The Curb

Hi all. I have upgraded my site to a new cms. This move cuts costs and the amount of time I need to add new features. Previously I had been adding cms features by manually coding them. Even though that is enjoyable to me, it is also very time consuming. I have removed the old galleries and replaced them with the flash photoviewer. However, I'm not completely happy with it as it lacks captions and a save as feature, so I'm going to use new software to display the photos as well. I will be migrating my posts from this old site to the new one during the week. I would have done that already but I will have to write custom scripts that will move the entries from my custom database to the database of the new cms. So, make sure you update your bookmarks to use http://lifeonthecurb.com.

I don't really like Myspace, I don't see the point. I already have a site, here at http://lifeonthecurb.com. Yet, I continually hear, where is your Myspace page Saul? Well, I made one, against my better judgement. It's literally almost nothing. What does my space offer that you cant get out of privately hosted space, other than limited space and tacky ads? Everyone that adds content to their Myspace blog basically is giving the Myspace owners free money, why would you do that? I don't know. The idea sickens me. I'm going to assist the Myspace company in generating revenue, for nothing? Based on my midnight blogging and late night party pics. That's insane.

Its another year of course, however still feels the same to me. This site needs a makeover but I can't seem to gather the energy to do it. I need some way to manage the media, but its becoming a monumental task. Newsgroups and IRC have been down for I don't know how long. Lots of good stuff happened over the Christmas Holiday, saw my uncle Richard and his family and started a fire. Spent some time on the 4 wheeler, thats always good. Still not productive though. I had wanted to work on the Linux Kernel and setup my own distribution but I have this feeling deep down my time would be better spent on something else. Not that Microsoft is worth anything, but they there may be other things in the world more worth while than 50 lines of code and a headache. We'll how tonight turns out.

Tonight was Solomon and Robby's Christmas Orchestra Concert performance. Not only did they dress professional, but they played perfectly too. They have worked very hard to be where they are now, spending many hours a week practicing in addition to accomplishing outstanding grades in their pre-ap classes. A video of one of the performances is here. The file is somewhat large, so be prepared. More pics in on the gallery listed to the right. Solomon is on the right here, and here robby is on the left.

It's been quite a while since my last post, things have been mostly a whirlwind. I moved from my small abode Houston to a generously sized home in neighboring Richmond. The change for me is like night and day. Even though I'm no fan of country living, the clear night sky and noticeably less polluted air massages my spirit after a long day at work. I have many pictures I need to upload as my coworkers have so humbly pointed out.

Using techniques of manipulation it is possible to find companionship, invoke infatuation, and false loyalty. A scene can be constructed to bring a man and a woman together in the hope that love will sprout. Such efforts are an exercise in futility. Will a man entice Love, that it may be abundant for him? To control Love.

If a man tries to pursue such a goal, he will not find Love. He will only have wasted his time earning the delusions of his heart. Love is steadfast and hopeful, and does not destroy like obsession. Infatuation does not grow into Love.

The best path is the least obvious. The gift of Love and its return is from the Lord.

I have started work on my new gallery feature for this site which can be visited here . I will be adding a section devoted to work photos and hopefully by the end of this weekend I will have completed a video section as well. Keep checking back during the weekend for updates.

Many have waited for the newly released Halo 3. And now I join the thousands of others that are sharing their Halo 3 experience on their respective blogs. I could be writing about something important, perhaps a novel recording the smallest details of our lives for future generations, but I’m not. Not today. Today I picked up my reserved copy of Halo 3 from my neighborhood software armory. Although it was released last night at midnight, the line I encountered, or better put, the small mob of over one hundred people sprawled out over the parking lot, persuaded me to wait for a more opportune time to spend my money. Now it sits on my desk. While looking over the screenshots on the box I wonder just how good the graphics are. It seems that the days when children would foam at the mouth over the anticipation of incredible graphics are gone. I long for those days. Now looking at the cover I’m wondering just what does the Master Chief have to offer me.

Its been an extra long day for me. I woke up extra early so I could leave work early to attend an Orchestra function with my kids. There was lots of ice cream and the kids had lots of fun. Solomon seems to be released from his illness. so I'm able to rest so much easier now. Earlier in the day, co-workers and I celebrated Vince's birthday at a local Mexican restaurant. The food was quite tasty and I was able to get a few videos and pics.

