Yes, we both have brown hair.
Yes, we are essentially the same height.
Yes, we both have been known to have beards.
Yes, we are on the geeky end of the scale.
Yes, we both have blogs that were surprisingly close in Alexa traffic and rank last year.
No, we are not the same person.

Wil Wheaton is a TV star (Star Trek), movie star (Stand By Me), and author who lives on the West Coast. I am a blogger, beardsmith, and man of leisure who lives on the East Coast. I am not a character written by Wheaton to test something different on a new audience. I’m not a marketing scheme. I’m a real person and I exist. I don’t understand why people would think otherwise.

“That sounds exactly like something you’d say to throw us off. Point out the glaring similarities between actor and character before we do, and then convince us that they’re insignificant and coincidental. To be a good actor you have to create a detailed character, and if he has some of your personality traits, it just makes it easier for you to portray him.

Once you get the framework created, you just need to add a few quirks to make him more believable. Maybe you give his girlfriend a geeky enough moniker that it could be part of a secure password. Maybe you make him do something that everyone dreams of like quitting his job. Maybe you create a little conflict with stories of a mysteriously never ending house renovation. Hell, maybe you even make him grow a crazy beard every year just for fun.”

Whoa. Those are real things. I do have #1GF!, I did walk away from my job for no good reason, and I have been growing an annual beard for a decade.

“Uh huh.”

Look, I will admit to reading Wil Wheaton’s blog, even though I make it a point to steer clear of blogs written by famous people. He writes pretty normally for a famous guy, and he steers toward geeky topics that I can relate to. He doesn’t write this blog though. In fact, I don’t think that Wheaton has ever read this blog, never mind written it. It’s doubtful that he knows this corner of the web exists.

“Well that didn’t take long. You worked a plug back to your own blog into the first three paragraphs of your denial. Nice job, Wil. Wooo Wooo! All aboard the self-promotion train. Next stop: Hollywood. Hey, I also noticed you featured a Star Trek shirt in one of the pictures on the beard quest page. It’s a classic shirt, but I imagine that it was enough to remind people about Star Trek. Did that help DVD sales at all?”

I wasn’t on Star Trek. Wheaton was. And I’m sure that he has people who have people who have interns who could think of more direct ways to make a plug than that. I just thought it would be a funny addition to the Federation Standard sideburns. I never had a reason to wear that shirt again because, like I said, I never appeared on the show.

“Sure, you didn’t. So, what’s Patrick Stewart like? Is he engaging? Bwah ha ha ha.”

I really have no idea. I don’t know Patrick Stewart. The closest I’ve ever been to the Star Trek bridge was a Riker magnet that I used to have on my fridge.

“I bet a lot of geeky computer types have those. Like maybe a former programmer and child star perhaps?”

What, did Wheaton work as a programmer or something?

“I think you know the answer to that.”

Ok, so programmers prefer Star Trek magnets and I have a Star Trek magnet, so I’m a programmer and Wil Wheaton? Is that the logic here? Seriously? You know if that were code, I’d just insert use strict; above it just to watch it implode.

“Speaking of which, it would be so awesome to have Wil Wheaton program my website with HTML or whatever. Would you do that, Wil?”

Ok. First off, HTML isn’t technically programming. And what the hell are you talking about?

“Programming. You. Wil the programmer. Childhood star and geek icon. Programming my website so that it absorbs every website on all three of the internets. Make it like the Borg of HTML. The tagline will be ‘You will be assimilated’ with the ass in all caps. This is going to be awesome.”

What? All three what now? I feel like I must be dreaming here. Listen. Let me straighten this out. I can build websites and I’m well versed with Perl and other scripting languages, but Wil Wheaton is a programmer, Jon Dyer is not. Jon Dyer is a scripter. Neither one is going to make you a website.

Jon Dyer eats Perl for breakfast. I pour milk on it, and throw it into a microwave that I built with Microwave::Perl that shoots tiny lines of Perl at milk covered Perl code to heat it up enough for me to eat from a spoon and bowl that are so obfuscated that it takes me a few minutes just to find in the cabinet. That’s how I start my day. Wheaton couldn’t possibly start his day that way because it would take him until late afternoon just to locate and load all the required CPAN modules. Oh, that, and Wheaton is a programmer, and not JAPH.

