Category: Metal (Technical)

I’ve been thinking at taking another look at Free and Open Source PHP shopping cart applications, and my list came down to osCommerce, ZenCart and CRE Loaded. If anyone’s Googling this post looking for answers, they’re likely to be as disappointed as I was. There seems to be no up-to-date comparison between them, beyond some… Continue reading ZenCart, osCommerce or CRE Loaded?

I was sad to hear today that Tectonic magazine has been discontinued. It’s only the print magazine that’s disappearing, the website will continue, and perhaps even do prosper as the small team focuses on just that aspect. It appears that advertisers weren’t coming to the party. As the publishers said: The decision to close Tectonic… Continue reading Tectonic magazine discontinued

As part of my metamorphosis into a neurotic accountant, I get to use FNB’s internet banking service on a weekly basis. I quite like their site. It’s much simpler than Nedbank’s, for example, and everything is where you’d expect it to be, available with minimal fuss. However, at the moment it has one rather fatal… Continue reading FNB Internet Banking

It’s an ironic title, before anyone gets too excited… I’m sourcing machines for a small office, looking for standard low-end machines, and I’ve been quite impressed with the willingness of hardware suppliers to install Linux. Of course I could do it myself, but I’d really like the supplier to do it on all the machines!… Continue reading The year of the Linux desktop

One of the projects I’ve been involved in for a while, IOL Technology, has finally seen the light of day. There’s still lots to come, and a few loose ends to iron out, but the site is up. Feedback, scathing or otherwise, is welcome!

Free Software Magazine recently ran an article entitled Wengophone: VoIP done right, with the subtitle Dreaming about a free software competitor for Skype? Maybe your wait is over. It’s a dream I share. Again, as with my world cup prejudices, that got me questioning why exactly I share that dream. Sometimes its worth questioning core… Continue reading Greed and need, or why I’m excited about Wengophone, the ‘open Skype’

If anyone has a bit of dosh to spare, and is interested in the esoteric art of search engine optimisation, some of my old colleagues at IOL, now with Purple Cow, are offering an SEO training course.

Helmar let me know about the recent launch of Qunu. Qunu is an interesting idea that aims to connect help-seekers and experts via their IM clients, and is based on Jabber. For help-seekers, the benefit is that help is more immediate. No more messing around on forums and waiting days to be told RTFM. For… Continue reading Qunu launches

I read a Tectonic article today about a local chapter of Drupal being launched. It’s pleasing to see that there’s a Drupal core developer, Adrian Rossouw, living at Cape Town. I’ve just started playing with Drupal, and Adrian is planning to give a presentation at the BarCamp to be held in June in Cape Town.… Continue reading BarCamp, Drupal and a choice to make

After reading an article about memory leaks in Firefox extensons, I decided to look for updates to my existing 20 or so extensions. None of mine were in the guilty list, but I hadn’t updated for a while, so thought I’d see what improvements were made. About 8 or so of my extensions had updates.… Continue reading Firefox extension woes