The Wargo Blog

I run a WordPress blog and setup the registration option so friends and family (especially my last remaining Aunt) can know when I post new items to the blog. I setup the system to notify me when someone registers and it’s funny to see the different spammers register for the system. Usually the user name they enter doesn’t look anything like the email address – that’s usually a good clue for me that it’s a spammer. You’d think that the user name someone selects would match their primary email address, but that’s not what they usually do. I haven’t tested this, but I’m sure the email addresses are bogus – too funny though how many of them end in .ru.

You’ve got to love it though when spammers register for your site and clearly identify themselves as spammers. Take a look at the following screen shot:

Spam Tester

The person registered for the site and the email address they’re using tells it like it is: someone testing some spamming software.

WordPress has a pretty cool system that blocks spammers from posting stuff to your blog. I use dto use the Nucleus CMS for my blog and one time I had hundreds of spam comments on all sorts of areas in my blog. With WordPress, blocking those guys is automatic, you enable the module and it keeps the bad stuff out.

You’ll notice that I’m not doing what most people do and spell spam with all capital letters. A lot of folks out there think Spam is an acronym when really all it is is a tasty breakfast meat. It’s just a word, nothing to get all capitalized about.

Well, it was -8 degrees this morning, supposed to be -13 tomorrow. Horrible cold.  Furnace broke twice in the last couple of weeks.  Logs going on.

Contacted one of my friends at Binary Tree yesterday. Got a chance to apologize for the way things ended up. I tried to contact him right after the event, but he wasn’t in the mood to hear from me. I’m glad everything is OK between us; he’s been a friend for a long time.

Heard from my friend Laura – it had been quite a while since I talked with her. It was great to hear some of the cool things she’s doing.

I took my Lotus Domino Developer Certification Exam this afternoon. I registered for the wrong test, so it took a lot longer than I’d expected. I wasn’t very prepared for the test, but I passed – that’s all that matters. I’ve now been a certified Lotus Notes developer since version 2 all the way through 8 – I think I got my Notes 2 certification in 1993?  Can’t remember, but it’s been a very long time. I’m trying to find out how many people are left that have certifications going back that far (there wasn’t a Notes 1 certification).

It’s time to start planning for Lotusphere (it’s next week). Always bittersweet for me. I met Anna at the conference, but I also learned my mother had passed while there. It’s year #14 for me for the event, only a few have attended more. I’m looking forward to hanging out with some of my old friends next week.  I hope I’m up for it – I’ve been sick all week, I hope I can still party!

Trying to finish chapter 4 of the book. Should have it done by Sunday night. I’ve got some friends reviewing it as I go and I hope to hear from the publisher soon.