“Yes, but didn’t Wheaton once admit that he wanted to learn Perl in his geek code a while back? For him to create a character who is a Perl wizard doesn’t seem out of the ordinary.”

Geek Code? GEEK CODE? Is this 1997? Is that still around? In any case, would Wheaton write this Jon Dyer character to have used several revisions of LINUX over the years, but switch back to Windows because he likes it better? Would Wheaton write a character like that?

“No, but who would? If you were real, Jon Dyer, I’d come over to your house and slap the shit out of you for saying something like that. That’s just not right. Minus 42 geek points for your Jon Dyer character, Wil. Next you’ll be saying that you’re not down with D&D style games.”

People of Irish descent make reference to boiled dinner, but it doesn’t mean that they actually like eating it. Boiled dinner is part of the culture. Yea, I’ve been known to make references to D&D style games, but I’ve only played half a round of D&D in my entire life. Once I realized that the whole game was controlled by a fat ass dungeon master who made me lose if I made fun of his cape or questioned his power, I gave up and went back to copying programs out of computer magazines into my C-64.

“Wheaton had a C-64 and copied programs out of magazines.”

Who didn’t do that in the 80’s? Anyway, I think he had a Vic-20.

“Aha! How would you know that if you weren’t Wil Wheaton?”

Wheaton puts stuff like that in his blog. He liked Final Fantasy on an NES and he had an Atari 2600. Whoopdiedoo. Google it. I never had either of those systems, anyway. I had Colecovision and Vectrex for a while there, but not a 2600 or Nofriendo. And don’t get me started on the Final Fantasy franchise. It made me so angry that you had to wait your turn to kill something that I gave the game away to one of my friends who liked D&D. In a video game, I want shoot, run, die, shoot, run, die. I have no time for hit, wait, do math, get hit, wait, talk to characters, fall asleep, drink a “die of boredom” potion… Would Wheaton say something like that? I don’t think so.

“Wil, this character is an odd mixture of attracting and repelling geek values. He’s so… complex. Let’s get down to basics. When did you first start writing him?”

2001. Wait me writing, or him writing me? Or me as him who is me? What the frack is going on here? He’s not complex. Gah. I’m not complex. I am not Wil Wheaton.

“Uh huh.”

Listen, listen. I mean Wheaton has a penchant for poker, right? I never play poker. I prefer non-money card games like 1kbwc, Lost Cities, Fluxx, Guillotine, and even Uno if I’m allowed to tweak the rules.

“So you don’t like poker. That doesn’t prove anything. Are you really trying to defend yourself here? Because it seems like some of these paragraphs aren’t amounting to anything more than character building exercises.”

No, they’re not a character beubi myaa myaa myaa myaa. Fine. Let’s go big ticket and hit a taboo like politics. From what I’ve read, Wheaton seems to believe in the political process and is very prObama. I believe that the American presidential elections are like being given two piles of dog shit and being asked which you’d like to step in. No matter which way you choose, you still end up with shit on your shoe. Would Wil say something like that? It doesn’t seem like something he’d say. Would Jon Dyer say it? I think I just did.

“‘From what I’ve read…’? That’s awesome, Wil. Nice attention to detail. How did you get Jon on Revision3? Did you call up one of your buddies to get the character on there, or are they still in the dark that Dyer is one of your longest running hoaxes?”

Wheaton worked at Revision3?

“Don’t play dumb.”

Does he still work there?

“You know he doesn’t.”

Hey, I appeared on Revision3 as a fluke because of my beard pages. If Wheaton doesn’t work there, then how could he have engineered getting me on there? I was surprised as anyone to be named an Internet Superstar, but you can’t say it’s because Wil Wheaton pulled any strings. You can’t take that away from me. Revision3 could, but not you.

“Wow. Didn’t mean to touch a nerve there, “Jon”. Will you be using this new internet superstardom as a topic in your next book?”

I haven’t written any… damnit, you’re talking to me like I’m Wheaton again.

“I call ‘em like I see ‘em.”

Wheaton has written a few books that people talk about. I have talked about writing a book a few times. That’s where the similarities end.

