Blog of Jaap A. Haitsma

CloudFlare: Speeds up and protects your website for free

Jaap — Mon, 20 Jun 2011 02:47:37 +0000

It’s not often that I get excited about a startup, but CloudFlare is one of them. CloudFlare can speed up websites by 50% and also protects it against Denial of Service, Web spam, Code injection etc.. The only thing you need to do is change the name servers of your website to the ones provided by Cloudflare. Signing up and changing the name servers is taking less than 5 minutes. The free account is probably good enough for most of sites. If you want more advanced features you can get that for $20 a month with additional sites costing you $5 per month.

ClouFlare distributes the content of your website over their servers that are distributed over the globe. So they basically provide a CDN service like Akamai and this is one of the reasons that your website gets faster. Due to the caching of CloudFlare your site even can stay up when your server is down.

As many websites are hooked up via CloudFlare they also gain a lot of insight on attacks on websites and they developed software to automatically recognize attacks. The CloudFlare servers put up a challenge page with a CAPTCHA when a possible attack is detected.

Below two videos. The first one explains on highlevel how CloudFlare works. The second is a nice interview of Robert Scoble with the two founders of CloudFlare where the founders explain in more detail how their service works.

Finally I’d like to thank the CloudFlare team for this really awesome service that has sped up my websites significantly. The way I see it CloudFlare basically brings CDN to the masses.

Chilean Driver Exam (Dokter Bibber, Ezeltje prik and more)

Jaap — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 02:29:55 +0000

Today I tried to get my Chilean driver license. Exam was very funny

I had two play two games to see how my physical skills are. A kind of version of Dokter Bibber. (For the non Dutch here is a 20s video http://goo.gl/uqIho ) and a version of Ezeltje prik (An old Dutch game played at child parties where while blind folded you have to put a pin in a picture of a donkey)

Luckily as a kid I was brilliant at these games so I passed this part of test. So then I had to go medical exam. Do you have any health problems? No? OK you passed the exam.

Then there was the theoretical part with some real gems

Two examples

1. You are driving 65km/h when you unfortunately hit a pedestrian. At that speed

a) for sure the pedestrian will have died
b) it’s very probable the pedestrian will have died
c) for sure the pedestrian will survive
d) it’s probable that the pedestrian survives

2. Which of the following traits are typical for people that give in to pressure of a group

a) In general they are not that self confident
b) They are afraid that they will be laughed at by others from the group
c) They have greater autonomy and will to defend their opinions.
d) They are able to withstand jokes or being labeled as “cowards” or “bad person. ”
e) They are very confident.

Miraculously I also passed this theoretical test and could go for the practical part.

The instructor told me I needed to hold the steering wheel with two hands because that is the law. After the test I could do what every I wanted.

Here’s a map of the trajectory I had to drive http://goo.gl/gZ9zI

According to google it’s about 2 minutes but I think it was a bit more because I had to wait quite a while for a traffic light.

So I passed all the tests but did not get my driver license because I did need to give them proof that I at least finished primary school. I brought my original university diploma but that didn’t work. It needed to be a legalized copy.

So I still need to go to the notary and get the legalized copy of my diploma and then I’m good to go can legally drive around in this beautiful country.

Boycot GoDaddy.com: CEO Killing Elephants for Fun

Jaap — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 18:35:39 +0000

This really ticked me off today

I used to have a domain with GoDaddy because if you sign up with Google Apps for your domain there was an option to buy a domain at GoDaddy (I hope Google will remove this option soon now that it is known that the CEO killl elephants for fun)

Today I found the following email in my inbox from my current registrar Namecheap

Hi Jaap

It’s not often that we would disagree publicly with a competitor, but we at Namecheap are very disturbed by this video of a competitor killing an elephant for sport. Check out the ABC News Report (Warning: Very Graphic!)

We’ve decided to throw our support behind our Elephant friends by offering domain transfers at a price where we actually lose money.

Show your protest by saying BYEBYEGD again and transfer your domains to Namecheap for $4.99 for the next 24 hours through 11:59pm EST on 3/31/11 (limit 10 per user, valid for all com/net/org domains).
On top of that, we’ll donate $1 for each transfer to Save The Elephants at http://www.savetheelephants.org/

Use coupon code BYEBYEGD and let’s help the Elephants together!

