Web Software & Database Development-Latrobe Greensburg Pittsburgh

CICON 2011
Posted 08/26/2011 by Dan

This last weekend, Nick and I took a trip to CICON 2011 in New York City, a conference for PHP developers who use the CodeIgniter framework. Some of the big CI community members were there, including Phil Sturgeon, Greg Aker, and Kenny Katzgrau, and I got to talk with each one of them one-on-one.

There were a number of excellent talks given about such topics as:
- Web server optimization - how to get your web applications to run faster and to scale better.
- Unit testing - how to develop testable code and write unit tests effectively in Code Igniter.
- Redis - how it works and when to use it.
- Code libraries - how to build extendable code that can be easily tested and used by others
- Git - learning how to use the freshest and most powerful source control engine
- getsparks.org - a great place for CodeIgniter modules, so we don't have to customize everything. As this site grows, the CodeIgniter community will too.

Some other thoughts from the conference.
- There was not a PC in site. Everyone had a MacBook, and almost all of the software tools being used were for Macs. We might consider switching if we didn't do some .NET development, but it's very tempting.
- The CI community is relatively small, but is very active and growing internationally. There were over 90 people in attendance, and some came all the way from Germany and Sweden (despite there being a conference in London in October).
- We had been trying to decide between Git and Mercurial for our next source control implementation, and CodeIgniter moving from Mercurial to Git helped make our decision easier. A lot more people are using Git, and it's a huge upgrade from Subversion.
- Twitter is a great way to be an active member of a community by having regular contact and keeping up with what other people are working on, without having to watch forums all day. I plan to join Twitter soon and to start following many of the guys from the conference, because they have a lot of great things to say.
- Every one of the speakers at the conference were outgoing and easy to talk to - not your stereotypical programmers. Communication is becoming necessary for programmers, especially in an open source community.

~Dan

Password Security
Posted 08/02/2011 by Dan

As I find out about new clever ways of creating safe passwords, I will do my best to share them.

- One of the most common ways that hackers are finding passwords is simply by trying a lot of common passwords and seeing what works. Scripts can be written to try tens of thousand passwords a second, so they can guess a lot of things. One of the most effective ways to beat this technique is to avoid using dictionary words or names in your password. But this makes it difficult to actually remember your password. So one way to beat the brute-force method is to use a password that repeats a character a lot of times. So say for example you use pickles5 as your password. Try using pickles5^^^^^^^^^^ instead. Just remember the number of special characters to add at the end of your password, and it makes your password much longer. Similarly you could just duplicate each key that you press, and make your password ppiicckklleess55. The longer and stranger your password is, the less likely it will be broken by brute-force.

- A common way that hackers are getting passwords for secured systems is by assuming that people use the same user name, email address, and password for multiple sites (called password entropy). This is very true for most users, because it's difficult enough to remember one good password. One way to prevent having all of your services hacked is by coming up with a different specific ending to your password depending on the site you are visiting. So say you again use pickles5 for your password. Try using pickles5G for your gmail account, and pickles5Y for your Yahoo! account. This way, if someone gets your password for one site, it's unlikely they will be able to guess your passwords for the different sites that you use.

- People have developed online password managers to help you keep track of passwords for different websites. Just remember one user and password, and the managers handle all of the sites that you log into. I haven't used one myself, but you want to choose a site that you can trust.

These techniques help beat the commonly used methods for now - but the hackers are innovating just as quickly as the hacker prevention tools are. Understanding what hacking methods are out there and using passwords with techniques that are not commonly used is the best way to keep yourself safe.

~Dan

Facebook stuck with MySQL?
Posted 07/25/2011 by Dan

While much has been made of the ability of MySQL to function in enormous environments, such as Facebook, recently much has come to light about the difficulties that Facebook has keeping up with the workload. This article highlights the biggest issues that they face. http://gigaom.com/cloud/facebook-trapped-in-mysql-fate-worse-than-death/

Choosing MySQL is a very common practice for web-based software. It's inexpensive, easy to configure for initial use, and it works very effectively. But it was not built with the intent of housing mountains of data like Facebook does. But you don't want to start with an Oracle database on a project that might not take off due to its costs. So what database should you choose for your project?

