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Goodbye Dreamhost

Wow…here’s the story…

I use Dreamhost to host ilias.ca. I have many ilias.ca email aliases. Most relay messages to a gmail account (for spam filtering, and a searchable web archive), which then forwards them to an IMAP account hosted on ilias.ca.

On Friday, Dreamhost decided to move some email accounts to new hardware. Here’s the blog post:

A small number of accounts had mail that was unable to be moved over to new hardware before we had to power down the last of our servers and move them out of the old data center. For now we are setting up those users (without the data) on the new system so they should still be functional and we’ll be working on restoring the data once we have moved the servers (the data is not lost, just not currently available). We apologize for this – we understand how important mail is and wanted to reassure those effected that we’re aware of the matter and are working to correct it.

So on Saturday morning, I woke up to find that all of my previous messages and user-created folders are missing – 0r other hosted ilias.ca addresses for that matter. In fact, I couldn’t even connect to my mail server until a DNS server update. It’s Monday now, and Dreamhost still has not fixed the issue.

Let’s add some extra weirdness to the matter. Today, my IMAP account stopped receiving messages, and started sending my Gmail account bounce messages. I contacted Dreamhost about this, and it appears the configuration was changed from being fully-hosted to a forward-only address with no destination. What this means: dataloss!

I put up with the occasional downtime because of the price, but dataloss? My previous messages being missing for over two days? Buh-bye.

Does anyone have suggestions for a hosting service?

2009 11 23 Chris Ilias Personal
ilias.ca Comments (8) Permalink

How to upgrade to Firefox 3.5

Firefox 3.5 is released!!

If you’re using Firefox 3.0.x, just open the Help menu and select Check for Updates…

If you’re using anything else, download Firefox 3.5 from http://www.getfirefox.com.

2009 06 30 Chris Ilias Firefox
Mozilla Comments (5) Permalink

Making your bookmarks your home page

Some people like to set the Firefox home page to display their bookmarks. That was easy in Firefox 2, when bookmarks were stored in an HTML file, but it’s a little tougher to figure out for Firefox 3. Not only can it be done in Firefox 3, but it works even better.

Just set your home page to the following URL:

chrome://browser/content/bookmarks/bookmarksPanel.xul

That’s it! It doesn’t require you having to find your profile folder, and bookmark folders can be collapsed or expanded individually. Plus the search box at the top of the page will work.

2009 06 06 Chris Ilias Firefox
Mozilla Comments (3) Permalink

Law against using the iPhone while driving

Yesterday, Ontario legislature passed a law banning the use hand-held devices like the iPhone or BlackBerry while driving (with exceptions for cases like headsets, etc.).

I got an iPhone as soon as it was available in Canada, and since then, it is very rare for me not to be using it while driving. But I agree with this law. Very soon after getting an iPhone I noticed a degradation in my driving, because I wasn’t concentrating on the road. I’ve had two instances in which the driver behind me honked, because I didn’t move when the traffic light turned green.

Going back to driving without using my iPhone will be like trying to kill a drug addiction, but I understand why it has to be done. Luckily the law probably won’t take affect until autumn, so I have some time to adjust.

2009 04 23 Chris Ilias Personal Comments (4) Permalink

7 Things

The Swedish rockstar David Tenser tagged me.

Rules:

  1. Link to your original tagger(s) and list these rules in your post.
  2. Share seven facts about yourself in the post.
  3. Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names and the links to their blogs.
  4. Let them know they’ve been tagged.

Things:

  1. I used to work as an audio engineer at a major Toronto recording studio. I’ve worked with Big Sugar, Wide Mouth Mason, Kardinal Offishall (w/ Saukrates and Solitair), Jane Sibbery, Universal Honey; and I’ve produced a song for Pilot Speed.
  2. Before that, I played guitar and wrote songs in a band. We had a production deal, but our singer decided he’d had enough.
  3. On weekends, I play bass and bouzouki in a Greek and Macedonian traditional dance band for weddings and dances.
  4. I’m allergic to chocolate. More specifically, I sneeze whenever eating dark chocolate, but not as much with milk chocolate.
  5. I still live with my parents.
  6. Both of my parents came from the same village in northern Greece, which was part of Macedonia. My last name was given to my dad by the Greek government, when the Greeks took over.
  7. I’ve taken the Mega-Memory home study course.

Tags:

This madness must end.

2009 01 24 Chris Ilias Personal Comments (2) Permalink

Everything is just a few hundred clicks away


Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard
Hilarious!

2009 01 06 Chris Ilias Personal Comments Off Permalink

Canada wins Gold!

Look at the score and the time left in the game…

Canada vs Russia 2009 WJHC last seconds

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqfWzXbqOHM

2009 01 06 Chris Ilias Personal Comments Off Permalink

Firefox on election day

From CNN’s TV broadcast. They use Firefox 3.

2008 11 05 Chris Ilias Firefox
Mozilla Comments (4) Permalink

iPhone apps – Fake Calls and Opera Mini

One of the things I love about product extendability is some of the great ideas people have. Today, I found out about a cool iPhone app called “Fake Calls“. The idea is this: You can make your iPhone simulate an incoming call. It’s great for socially awkward situations, like blind dates or bad party conversations, that you need to escape from. It works on a timer, and lets you customize the identity of the incoming caller.
It’s a free app until tomorrow.

Speaking of iPhone apps, it looks like Opera developed a version of Opera Mini for the iPhone and submitted it to the App Store. According to Opera Software CEO Jon Stephenson von Tetzchner, Apple blocked it due its competition with the built-in Safari browser. Shame on Apple. I hate monoplies. :(

2008 10 31 Chris Ilias Firefox
Mozilla
Personal Comments (10) Permalink

Firefox product placements

Over the past few years, I’ve noticed that I’ve developed a habbit: Whenever I see a browser in the media, be it television shows, commercials, screenshots on web sites, I automatically check to see what browser and OS is being used.

Very often, Firefox is the browser being used. Today, on CNN.com, I saw another instance.

It’s a little hard to tell, but there’s a Firefox icon in the bottom left of the dock, the tab has a favicon, and the search bar has a favicon. Ergo, that’s Firefox, not Safari. CNN used to use Netscape 7 in their screenshots. (Although, that could have been because of the AOL-Time Warner umbrella.)

Years ago, the Mozilla Suite was on the Simpsons:

If it hasn’t already been started, it would be cool if we had a log of all instances Firefox has appeared in the media.

2008 10 05 Chris Ilias Firefox
Mozilla
Mozilla Suite Comments (3) Permalink