Regards,
Team Namecheap

Many people are outraged about the video showing Bob Parson spending his holiday in 2011 shooting elephants as you can see in the comments of the video that are linked to in the above email. It’s actually weird that this now is in the news.

I clicked around on the video.me site and actually found this video which shows Bob Parsons killing Elephants in his holidays in 2010. It does not have that many views and the comments on it are even disgustingly positive. Bob is defending himself that these elephants are real problem and that he’s helping the locals with this, but if you listen to him in the videos you notice that he does it purely for himself because he is getting a rush of it. He’s even saying “Each year I go to Zimbabwe and hunt problem elephant. It’s one of the most beneficial and rewarding things I do”

If this is the most rewarding thing he does, ……

In case you are not convinced yet about boycotting GoDaddy go to the NoDaddy site, because also their service sucks

Want to get $40,000 for your Startup Company

Jaap — Tue, 15 Feb 2011 02:05:03 +0000

The government of my new home country Chile has a great program called Startup Chile. With this program a foreign entrepreneur that wants to setup a startup business can get $40,000 from the Chilean government. And the good thing is that you don’t have to give up a part of your company. It’s a $40,000 grant. With these grants Chile wants to stimulate entrepreneurship and aims to become the technology hub of South America.

The only real string attached is that you have to come a live in Chile for 6 months (the government arranges all the paperwork). However that is not really a punishment either. Chile is modern country, with nice weather, friendly people and fantastic scenery.

Applying for the $40,000 grant starts tomorrow. You can find the details about applying and the exact conditions here

Santa’s gift to GNOME foundation $1360

Jaap — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 20:10:49 +0000

Because of Christmas shopping I expected the affiliate fees to beat the $1000 a month mark. Santa left a total of $1360 to the GNOME foundation in Amazon affiliate fees

Detailed overview of the December affiliate fees:

Amazon.com	$693.00
Amazon.ca	$0.00
Amazon.de	€298.42
Amazon.fr	€65.80
Amazon.co.uk	£89.94
Amazon.jp	¥3346

Graph below shows the history of the affiliate fees of the past year.

Keep on spreading the plugins to friends and family

Below and in the GNOME Amazon Store you find the links to install the GNOME Amazon Search Plugin of your favorite Amazon store. NOTE the links below might not work if you read this post in an RSS reader, because it needs a javascript command to install the search plugin. Just install the search plugin by going to this post directly.

Firefox

Epiphany/Google Chrome/Chromium

For epiphany use the following smart bookmarks. For Google Chrome/Chromium you can also use the URLs listed below to add a specific GNOME Amazon Search Engine

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.ca: http://www.amazon.ca/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-ca-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-uk-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.de: http://www.amazon.de/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-de-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.fr: http://www.amazon.fr/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-fr-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.jp: http://www.amazon.co.jp/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-jp-22&field-keywords=%s

Getting close to $1000: GNONE Amazon Affiliate Fees November 2010

Jaap — Mon, 27 Dec 2010 02:09:46 +0000

A bit later than usual (my son got born and we moved to live in Chile in the past 5 weeks). Also good news for the affiliate fees as it topped again in November and we’re getting close to $1000 a month. In November the total was $977 helped by a significant increase by Banshee affiliate fees that reached $628.

Detailed overview of the November affiliate fees:

Amazon.com	$570.66
Amazon.ca	$0.00
Amazon.de	€167.84
Amazon.fr	€27.21
Amazon.co.uk	£61.43
Amazon.jp	¥4645

Graph below shows the history of the affiliate fees of the past year. Banshee now has a separate curve

Amazon in the meantime opened two other international stores in Italy and China. So there are more revenue opportunities out there.

Keep on spreading the plugins to friends and family

Firefox

Epiphany/Google Chrome/Chromium

For epiphany use the following smart bookmarks. For Google Chrome/Chromium you can also use the URLs listed below to add a specific GNOME Amazon Search Engine

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.ca: http://www.amazon.ca/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-ca-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-uk-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.de: http://www.amazon.de/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-de-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.fr: http://www.amazon.fr/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-fr-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.jp: http://www.amazon.co.jp/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-jp-22&field-keywords=%s

Still breaking records!! GNOME Amazon Affiliate fees October 2010

Jaap — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 15:52:20 +0000

Affiliate fees are still growing. October brought in record $823 . A very nice increase from the previous record of $635.

Banshee MP3 sales really kicked in (I guess because of recent distribution releases). Banshee MP3 download affiliate fees doubled from $218 to $448.

