• What to do if XAMPP for Windows won’t load anything under localhost

    I’ve used XAMPP for Windows on my laptop as a testing server for over a year with no problems. Today, though, I started the Apache and MySQL services as I have many times in the past only to find that both localhost and 127.0.0.1 did not work in my browser. Here’s some of the things I tried that did no good and some notable facts:

    1. I tried localhost:80 and 127.0.0.1:80 with no effect
    2. I disabled the Windows firewall. No dice.
    3. I uninstalled the Apache service. No change.
    4. I uninstalled/reinstalled XAMPP multiple times with multiple versions. No change.
    5. When I would put localhost in the browser, I did not receive a "Page cannot be found" error. Instead, the status bar would indicate "Waiting for localhost." I waited more than ten minutes to see if anything would happen at one point. Nothing did: The screen remained white.
    6. It didn’t matter what browser I used. IE, Firefox, and Opera all sat there and waited while nothing happened.
    7. I have made no system changes since the last time I ran XAMPP except for the regular barrage of Windows Updates.

    While I don’t know exactly what broke my XAMPP installation, I can almost guarantee that a Windows Update killed it. I know Microsoft can’t keep every program under the sun from breaking with its updates, it could do a better job of telling you exactly what each update does without having to dig through 500 lines of the KB articles. Anyway…

    I managed to fix the problem, as per this article posted in the Apache Friends forums. In the C:\program files\xampp\apache\bin\httpd.conf file, I added the following line:

    Win32DisableAcceptEx

    From the best I can tell, this has something to do with Apache’s interaction with Windows’ WinSock 2 API. I’d say some security update managed to fix a problem in WinSock but break Apache. It makes me feel really stupid that I don’t know exactly what caused the problem or exactly how the solution actually fixed it. I’m just glad everything is working now. I can actually get to work on the project I needed the server for in the first place.

  • The Best Desktop Wallpapers on the Internet

    One of my favorite places on the Internet is Digital Blasphemy.com. This site is by far the place to get desktop wallpaper. I’ve been a fan for about 4 years and with each update, I am more and more impressed with Ryan Bliss’ work. He is an amazing digital artist.

    One of the coolest things to do is go look at the 2001 work and compare it to the current offerings. With every new version of software (Truespace 3D, Lightwave, etc), Ryan manages to push the envelope and get the most out of new features. This goes to show you that a true artist can get the most out of his tools.

    Digital Blasphemy has free section, but I would recommend that anyone pay $20 and sign up for a 1 year subscription. The paid wallpapers are well worth it, especially if you spend as much time on the computer as I do.

  • Superman Ice Cream is so hard

    One of the simple pleasures in life goes all the way back to my youth: Superman Ice Cream. We bought a gallon a little over a month ago at Save-a-Lot and I’ve been slowly chipping away at it. This evening, I decided I needed a bowl but I was having a horrible time trying to scoop it out. Thanks, Becca, for lending a hand. If the world was about to end, as long as I had you to scoop my Superman Ice Cream, everything will be ok. I love you babe.

  • My Little Wife

    Today has been awful. Program Assessment is looming around the corner and it’s always very stressful because no matter how hard I try, I can never seem to do the thing well enough to satisfy the people who call the shots.  Because of this Program Assessment stress, I have been less than cheery today. I want to thank my pretty little wife for putting up with me and being supportive as always.

    I love you Becca. Always and forever my love you will be.

  • Finally, easily enable WPA in Ubuntu 6.06

    The following was taken from http://www.debianadmin.com/enable-wpa-wireless-access-point-in-ubuntu-linux.html Normally, I would never repost content from some else’s site, but I’m afraid that it may disappear at some point. So, I’ll post it here. Again, I DID NOT author this content, but I’m puting it here for archival purposes just in case it disappears.

    Procedure to enable WPA Wireless in Ubuntu

    To update the source list run the following command

    sudo apt-get

    sudo apt-get install wpasupplicant

    sudo apt-get install network-manager-gnome network-manager

    sudo gedit /etc/network/interfaces

    Comment out everything other than “lo” entries in that file and save the file

    Create a file called /etc/default/wpasupplicant, add entry ENABLED=0 and save the file

    sudo touch /etc/default/wpasupplicant

    Reboot your system or use the following command

    sudo /etc/init.d/dbus restart

    Once you login back in to your machine you need to left-click the network manager icon in Gnome and select your wireless network It should prompts for password, type, etc and It will ask you to choose a password for your new “keyring”.

    After enterring all the details my wireless network was connected and working fine you can see in the follwoing screen

    Again, special thanks to the folks at DebianAdmin.com for providing us with this elegant solution.

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