AppConnector Ranking by Google - Year-End Review

Last year, I observed that Karora AppConnector finally got ranked #1 by the Google search engine for the "appconnector" search word, and suggested that we set our next goal to be ranked #1 for the phrase "desktop application integration".

Well as you all know, over the past year, our marketing engine has been cranking hard ;-), and now it's that time again. Let's see how we faired:

View Full Image.

Eleventh place!
Not quite the #1 billing we had hoped for, but not too shabby either, a vast improvement over last year's ranking for the same phrase. Woohoo!!!

Wally

That Wally, so wise!!! :-)


Courtesy: dilbert.com

Heehee, this is sooo true!!! It's also sooo ... me, minus the "existence of [my] wind" part. :-)

"no one" has "seen [me] work" as well. ;-)
And this usually means that I actually get more work done than when some one does "see" me work.

Now you've got to ask yourself one question: Who's this "no one" character?

AppConnector Cookbook: A Spam Flood Notifier

End-user Problem Statement:
You're an IT Director. Your mail server runs on Windows 2000 and uses a directory to queue incoming messages. You want to be notified as soon as this queue becomes heavily loaded, by excessive spamming for instance, so that you can take the appropriate action in time to avoid mail delays for your users.

Motivation:
I'm that "IT Director"! 8-|
I got up this morning and found that my mail server has been so heavily bombarded by excessive spams for the last 12 hours that our SpamAssassin filter was fuming, and there were in excess of 2000 messages stuck in the queue, and the number was rising. All hell broke loose! It took me three hours to stabilize the spam filter and clear out the message queue.

A couple times a year, we tend to run into little fiascos like these. Alas, with each problem comes opportunity.

Techie Translation of Problem Statement:
Need a utility that lets grumpie here monitor a directory for changes, and it should email him when a directory content has exceeded a certain maximum number of files (say 1000).

Solution:
I don't know if Windoze server provides any built-in way to do what's required, but as the old adage goes: Stick with what you know. So here goes...

Use AppConnector with the following recipe:

Ingredients:
- 1 Default Adapter
- 1 File Monitor event
- 1 Script task, with 1 input parameter
- 1 Mail Task
- some angel dust

Instructions:

1. Start warming an empty KAP in 23C temperature environment for comfort
   
2. Add new application using Default Adapter
   
3. Add Script Task, sprinkle in 1 input parameter for flavour.
   
4. Add File Monitor event, set monitored directory to be the mail queue directory, notification type to ONLY ADDED FILES, and let it simmer.
   
5. Back to Script task, add a couple of lines of script to check number of files in the the directory. Set script so that if this number is below the set limit, it should FAIL. Otherwise, it should SUCCEED, to allow the successor task to run.
   
6. Add Mail task as a successor of Script task. Configure it to send email to IT director with an appropriate message body. Sprinkle in some angel dust for taste and stir well.
   

Test well before serving.

Geek jokes, Java flavoured

Just read these jokes on Chet Hasse's Java.Net blog, found them quite ... cute. Thought I'd share them here. You may need to have some programming background to appreciate ...

Two items walk into a ToolBar.
The bartender says, “Can I get you a menu?”
“No thanks, we're looking for a little action.”

...

An item walks into a ToolBar.
The bartender says, “Where's your friend?”
“Big event last night; he's disabled.”

...

Two ints and a Float are in a bar.
They spot an attractive Double on her own.
The first int walks up to her.
“Hey, baby”, he says, “my VM or yours”.
She slaps him and he walks back dejected.
The second int walks over.
“Hey, cute-stuff, can I cook your Beans for breakfast”.
After a quick slapping, he too walks back.
The Float then ambles over casually.
“Were those two primitive types bothering you?”, he remarks.
“Yes. I'm so glad you're here”, she says. “They just had no Class!”

And here are my two cents:

Two items walk into a ToolBar.
Waiter says "Would you like to sit in the menu or non-menu section?"
Item: Non-menu please. Menu section will give us ClassCastException. Can't you see that we're buttons?
Waiter: Oh, I'm sorry. In that case, I can't seat you just yet. Wait here for your ActionListener please. He's busy serving other buttons right now.

Flickr

I just joined the Flickr bandwagon. Here's my very first post :-), taken on my business trip last June using my Canon PowerShot digicam:


Flickr will come in handy the next time I need to include images and illustrations in my blog entries. It is, albeit, a copy-and-paste solution (urgh!) for the time being-- copy the image link from Flickr, paste into Blogger--but it'll do, at least until Blogger finally clues in and supports image uploading in their blogging service. Or is that a premium option? ;-)

Yeah, Yeah, I know Blogger has a thing called Picasa that lets you upload photos. But it's not quite what I'm looking for, because each image uploaded via Picasa immediately shows up as a separate blog entry.