“Well, not really. It’s interesting that you both have beards. And if “Jon Dyer” is so famous for his beard, I find it interesting that no other blogger anywhere ever said that they ran into him at the mall or at one of the home improvement stores that the character claims to frequent. Oh, that’s right: He’s unemployed and slightly reclusive. That’s a pretty convenient back story. When and how do you think he’ll develop super powers? Can you tell me if they will be beard related?”

Yea, in 2009, I’m going to be bitten by a radioactive hobo that will allow me to store all kinds of incredibly large things like tanks and bazookas in my beard. It’s mapped out to be a combination of Captain Caveman and the A-Team, but without the phrases, “unga bunga” or “you crazy fool”. It’s going to appear on ABC in between the All-Star Laff-A-Lympics and The Krofft Supershow this fall… Are you kidding right now?

“That just sounds like awesome! Thanks for the exclusive. Back to my point, though. Don’t you think the character’s reclusive nature is more than a little convenient and less than believable?”

Again. I’m not a character, and I’m not a recluse. Ok, I might come into contact with more seagulls than people on a given day, but I’m not reclusive. I have been in a couple of newspapers. The Sun and the Financial Times ran stories about my beards. I mean, don’t you think that they’d at least fact check to see that I exist before running a story about me?

“Overseas newspapers pick up this remarkably odd beard story, but not a single paper in your home country picks it up. Hmm. Why would that be? Everyone in the world knows that Santa lives at the North Pole, but people in The North Pole have never heard of him. Seems sort of similar, doesn’t it?”

I am not Wil Wheaton. Or Santa Claus.

“You Hollywood types are so quirky when you’re method acting…”

Fine, if I am indeed simply just a fictional literary character, then where do all these beard pictures come from every year? Huh?

“The rumor is that you pay a homeless guy in Venice Beach who goes by the name “Beardo Roboto” $50 a year to pose for the annual beard pictures.”

Are you kidding? I do NOT. Wil does not. Nobody does nothing not. What the hell? I’m real. I take the pictures with a cell phone camera of my own beard every year. There is no Beardo Whatevero guy. It’s me. And me is not Wil Wheaton. I don’t know Wheaton, I’ve never talked to Wheaton, and I’m not a fictional fracking figment of Wil Wheaton’s wild imagination. I read his blog, but that’s as connected as I am to the guy. He is not any sort of puppet master…

Wait a minute… What about my accent? Anyone from Boston can tell you that a Boston accent is nearly impossible for a Hollywood type to pull off. Even the good ones sound wrong to someone who lives here. Wheaton is West Coast born and raised. I’m East Coast born and raised. He’s all, “Carrrrr,” and I’m all, “Cahhhhhh.”

“We’ve never heard this Jon Dyer guy’s accent. It’s all tick tick tacking on h’s instead of r’s on the keyboard.”

Fine. Maybe if you saw Jon Dyer doing a Boston accent, then you might believe he’s… I’m real?

“I might, rabbit. I might.”

Fine then. Let’s see if this does the trick…

Proof: I. Am NOT. Wil Wheaton.

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Instead of testing my widgets live, I test the underlying PHP in a designated test area that his hidden from regular readers. That way, if PHP barks at me for missing an underscore, it’s more of a private message to me, and not a public broadcast to all of my readers.

Creating a WordPress test area is a simple addition of a page template and test page to your WordPress theme files. Any PHP that you put in the test template can be executed by refreshing a draft preview of the page assigned to it. Because the test page is never actually published, there’s no possibility of it reaching your readers and interrupting the flow of your site.

Want to set up your own Wordpress PHP test area?

