Web hosting
Ok, I actually do have something to say, ask even: if RandomBase started a web hosting service with extremely reasonable prices, would there be any people interested? Please say so in the comments, and I’ll see from there 
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And now for something completely different
By Iron and has no comments yet.
As I’m “between projects” at the moment (have a nice one in mind but it’s a hell lot of work) there isn’t a lot of news, so I’ll just post a picture of a cute panda cub. That should work.
Bad Company 2
As I remain a big fan of the Battlefield series (except for the piece of disappointment called Battlefield Heroes) I pre-ordered Battlefield Bad Company 2 and am now playing the beta and damn; this game is buckets full of fun. The map currently available is a little bit on the boring side (a more urban level would be awesome), but the destruction and the constant rain of explosions makes this a great game already.
I can’t wait for the full game, it’ll probably pull me away even more from working than it does already now. My current character is called (familiar probably to the veterans here): Brotha. Feel free to add me to your friends list as long as you’re not making fun of my shooter skill, programmers have feelings too!
Introducing Rien
For the sake of having more than one voice on RandomBase, I’ve invited Rien (an ex-moderator on BFHforum and a great person overall) to share his opinion with the rest of us. So from now on you’ll see Rien post on pretty much anything that’s on his mind.
His English also beats mine big-time, which is hardly an accomplishment. 
Free domain names at DomainsCreek.com
A little out of my usual line, a website where you can get free domain names (yes, free, that includes .com/.net/.org/…) without a credit card or anything. Did I mention it was free?
All you need to do is go to DomainsCreek.com and sign up, complete some surveys and order the domain; it’s one 100% yours, you’ll have full control on it. This works best when you live in the USA, Canada or the UK but we have thought about the rest too by putting in a referral system. Each time you refer somebody to the website, you’ll earn 10% of his/her earnings, and this lasts indefinitely!
We’ll be adding free cPanel hosting too as soon as the first domains are rolling out, have fun and see you on DomainsCreek.com !
Buying a new computer
My current computer is a pretty nice one, it still runs everything on very high and I have no complaints, but somebody offered a decent price for it so I’ll be selling and buying a new one – a great method in my opinion! As I know nothing about hardware, I let a friend put one together for me. For the geeks, these are the specs:
- Antec Three Hundred Versatile Case
- Samsung SH-S223C/bebe Black S-ATA 22X DVD-RW
- Asus EAH5870/g/2DIS/1GD5 1024MB GDDR5 PCI Express
- Kingston 2048MB 1333MHZ PC3-10666 DDR3 Value Series KVR1333D3N9/2G (6GB in total)
- Western Digital WD10EARS 1000GB 64MB SATA300 Intellipower Caviar Green
- MSI P55-CD53 DDR3 Socket 1156 Intel® P55
- Intel Core I5 750 45NM 2.66 8MB LGA 1156 Boxed
- Corsair TX650 Power Supply
I’ll be ordering tomorrow night, let me know what you guys think!
CMS comparison
I’m very busy working on a semi-secret project (as in, if you’d really be interested you’d know which one already or you could always have asked) and hope to launch it soon, but I needed a decent CMS to work with it. My requirements were very specific, so usually I’d fire up my PHP editor and program a custom CMS but I live with the idea it’s useless to reinvent the wheel, so I tried a couple of open source content management systems powered by PHP and MySQL.
I tried three before I got to using the last one on this list, read more after the “jump” (yes – 2002 called, they want their jump back, I know).
phpBB simple shoutbox mod
Did some PHP coding, with a little AJAX and the usual. It all fell together into what you could call a simple shoutbox made for phpBB forum software. I’m offering it for download here already, but please continue reading before you make any comments…
This is my first published phpBB mod, I’m quite familiar with the code but not with actually publishing my own modifications, so yes – it could be buggy, it could be incompatible with your template and it might not meet the full coding guidelines and it probably won’t have every little feature you’d like such as smilies. Adding smilies wouldn’t have been too hard, but what I have made is nothing more than a pretty decent base system that works on its own, but could be easily modified to fit the needs of your own forum. I would really like any feedback you guys could give, or even correct errors/mistakes I made.
I have submitted it for review to the official modification directory and hope it’ll get approved. If you want to try it on your own forum, you can download it here. It is currently only compatible with the Prosilver theme, but it can be easily modified for your own theme, the tags are pretty obvious if you read shout.html in the templates folder.
A live demo can be found on our own forum.
Google shows some teeth, at last
This is news: major news. From the official Google blog:
We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.
Google, I would like to say this: I love you so goddamn much right now. People shouldn’t be withheld any information, especially not when it comes to human rights. I understand this is an extreme step and you guys must feel incredibly confident to take it, this is a first step to breaking down the Great Firewall of China. The risk you guys are willing to take is enormous, this might very well mean Google loses all chances in the worlds biggest and fastest growing economy, your stocks will probably fluctuate or even drop a great deal, but this is still the best possible move you could make.
Google, thanks.
RandomBase Forums!
In all honesty, I am not expecting too much of them, it’s all based on how you guys behave there and ask more people to join in. It’s not like the other forums I usually create or administrate, it’s a simple, relaxed place with what I hope will become mature discussions and a fun hangout for both old RandomBase fans (you know who you are ) and new visitors. At this very moment it doesn’t come with fancy plug-ins or an awesome custom design, it’s just a rushed version but as usual I’ll be expanding and modifying exactly the way the community wants.
In the same category: I’ll be developing a phpBB3 shoutbox plug-in for the forum and will release it later to the public, hoping I meet the phpBB coding guidelines. This might take a while as I am used to modding the software but not when the code has to be clean and nice on the eye for a larger public.