Drupal

I received this in an email and after some checking, found out that it is true.  It's a little old, but I thought it was relevant, given the recent news about drilling for oil and some of the idiots who think they're the world's voice on environmental issues.  Why do we not see this on CNN, MSNBC or some of the other liberal news stations?

 House #1     A 20 room mansion (not including 8 bathrooms) heated by natural gas. Add on a pool (and a pool house) and a separate guest house, all heated by gas. In one month this residence consumes more energy than the average American household does in a year. The average bill for electricity and natural gas runs over $2400. In natural gas alone, this property consumes more than 20 times the national average for an American home. This house is not situated in a Northern or Midwestern 'snow belt' area. It's in the South.
 

House #2     Designed by an architecture professor at a leading national university. This house incorporates every 'green' feature current home construction can provide. The house is 4,000 square feet (4 bedrooms) and is nestled on a high prairie in the American south west. A central closet in the house holds geothermal heat-pumps drawing ground water through pipes sunk 300 feet into the ground. The water (usually 67 degrees F.) heats the house in the winter and cools it in the summer. The system uses no fossil fuels such as oil or natural gas and it consumes one-quarter electricity required for a conventional heating/cooling system. Rainwater from the roof is collected and funneled into a 25,000 gallon underground cistern. Wastewater from showers, sinks and toilets goes into underground purifying tanks and then into the cistern. The collected water then irrigates the land surrounding the house. Surrounding flowers and shrubs native to the area enable the property to blend into the surrounding rural landscape.

HOUSE #1 is outside of Nashville , Tennessee ; it is the abode of the 'environmentalist' Al Gore. 

HOUSE #2 is on a ranch near Crawford , Texas ; it is the residence the of the President of the United States , George W. Bush.

This story is true according to SNOPES, but you'll never hear it in the main stream media.  That should scare the hell out of you. 

Well after weeks of working with the phpBB forum I integrated into my blog, I decided to delete it for now.  Although I was receiving a fair amount of views, no one wanted to leave a comment or start a new topic.  The forum you see here now is an add-on module Drupal called Advanced Forum and brings more capability to core forum module.  This forum is more integrated with my blog, easier for visitors to post comments and still has some great capabilities. 

Well I finished the integration of phpBB3 forum with my blog running Drupal 6. I added this forum to explore more back and forth type discussion with regards to the items I post here and to allow others the opportunity to start their own discussion threads.  The forum does not require you to register in order to post, but does ask for the basic information, like name, email, and there is a anti-spam feature.

If your a registered user of Bob's Daily Blog, you will be automatically logged into Bob's Forum when you log-in to my blog.  In addition, if you have a signature block and avatar, they will synchronize between the two locations.  The most recent topics posted will be listed in the middle column under the Bob's Forum Topics so you can see what's going on there.  I hope you will give it a try and let me know what you think. 

Ok, I've added a few topic areas to get this started.  I know it's not much yet, but the forum has some great capabilities and right now it's open to guests who would like to start a discussion. So try out  Bob's Forum and let me know what you think.

I've dropped the SMF forum and added phpBB forum to discuss those hot topic issues.  This is only a test for now and is open to anyone who wants to post a topic they feel is important. 

The forum capability here will remain to discuss issues I post on my blog, but Bob's Forum  is available to anyone to strike up a discussion on those hot topics.   I'll add a few topics over the next few days to see how it does.  In addition, I have it set up so guests can comment and add topics without registering.  Let me know what you think.

27 Apr 08 Update:  The SMF Forum was taken down and replaced with a phpBB fourm.  You can check it out Bob's Forum.

(UPDATE)  OK, I have it set up and have added a few topic areas to start with.  The Forum has a lot of nice features to allow you to really show how you feel about a topic.  At this point, the topics are open to anything and everything.  However, I will not tolerate any racist comments or hate type speeches.  Even if you are friends of Senator Obama... lol

I've added a Simple Machine Forum link to check out. I'm still setting it up, so check back soon to see how it's going. 

I just upgraded my blog to Drupal 6.0 and everything went fine.  A few changes can be noticed, like no Google AdSense and the Weather blocks are gone.  The were not yet compatible with 6.0.  The new "Drag-n-Drop" feature for menus and blocks is great.  If you're looking for an easy, yet powerful CMS, I suggest you check out Drupal.

Well after a long trip out to Ridgecrest, California (for my job) and few hours reconfiguring my site, I'm glad to announce Bob's Daily Blog is back up and working. I still have some more work to bring it back to pre-crash function, but it appears to be stable and working now. Thanks to paulnem and quint over at the drupal.org forum.

While trying to upgrade my site, I ran into a critical error which crashed the site. The good thing about it, was I did not have a lot of content. The bad thing, was I had spent a lot of time developing what little content & comments that were posted. Things I learned: 1. BACK-UP, BACK-UP, and oh, BACK-UP your site. Although, I'm not sure how to do this, I'm going to figure it out. 2. If possible, you should build a test site where you can test patches & upgrades to make sure they work, prior to loading them on your production site. Although most of the seasoned bloggers probably know this, I suspect its easier said than done... Hence why I didn't do it. I have a hard enough time keeping one up and running. 3. I think I'll start writing my comments & post in a word document first and then cut & past into the site. That way, worst case scenario, I still have the content to re-post. If you have suggestions or best practices you use, please let me know.