I really wanted to talk about open source software, how it relates to Xavisys and specifically me, why I believe in it, and why I support it. I knew that before I did, I needed to address the issue of profiting from open source. Take the time to read that, it will give you a more accurate picture of my relationship with open source, as well as some tips on how you can benefit from a similar relationship.

I personally love open source, because I love the idea of benefiting others. I enjoy giving someone else an advantage that they wouldn’t otherwise have. Take WordPress for example. It benefits two sets of people, the users who get a better experience and better functionality, as well as the companies and developers who use it as a platform to build on. Sure, some of those companies are competitors, but I want them to succeed too. I certainly don’t want to move ahead in life at the expense of others, I’d much rather move ahead by helping others. In the end we can all benefit. Whenever I hear the saying “It’s lonely at the top,” I can’t help but think that maybe they did something wrong then. If they’d have worked with people on the way to the top, and brought them along for the ride, they wouldn’t be so lonely. That’s my goal.

Do you remember in the good old days, when you went to the market down the street because you knew the owner, John, and his kids went to school with yours? When you went to the mechanic across town, because you new that Dave wouldn’t ever charge you for something you didn’t need? I don’t, I’m only 26 after all, but I wish I did. I’m tired of choosing a company based on impersonal tv commercials, that the owner of the company may or may not have even seen. I don’t want the cheapest, I want the best value, and I don’t necessarily want whatever the latest celebrity wants.

Building a company is hard work, but I’ve decided to draw a line in the sand. Xavisys is going to be a great company because I stand behind it, and I’m an upstanding, honest person that you can get to know.
Read the rest of A Marketing Strategy You Can Believe In »

Over the weekend I had James Pearson (of Surviving America and Acholi Beads) and Steven Homestead staying at my house. I couldn’t help but take advantage of this abundance of creativity I suddenly found at my disposal. As a developer rather than a designer, I find the creative process to be mysterious, possibly even magical. Seeing phrases like “Enslave the Internet” written on the windows of my home, I was far from disappointed as I was treated to a rare opportunity to take a peek inside the creative mind.
Read the rest of Creative Brainstorming Meeting »

I started working some with the Google Maps API, and it’s pretty nice. The documentation is decent, the examples are good, etc. I realized that I’ve come to expect this from Google, so I wanted to take the time instead to point out that this is an exceptional product. For example, I began to look into making the scroll wheel zoom on my maps like they do on the Google Maps site. What does it entail? One line:

map.enableScrollWheelZoom();

However, as great of a product as it is, it seems to be lacking some things. For example, if I want an info window that gives the options to get directions to or from that location, I have to do all that myself. I have to generate the links, and make them replace the content of the info window with a form that I have to make, and I have to make that form run some JavaScript when executed to get the directions. Why? This has GOT to be a common task. Why not build it into the API? However, in the end, that pales in comparison to the real problem. There is no way to validate a Google Maps API key! Instead, you have to load JavaScript using that key, and it uses an alert to announce that the key was bad! No one wants a JavaScript alert to pop up on their page! Since I’m making a WordPress plugin out of this (teaser!), I needed to make sure that the users of my plugin wouldn’t have this issue. I ended up having to override the alert function on the options page for my plugin like this:

var KillAlerts = true;
var realAlert = alert;
var alert = new Function('a', 'if(!KillAlerts){realAlert(a)}');

Then I added a function that runs on page load, re-enables the alerts, and checks if the key was valid:

function load()
{
    // Re-anable alerts
    KillAlerts = false;
 
    if (GBrowserIsCompatible()) {
        // Key is valid
    } else {
        if (G_INCOMPAT) {
            // Key is NOT valid.
        } else {
            // Can't tell if the Google API Key is valid, due to the browser not being compatible with the Google Maps API.
        }
    }
}

There is no reason that it should be that complicated. They should have a web service where I can send a request to verify a key, or their script should set a global variable rather than send an ugly alert! In the end, it’s a great product, but I would have expected that these kind of rough edges would have been taken care of by now. Google, you make me sad.