we were putting ourselves into a very vulnerable situation concerning all things health related. Not that the change of environment would have an impact, but the local Travelers Clinic did a real good job of instilling "worry / caution". "Don’t eat street vendor food." "Going outside? Apply a layer of sunscreen, a second layer of bug repellent (anything with Deet), and a third layer of sunscreen." "X country has [insert disease name], we recommend [insert medication]."

By the time we had left the clinic, we an additional $400 hole in our wallets to cover vaccinations and medications. Did we end up needing everything? Not really. Was the peace of mind worth it? Of course.