The answer is - you don't choose! An application can actually maintain database independence more easily than it seems. At Ethix Systems, we build our applications using an ORM solution that supports MySQL, PgSQL, MSSQL, Oracle, and Sqlite among others. By doing so, we can ensure that choosing a database is not an issue at the start of the project and that it will not become an issue as the project grows and matures.

Had Facebook implemented a similar solution, they would not have the issues that plague their database administrators currently. Fortunately, we have learned from their mistakes and will be avoiding that particular problem for our clients.

~Dan

Code Documentation
Posted 06/14/2011 by Dan

Many of our clients wonder, what makes Ethix Systems one of the most highly recommended programming companies in the area? One of the things that help us to stand out is that we build an application not just for today, but for 5 weeks from now, 5 months from now, and 5 years from now.

One of the many ways that we do this is by commenting our code effectively. Ask any programmer what their least favorite task is, and you'll likely hear this one a lot. But it's extremely important to do so. Most people might look at a block of code and wonder "what does that mean?" Well, usually a year after a programmer has created some code, even he or she looks at it and thinks "what does this do?" In addition, trying to review another programmer's code can be very challenging, since no one person thinks in the exact same way.

While we pride ourselves on training our staff to work on projects the right way, each programmer can have a different coding style. Thus, it becomes very important to document our code both thoroughly and accurately to make sure that someone else can pick up where they left off if necessary.

We use phpDoc notation to comment our client projects for three reasons. The first is because it is familiar. phpDoc is derived from JavaDoc, which is one of the most popular standards of code commenting available. Second, it is comprehensive. It contains information about when the file was created, when it was last updated, who all has made changes in the file, a description of its purpose, and basic information about its input and output. This ensures that reviewing the code is much simpler and less frustrating. Comments are much easier to understand than trying to derive the logic and what the coder was thinking at the time.

The final reason is because we can provide substantial code documentation very easily. phpDocumentor is a tool that converts JavaDoc-style comments into literal code documentation. While we don't have a publicly available example of phpDocumentor in action, it is used by a large number of open source projects, such as TCPDF. An example of their documentation is located here.

This is one way that our clients can sleep soundly knowing that the code of their application can be easily understood and worked on by anyone familiar with PHP programming and the CodeIgniter framework.

~Dan

Having a Successful Internship Program
Posted 05/26/2011 by Dan

Many people are intrigued when they find out that we hire a lot of student interns for our company with great success. And many ask how they can do the same.

So here are my tips to having a successful internship program.

- Seek out ambition. If you are comparing one student who has experience and a student who has done things on their own, see what your gut tells you. You may have to spend more time training someone with raw talent, but it will pay dividends down the road when you assign them a task and they can run with it.

- Spend time up front with them. One-on-one training is very time-consuming. But if you have an intern doing only busy-work, they will never truly feel like a part of your team. You will have a much more dedicated employee when you devote the time to train and teach them how to perform more critical functions.

- Give them responsibility. If they don't think that they have the power to do anything important, they won't feel that they are necessary to your organization. Even just giving them a key to your office and asking them to open or lock up makes a huge difference in feeling important.

- Pay them reasonably. Unpaid internships with prestige are rare. If you have an intern and you pay them well, they will treat the job with respect and will acknowledge that responsibility. If the student is unpaid and they have a big test coming up, they may decide to not show up. Make it worth their while to help you.

- Give them different tasks to do. They are still trying to find that dream job, and allowing them to try different things helps them to learn about what they like and what they don't like. Additionally, having them use different skills allows you to find their strengths and weaknesses. One of our programming interns happened to write excellent sales proposals. Just make sure that they are interested in branching out past their job description.

- Get and give feedback. Everyone wants to get better at what they do. Give them opportunities to grow as a person, and they will relish the chance. They will also have a different perspective about your organization and might give you some great insight.

~Dan

Google Apps free accounts reduced
Posted 05/09/2011 by Dan

For anyone who is thinking about migrating to Google Apps, or trying it out for their business, it's worth doing before 12:00 AM tomorrow. The free version of Google Apps that grants you up to 50 accounts is being reduced to a limit of 10 accounts. Once you need that 11th account, it will cost you $50 per user account per year - much more significant than the currently free price-tag.

Please note that educational and non-profit accounts will not be affected by this.

~Dan

Software Power Consumption
Posted 04/05/2011 by Dan

Seeing a blog post from the IE9 team about their browser's power consumption leading the industry make me laugh at first. (Of course their browser will lead in the power consumption race, since it's the most directly tied with the operating system.) But then I got to thinking about software development and how it affects power consumption. Is there such a thing as some software being greener than others?