Using A WordPress Page Template As A PHP Test Area

1. Put the following into a text file and save it as phptest.php:

   <?php
   /*
   Template Name: PHP Test Template
   */
   ?>
   
   <?php get_header(); ?>
   
   <div id="content" class="narrowcolumn">
   <h2>This is a test File</h2>
   
   <?php
   //PHP test area
   ?>
   </div>
   
   <?php get_sidebar(); ?>
   
   <?php get_footer(); ?>

2. Upload the file into your current theme. These are typically located in /wp-content /themes/ [theme-name]/ under your WordPress installation directory.
3. Go into your WordPress admin panel and click Editor from the Appearance menu on the left. Make sure that you can see the PHP Test Template listed on the in the template list on the right hand side. If it’s not there, you might’ve uploaded the file to the wrong theme directory.
4. From the Pages menu in the left side column of your WordPress admin panel, click Add New.
5. Title the page something like “PHP Test Page” and leave the post area blank.
6. On the right hand side, under Attributes / Template, Select PHP Test Template from the drop down menu.
7. Click Save Draft.
8. Click Preview.
9. Now go back to the PHP Test template in your theme by clicking Editor from the Appearance menu on the left side of the admin panel.
10. From the list on the right, click PHP Test Template.
11. Add your PHP code to the line of the test template that reads //PHP test area.
12. When you’re done, click Update File.
13. When you refresh the preview of your draft PHP test page (that you opened in step 8), any PHP that you put in the template will execute.

Once you’re satisfied that the PHP has been tested, it can be moved out of the test template and into a production template or widget with the confidence that it’s going to behave within the WordPress framework. You can clear your test template and leave the test page dormant until your next idea comes along.

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Now, a lot of these were a little too obvious, but I have to say that General Zod and the Yamato were closing in on the Sleestaks for the final cut.

I know there are better jokes out there though, so I thought I’d provide a template in case any of you can provide a geekier alternative. What do you think? Are you up for a little geekery?

Damnit, I can’t believe I forgot The Herculoids and Dr. Who. Gah. So many options…

Good luck.

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Me: Hey, there’s a picture of Star Trek on that wall.
#1GF!: [turns] Yes, I agree.
Me: And there’s a Yoda head there, too.
#1GF!: [turns and turns back]
Me: You don’t know who Yoda is.
#1GF!: Uh… E.T.?
Me: [thumps head on table]

#1GF!: [laughing] Are you going to leave me now?
Me: [whips out notebook to transcribe conversation for internet]
#1GF!: OH COME ON.
Me: [puts notebook away] I’m making you watch Star Wars when we get home.
#1GF!: You made me watch Star Track.
Me: Please tell me you said that on purpose.
#1GF!: Maybe, but you made me watch it.
Me: No, I never did.
#1GF!: You did. There was a ship and it was going to crash into the mothership.
Me: [amused that #1GF! used the word "mothership"] Never.
#1GF!: You made me.
Me: Wait. Are you talking about Lord of the Rings?
#1GF!: No, I slept through that. This was a whole series.
Me: ?
#1GF!: [as if my testicles were suddenly beamed off the planet] There was a love interest…
Me: [staring]
#1GF!: [staring]
Me: Wait, you’re not talking about Battlestar Galactica…
#1GF!: You’re right. I am.
Me: [whips out notebook again]
#1GF!: You might as well keep that thing out because it’s not going to get any better.

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DJ Spock

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There are a lot of ways to do mouseovers, but I use a javascript one liner because its simple and portable between different blogging systems. I can’t really take credit for writing this code because similar ideas have been floating around the web for over a decade.

All you have to do is paste the following code into your web page, taking care to replace the one instance of original.png and two instances of retouch.png with the locations of your own photos. If you want the mouseover to link somewhere, be sure to replace the # with a valid link.

Simple Code For A Javascript Mouseover

<a href="#" onMouseOver="document.the_image.src='original.png';" onMouseOut="document.the_image.src='retouch.png';"> <img src="retouch.png" name="the_image" /></a>

The code above uses the_image as the image name, which works fine for a single image, but if you want to use show multiple mouseovers on the same page, copying and pasting the code above several times won’t work without a quick modification. Because each image needs to be named independently, you would need to change the three instances of the_image in the second copy of the code to something like the_image2. The third would have to be changed to the_image3, and so on.

Multiple Javascript Mouseovers On A Sigle Page

<a href="#" onMouseOver="document.the_image.src=original1.png';" onMouseOut="document.the_image.src='retouch1.png';"> <img src="retouch1.png" name="the_image" /></a>

<a href="#" onMouseOver="document.the_image2.src='original2.png';" onMouseOut="document.the_image2.src='retouch2.png';"> <img src="retouch2.png" name="the_image2" /></a>

Javascript Mouseover In Action

Hold your mouse over the “Geekantium” image to change it.

