Of course, this could apply to a lot of different departments, heck, I am sure some poor delusional soul out there thinks these could apply to IT, but for now, let’s remember, the just fit best with Marketing.  Not a specific Marketing department, but just about all with which I have ever worked.

I found a great example of what I wanted at Drew Wilson’s blog, complete with almost all the features I needed.

One thing his script is really lacking is a good way to show ALL the results.  We have a huge category list, and want to let someone browse them all.  In the base script, this isn’t going to work, since there isnt a way to make the look up fire off without input.  I didnt want my users to have to enter in, one by one, each letter of the alphabet looking for what they wanted, so I settled on using a double click event to force the display of the entire list.

And here is how to make that happen:

In the js file (jquery.autoSuggest.js) you will need to make some changes.

~line 149 add:

 }).dblclick(function(){

 if (timeout){ clearTimeout(timeout); }

 timeout = setTimeout(function(){ keyChange(); }, opts.keyDelay);

so it will look like:

 }).blur(function(){

 if($(this).val() == "" && values_input.val() == "" && prefill_value == ""){

 $(this).val(opts.startText);

 } else if(input_focus){

 $("li.as-selection-item", selections_holder).addClass("blur").removeClass("selected");

 results_holder.hide();

 }

 }).dblclick(function(){

 if (timeout){ clearTimeout(timeout); }

 timeout = setTimeout(function(){ keyChange(); }, opts.keyDelay);

 }).keydown(function(e) {

This will pull up a list on double click.  You can change dlbclick to just click for a single click response instead.

~line 226 comment out the lines:

if( lastKeyPressCode == 46 || (lastKeyPressCode > 8 && lastKeyPressCode < 32) ){ return results_holder.hide(); }

and

if (string == prev) return;

and

if (string.length >= opts.minChars) {

and then on ~line 252 comment out

 } else {

 selections_holder.removeClass("loading");

 results_holder.hide();

 }

You will also want to turn the option “resultsHighlight” false, when you create the instance.

Now, on double click it will present a full list of options.

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Well, at Dallas Love Field (KDAL) there was just the old method of metal detectors. Empty most of the stuff from your pockets and move along. Well, at Baltimore Washington International (KBWI) the scanners are in place and being used.

When we walked up to the security line, Jess asked, “Are those the new scanners?” Yep. She didn’t like the look of them one bit, and even hesitated a little bit. I did point out that not everyone was even being asked to go through, just about every third person.

We emptied our pockets of everything metal or electronic, and stepped up. Jess was waved through the normal “old school” metal detector, but I was instructed to go through the scanner. He, the TSA officer, did not inform me of my right to refuse and get a pat down instead, just told me to go through. I refused, politely. He THEN informed me that would mean I would get pat down, to which I replied “Let’s do this.” I knew the consequences of my choice, but there was no way in hell I was going to get a almost naked image of me taken and God knows what done with it, since the TSA is being very vague about what they actually do with those images.

Another officer stepped up and asked if I had anything in my pockets. I replied I did, my wallet, and he asked me to put it on the belt, to which I refused. I have NEVER been asked to remove my wallet or chapstick, since they are not metal, and most people don’t even notice them. This was new to me, and now I am very unhappy because I have already asked for a pat down, so why do you give a crap what I have in my pockets?

He said that I had to totally empty my pockets. I again refused and asked, again politely, to speak to a supervisor. He said that a supervisor “will just tell you the same thing, so I don’t know why I need to bother him.”. I then, more firmly but still politely, asked to speak to a supervisor. He argued a little bit more, I interrupted his excuses, and said “I have expressed my desire to see a supervisor. I have been polite, can you please just do as I ask.” Well, I suppose he didn’t know what to do with a polite but firm passenger, so he said “OK, fine.”

About a minute, perhaps not even that long, passed and supervisor came up and asked what was going on. I told him I had refused the body scanner, and refused to put my wallet on the belt, where I can not see it, they wont take responsibility for it, and I would be separated for perhaps several minutes while I pat down. I suppose that argument, again politely expressed, just made a lot of sense. He moved me through the normal metal detector, with my wallet in hand, and asked me to have a seat in the pat down area.

