Facebook Connect

Posted: February 2nd, 2011

So it’s becoming apparent that the world is addicted to Facebook. I seem to be doing more Facebook centric applications than anything right now so I’ll let you know where I see this going.

Most web saavy people have a Facebook account and are actively posting there and watching what their friends are doing. This can be addicting to people so Facebook is now spreading to outside websites.

I’m currently building my first Facebook Connect site for a client.

What is Facebook Connect? Facebook Connect is a set of APIs for use in Web Development. My current app is using a hybrid of Javascript and PHP in order to accomplish what needs to get done.

When I first started, it seemed like my app would work one second and then would fail the next. After about a day it seems that things stabilized and it was actually working on a consistent basis. This can be really annoying to most web developers that are used to the “either it works or it doesn’t” philosophy which has served us so well in the past. Well in the Facebook area, its not an absolute any longer. You have to realize that Facebook is getting so large that they have lots of servers handling requests and not all the servers get the application (your Facebook Connect site requires you to setup an application!) settings immediately. Best to setup your application and then wait a few days.

When you’re just getting started, I recommend you read through the Facebook Developers documentation. They are making it better. When I wrote my First Facebook App (Last Summer) it was horrendous and there was many hours spent cursing Facebook! They seem to have gotten the picture but it still has a ways to go. Anyway, read what you can and use Google to find answers (make sure they are current!) and you should get by. If you’re new to PHP and Javascript, then I would not recommend jumoing write into Facebook Connect. If you don’t understand the fundamentals, you’ll drive yourself crazy trying to make it work.

I’ll try and post some sample as I build them.

Building a Content Management System

Posted: May 6th, 2009

Since 2005, McClintic Design Inc. has been building a Content Management System (CMS). During that time we’ve run into pitfalls and the inevitable scope creep that a development project can become.

Our initial goal was simple:

Create a content management system that anyone can use and taylor it to web designers that just need to get a site out and don’t want to spend weeks or years learning the platform that they are building on.

We spent months working with Joomla and Drupal and while both have their merits, most normal people don’t need that much functionality. Most webmasters just need to get in, modify a page or two, and get out. They don’t need to spend weeks reading a book on how to use their chosen CMS.

Our CMS (currently called MDSM for McClintic Design Site Management) was built on PHP and MySQL and is currently running on several commercial websites and has several in the works. MDSM is a great solution for businesses that just don’t want to pay a designer or webmaster to modify one page a month. MDSM also includes the ability to extend it’s functionality with a module framework that can assist with functionality like Photo Galleries, testimonial capture and approval, and will soon have it’s own blog module.

While MDSM isn’t currently free, we’re not ruling out a free version at some point. Right now we have to get several design issues resolved and streamline (okay, make more OOP compliant) and get some installer/updater features working. Since most people are happy that the site functions and shows the information about their business, we’re always striving to make it easier to install and manage modules and templates.

If you are interested in finding out more about our CMS project, have a look at http://mdsm.mcclinticdesign.com and feel free to contact us for a quote.

Domain Name Scam

Posted: June 6th, 2008

Anyone who owns several domain names knows that they can be valuable pieces of internet real estate. When recently my work load got a bit overwhelming, I forgot to renew one of my domains. I own the .net and .com versions of this domain because in the future I plan to use this name.

So after the domain expired I called Godaddy to check about getting the domain back before it dropped into the public pool. They told me the domain was in the reclamation period and that I could re-acquire it for $80. Well $80 is quite a bit if you understand that I paid $6.95 for it originally. Now I love Godaddy and I understand that they have to make money somehow and it was a mistake that I made. So I’ll forgive Godaddy there.

Now I figured hey, eventually it would just fall back into the public pool at the end of the reclamation period and I’d have it. I know I was taking a risk but this domain name probably would only be valuable to someone here in Colorado Springs so I risked it.

On May 2, approximately a week after the reclamation period ended, I got an email from a man calling himself Ken Palm. His email stated that he had acquired the domain and that he would sell it to me since I still owned the .net version. He gave me a link to go look at the price and my curiosity was peaked so I took a look. To my surprise, he was asking over $400 for it. He said that that cost covered acquisition costs (yeah right) and a modest profit.

On May 6, after getting at least 6 emails from Mr. Palm, I received another email stating that they were discounting my domain by a whopping $250. Now I’m not a rocket scientist but this just seemed strange. Of course I just resigned to letting someone else get it because honestly, I don’t have $200+ to pay for a domain.

I’m not sure how Mr Palm was able to get a domain immediately after reclamation, and then be able to offer it for sale and then magically less than 30 days later it drops back into the public pool without another 90 day reclamation period but to my surprise this morning, it was available and I picked it up for $6.95 again.

My theory about this process is that after the reclamation period, Godaddy auctions off the domain names and allows interested parties to “purchase” them. So an interested party can investigate a domain and see if that domain has sister domains (.net,.org etc.) that are owned by the previous owner and then start soliciting a large sum to re-acquire the domain. If the previous owner shows interest, they purchase the domain from godaddy for as little as $6.95 or whatever their wholesale cost is and then markup the domain and make $400+ on something that all they did was send a few emails about.

I’m all for capitalism and I’m sure that this little trick has worked on some poor guy or gal that doesn’t understand the process but that’s an insane amount of money to pay for a domain. Now do I wish I was the guy that squatted on pizza.com and made a million bucks on it? Sure. But when the domain name obviously doesn’t have any value except to the person that bought it, it seems a little like black mail seeing as they play on your fear of losing it.

At any rate, I just wanted to write this so that someone else in my shoes doesn’t fall for this in desparation. Of course if it is a domain name that has world wide significance, you may just want to pay the $80 to Godaddy and re-acquire it. In this case, this guy didn’t even buy the domain, all I can figure is that they place it under retainer from the registrar while they try and get the previous owner to put up a large sum of money which they get for sending a few emails. Ingenious but completely unnecessary.

Beware.