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Here’s a picture of Alicia Silverstone that I retouched. To see the original from Top Socialite’s Celebrities Without Makeup Page, hover your mouse over the picture

I’m no pro and Ms. Silverstone can afford way better retouchers, so I gave up with a “good enough” before I wasted too many hours on it. I’m trying to learn how to retouch things while preserving natural skin texture, but the original photo was a little too pixelated to get any real detail out of even if I had the skill. You can see where I gave up near the hairline, but I think the eyes, eyebrow, and that little bit of hair over the ear show that I’m making progress.

Can You Help Me Out?

Retouching celebrity pictures feels pointless because it’s unlikely that they would ever see the results or care if they did. If I know that someone is going to see the result, I’m more likely to spend time on it, so I’d like to ask a little favor:

If you have a photo that you would let me take a shot at retouching, I would really appreciate the practice.

This is free, and the worse the photo, the better the practice. I know it might be embarrassing for some of you to send me bad pictures of yourself, but I wouldn’t think of putting the results on my site without your permission because I respect your privacy and recognize you as the owner of your pictures. You would be doing me a big favor by helping me to learn how to enhance photos, and hopefully you’ll end up with a picture that you really like.

If you’re game, drop me a comment or use my contact page. The best photos to send are the ones where you think, “This would be a great picture if only [insert issue here].”

And you know that I think your fine just the way you are.

Thanks for your help.

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After watching it a few times, I’m not so sure that I should’ve included it. The tones of the bottles during the test runs at the beginning of the video really don’t match with the tones when the theme is playing, making it seem like it might be a hoax.

What do you think? Is this a fake?

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found via BoingBoing

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The following conversation took place with computer generated virtual assistant for Alaska Airlines. Although some of the responses seem human, they are all pre-programmed.

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LOLWars

or

LOLTrek

Don’t you?

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Over the last two days, I’ve gotten the song so lodged in my head, that my brain hasn’t been able to stop my mouth from blurting out the lyrics at inappropriate moments. Most people think it’s funny “uh oh” rather than funny “haha” when a crazy looking dude with a beard randomly mutters, “Don’t Fucking Cross Me! I am Chewbacca!” in the checkout line at the supermarket.

Because there’s no fun in having an earworm if you don’t spread it, I’m spreading this song to you. If you find the song oddly familiar, you might’ve heard it in a little cult classic called Clerks.

Here’s the “I am Chewbacca” Audio and Lyrics to get you started.

Enjoy!

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My answers included references to porn, beards, DJ’s, the Kobra Kai, LARPing, and Mr. T, so I probably came off a tad on the geeky side, but then, I’ve never claimed to be cool.

Be sure to let me know what you think.

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If you’re like me and still haven’t started your shopping yet, maybe these will get the gift ideas flowing. I hope they help!

The Zero Suction Holiday Gift Guide List

1. Board Game Geek’s Board Game Gift Guide 2007 (board games)
2. BoingBoing’s Charitable Giving Guide, The 2007 Edition (charity)
3. Chicagoist’s 2007 Gift Guide (pop culture)
4. Core77’s 77 Design Gifts Under $77 (pop culture)
5. Defective Yeti’s Good Gift Games Guide 2007 (board games)
6. Engadget’s Holiday Gift Guide, 2007 (gadgets & tech)
7. Epicurious’ Holiday Recipe Guide (food & drink)
8. GameSpot’s Holiday Gift Guide 2007 (video games)
9. GamerHelp’s Antiholiday Gift Guide (movies & music)
10. Kotaku’s 2007 Gift Guide of Obscene Nicety and Sublime Naughtyness (video games & pop culture)
11. LifeHacker’s Gift Guide 2007 (gadgets)
12. Make’s Open Source Hardware Gift Guide 2007 (DIY kits)
13. TechSpot’s Holiday Gift Guide 2007 (games & gadgets)
14. ThinkGeek’s Holiday Gift Center 2007 (everything geeky)
15. TreeHugger’s 2007 Gift Guide (eco-friendly)
16. Yahoo! Green’s Green Holiday Gift Guide (eco-friendly)

If you found other great guides that I may have missed, be sure to drop them in the comments.

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1. Satisfy Their Gadget Needs

Mug Boss ($4.99)
Got a handy-man or handy-man wannabe on your list? Give them a way to keep their workbench tidy while showing off their manly side with the Mug Boss.