Another officer, Officer Bell, came up to me and asked for my wallet. I handed it over, and he said he would now go through with it me watching. “No problem,” I replied. My wallet is very small and very tightly packed. He really did seem uncomfortable with it, since he didn’t see how to get things out without potentially causing a huge mess. I asked him how he wanted to proceed and the supervisor, who was standing near by, said that he would personally run it through the scanners (the old normal ones) and ensure that it never left his sight, except while in the scanner, and he would take personal responsibility for it.

“Fine. Thank you.” That seemed like a very fair arrangement and let us both achieve our goals. His of getting me checked out and on my way and me of not losing my wallet at BWI.

He did that and came back and handed it back to me. Thanked me for my cooperation, and left the area.

Officer Bell then asked me to step on the spots on the floor mat, and put my arms up, palms up. He had latex gloves on, was well groomed, and professional. At all times he told me what he was going to do. He started with my shoulders and chest, worked down to my stomach, and then went to my back. He was not rough, forced, or any of the other crap I would have expected based on the media’s repeated telling of the situation.

He then said he would use the back of his hands to go over my buttocks. I replied “alright”. Done. Now, again telling me before hand so I am very informed, he said he would use the back of his hand to go down the zipper of my jeans. “Sure”. Again, done. Not forceful, not threatening, in no way invasive. He then moved down my legs and about 90 seconds after it started, my “enhanced” pat down was finished.

I collected my things and moved along.

Now, the real question is, was my experience normal? Or was the entire staff, with one possible exception, just amazingly polite and professional? I hope not. I hope exactly what I went through is what can be expected no matter what airport you are in. I think the entire TSA situation sucks, and we, as a country, could do better for our security. But, my experience, and the entire time I stayed polite, honest, and professional, and I am glad to see it was not too much to expect them to treat me the same way.

What about the rest of y’all? Anyone pass on the new scanners and ask for a pat down? How did it go?

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Why?  Why do we not write perfect HTML?  Surely with the free validator on the authority’s website there is no excuse to write code that wont validate against the standard.

The answer there is simple, if and when all the major browsers (Firefox, Safari, IE, Opera, Chrome) all render a page according to the standard, then I will finally start caring about the validation of my websites.  Until then, I will continue to write code that works across the board, and just not care if it is “valid”.

To be real though, most of the browsers work pretty well, however the 800lb gorilla in the room, IE, does not.  Microsoft continually changes the standards by which they will render a page, like promising CSS 2 support in IE7 then bailing on that promise 6 months before release.  And let us not forget the horribly pathetic Javascript rendering engine, JScript, that the rest of us just ignore because it can’t be trusted to behave reliably.

So, like even on this website, we find ourselves writing “valid” code, and at the same time having to redefine valid to mean “Code that works in all the browsers”, not “Code that the W3C says is valid even though it looks like crap in IE6″.  Just to maintain a semblance of order and sanity, we use the handy IE CSS hacks where IE on Windows will actually arbitrarly execute code depending on the version of the IE browser being used.  Does that sound like an admission of guilt on the part of MS to anyone else?  OK Bill, repeat after me, “I know my browser sucks, so, instead of fixing it which would severely hamper my marketing and legal budgets, I will just allow hacks in order to ensure you nerdy web guys can still make pretty pages”.  There, was that so hard!?

So, someone feel free to run the validate against any of my websites.  Don’t bother sending me the results because I don’t care.  The sites work, the code looks good, documented, and is maintainable, so, what exactly was the complaint?

*valid code is extremely subjective, but let’s assume here I mean W3C “valid” code.

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“Want to make a website which features a different picture of a babe everyday.

Successful candidate:

• Must create and design the website
• Logo creation
• Provide 3000 original large, high quality photos with my watermarked logo
• These photos must be legal
• All copyright will belong to me
• Photos must automatically change as of 12:00 PM MST
• Must be able to and will be responsible for setting up the website with advertising program to ensure money is made from visitors”

The poster gave a max budget of $250….

Really!!!???

Let me make sure I understand…You want me to develop the software to power the site (admittedly very simple), design the look and feel of the site, create a logo, and come up with 3000 original photos of “babes” and then sign it all over to you, all for $250?  Then you want me to market it and advertise it?  What the heck do I need you for?  Let’s face it, you cant get 3000 images, even non-original ones for that price, but I have no idea what the photo shoots required would cost…maybe $25000?  For that many images there are going to be a lot of different girls, doing a lot of different things, in a lot of different places.  $25000 may be extremely cheap I don’t know.

