It can be hard to visualize potential. I've created this video demo as a way to show what a basic website looks like, including a brief look under the hood. Check it out and let me know what you think.

Website Demo: "Our Mission" from Josiah Ritchie on Vimeo.

I upgraded the CCK module this morning to version 6.x-2.0 RC4.

In case you are not familiar with the CCK Drupal module, here is their description from the module site on drupal.org.

The Content Construction Kit allows you create and customize fields using a web browser.

More descriptively, it has become one of the standard building blocks of Drupal content types, allowing various types of data to be associated with a type of content easily and quickly.

I upgraded the Mollom module this morning to version 6.x-1.3.

In case you are not familiar with the mollom Drupal module, here is their description from the module site on drupal.org. I'd recommend it for any drupal site that permits user contribution.

I moved one of my last sites over here to my new hosting environment. This is probably my oldest. It's been around since some time in the Drupal 4 series, at least 3 years.

When I moved it here I upgraded it to Drupal 6 from 5.7. This created some problems that resulted in not being able to make comments as well as other issues that boiled down to minor problems with the database causing big problems.

Here is an example error message we received from the watchdog module. The comment module provided something similar.

user warning: Duplicate entry '0' for key 1 query: INSERT INTO watchdog (uid, type, message, variables, severity, link, location, referer, hostname, timestamp) VALUES (24, 'user', 'Session opened for %name.', 'a:1:{s:5:\"%name\";s:2:\"Ed\";}', 5, '', 'http://site.com/node/353?destination=node%2F353', 'http://site.com/node/353', '70.137.0.115', 1215526129) in /home/user/public_html/modules/dblog/dblog.module on line 144.

It turned out that these database tables simply didn't have auto_increment set. In Drupal 6, the developers changed the way they handle the incrementing of the record IDs. They are using the database feature to handle it now instead of doing it themselves in the code.

The resolution to this was a couple of simple SQL commands to turn on auto_increment where it was needed. Here they are.

Last night a new version of Drupal was released. As this was a "moderately critical" security upgrade, I made sure to upgrade each drupal site under my responsibility. Thanks to the multi-site feature of Drupal, it was a very quick process. You can find out more about the security element of this

If you'd like more information, you can stop by the Drupal 6.3 release notes for a complete rundown.

I've grown increasingly fond of my blackberry. I decided to upgrade my phone package for a variety of reasons. One was so that I could work on things related to this contracting job while on the road. In fact I'm writing this blog entry from my Blackberry.

One thing I haven't found yet is a sufficiently comfortable text editor. Yeah, this is a geeky request, but a truly simple yet fully featured text editor is a wonderful experience that can make life a little less annoying.

Our world is growing more actively creative. The younger generations growing up familiar with the tools that technology provides are excited about using them in new and interesting ways to express themselves. Participation in the entertainment is becoming a key part of entertainment. Television is going to be forced to adapt, but the church must also. With this high level of participation come the expectation of others to participate. How is your church going to participate in a collaborative entertainment to God's glory?

Here's a great video example of what participation means to the rising generation and the opportunity to share truth from the Bible in the middle of it.

This keynote speech by Clay Shirky argues that the collaborative nature of the Internet holds an important part of helping us move beyond the years we've spent nightly in front of the TV watching Gilligan's Island or The Simpson's.

One of the things that I'm excited to share with potential clients is Google Apps. This free service from Google fits the church in a great way. It provides a collection of tools for ministry that address the needs of a largely volunteer and distributed "work force". Anyone with an Internet connection can have a church email account, calendar and collaborate on documents.

In the past, leading a church has meant a lot of work bringing people together. A lot of the burden has fallen to the central church staff, but the future holds something more collaborative.

So it appears that this contracting thing will be kicking off real soon. I enter the realm of IT contracting with confidence in my technical and support skills; however, I am a bit unsure of my business skills. I suppose this is how all new contractors feel.

As this is the path God has given, I'm confident that He will provide for and teach me along the way. May his wisdom go with each action taken in this endeavor.