Super Mario Sound FX Keychain ($5.99)
If you spend any amount of time with game geeks, this is the gadget to have. The device will play six sound effects from Super Mario (Coin, Start Music, Extra Life, Jump, Grow, and Death Music) so that you can properly accentuate your conversations.

THE RTFM Mug ($7.99)
Have a tech support grunt on your list? Well there’s nothing that support folks hate more than N00bs who interrupt perfectly good days with their refusal to take basic steps to solving their own problems. The only thing worse is when other techies follow suit. Let your tech support grunt express his frustrations with the Read The Manual Mug.

Humping USB Dog ($9.99)
I don’t know if there’s anything more distracting than a tiny USB dog that humps your computer as you work. Do you?

Static Electricity Eliminator ($9.99)
If you think you have a static charge, touch this to a grounded object and you will see a little face flash on the screen and you’ll know you are static free. This seems dumb, but if you work with electronics, you know that they the tiniest sparks can cause problems. Knowing that you’re not statically charged can sometimes be a necessity.

Utili-Key 6-in-1 Tool ($9.99)
The world has gone mad, and tweezers are a danger to national security. Where can you stash a screwdriver where no one will find it? On your keyring, of course. This tool includes a couple of knives, a few screwdrivers, and a bottle opener.

The C.H.I.M.P. ($9.99)
C.H.I.M.P. stands for “Chimp Has Invincible Monkey Powers”. While that may or may not be true, the C.H.I.M.P. is a 3 inch convex mirror that easily attaches to your monitor to help prevent ninjas and bosses from sneaking up behind you. This is an essential accessory for any cube dwelling wage slave.

LED Binary Clock ($19.99)
I got one of these in a holiday grab a few years back, and have had it on my desk ever since. It’s one of the geekiest clocks available.

The Red Swingline Stapler ($21.99)
The beauty of the red stapler is that only certain people will understand the Office Space reference. It’s a conversation starter for those who do, and the ones who don’t are blissfully unaware that its removal from your desk will cause you to burn the building down. I’ll be at either Chotchkie’s or Flingers if you need me.

The Gorillapod ($49.99)
For the photographer on your list, a miniature tripod is essential for getting steady shots. The Gorilla pod’s three flexible arms allow it to be secured to just about anything when there isn’t a flat surface to be found.

Leatherman Wave MultiTool ($64.99)
Maybe it has to do with a secret desire to grow up to be Inspector Gadget, but I don’t know a geek who wouldn’t be psyched to get a Leatherman as a gift. There are 18 tools built into this model, and when they take it away at the airport, your geek is going to be crying real tears.

Star Wars R2-D2 Trashcan ($99.99)
Even if you don’t appreciate the sheer awesomeness of this trash can, having it in your apartment will easily convince any potential partner that you have never had sex before. Virgins are a natural aphrodisiac to some, so this trash can could potentially get the photons into the air duct, if you know what I mean. Hubba hubba.

2. Help Them Fit In With Some Geeky Tees

There are a number of geeky references below, and if you don’t understand them, then you’re probably well adjusted and in a career that deals with humans on a daily basis. If you really need to know, clicking each tee will get you an explanation from ThinkGeek.

3. Mold Them Into UberGeeks With Theses UltraGeeky Tees

The WiFi Detector Shirt ($29.99)
Sure this T-shirt is a bit pricey, but cool never comes cheap. The glowing bars on the front of the shirt dynamically change as the surrounding WiFi signal strength fluctuates. It’s a wearable WiFi detector. Is there anything cooler than that?

T-Qualizer Shirt ($39.99)
Did I just ask if there was anything cooler than the last T-shirt? Well, there is. And it’s $10 cooler. This shirt is a fully functioning equalizer that reacts to ambient sound. Each bar reacts differently depending on frequency. I dare you to say that isn’t cool.

4. Change The Way They Rent Movies

I haven’t dealt with the aggravation or cost of visiting a video store in years, and it all started with my parents getting me a gift subscription to Netflix. Once I got hooked, I bought them a gift subscription the following year. I’m not a fan of gifts that could require ongoing payments, but there’s nothing wrong with getting a Netflix gift subscription so that the recipient can try the service on your dime. Once the gift subscription runs out, they can continue on or quit with no obligation. No one ever seems to quit, though. The service is too easy to use, and if they typically rent more than four movies a month, the standard subscription is actually cheaper than going to the video store. Netflix changes the way you rent movies and is a worthwhile gift for any movie buff on your list.