Computers use power as their resources are needed to be used. If the CPU is being taxed, it will require more power. The same thing is true of the hard drive, CD drive, and any other peripheral device. So it's true that well designed software will have a lower power-consumption hit than poorly designed software, since well-designed software will use fewer resources. However, many factors go into designing a software program aside from performance. These include efficiency of development, maintenance, and time to develop. As a result, performance is considered, but not often made a primary point of emphasis unless you're working with an enormous set of users, an enormous set of data, or are developing for handheld devices (where power usage is a huge concern).

In most cases, web software should be more green than most other software implementation models since it uses a thin-client model, assuming there are more than a handful of users. Let's say you have 50 users running a program. On a traditional software model, each of those 50 machines will be running a localized version of the software. They will be connecting to a centralized database, performing calculations, and storing information locally, thus increasing power consumption for each of those users. In a web-based application, the server performs the bulk of the calculations - only the JavaScript requires calculations, and only cookie and session information is actually stored on the hard drive. So the server shoulders the bulk of the power-usage, while the clients require very little. Server operating systems are much more energy-efficient since a significant portion of a server-farm's budget is for electricity. So while I have no statistics to support my theories, I believe that by using web technologies, Ethix Systems develops software that is just as green, if not greener, than most others.

We as a company have not made conscious decisions to use power-efficient solutions for our clients, as we are primarily trying to find the ideal solution from a business logic and implementation perspective. However, by building programs that are well-designed and laid out ahead of time and by using web technologies, our programs inherently are about as green as they come. It's interesting to think about and to consider as we develop using newer technologies and paradigms.

~Dan

Radiation Level Chart
Posted 03/31/2011 by Dan

In leiu of the recent disaster in Japan, some people have become panic-stricken in the US regarding nuclear radiation and whether unsafe levels might hit the US. In an attempt to educate people on radiation, where it can be found, and what a safe level is, someone posted what I like to call a "radiation reality-check chart." It talks about common household items that create radiation, what it takes to hit unsafe levels of radiation, and it compares the radiation generated from Fukushima and Chernobyl. I found it very informative, as well as entertaining.

You can find the link at www.xkcd.com/radiation. Hopefully you will learn something!

~Dan

Software Seminar
Posted 03/17/2011 by Dan

Software is such a broad field and changes continually, so it isn't surprising that it's also one of the most commonly misused areas of business.

Part of our Mission Statement at Ethix Systems is to help educate people in how software should be purchased, tested, used, and maintained. As a part of our this effort, in conjunction with the Small Business Development Center at Saint Vincent College, we will be hosting a seminar entitled "Making Good Software Decisions for your Company" on March 30 from 9:00 AM - 12:00 PM.

During this seminar, we will review a number of topics, including data entry, software customization, software licensing, database concerns, and how to avoid getting scammed. We will also focus on web technologies and whether or not free software is worth using.

I would recommend this seminar to any small business who struggles delegating tasks to their employees and staying organized, as well as to mid-sized companies who struggle with efficiency and have no idea of how well their company is doing at any given time. These are some problems that having the right software would solve. Also anyone just interested in learning more about how software works and what different technology options exist would find value in this seminar.

The cost is $40/person - if you're interested in attending, please fill out the form at the bottom of the flier, located here.

~Dan

Take payments on the go
Posted 02/23/2011 by Dan

So most companies can accept credit cards in their store or online. But what about on the go? Very few people carry cash anymore, so selling goods and services on the go can be a serious challenge.

A product by Square, Inc. now lets you use your iPhone, iPad, or Android device to accept credit card payments. The credit card reader is free and it plugs right into your phone. Just download the free app on your phone, register an account with Square, and you're good to go. There is no contract, and the payments deposit directly into your bank account. You just enter the amount of the purchase in the app, the user swipes their card and uses their finger to sign directly on the screen, and voila - the payment is taken. The cost is reasonable too, - 2.75% of the purchase may seem high, but when you consider that there are no merchant services, startup fees, or monthly requirements, it's very reasonable. There is also an option to manually enter the card number at a slightly increased cost of 3.25% + 15 cents.

Some people this could definitely help:
- A company who accepts one or two credit card transactions each month
- A musician selling recorded CDs at shows
- A street or travelling performer
- A craft-maker selling wares at weekend festivals
- A beggar..wait, how's a beggar getting a smart phone? Never mind.

