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Pool coping project — getting started
Time to get started on the pool repair project.. better late than never I suppose. I’ve blocked off this coming Thursday to rent a concrete saw and cut back the expansion joint. Also, I’ve been thinking a lot more about what to use to mortar the coping stones in place. Terry Tamminen’s excellent book, The…
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SSN Remediation is here
Woo-hoo! SSN Remediation happened over the past weekend, and we’re back up and running. I really think this is going to be a big win over the long term. On the myUMBC side of things, there wasn’t much I needed to do. Just update my code in two places (one on the uPortal side, and…
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Finally got in the pool
Better late than never, we took our first swim of the season today. It’s nice to finally be using the pool, because it makes the hassle of maintaining it seem more worthwhile. It’s not quite worth all the effort and expense IMHO, but still, it is nice to be able to hop in the pool…
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Student Parking Registration
I should have seen the writing on the wall 5 years ago.. I’m busy fixing the online Student Parking Registration app, which has been sorta broken ever since the uPortal launch. Student Parking is a unique application. It’s the only app we have here that: Communicates directly with the HP3000 mainframe via TCP sockets, and…
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Out with GUIDs.. in with Campus IDs
OK, policy decision for our up-and-coming launch of uPortal 2.5.. I’m going to stop using the LDAP GUID as the uPortal ‘unique username’, and use the new UMBC Campus ID instead. Background: Every uPortal user gets an entry in uPortal’s user table, UP_USER. This table contains (among other things) a numeric ID for primary key,…
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New Boiler
So it looks like we’re going to take the plunge, and get a new boiler put in. Several things are driving this. For one, a detailed heat loss calculation has revealed that our current boiler, while reasonably efficient, is about twice the size it needs to be to heat the house. It has always short-cycled,…
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Funny CVS Snafu
First the good news… we’ve decided to go to uPortal 2.5 for the fall, and switch from the buggy Aggregated Layout Manager (ALM) to the purportedly-much-better Distributed Layout Manager (DLM). I’ll be counting the days until ALM is history. With that in mind, I pulled down a fresh copy of uPortal 2.5.2 and created a…
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Pool’s open… don’t everybody jump in at once
Yesterday we finally uncovered the big concrete hole in the backyard. The water looks pretty good, but due to my neglect over the spring, I’ve got a bigger problem with surface-clinging algae than in past years. There was the usual green stuff on the bottom which easily vacuumed out, but the steps and the diagonal…
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Back from Vancouver
Welp, faster than a blink, I’m back from Vancouver. Unfortunately, on my second night there I came down with this nasty GI thing that dragged me down for the rest of the trip. I managed to get out and do some walking along the Coal Harbor Seawall and in Stanley Park. But, my planned recreational…
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Back in Vancouver
Well, here I am in lovely Vancouver, BC again. Today is my free day, and it looks like my hopes of hiking/sightseeing are going to be dashed, because of a steady drizzle. Oh well, I guess I’ll try to squeeze something in Tuesday evening, when the conference is over and the weather forecast looks more…