I've finally have had some much needed dental work done, which involved four extractions (not wisdom teeth, those were removed a long time ago). The relief I have now from the constant pain that has accompanied me for over ten years is unimaginable. The scourge of pain started from a lost filling in 1995, at which time I did not have enough resources to fix the issue. Mounting responsibilities at that time as well, distracted me from the importance of dental maintenance.

Last weekend at Memorial City mall the kids and I saw this patrol officer riding a Segway. The video should play automatically through the Quicktime player. If not, leave a comment and I will convert it to wmv format.

Instead of being known as Space City Houston, this place should be known as The Burning Inferno. The local weathermen play down the raging temperatures, but my thermometer speaks otherwise. An incredible 103 degrees Fahrenheit, at 5 in the afternoon. The summer heat is even more unbearable because the previous two months of torrential rains kept temperatures in the eighties. I remember the first dry day the temps were at 93, a few days later 96, and now 103. Its hard to believe.

Yesterday I was going over a few Linux commands with a coworker who specializes in VMS. While copying a file he inadvertently used cp file directory/*.* , which instead of copying his file, renamed his file to *.*. Well, common sense would say, ok, lets remove that. So we ran rm *.* thinking it would remove the file but of course it deleted everything in the directory. Lesson learned, if you have a file name *.* make sure you escape out before running delete.

After not even having a cell phone at all for over two years I have been itching to exploit all of the features the new one I have has. I got a one gig card that should be enough for almost anything, but since I say that now, watch me not have more space and need it later. First picture is one over looking the balcony at UH Downtown where I work. Next, Solomon and Robby at the mall, and at home. My coworkers cubicle, a shot of my dual monitors, and homage to Starbucks. At a standstill on the Katy Freeway, and at a standstill on Katy Freeway in the rain.

Last week I went out with some coworkers from the office and had a great time. I mention this because normally I don't socialize due to my anti-social tendencies. Even so, I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to fit in. The food was somewhat mediocre but the cinnamon sugar coated crispy deserts were very enjoyable. Despite Rudy's warning not to eat the chips due to possible health hazards, I felt no ill effects.

My Grandfather passed away last week. I don't know what to say about it. I only knew him from a very distant perspective, but even so his presence, was a comfort. My first memories of him are of cigarette smoke and his trademark chair that he would sit in most of the day. The house would be awash in nicotine, so much so that that the evening sun shining through the window would create the atmosphere of a dense fog. His chair, through its many upholstered incarnations has become become bonded to the memory of him in my mind. To the point that, I'm afraid of what I might feel if I'm brought to look at it again. He enjoyed being a craftsman, and made many pieces of furniture that are in the house today. He also enjoyed shortwave radios and frequently had a smart remark for any given situation. There is a gallery setup for him to the right, I will try to populate the gallery as much as I can with pictures of him as they become available.

I just completed the first week in my new position as Systems and Information Security Administrator for The University of Houston Downtown. It is the most rewarding work environment I have ever had the opportunity to be a part of. My first projects are evaluating the performance and security of one of the clusters and profiling the performance of a new email system into quantifiable terms so that we can reliably implement measures to increase it's responsiveness. Among the great benefits are unlimited use of most of the schools facilities and the chance to work with an extremely talented team of professionals.

The kids and I went out for a short ride today through the local park. I posted the pics in this new gallery. It was somewhat uneventful but we did manage to climb to the top of a hill.

I received my certificate documenting my C++ certification in the mail today, woohoo! Now to find a frame! Unfortunately, based on my current search for one, which highlights the dismal selection at the local retail outlets, it will be probably will turn out to be harder than getting the certification. Maybe the lack of meaningful and useful items in our current marketplace is a symbol of the creative black hole that has sucked the life out of our culture.

On Monday summer classes at HCC start and I'm eager to get a chance to further boost my GPA from its current 3.25. I will be taking PreCalculus this summer which to my surprise seems to be only a review of Algebra and Trig. Oh well, I guess the easier the better for the time being.

The Family and I went to Damon's birthday party last night, it was great as usual. Damon's brother Chris, was an excellent chef. The Oreo ice cream cake was the best I've tasted in a long time. I was able to get a video of the birthday song as well.

My twin sons just graduated from 5th grade last week. I'm very proud of them and I was fortunately able to attend their graduation ceremony. In addition to having close to perfect grades, they were also well dressed. However, I have not yet mastered the controls of my new camera, as a result, I only got a few pictures and a couple short of video clips. This is one while they are standing up, notice they are wearing yellow shirts. The next clip shows Solomon getting his award and Robby sitting down. There were too many other parents in the way as well, which prevented me from setting up my tripod in an optimum position.