Check it out at www.squareup.com.

~Dan

Mobile Development - Know the Facts
Posted 02/17/2011 by Dan

We've gotten a number of inquiries recently about mobile development, and there are a number of misconceptions out there.

1. iPhones/iPads are not the only mobile platform that matter

While Apple has the pizazz and much of the attention right now, Android devices are growing faster and are approaching Apple's market share. Also, Blackberry still has the lion's share of business users, and Windows Phone 7 is new, so that may come into the picture soon.

2. Developing the same app for two different platforms is like building two different applications.

Well sort of...much of the logic and interface layouts for the apps would be the same. But the actual programming would be completely separate since each uses a different programming language and paradigm.

3. Mobile websites can adequately replace the need for an app in some cases.

An app has wonderful marketing potential - the user sees your app's icon just by looking around on their phone. Plus it can run without internet access and can utilize more of the phone's resources, giving it a better user experience. Plus it gives your organization more credibility by having a custom-developed app.

However, in some cases a mobile site is sufficient. For example, you don't need an app for your online store - you just need a mobile version of your store available so people can still easily browse and purchase from you on the go. Mobile sites do not require publishing to an app store, continual update pushes, or device-specific development, so they carry a cost and maintenance advantage in most cases.

In short, there is not one easy answer for where to start with your mobile app ideas - it will usually depend on the app's resource needs, your target market, your time-line, and your budget.

~Dan

Verizon iPhone - a step toward more choice?
Posted 01/31/2011 by Dan

Huge news that Verizon's getting the iPhone. Now the world's most popular phone will be available to another huge market-share. All of the analysts are asking some interesting questions related to AT&T, Verizon, Apple, and the iPhone following. But most of them are missing the big picture question. Is this the first step to phone and phone service separation?

Let me explain what I mean. Right now when you need cell phone service, you go to a service provider and talk to them about purchasing a phone. They allow you to browse their available selection of phones, you purchase your phone, and then you leave with a 2 year service plan.

Is it just me, or does it seem a little crazy to purchase both at the same time? Do you walk into your favorite internet service provider's store to purchase a PC or laptop? Do you go to your favorite gas station to purchase a car? Cell phones and cell phone service may depend on each other, but they are essentially separate services in the same industry. Verizon, AT&T, etc. are simply representing the phone developers in their store with their small selection of available phones. Why can't we use whatever phone we want with whomever's service we want?

There's one really big reason: not all networks work the same way. The new Verizon iPhones are very different from the AT&T iPhones. The Verizon phones will not work on AT&T's network, and vice versa. No phone works equally as well on any given network. But imagine being able to choose your phone and your provider separately. It opens up a new world of choice for the consumer! But the way the cell-phone market is currently, this separation would be impossible. Networks are way too different.

So what does the iPhone have to do with this? It costs Apple money to make two different iPhones - one for Verizon and one for AT&T. Can Apple put enough pressure on Verizon and AT&T to force them to narrow the gap between their network differences? Will other phone developers follow suit? It would require Apple and others to take a stand and require the service providers to change. Will this happen overnight? Certainly not. Will this happen eventually? I hope so. But you'd better believe that service providers will be fighting tooth and nail to prevent it.

~Dan

User agents
Posted 01/26/2011 by Dan

For those of you web developers out there wondering what a user agent is, why you should care about it, and why they are so confusing, this should help.

Each browser has a user agent that uniquely defines the browser version that you're using.

Here are some common user agent strings (they can differ depending upon your operating system and settings):

IE8: Mozilla/4.0 (compatible; MSIE 8.0; Windows NT 6.0)
FF4: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 6.1; ru; rv:1.9.2.3) Gecko/20100401 Firefox/4.0 (.NET CLR 3.5.30729)
Chrome: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US) AppleWebKit/525.13 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/0.X.Y.Z Safari/525.13.

Confused yet?

Here is a link to an informative (albeit goofy) article discussing why user agents look the way that they do.

So why do user agent strings matter? Some of the following are common ways of using the user agent to guarantee a better site experience:

Ever wonder why your smartphone displays some sites differently than a regular computer? It's checking your user agent to see if you're using a device that has a smaller screen and sends you to a mobile version of their site.
You can apply different CSS styles on browsers that don't render something exactly right. Just check the user agent, and apply a different stylesheet.
You can restrict the number of supported browsers on a site - often this is done on JavaScript-heavy applications to reduce the number of tests needing to be run. (This is a more common practice on internal applications.)

