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qgyen.net

the blog of ken robertson

After my post yesterday, I think I came up with a domain name that I like: invalidlogic.com

You got to look at it as a bit of a play on words. It could be invalid logic, or the way I have the title, In Valid Logic.

I think I'll stick with it. Better than some of the other ones I was considering. At any rate, hop on over to the new site, and don't forget to update your subscription!

As of now, I will no longer be blogging on qgyen.net. It has been a good run.

All my old content will remain live though.

Finding a new domain is so hardApril 10

One thing I've been trying to do for a long time is to find a new domain name to move my blog too. One that is catchy, easy easy to remember, short, .com, et all. It is way harder than it sounds, really.

Qgyen is kind of old and out dated. It has all my Google juice, but that is mainly because I've had it for ~8-9 years. But it is just a word I made up. No one knows how to pronounce it, I don't give it out to people via word-of-mouth since it sounds dumb when I say it, and no one can spell it. Looking at my Google Analytics, often times people get to my blog by going to Google and searching for "ken robertson". Even Rich Mercer has told me he gets to my site by Googling for my name.

If people you know (friends/coworkers) get to your site by Googling your name, you need an easier domain!

But finding a good domain these days isn't easy. First, my name is too long, and even then, the .com is taken (I have the .name though, but who uses .name?). I had thought of a few others, but when thinking about the names later, they sounded too corny, or just didn't seem fitting.

The two main contenders I came up with were linkedlabs.com and explosivethoughts.com. Linked Labs just sounded kinda catchy, but I am not a lab. I'm not linked to any labs. But they sound good together. Then I got explosivethoughts.com... it sounded catchy at the time. Kind of like "this idea is so hot, it'll explode" or the tagline

Google App Engine and its impactApril 8

I've been doing some reading about Google's announcement of their "App Engine" platform for hosting scalable applications. Some of the reactions so far are pretty interesting. Partially of note, I see a number of places saying it will be the "Amazon killer", or "hosting killer", and even that it is "Geocities 2.0". In my opinion, all of them are wrong.

Google isn't going to kill anything. The hosting market is very vast, with diverse offerings, new consumers every day, and players always coming and going. They'll add a new dynamic for sure, but they'll be perfect for some, and won't be a good fit for others.

Easy scalability is now an issue. Up until recently, sites that needed to scale usually followed this (or a similar route): come up with idea, start site, begins to catch on, get VC (or money from somewhere), build (or pay someone for) a scalable infrastructure. Now, a super small (even single developer) can build an application that goes from zero to hero in mere weeks, especially with the advent of sites like Facebook.

Google vs. Hosting Companies

Google's target is different than your average hosting company. Google's specifically called out they're targeting developers and scalable web applications. At your regular $3.95/mo hosting company like GoDaddy, Dreamhost, or other small companies, this isn't something their customers are after. Su

ASP.NET MVC in Meow MixApril 4

I hate databind, I hate postback, MVC please deliver.

Alright, it doesn't exactly have rhythm, but it popped in my head after wrestling a little databind/postback related bug this morning.

Quick thoughts on the iPhone SDKApril 2

I know the iPhone SDK is basically old news now, but having recently got my iPhone, I have a few thoughts of my own.

First, I have downloaded it, however I haven't used it other than messing with the simulator for web development. Initially, I was disappointed with the lack of the interface builder, though they did recently update it with interface builder support. Hopefully some of the sample code gets updated to show how to do it that way. I've done interfaces-by-code and it is not really fun. My experience was with Qt in C++ on Linux back around 2000/2001.

What I really think will make a difference is the iTunes App Store. There have been a lot of complains about it, and about the application process, the $99 fee, and their somewhat selective approvals of applicants. The blog posts I've read about it pointed mostly to the processes for approval and such still being put into place, so the initial 'rejections' were more of a postponement. The $99 sucks, true, but I don't think it is that bad. Compared to the development tools I've bough on my own before, it isn't bad, and its cost can get made up with the benefits of the iTunes App Store.

So what makes the store so awesome? Have you ever tried to find and download applications for a mobile device before?

I hadn't downloaded much on my Blackberry, but back when I had various Windows Mobile/Smartphone devices, it was painful. Really, mo