I completed my 2nd semester at the Houston Community College with a 3.25 GPA, which puts me on the Honor List... woohoo! I was aiming for a least 3.8 but my Trig average brought it down a little. Oh well, this summer I'll only be taking Pre-Calculus, so I should have plenty of time to focus. Also, I achieved C++ certification from Expertrating.com, hopefully this will put me in the market for a higher salary.

Last Friday I had the good fortune of being able to purchase an almost new car with help from my Dad. It's a 2005 Corolla S. The interior is pristine, and the drive is so smooth. I had a surprise when I brought it home and opened the trunk, there was already a subwoofer professionally installed! I had been wondering on the way home why the sound was so great, lol.

Last weekend I had the good fortune of being able to purchase a new HP DV6000 laptop. While making the purchase, I was incessantly harassed by the salesman trying to upsell products to me. For example. Sir, you know you'll need to purchase anti-virus software, let Geek Squad maximize the speed of the Vista OS for you as well. Well, I told him that I don't need to worry about Vista because I'm not going to use it. He then told me that if I was think about putting XP in there, I should know that it is very difficult and that I would void the warranty by installing my own OS. He also implied that I should just learn to like Vista. Well, I chuckled and told him that issues like that don't affect me.

I got home and spent a few moments to be mesmerized by the technological marvel before me. I went through the Vista greeting screen just to see what Vista might have to offer but decided to cut the trip short after being prompted three times if I actually wanted to visit a website.

So, I got XP and popped it in. Sure enough the installer works like a charm. The install completed and of course nothing worked without the drivers. Of course, I expected that. So I went to the HP website and lo and behold, all the drivers were provided. The total time spent doing this was well less than an hour and now I have a perfectly running XP DV6000.

My Kids and I visited my grandparents yesterday. Pictures are on the menu to the right under Spring Day 2007. It has been a long while since I had been there for so long (more than 2 hours), and we had a great time. The kids managed to dismember a tree, and Richards son Alex was very enthusiastic about mowing the grass. Anthony cooked shrimp and oysters I believe, which my kids thoroughly enjoyed. I didn't realize that the backyard cat had already reached an age of about 23 years, wow. Unfortunately, it shows. I have some pictures of that cat in it's youth, which I will track down and post before the summer is over. Richard took us on a trip to see one of the Natural Gas installations on my families land. I wasn't even aware that such things were in place. It was quite interesting. However, I was somewhat uneasy about the odd sounds that were emanating from one of the devices. It was a very fun trip and I hope that I will be able to visit again soon.

So much has been going on I have trouble catching my breath. I added a guide to installing SMTP AUTH for Postfix on the documents menu. It's the result of a three day effort to get SASL fully implemented on the new mail server at work. You would think that the Postfix manual (which I have) would have complete and detailed instructions on it, well it doesn't. There are lots of how to's and guides, but most of them give contradicting instructions. So I put everything together in one, semi-authoratative guide.

My second semester of college is coming to a close, and I'm already starting to get post semester depression. Thats what happens when you fill your life up with notes, essays, and exam preparation, only to have those things that give one third of your daily life its substance, taken away from you.

Nevertheless, I know that once I fully devote myself to Christ fervently once again that things will fall into place. It is too easy for the trivial distractions of this world (school even), to keep us from experiencing the joy that the Lord wants us to have.

For the longest time I've been wanting to post some more of my artwork and music and I'm still working on making that happen.

Several months ago I rented another virtual dedicated server to host some special services and sites on but sadly, I haven't had time to move anything over. I have had time though, to setup and compile Latex, which was not a trivial feat. I'm still not sure exactly how to interface it with PHP, but hopefully it won't hurt too much. For those that don't know, Latex provides a way for the webserver to display mathematical formulas. This way I can setup some tutorials on the site for future Trig and Calculus students.

Looks like everything is going a lot easier than I expected. I have almost all A's across the 4 classes I'm taking. Considering that I'm working full-time I thought it would be more of a struggle. Also unexpectedly, I have a sense of accomplishment. Thanks to Amie for supporting me in this endeavor and Damon for volunteering to proofread my english papers (he is an english teacher by the way). This is only the second semester but time is passing even faster than I thought it would. I know much of my immediate and not so immediate family doesn't get to see very much of me but hopefully after all this I will be able to spend more time with you all.