Here is a nifty tool to let you enter a confusing-looking user agent string and get pertinent information about what device and browser is being used.

Here is also a Firefox extension that allows you to change the user agent on your browser, which can lead to interesting results.

~Dan

Phones replacing wallets - a matter of when, not if
Posted 01/20/2011 by Dan

I was thinking about the contents of my wallet the other day, and I realized just how much a smart phone can replace everything in there. A driver's license could be digitized easily. Credit cards are already being replaced in some places with a phone app. Membership cards would be simple to add. I definitely have more pictures on my phone than in my wallet. And my wallet rarely contains cash anymore, so that's not usually a concern.

So my question is, when will wallets be a thing of the past? 5 years? 10 years? When will enough people have smart phones to allow organizations to replace membership cards with membership apps?

Some people might be concerned about this change, but it can be safer to lose your phone than your wallet. You can't secure a wallet - if your wallet gets stolen, their contents are gone and there's nothing you can do except call your financial companies and have your cards disabled. But if your smart phone gets stolen, there are apps that allow you to lock it down online (these apps are worth their weight in gold). It's much easier and more secure than a wallet is.

This is definitely the way society is headed - I just wonder when I'll have to start getting used to my back pocket being empty.

~Dan

Online shopping - do your research
Posted 11/29/2010 by Dan

As search engines become more and more intelligent, there are some unintended side-affects that come about based on peoples' browsing habits. Most people know that the more your site is mentioned on the Internet, the higher it will be ranked by Google and others. Well, did you know that bad publicity can be a good thing on the Internet?

Statistics show that an unsatisfied customer is much more likely to post a complaint than a satisfied customer is to post a sparkling review. So if you're looking for a web presence, does it actually make sense to give bad customer service in order to boost your presence online?

Normal logic would say that isn't so, but there are companies out there taking advantage of this loophole and are purposely providing poor service in hopes that someone will complain about their company online. Having 5 good reviews and 75 bad reviews will give you a higher Google ranking than having 35 good reviews and no bad reviews. Combine this with the fact that most online shoppers don't review websites before buying, and it's possible that having poor customer service will result in higher sales. Here is the New York Times' story about one business who has done just that.

A simple stop to sites like the Better Business Bureau or GetSatisfaction.com can often tell you if a site is legitimate or not. Unfortunately the average purchaser goes no further than their Google search for "sunglasses" or "cheap netbook."

So if you plan on doing online shopping before Christmas, I highly recommend researching your vendors online - it may save you a lot of trouble this holiday season.

~Dan

CI 2.0 - Helping to Stop Phishing
Posted 11/18/2010 by Dan

While it isn't official that CodeIgniter 2.0 is out of beta, based on feedback from the community it will not be undergoing any significant revisions. So, we have decided to use it for our projects starting this month.

Most of the features are great for programming and code-structure, but there is one security feature worth mentioning. Cross-site request forgery (or CSRF) is not a well publicized problem, but it is directly related to phishing, which is much more well known.

How does phishing work? Hacker X sent Person A an email requesting the user to go to www.amazion.com instead of www.amazon.com. Person A clicks on the link, and they come to a page that looks exactly like Amazon.com. Amazon.com actually owns amazion.com but if someone else did, they could turn it into a site that looks like Amazon.com. Person A logs into what appears to be their Amazon account, and their account information is stored for Hacker X to look at. Then they are redirected back to Amazon.com and are automatically logged in. The user does not even know that something bad happened!

To log the user into the real Amazon.com, Hacker X used CSRF to submit the user's login information to amazon.com seamlessly. While we cannot prevent the user from clicking on the link and giving up their login information, we can tell them once they get to the real site that they have attempted to log in from a remote website and that they may have had their login information compromised. CodeIgniter 2.0 allows us to build in CSRF-protection in our applications to help prevent phishing victims from becoming identity-theft victims.

~Dan

New Addition to the Team!
Posted 11/11/2010 by Rob

Though he has been with us for some time now, we have updated our blog and site to officially welcome new programming intern, Joe Anderson, to Ethix Systems. Joe is majoring in Mathematics and Computer Science at St. Vincent College in Latrobe. With Joe as our 4th intern, our team now totals 8. Now that the number of student interns equals the full-time employees, we soon hope to take over Ethix Systems from Dan, Nick, BJ, and Adam. Joe will be an integral part of our plot.