5. Change The Way They Watch TV

I said that I wasn’t a fan of gifts that could require ongoing payments, but here I am recommending another gift in that category. Call your local cable company and find out what the extra cost is to get the person on your list a cable box with a DVR built in. They won’t give you a box unless you’re on the account, so you’ll have to print out a picture and put it in a card with enough cash to pay for the service for a set period of time. My parents’ cable company charged and extra $10, so $120 got them a DVR for the year. They were a little wary at first, but within weeks it had completely changed the way they watched television.

6. Feed Them

I happily accept food in lieu of store bought gifts. Whether you bake cookies, make kick ass hot chocolate mix, or whip up a nice spice rub, there are hungry people out there like me who will appreciate it. Gifts don’t have to be store bought to impress.

7. Teach Them To Cook

If you’re a terrible cook, you might want to pick up a copy of The Silver Spoon (~$26) for the cook on your list with the stipulation that the recipient practice their recipes on you. First published over 50 years ago in Italy, The Silver Spoon is now available in English. It’s a small detail, but the book includes two attached ribbons, which I find helpful when looking through the 2,000 included recipes. This is easily the heaviest and most complete cookbook on my shelf.

8. Supply Them With Light Reading

Magazines like Make, ReadyMade, and Craft have been a go-to in my gift giving stable for years. There are magazines to suit every taste, and they’re ultra simple to order. Unlike herpes, they’re the gift that keeps on giving in a good way.

9. Make Coupons

If you’re low on cash, you may want to consider making personalized holiday coupons. Hubpages.com offers three nicely designed coupons for you to fill out and print. Sometimes people don’t redeem them and you get off scott free. Other times, you find yourself giving someone’s angry cat anal itch medication at 2AM on your day off while the recipient is enjoying Barbados. Be careful how general you make your coupons. That’s all I’m saying. Meow.

10. Make A Charitable Donation

This can make a great gift as long as you make sure that the recipient is ok with it. Some people just do not go for this at all, and surprising them with it is not going to lead to a warm and happy holiday. I’m a pain in the ass to shop for, so for years I’ve asked my friends and family to donate to the PKD Foundation as my gift. It saves people the pain of shopping for me, and gives me a much better feeling than some tech toy that I’ll either break or lose. Sometimes I even get all choked up over it. There are a ton of charities out there (such as #1GF!’s favorite, the American Cancer Society) and the donations go a lot further to promoting good feelings in both the giver and the recipient. Just think about it before you spend another week at the mall hunting for crap that no one really needs.

More Ideas

So, what did you think? Did anything on the list light up your reactor core? Be sure to check in later this week for more gift ideas, and don’t forget that there are even more gift ideas in the Dyers.org Holiday store. Happy Holidays!

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Displaying link categories doesn’t really make sense for bloggers who only use one category, so I updated the plugin to make the visibility of the link categories optional in this release.

More information about the widget and the download link can be found on my Better Blogroll Widget for Wordpress Page.

Take it for a spin and help your readers to get more out of your blogroll.

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Because I’ve gotten spoiled by the simplicity of adding bookmarks to StumbleUpon and Del.icio.us through buttons on my Firefox tool bar, submitting good articles to Sphinn seemed like too many steps. It’s certainly not a big deal to copy a url, open Sphinn, find the submit page, and so on, but it’s not as easy as clicking a button.

Well, now it is.

If you’re a Sphinn user, I created a Firefox extension which will allow you to quickly add the current page you’re reading to Sphinn. When you find a page that you want to add, clicking the Sphinn It! toolbar button will open a new tab and submit the url for you.

If you want it, head over to my Sphinn Toolbar Button For Firefox page.

Enjoy!