I do know the person that posted this is delusional.  He/She wants to pay a paltry sum for someone to do ALL the work.  Usually clients have ideas, content, and know how to market their own stuff, but not in this case.  Maybe this person works in politics and thinks this is how the real work actually operates.

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Yes, that is right, I will never get back all that I put into SS.  Nevermind the fact I should be paid interest on my contributions.  Why was privatizing such a bad idea?

Anyways, I received one of these letters, and it had a section in it entitled “Will Social Security still be around when I retire?“.  Look to the right, there is a scan of this image.

I love how it says “Yes.” at the very begining and then goes on to try and quantify that answer with the basic assumtion you, the reader, didnt pass 2nd grade math.

So, according to this, the money will be gone in 2037.  I hate to point out the fact I dont reach age rull retirement age (67) until 2044.  Not inspiring a lot of trust with already failing in the numbers department.

Then it goes on to say that if nothing is done, in 2037, they should be able to pay about 76% of the benefits to which I am entitiled.  WHAT?!

So just to clarify, Social Security will run out of money ~7 years before I am at full retirement age, AND will only be able to pay 76% of the benefits scheduled, which already are only about 80% of what I paid in, with no interest.

How was the answer “Yes.” to the question “Will Social Security still be around when I retire?“?  You just said we will run out of money years before I am elegible to retire, and even then I wont recieve all that I should.

What have we learned?  First and foremost, like healthcare, the goverment has great ideas, really, they are good ideas, they just have no fricking clue on how to execute it.  None!

Secondly, the correct answer to the question “Will Social Security still be around when I retire?“, is “No.  Not really.”

If you want, contact your folks in Congress, let them know this is a bunch of crap, and now is the time to start fixing it, not 2037, or 2044, or whenever it is you will retire, or (God forbid), need disability.  And if you think you don’t need to save for retirement, go take a 2×4, hit yourself in the head, and start drawing disability now.  Learning to live on that income is the ONLY way you will not need your own retirement setup.

thing.  Which I just don’t get.

If you are a programming, why would you use views?  It is adding a layer of abstraction between the logic and database in an interpreted language with a framework that is already bloated beyond all recognition.  I know when I write plugins for WordPress, I want the plugin to be quick, precise, and add the least amount of overhead possible.  Views just seem to be a way to do all the opposites of those, just for the hell of it.

If you are not very technically inclined, I understand.  Using views is a lot like using MS Access.  You can create fairly complex queries yourself, without having to get someone that actually understands it involved.  And that is the trade off.  You can do it yourself, and eat the extra overhead, or pay/hire/bribe/cajole someone else into doing it for you, specialized, and thus, in theory at least, more efficiently.

These folks claimed to be programmers though, so I just don’t get it.  Why are you depending on someone else’s plugin, that extends functionality that is inefficient and clumsy, can’t do everything, and still requires custom code to be written or even more plugins to be added.  Where exactly does that circular line stop?

The Drupal “framework” and I use that term loosely since it is really a CMS that can just be extended, has enough problems and bloat in it, why exactly are views worth adding more?  Again, assuming you know SQL and PHP on even a basic level.

It just doesnt make any sense.  Query writers and views are one thing if you are working directly with the database, (e.g. phpMyAdmin or TOAD), but adding it as a layer to a “custom” application that you will be supporting when you claim to be capable of actual programming!!??  Please explain that one to me.

To be fair, I dont use Drupal much, I like WP much better.  The OO approach is much more appealing than the very Perl-esque (read: old) way of doing things Drupal does with its modules. But I still don’t get what the big deal is about Views.

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The solution is simple: optimize your images.  I use Fireworks, but Photoshop has it built in these days as well.  It is basically a way of taking the image you want to use, and removes unwanted data, making the image size smaller, and hence, faster to load.  The web is a horrible medium for images, the 72dpi resolution of most monitors is just not that great.  But, it is all we have right now, and that is probably a good thing since anything more and the image just gets bigger and bigger.

By optimizing, your look stays intact, and everyone can enjoy it faster.  And it is cheaper on your wallet since it requires less bandwidth and less CPU to serve a smaller file.  Speaking of cheap, for those of you that do not have the Adobe suite, there is a pretty spiffy free online optimizer here.  Enjoy, and for the love of all things holy, optimize!