Feel free to check out Joe's employee profile in the Our Team section of our website.

~Rob

Firesheep - who's watching you?
Posted 10/29/2010 by Dan

There's a new, free Firefox add-on called Firesheep that does something very scary. It allows someone on the same network as you to stalk and steal your Facebook, Twitter, Gmail, Amazon.com, and other sessions that you once thought secure.

From a technical standpoint, here's how it works. Websites such as the above use cookies to store information about your browsing experience. That's how sites can personalize what they show and how logins often work. Well these cookies are not the most hidden pieces of information - they can be seen by anyone. They are also generally standardized, meaning one person's Facebook session cookie looks a lot like someone else's - just with their personalized information instead.

So all Firesheep is doing is checking out every machine that it can see for cookies that it recognizes. When it recognizes one, it steals it and puts it on your machine. Then it gives you an option to use that cookie to pretend to be someone else.

Two notes before I explain how you can protect yourself.

One, this has been possible since the dawn of the internet cookie so it isn't a new concept. As long as a site is relying solely on browser cookies, it has no way to prevent a session from being stolen. What's scary now is that anyone with a computer and an IQ above 50 can download Firefox, download this app, and spy on the people around them. When flaws are found in systems, it's scary. But it's much scarier when they are made available for the common user.

Two, there are ways to develop systems that use database-stored, encrypted session cookies instead of purely browser-based cookies. Our framework uses database sessions which uniquely identify your computer's IP address, exact browser version, and last activity timestamp with the session that you are using. So even if someone else steals your cookie, they will not be able to access our custom systems with your login information without needing to know all of that information exactly.

As for protecting yourself, there are a few things you can do.

Use SSL when available (also known as https) - this prevents recognition of the cookies since it uniquely identifies your machine and will prevent others from gaining access. Not all programs offer this, so this solution is limited. But start going to https://www.facebook.com instead of http://www.facebook.com - it will protect you.
Get a firewall - probably your safest bet. Turning security settings up can get very annoying when it asks you every time if it's OK for program A to talk to person B, but it will definitely protect you. If "Billy's PC" is trying to connect to your computer and you don't know who Billy is, block it. Firewalls can protect you if you know how to use them.
Avoid using public wi-fi. Not always avoidable, but you can only be tracked by those on your network. Getting air cards are an expensive alternative, but an alternative nonetheless.

~Dan

Digital Warfare
Posted 10/11/2010 by Dan

A friend of mine was telling me last week that one of his website hosts was being attacked with a Denial of Service attack. He said that trouble began when this host began doing business in China and that he was considering moving all of those websites because they had become unreliable. That business may go under as a result of these attacks, and all because one person or organization decided to test a hosting company's digital defenses and found them lacking.

That got me to thinking about just how lethal digital warfare can be on an organization. We've been moving toward a society where organizations are nearly as powerful as governments. All it may take to bring down a business' digital infrastructure is a $200 netbook, a small slip up by a network admin, and a brilliant mind with a strong desire to see that company brought to its knees.

It's scary to think that deep within the internet there is a massive game of chess being played between millions of players, each one trying to protect their interests and possibly destroy others' lifetime of achievements.

While commerce continues to rely more and more on technology, digital warfare is only going to become more commonplace and more clever. I only hope that the good guys can keep up.

~Dan

jQuery ThemeRoller
Posted 09/21/2010 by Rob

Having used jQuery's ThemeRoller plugin in several projects so far, I decided to write a short little blurb about it. jQuery offers a CSS/javascript based plugin that allows you to dynamically style pages.

ThemeRoller only requires css classes in your html tags. Example,

< td class="ui-widget-header" >

In this example, the td will be styled with whatever theme you choose from the theme roller for the header via jQuery.

After you roll a css theme onto your headers, content, buttons, etc. simply download the custom css and include it in your page.

This tool allows much flexibility in your styling, especially in the case of a color scheme change if you are programming a web app which you plan on selling to multiple clients.

Check out this link and play with your own styles!

~Rob

Happy Programmers' Day
Posted 09/13/2010 by Dan

Well, in Russia anyway.

