Peter's Useful Crap

PayPal’s Payflow Pro is an online payment gateway for businesses to accept credit card transactions.

In our testing, we found that some transactions, although they were unique, were resulting in “Invalid transaction type” errors, which also returned a more specific “duplicate=1″ message.

One of the fields that you have to send Payflow Pro when processing a transaction is “X-VPS-Request-ID”, which is a 1- to 32-character unique ID for the transaction, stored for a minimum of 30 days. This is how Payflow Pro can help you prevent sending duplicate transactions. We had been using the timestamp concatenated with the customer’s e-mail address as the “X-VPS-Request-ID”. However, it turns out that Payflow Pro was only returning bogus duplicate transaction errors when the customers’ e-mail address had more than one period in it (such as “[email protected]”). We don’t know why Payflow Pro was failing on multiple dot characters, but our solution was to simply send an md5 hash of the timestamp + e-mail address, which is conveniently 32 alphanumeric characters. md5 collisions, although rare, do occur, so if you are in a similar situation you could also just manually strip out the periods or replace them with another character.

Web development often involves remote clients and physically distributed teams. For me, screen sharing is an essential tool in order to demo web features via a richer communication channel, and also to help troubleshoot client problems. It can be the difference maker in winning a contract, getting specifications right the first time, and collaborating efficiently with co-workers.

Skype is already the leader in providing both audio calls and instant messaging (and to a lesser extent, file sharing and video conferencing via webcams). Its free screen share feature is a decent option between two existing Skype users. Overall, it’s good as a quick screen share, easily accessible during a Skype call:

You can share a specific application or the entire desktop. Quality is OK but not great. Features are limited: for example, it’s only available in two-person Skype calls, and it lacks many of the features that WebEx has.

WebEx is a paid online meeting service, starting at $50 per month for unlimited meetings and up to 25 participants per meeting. It is well worth the price for its ease of use and quality of its core features. I’ve tried some free and trial versions of other web conferencing tools — join.me, Dimdim and Yugma — WebEx is simply easier and better.

WebEx’s requirements are mainly that you have Java installed and you use one of the major browsers (such as Internet Explorer, Firefox, or Chrome on Windows; Opera is a major omission). It supports all of the main operating systems.

Starting a meeting is quick — just fill in a short form and WebEx will automatically e-mail all participants with the secure meeting URL or you can manually e-mail people the link (and password, if relevant). You can schedule meetings in advance when needed.

You do not need to install any specific software to be a host or a viewer. The first time you load any WebEx meeting, it takes about 2 minutes for auto-setup to occur; subsequent loads take a few seconds.

When sharing a screen via WebEx, you can choose to share your desktop, a specific application, or a specific document. Passing the host or presenter role is very easy to do via the sharing toolbar that appears at the top of your screen.

You can also assign control of your computer to someone else or remotely control their computer, as if your respective keyboards and mice were plugged in to each other’s computers. (At the moment, you can’t do a simultaneous share though…)

WebEx has become very stable and reliable. It seems lightweight and lag is minimal.

The audio portion of WebEx is passable, but not as clear as it probably could be. I prefer to use Skype for the audio portion due partly to the improved sound quality, but mostly because of the ease of starting an audio conference with several Skype users and phone numbers. Using WebEx audio is useful for things like webinars where a non-fixed set of participants might join in at any time — you can provide a couple of call-in options: via the participant’s computer microphone and speakers or via a call-in phone number.

Other WebEx features to support online meetings include text chat, webcam sharing, recording meetings, and annotating (otherwise known as drawing on top of the screen). They all work well, although I do not use them much.

I wouldn’t be surprised if WebEx’s competitors eventually caught up, but for now it is what I recommend for web conferencing.

If you live in a major Canadian city, WIND Mobile has a deal until the end of 2010 that is worth considering, either as an alternative to your current plan or as a bargaining chip to get a good retention plan from your existing provider.

This deal is supposedly only available to new customers. It includes unlimited Canada-wide calling (from WIND’s network coverage areas), unlimited texting, and many standard calling features, such as caller ID and voicemail, for $20 a month plus tax.

