news

Hosted Apache Solr's Revamped Docker-based Architecture

I started Hosted Apache Solr almost 10 years ago, in late 2008, so I could more easily host Apache Solr search indexes for my Drupal websites. I realized I could also host search indexes for other Drupal websites too, if I added some basic account management features and a PayPal subscription plan—so I built a small subscription management service on top of my then-Drupal 6-based Midwestern Mac website and started selling a few Solr subscriptions.

Back then, the latest and greatest Solr version was 1.4, and now-popular automation tools like Chef and Ansible didn't even exist. So when a customer signed up for a new subscription, the pipeline for building and managing the customer's search index went like this:

Hosted Apache Solr original architecture

Original Hosted Apache Solr architecture, circa 2009.

Staying Current - Tech News and Development Trends

Ever since I've been able to access the Internet, I have been passionate about finding reliable, informative sources for news about all things tech. I have limited bandwidth, so I like high quality, low noise sources.

Joy of Tech - Information Overload
Source: Joy of Tech

People who don't closely follow tech news and the hacker culture closely wonder how I stay informed about rapidly-changing trends in programming and development and still have a life. The same people often wonder how people I have an answer for almost every question (simple—I just Google it).

'Stir' over Facebook comment caused by breach of privacy [Updated x2]

I was disheartened by the following news story from the St. Louis Post Dispatch: 'Mormons: 1. Indonesians: 0' debate post by STL Catholic exec causes stir.

The story notes that Alderwoman Lyda Krewson, a Democrat in the 28th ward in St. Louis, tweeted a comment made by an employee of the Archdiocese of St. Louis on the employee's personal Facebook wall—which is set to private, and only accessible/visible to the employee's friends. (Note that the same employee has a public Twitter account that she uses for public communications).

Lyda Krewson public tweet about private affairs stltoday

New St. Louis-area Catholic Blogger

There's a new blog in town: thiscatholicgirl, by friend and former co-worker @ESWesthoff in the Archdiocese of St. Louis. She's witty, funny, and has good insight.

While I'm on the topic of new things, I can't forget to mention that I've been brushing up a bunch of new reviews of microphones and audio devices, and I'm hoping to start testing the iPhone 5 with as many audio gadgets as I can to supplement my article External Microphones for iPhone 5, 4S, iPad and iPod Touch Audio input. More to come!

St. Louis Catholic Business Owner Sues HHS over Contraception Mandate

O'Brien Industrial Holdings, LLC

Frank R. O'Brien, owner of O'Brien Industrial Holdings, has filed a lawsuit against the US Department of Health and Human Services because the recent contraception mandate violates his right to freedom of religious belief.

CBS News reports:

The lawsuit marks the first legal challenge to the HHS mandate from a private business owner and his company. Until now, only religious organizations or institutions have brought lawsuits challenging the mandate. ...

Catholic Apps make faith aids mobile

I'd be remiss to not mention a very well-written article in the Denver Catholic Register by Julie Filby: Catholic apps make faith aids mobile.

In the article, Julie does a great job explaining apps and their growing prominence in the lives of the faithful, along with some tips from Mark Hart and I:

Today’s technology offers Catholics many tools for praying, communicating and learning about their faith. One such tool comes in the form of “apps.” [...]

While members of the younger generation used to be the primary users of apps, driving sales and popularity; today all age groups are using them.

This market is still a moving target, and I'm anticipating some great new apps for the faithful—as well as some great updates to old ones—in the coming months. In fact, thanks to the generosity of @kliftonjk, I have two Android devices on which I'm developing an Android version of Catholic News Live!

The Catholics Next Door - Appearance on The Catholic Channel

I didn't have much time today to post this earlier (I was driving home from a trip which took me through five states in six days, and had to do this on the road), but this afternoon I was on the excellent 'Catholics Next Door' radio show on the Sirius XM Catholic Channel.

I was happy to speak with Greg and Jennifer Willits about flockNote, about parish communications, and about helping Catholic organizations get connected to their flock in various ways.

Then I continued driving home from Chicago :)

I don't know if they have an online archive of their shows, but if I can find a link to the audio at some point, I'll try to provide it. I'm also not too familiar with satellite radio, since I've never subscribed (Pandora + free radio has worked for my musical tastes), so I don't know if there are any rebroadcasts or ways of listening to past shows...

Reeder (RSS reader) for Mac released - finally out of beta!

Reeder, the new best RSS reader for Mac, is finally out of beta! It's only $9.99, on the Mac App Store.

Reeder Icon

I used NetNewsWire back in the early '00s, but it has become a complicated beast, and after learning about Reeder beta 1 a few months ago, I was an instant convert.

Reeder is great, because all I ever do is arrow-down through news stories, glance over ones I might be interested, press 'B' to open the really interesting articles in my browser, and then press 'A' then 'return' to mark all stories as read.