Detailed overview of the September affiliate fees:

Amazon.com	$403.46
Amazon.ca	$0.00
Amazon.de	€173.43
Amazon.fr	€25.71
Amazon.co.uk	£64.71
Amazon.jp	¥3162

And here is graph showing how we have been doing this year with affiliate fees. The curve has a nice direction

Keep on spreading the plugins to friends and family

Firefox

Epiphany/Google Chrome/Chromium

For epiphany use the following smart bookmarks. For Google Chrome/Chromium you can also use the URLs listed below to add a specific GNOME Amazon Search Engine

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.ca: http://www.amazon.ca/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-ca-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-uk-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.de: http://www.amazon.de/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-de-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.fr: http://www.amazon.fr/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-fr-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.jp: http://www.amazon.co.jp/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-jp-22&field-keywords=%s

Remarkable Flight Entertainment Systems

Jaap — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 19:33:13 +0000

Actually haven’t come across a remarkable flight entertainment system yet . The ones I’ve used on all the flights I have been on are always slow and have non intuitive user interface. A nice example is the KLM flight entertainment I had last week on a flight from Amsterdam to San Francisco. This deserves to be in the UI hall of shame

Why oh why do I have to select between 3 versions of The Bounty Hunter why can’t I just select the movie and later on change audio or subtitles.
Why is there Library I and Library II?
Why do only some movies have the option to see a trailer?
Why does the the system react so slow when you push a button.
Why is the remote placed on the inside of the armrest? When I have the screen turned off it turns on again because I accidentally touch a button with my leg
Why does KLM show a 30 second ad about their wonderful inflight system every time I turn on the system or watch a new movie? I just want to see the movie.

Leave a comment if you have come across remarkable flight entertainment systems.

Another Record Month! GNOME Amazon Affiliate fees September 2010

Jaap — Sun, 03 Oct 2010 20:56:01 +0000

September has beaten our previous record month . In total approximately $635 has been received from in affiliate fees from Amazon compared to the previous record of $500 a nice 27% increase.

The affiliate fees that banshee generates are also part of this. These increased from $174 to $218 this month.

Detailed overview of the September affiliate fees:

Amazon.com	$291.65
Amazon.ca	$0.00
Amazon.de	€142.21
Amazon.fr	€17.77
Amazon.co.uk	£43.23
Amazon.jp	¥4553

All stores increased their revenues this month

And here is graph showing how we have been doing this year with affiliate fees.

Keep on spreading the plugins to friends and family

Firefox

Epiphany/Google Chrome/Chromium

For epiphany use the following smart bookmarks. For Google Chrome/Chromium you can also use the URLs listed below to add a specific GNOME Amazon Search Engine

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.ca: http://www.amazon.ca/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-ca-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-uk-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.de: http://www.amazon.de/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-de-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.fr: http://www.amazon.fr/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-fr-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.jp: http://www.amazon.co.jp/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-jp-22&field-keywords=%s

GNOME Amazon Referral Fees August 2010

Jaap — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 20:59:42 +0000

August has been a record month for the affiliate fees that the GNOME Foundation received!!!! In total approximately $500 has been received from the different stores.

The change compared to last month ($231 in total) is for large part due to the fact that Banshee now has the option to buy MP3 files from Amazon. Through MP3 purchases of Banshee users $175 of affiliate fees were generated. Since the Amazon store is only present in a development version of Banshee I expect we’ll see much higher revenues when 1.8.0 gets released and gets packaged for the major distributions. Hopefully the distributions will not change the affiliate tag to their own.

Hopefully somebody will also add the Amazon MP3 store this into Rhythmbox.

Detailed overview of the August affiliate fees:

Amazon.com	$272.00
Amazon.ca	$0.00
Amazon.de	€133.38
Amazon.fr	€12.18
Amazon.co.uk	£20.96
Amazon.jp	¥732

Keep on spreading the plugins to friends and family

Firefox

Epiphany

For epiphany use the following smart bookmarks.

Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.ca: http://www.amazon.ca/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-ca-20&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.uk: http://www.amazon.co.uk/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-uk-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.de: http://www.amazon.de/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-de-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.fr: http://www.amazon.fr/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-fr-21&field-keywords=%s
Amazon.co.jp: http://www.amazon.co.jp/s?mode=blended&search-alias=aps&tag=gnomesearchplugin-jp-22&field-keywords=%s