If you want to read more on the topic: HTMLSource.

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I then stood up to leave, and Lynn took the check from her desk, and despite me asking her for it, since she wasn’t going to do anything with it anyways, she refused and I reached over and took it from her hand, since after all it was my property and she refused to give it to me.  She then very dramatically claimed I assaulted her, and claimed to call the police.  I laughed considering the preposterous nature of the claim of assault, and left to continue on errands with my family.

While driving, I called the national call center for Capital One and filed a formal complaint with Brittany.  She informed me of the process and that someone would be in touch.

About fifteen minutes later, I received a call on my cell phone from the Flower Mound Police Department asking me to return to either the bank or the police department.  I told them I would be at the police department in about ten minutes.

I showed up and sat down in a conference room with a pair of officers who explained to me the situation.  Lynn is claiming assault, but since it obviously wasn’t assault, it has been moved down to a Class C misdemeanor of “Offensive Touch”, which is dubious since there were no witnesses or any physical evidence.  I filled out a voluntary statement explaining what had happened. The officer  said the bank wanted to “Trespass” me, which basically means they tell me not to come back or they will call the cops.  The officer said he wasn’t going to do it, and asked for my word that I wouldn’t go back.  I, of course, gave it since at this point I can’t take my business from Capital One fast enough.

During this time, my wife had been in the car with my girls and on the phone with Capital One trying to figure out how to continue to conduct business until we can change banks.  Sandy (she introduced herself as the branch manager), told my wife I was not to come back to the bank, and that all our accounts are now frozen (garnished).  Sandy gave no reason for this drastic (and illegal) action.  My wife told Sandy that she needed to buy groceries that night for our infant and toddler daughters, and in response, Sandy said, “You can’t.  Your accounts are all on hold, until you come in and close them.”

One of the accounts garnished was my business account, and LLC which isn’t even mine since it is its own entity not linked to my social security number at all.

My wife eventually got the number for Mr. Randy Hall, the District Manager, whom we tried to call several times but he doesn’t answer his phone and his voicemail isn’t set up, so we were unable to leave him a message.

We received a voice mail on Tuesday from Leslie at the call center saying “there is a chain of command and you will need to speak with the Branch Manager”.  We also found out that day that there really isn’t a branch manager just an interim setup of various people filling in as required.

Since all our accounts were frozen, we went and opened four new accounts at another local bank.  My wife had asked Capital One’s call center for some help in understanding what was going on, but they said we had to speak to the branch manager at the Flower Mound branch.  We couldn’t even go to another branch to get this fixed, and by fixed, I mean, get our money that had been illegal garnished.  We then got our attorney involved to figure out how to get the accounts closed.  He called the Flower Mound PD and they said to just go to the Flower Mound branch, and let them call the police.  As long as we were there conducting business, they can’t ask us to leave since we have effected consent to be on private property.

I didn’t really like that answer, so our attorney called the Flower Mound branch and asked what we could do.  James said my wife could come up there and close the accounts, even though the business account, by contract and law, couldn’t be closed by anyone other than myself.  But since Capital One employees had already broken a few laws, why stop now?  We decided to go to the Lewisville Branch and close the accounts.

Olivia helped us there and was very helpful, friendly, and professional, exactly what we were used to and have come to expect from Capital One over the years.

On Wednesday, I again called the call center and spoke to Kenneth, who was appalled at the entire situation and again gave me Randy Hall’s phone number.  Kenneth did confirm that it was in fact not working and gave me Mr. Hall’s assistant’s phone number instead.  Kenneth did confirm that in Texas it is illegal to place a hold on an account’s funds without state or federal directives and only then it is for child support or the IRS.

I have called and left a message with Randy Hall’s assistant, so we will see where this goes.   I am still pursuing the matter actively with consumer groups, regulatory entities, and governmental agencies.

The treatment was ridiculous.  Does Lynn call the cops on every single person that takes a piece of paper from her hand faster than she wanted?  Especially after being asked for it and not relinquishing it?  If so, it is amazing there are customers at the Flower Mound branch of Capital One at all.  If not, why was I singled out?  What are the consequences for Sandy and Lynn for illegally garnishing our accounts, including a company account which is hurting our business since we can’t cut checks until we have new ones printed?  I have employees to pay, and that now gets delayed due to the illegal scare tactics of Capital One Bank.