On September 11, 2009, Russia declared the 256th day of the year (September 13, or September 12 on leap years) to be Programmers' Day, an official professional holiday.

That particular day was chosen because it is 2^8, also known in programming as the lowest number that a binary byte cannot recognize (11111111 is 255).

Despite employing thousands of programmers, Google apparently does not recognize the holiday, as their logo does not appear in ASCII text today. For shame!

We will be celebrating with ice cream. We have no news on how the Russians celebrate it.

Anyway, Happy Programmers Day everyone!

~Dan

Facebook, aka Intern's Playground
Posted 09/07/2010 by Rob

Ethix Systems is now on facebook. Please be sure to check us out for short timely updates like this one!

~Rob

Free Software Installation
Posted 08/30/2010 by Dan

So I haven't been keeping up with this, because the post before this I promised more information about SSL certificates. Well we did some research...and then we did some more research...and then we ended up having more questions than answers about how exactly they work and what the differences are.

So I haven't been blogging because I haven't had time to finish the previous post. No more. Back to quick and easy blogging - I'll get to the SSL certificate when I get to it.

There is a fantastic tool available for quickly setting up software on a new computer. At http://ninite.com, they combine the most commonly used free software downloads into a single installer. This way, you can get the latest versions of your favorite software all from one source, making reformatting a computer an absolute breeze. There aren't even any annoying ads or anything.

You can even use it to find alternatives to software that you're currently using - for example, 7-Zip is a great alternative to a WinRAR trial for file compression software and most people don't know about it.

A paid version allows you to use the tool for commercial use. For $20/month you also get a simpler management tool from your desktop, automatic removal of annoying toolbar add-ons, and a few other perks. Might be worth it if installing these applications would save you a lot of time.

~Dan

SSL Certificates - Part 1
Posted 06/22/2010 by Dan

Not many people understand how an SSL certificate works, even though most of us have used one, perhaps unknowingly. We trust that a company's shopping cart is secured because their browser bar is colored green or has a little lock symbol on it. But what exactly is SSL and how does it secure your information? And as a user, should I care about it?

An SSL certificate serves two purposes. The first is that it proves your identity to a user. When a website owner requests an SSL certificate for their server, it is verifying ownership to a third-party company, like Verisign. You are saying "yes I am www.ethixsystems.com, and I want other people to know that I am www.ethixsystems.com." So they sign you up and give you a secret key. You put that secret key on your server at www.ethixsystems.com and don't share it with anyone else.

Now when a web browser contacts www.ethixsystems.com, the Ethix Systems server responds saying "I am secure, and my third-party is Verisign." Then the browser contacts Verisign and says "is this the right person?" Verisign then comes back and says "yes, here is the correct credential." Then the browser sends that credential to the Ethix Systems server, proving that it checked out correctly. Once the Ethix Systems server receives that, it verifies again with Verisign to make sure it's valid. Once that comes back, then both the web browser and Ethix Systems server are able to talk to each other securely.

The second purpose is to hide secure information from people who are "listening."Without a secure connection, someone can sit between the two machines reading all of the information they pass back and forth, much like someone tapping a phone line. They can hear and see everything, including passwords, credit card information, and sensitive data. The secure connection enabled by the SSL certificate scrambles the data before it sends it, and then once it's received by the other party it get decoded. This way no one can intercept your sensitive information.

So what does this mean for a normal internet user? Most of this gets taken care of for you. But most importantly, look before you type. If you're going to enter private or sensitive information, check the top of your browser to make sure it's secured. If you don't see the "https" in the URL, or you don't see a lock or green bar, then you might be submitting information across the web unsecured, or worse yet to a website pretending to be the one you think you're on.

In Part 2 later this week, I'll explain what SSL means for website owners and what the different kinds of certificates are.

~Dan

New Ethix Systems Intern
Posted 06/15/2010 by Rob

To meet the growing needs of our clients as we continue to acquire new and unique projects, we would like to officially announce another hiring: Programming Intern, Matt Manspeaker. Greatly interested in web development, Matt is majoring in Computer Science at St. Vincent College in Latrobe. He'll be working closely with our experienced team so as to make a seamless transition into the business. Though he has been here only couple weeks or so, he's a bright mind having already caught on quickly and has been a valuable member to the team.

Feel free to check out Matt's employee profile in the Our Team section of our website, which has been updated to accommodate him.

~Rob

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