Damon's Royal Rumble party was great. Food and entertainment were in abundance. I was suprised to see John Cena hit Omaga with that large metal object which actually knocked him out cold. Pictures are posted here. I'll be posting some video as soon as I get a chance.

Steven Seagal's movies are steadily getting better. In my opinion, I think this one should have at least had a chance at the dollar cinema. The cinematography was high "b" grade and the plot loosely followed the action film formula. Once again he reprises the role of an experienced martial artist. His one liners fit him perfectly and there is plenty of action to go around. I would recommend this movie to anyone that likes action flicks. However, do not confuse this movie with Attack Force, which was released before this one, but is completely terrible.

If anyone has checked the holiday pictures, you have noticed the new format I'm moving to for the pics and instead of just links to the images their will be thumbnail preview.

Someone might say, "Why is that special?". Well, its special because I'm putting together the site and its functionality piece by piece, not by using a pre-packaged utility like Wordpress or Gallery. For example for the holiday pictures, I uploaded the original pics to a Linux machine, compiled a program called Imagemagik via an SSH session using Putty, used that program to reduce the size of the pics to thumbnails 1/4 of the original (this is important because eventually this script will automatically run in the images directory to convert the images after they are uploaded). Then I used the program again to add the photograph and shading effects. Then after I uploaded them to this site, the php script I wrote automatically creates the html table and links for all the images that are currently in the directory.

The reason for all this work just to display some pictures is that if I were to just install a premade utility, I wouldn't be learning anything. And for me learning is something I enjoy. I hope that maybe this work will inspire someone to start a site of their own from scratch.

I have to give a shout out to Damon Jasso who inspired me back in the 90's with his site damonjasso.com. Over the years there are some spaces between his posts but overall when you look back on it you see an impressive collection of information and memories.

I finally got some pics of the holidays up. You can either click here or choose holiday pics 2006 from the menu on the right. There aren't many there right now but I'll try to post more as I get them.

I just registered for classes this afternoon (History, English, Trig, and Sociology) and I hope I didn't put to much on my plate. I felt that since most of the classes are only memorization, that they should be easy. I'm going to order my books early in the hopes that I will be able to offset any disadvantage I may have, seeing as how I'm working fulltime in addition to taking these classes.

The company Christmas party was a lot more fun than I thought it would be. They served grilled steaks and chicken along with potatoes and an endless amountof alcoholic beverages at the owners house. Gifts were also given made available by the owner as well. A few people got Ipods and I got a cordless drill (Woohoo!(not sarcastic enthusiasm)).

Christmas at our house was good, spent some time with relatives and built my kids a computer to play World of Warcraft and Everquest 2. Thanks to my mom for giving the kids some real nice art sets, they've been using them a lot. I still need to get my wifes present though, a Nintendo Wii. The stock levels are terribly low, and some have predicted they won't be at normal levels until as late as April. I'll upload the holiday pictures soon.

Amie got a new cell phone for New Years Eve from her perents, I don't remember the model of course but it is very nice, and has an MicroSD card slot. Didn't really see any fireworks, just rested at home. Wanted to see my grandparents and mom on New Years Day but that didn't work out. Hopefully someone took pictures.

Well, I actually completed my first semester of community college :). It took a lot more effort than I thought it would, and I was especially exhausted after the first few weeks. I was able to fight the fatigue though and passed an algebra class for the first time! One thing I didn't get a chance to do though, that is important to me is to write c++ programs that compute the common algebra equations such as the Quadratic Equation and Matrices. I will get some of the stuff up here for download here before this spring semester starts though.

I started school again last september, and its exactly as hard as I thought it would be. The issue really isn't the difficulty of the classes as it is finding the time between work and family to focus on them. I have an average of a about 80 so far in the College Algebra class. I appreciate the mathematics field for the most part, the part I don't appreciate is the tedium of factoring, squaring, cubing, factoring again and simplyfying. In my opinion, students would be better off with 2 years of solid theory first before application. With the theory in place the details take care of themselves. Hopefully I'll make it through.