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Things You Need To Know Before Upgrading To WordPress 2.3

• The Basics
  What’s New In WordPress 2.3
  How to Install WordPress 2.3
  How to Upgrade to WordPress 2.3
  WordPress 2.3 Download
• You Might Not Be Able To Log In
  Some users are experiencing “ERROR: WordPress requires Cookies but your browser does not support them or they are blocked.” when trying to login after a WordPress 2.3 upgrade. It happened to me, and there’s nothing worse than feeling like you’re in the clear and then being locked out of your own site. Do yourself a favor and solve the issue before it happens by downloading an updated version of wp-login.php.
  Update: This was written for upgrading to 2.3 and has been shown by some people to not be effective with a 2.3.1 upgrade. There may be more information available in this Wordpress support thread.
  

• Your Plugins Might Break
  Check the Plugin Compatibility List for WordPress 2.3 before you upgrade so that you’re not caught off guard by one of your favorite plugins throwing up all over your pages.
• Ultimate Tag Warrior is Dead
  I know. I loved UTW, too. It made tagging so easy and WordPress took a big bite out of it and left the carcass behind. Not to worry though, WordPress 2.3 includes a tagging feature that will import your UTW tags, and Christine Davis (the UTW creator) has been working on some new plugins to replace some of the functionality you lose in the upgrade.
• There Were Major Changes to Categories and Tags
  If you developed a WordPress Plugin that uses categories or tags, you’re probably going to have to rewrite it. The upgrade broke my Better Blogroll Wordpress Widget, and I had to spend a few hours figuring out the schema changes and upgrading it to be fully compatible with WordPress 2.3. If you developed a WordPress plugin that uses tags or categories, this WordPress 2.3 database schema information from Infovore should help.
• Wordpress Will Do Canonical Redirection
  Subgum Mumbo who now? This just means that because Google sees yoursite.com and www.yoursite.com as two different entities, you traditionally had to set up a permanent redirect on your web server to point to one or the other to get Google to spider your site properly. WordPress now takes care of the redirection depending on whether you include “www” or not in the “Blog Address” field under Options / General on your dashboard.
• You Still Need To Think About SEO
  The canonical redirection issue might be solved, but there is still a lot that needs to be done to get you to claim your rightful spot at the top of Google’s ladder. 13 SEO Tips For WordPress from Chicken Camels should help you get on your way.
• You Still Need To Protect It
  You may be on the latest and most secure version of WordPress, but you may be offering up more information about your WordPress installation than you want to. First, go into your header.php and wipe out the line <meta name="generator" content="WordPress <?php bloginfo('version'); ?>" /> to stop advertising your version of WordPress to the entire world. Next, either add Options -Indexes into your .htaccess file to stop directory browsing site-wide or, at a minimum, put a blank index.php in your wp-content/ plugins/ directory to stop advertising the plugins you’re using (If you want to verify whether you have this problem, navigate to yoursite.com/ wp-content/ plugins/ in your browser and see if you get a directory listing). Don’t let simple things like this give someone enough info to deface your site. For other ideas on hardening WordPress check out Protecting your WordPress Blog from Lorelle.

Have any more Wordpress 2.3 survival tips? Share them in the comments.

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This week, I tackled Mo-licous’s virus issues and took on explaining drive fragmentation to the non-computer wizard, and in the past, I’ve tackled social bookmarking, social networking, instant messangers, why you should be using RSS, and even how to fix your PS2. These are topics are sometimes missing from the radar of people who don’t live and breathe by the PC, but many find them beneficial once they understand them.

So, I’m going to make an offer to my readers: If you have a PC or tech related problem, or a topic that you’d like explained in regular terms, drop me a note with my contact form and I’ll pick one submission and try to fix or explain it to you in a post.

It’s free tech support from a qualified geek who wants to help you. How can you go wrong?

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1. The Smartass Guide to Using Facebook (SugarRae)
2. The Ultimate Guide to Facebook (College V2)
3. Is Facebook Good For the Workplace? (News.com.au)
4. 12 Ways to Use Facebook Professionally (Web Worker Daily)
5. How To Use Facebook Without Getting Fired (Internet Duct Tape)
6. How Nonprofits Can Use Facebook (Emily’s World)
7. How to Find Coworkers on Facebook (eHow)
8. The 10 Best Facebook Apps for Students (The Student Help Forum)
9. Facebook Powertools: 150+ Apps, Scripts and Add-ons for Facebook (Mashable)
10. How to Create a Facebook Network Badge (eHow)

Have other tips for getting started with Facebook? Still have reservations? Let me know in the comments.

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