I've never been a big fan of the NCAA or football for that matter. However, this game I started playing, NCAA Football 2004 has got me hooked. The games are so realistic now, with the crowd cheering in the background (no longer sounding like amplified static), the band, mascots, cheerleaders, and commentators tie everything together. I used the Dynasty mode to create my own team representing the Houston Community College. Haha, I know, its funny. I've got some great players though, won the first game of the season even. Last night though we lost to the Florida Seminoles 21-35. We were at 21-28 at the top of the fourth quarter, and I thought we might have a chance but an interception at the 40 yard line that turned into a touchdown pretty much sealed our fate.

When I opened my hood today, a rat was staring back at me. Such a unique occasion I thought. So I tried to carefully prop the hood up so I could get a picture before it ran away. He ran away. My disappointment was short lived because a few seconds later another appeared. I went to get my camera but when I came back he was gone.

I've finally posted a link for the pics regarding the trip to India. They are not compressed, so depending on your connection they may take a while to download. Sorry for the lack of a thumbnail feature, I'll see if I can implement that next week.

I know its been a long while since my last post, things have been kinda hectic and I've been kinda lazy, not a good combination. Yesterday I installed a newsgroup server for anyone thats interested in using it. Contact me for more information.

My wifes parents and brother had the opportunity to travel to the Himalayas during their summer vacation. Here are a few clips from the trip. This first one is of her dad riding a horse up one of the mountains. This next one is of her dad losing his hat. Both clips were taken at about 15,000ft above sea level. They said it was very cold.

Yesterday afternoon I was unfortunate to receive a corneal abrasion, inflicted by the pointed end of a card board box. The box was ok but my eye required immediate medial attention. An emergency visit to the eye doctor revealed that a large part of my cornea had a large scrape across it. The doctor was suprised I wasnt wincing in pain, as he said most people would be. After about 12 hours sleep and and a quick follow up appointment, the doc said I should be healed by sunday.

Well, Seems like I've been on a roll installing new services on the server. So I decided to add a Jabber server to the mix. Jabber is like having a private instant messenger service. I'm not sure how much use will come out of it but it's cool just the same. Anyone that would like access send me an email.

I've been needing to do something about the empty photography and sketches gallery space so I uploaded a quick fix to list content. Currently its a far cry from how I want these things to be presented but at least there up now. This weekend I'll see if I can find some time to create my true vision for the gallery space.

The IRC for the Curb is now online at irc.webfire-data.net on port 7110. Access is only available to select individuals. If you would like to join email the site admin.

The Curbs' new BBS system bbs.webfire-data.net is now online. Access will be limited to select individuals. Please email the webmaster by using the comments link below if you seek more information. There is also a link to the BBS that has been placed under the friends section.

I've finally been moved to a decent office here at work. Although it is somewhat spacious, its sometimes kind of hot.

I've had a lot of tunes in my head for the longest time that I've been wanting to record and compile into an album. I've had a couple of guitars throughout the years to accomplish this desire with (nothing recorded however), but I haven't had one in over 5 years now. My good friend Damon was kind enough to lend me his Casio CTK-611, which I have found is a melodical powerhouse.

Heres a brief history, of my past instruments and involvements to all who care to know. I got interested in music after seeing my friend Damon's dad playing the guitar back in 4th grade. He won't admit it but he seems to be one of the greatest and most humble guitarists I have ever known. He donated a Strat style guitar to me which I practiced on for the next several years, hooked up to a 30 watt stereo at times wile the pickups were still working. When they went out I attached a microphone with generous amounts of tape to the body to capture the sound, although this worked there were issues with feedback and ambient noise. Couple that with the makeshift string guide I had to make out of half of a discarded Oral B toothbrush and you get a nice banjo twang effect

In 10th grade I had almost a year of music theory from Dr. English of Elsik. In 11th I was allowed to enter the Orchestra as a Viola player at a freshman level provided I was tutored privately. Unfortunately, due to my unpredictable and emotional nature of the time, I allowed outside circumstances to withdraw me from the program after 3 months.

During junior college I used my first credit card to by an Ibanez w/ a humbucking and two single coil pickups that I played through a 200 watt Aiwa mini system. The sound was great and but something happened to the Aiwa and afetr not playing for several months and coming up in need of cash the Ibanez was pawned.

A short time later I bought a used Viola so that I might attempt to re-live my dream to enter some type of orchestra, and of course thats all I did, re-live the dream with no fruition invloved. It has been since lost through certain events.

Thanks to a generous donation from my father a short time later I was able to acquire a Gibson Epiphone Les Paul and a small 30 watt Marshall Practice Amp. The sound was outstanding and I enjoyed it a lot. This setup was soon joined by a Roland EM-10 budget synth, which I enjoyed very much as well but now both are lost as well.

Now in modern times, I just bought a USB Midi adapter and some music production software to get me back on my creative feet. Below is a picture of my current setup. I'll post some tracks hopefully later this week.

A lot of changes will be happening soon. I'll be moving the contents of the site to a new physical location and also I'm going to populate the sketches link for sure. I think I've finally discovered a solid way to design websites now, I'll post some examples of my theory and post an ebook to start.

The party last weekend at Damon and Ediths new house was great. Special thanks to Damons mom and dad for making sure everything was great. The cake was good and I wish I could have stayed longer. Here is a misc pic from the event. Click on the Damon Jasso link from the right menu of the page to access more pictures.

Why does it seem that most tech books are full of fluff? I got this book about a year and a half ago and was disappointed. I feel like its just a collection of man pages maybe thats because it actually has manpages printed inside. You might as well just install linux and read the manpages yourself. I guess thats why it finally went down to $5.

It's about time. I just saw the new series tonight, new for America at least and I'd have to say it's almost perfect. Although I hate the new interior of the Tardis. I have feeling why they would not want to be so technical, at least I think most people are burnt out on the edgy crap that the most recent Treks went after. They want to capture a feeling of newness and mysteriousness. Well maybe I will grow to accept it.

Main and journal galleries database integration complete, the only thing left now is to create the photography and sketch galleries.

I've spent the past couple of days integrating database functionality to the site. It's somewhat involved process and there is still lots more I need to add. I haven't been afraid to focus on this so much since much will carry over to some projects I'm doing at work. I have made some notes available here.

I found a few pictures of Bjork that someone had converted to these cool big pixel type images. I have some more that I'll put in the gallery someday but this is one of the nicest. Click here for the full size version

Ok. I’ve decided to give up my purist attitudes toward illustration, and sketch art. For the longest time I’ve regarded the use of computer aided tools to do artwork as cheating in some way. Well, no matter what tools you use to create a masterpiece, forethought and care must be put in. So, in a free spirited nature I will embrace the tools I once shunned. I’m in a research stage right now, trying to determine which tools will be best used to express myself. I’m considering Shade 8 for the ability to output to STL, and Manga Studio for the ability to compose my work into a meaningful dialogue.

I finally got a chance to code the comment section that you can see on the right lower hand of the site. Yea! It's setup pretty simple right now, any questions?

I just got an Ipod a few weeks ago and have been checking out some of the cool features, one of which is the ability to download Podcasts. Actually a Podcast is a pre-recorded Mp3 file that can be about anything from a political discussion to a rant from someone in their basement. The advent of Itunes with its ease of use and loyal following has promoted this new media to a popular level. For anyone wanting to download their own Podcasts, the Itunes software is a free download from http://apple.com. I have added a new category on my site that contains a collections of Podcasts that I think are important or interesting.

I haven't had time to post much yet but thought it would be nice to put up a few family pics.

I don't know how much time I'll be able to spend on this site but I thought it may serve some meaningful purpose if I share some of my knowledge and thoughts with the community. Maybe it will let people know what I'm about, or maybe some people can use the tutorials and essays to expand their knowledge. Better yet maybe some folks will check out the link to Our Redeemer Evangelical Church. Lately for some reason I've been thinking about the beach. If anyone has any interesting pics send them and I'll post them, could be of anything sandcastles or what not. Also it would be nice if we could find someone who has the Sharp model boombox from around 1991 that has a built in Subwoofer that wood be great. I would like to buy it.

A lot of stuff here will be changing, mostly stuff you won't be able to see besides the content. I'm working on a PHP backend to automate the posting process and add some nice features after which I might release the source to the public so they can use it as well. If there are any ideas just send me an email.

I do not understand why people love acronyms. They create needless confusion. I was recently looking for employment and would see many ads that said "must have LAMP experience", "LAMP guru wanted" . Had I known that LAMP stood for Linux Apache MySQL PHP, I might have applied for those jobs and gotten hired. Instead I overlooked them and didn't think twice until I saw an article online about LAMP. I think it's childish and unreasonable to expect the IT / Web Programmer community to constantly stay up to date with the latest ridiculous buzz words. What are they for? Management? That way it always sounds like your working on something new and exciting?