To get this promotion, you have to download and/or print the PDF brochure and then either call WIND customer service or go to a kiosk in person. See the PDF embedded below:

Be aware of WIND’s unique requirements, though. You’ll probably have to purchase a phone from them, as they run on a new frequency band. Also, their WIND Zone and AWAY Zones are a bit unconventional: White Rock, BC is currently considered an area in which you are roaming, whereas you could travel from Vancouver to Calgary to Toronto and be in a local calling area the whole time. For more information on WIND’s coverage areas, unique phone requirements, and other unique attributes, see my previous review on WIND Mobile.

Why you might want to switch: quite simply, this includes your basic cell phone needs for a very good price (at least for a Canadian wireless plan). One of my main criticisms of monthly plans is that they always leave something out that is a common want; however, this plan includes caller ID, call waiting, call forwarding, call conferencing, and voicemail. You also don’t get locked into a multi-year contract, nor is this a temporary rate that will later double. WIND’s network has some quirky negatives depending on your situation, but there are also many positives, such as much cheaper US roaming rates than the other standard Canadian carriers (Telus, Bell, Fido, Rogers, etc.).

For me, who has always had a prepaid / pay as you go plan, the main reason to NOT switch is that prepaid plans allow for the most flexibility for light to medium cell phone users. As an example, you can use $15 of airtime for most months, use $40 a month for a couple of busy months, and end up paying less overall. With the provider I currently use, Speak Out Wireless, airtime lasts 365 days, so I don’t have to worry about wasting unused minutes or losing my number if I’m out of the country for an extended period of time.

WIND Mobile currently has a few other special offers (including ones with data plans), as does another new cell phone service provider, Mobilicity. I’m sure there will also be other good offers at some point in 2011.

For more information on other people’s experiences and with similar WIND Mobile plans, check these other threads:

RedFlagDeals.com
Howard Forums

Kale “chips” are:

• Tasty: crunchy and good. They can satisfy a potato chip or salty food craving.
• Easy to make: wash the kale; tear off pieces (you don’t even have to do any cutting); season with olive oil / canola oil / similar oil, a bit of salt and/or pepper and/or cumin and/or other spices; throw it in the oven
• Quick to make: preparation is fast, and then 10 minutes in the oven at about 300 degrees Fahrenheit
• Nutritious: high in vitamin A, vitamin C, calcium; do a web search for more information
• In season in the winter: and technically available all year
• Kind of fun to make and eat
• Economical: similar in price to green leaf and red leaf lettuce from what I’ve seen
• An interesting discussion piece: it’s not as commonly known as more mainstream vegetables, is surprisingly crunchy, and has other interesting qualities as mentioned above

For the full rundown on kale chips, just search on Google: it will return many reviews, many variations, and a lot of other good information. I don’t think I’m adding anything new to the body of information on kale chips (or kale in general), but figured I’d give my simple, quick take on it because they’re just that good.

I’d never even heard about kale until a few years ago, and until very recently, squash was the only thing that came to mind when I thought about winter vegetables. For those who don’t know, raw kale looks like this:

My usual method of cooking vegetables in general is just to throw them in the steamer. Making kale chips isn’t much more difficult than that — no recipe or complicated process required. They’re good as a snack, an appetizer, or a complement to any meal.

August 29, 2012 update: Almond Breeze now uses sunflower lecithin instead of soy lecithin

Many people look to almond milk as an alternative to cow’s milk and soy milk due to dairy and soy allergies. California-based Blue Diamond produces Almond Breeze, which is one of the tastier and more widespread brands of almond milk. However, Almond Breeze contains soy in the form of soy lecithin (which seems to be in almost everything these days)!

I wrote to Blue Diamond to ask about the soy content and got a nice response:

Soy lecithin is currently used in our Almond Breeze product line as an emulsifier. The amount of soy lecithin that is used is very small – less than 0.1% by weight – or 0.25g per 8 fluid ounces.

To make the lecithin, the soybean goes through a very extensive process whereby most of the soy proteins are removed. For most individuals this may not pose any health issues; however there are those that are more soy sensitive that should consult their physician regarding this product’s appropriateness for their dietary needs.

Blue Diamond recognizes that there may be trace amounts of soy proteins that remain in the lecithin. Blue Diamond is committed to its consumers and providing them with the highest quality products.

In answer to the huge demand from our consumer to eliminate all soy from our Almond Breeze, Blue Diamond has a SOY FREE version in our Refrigerated Half Gallon carton.

I haven’t seen the refrigerated, non-soy version of Almond Breeze in Canada yet. However, I have noticed some alternatives: Pacific Natural Food’s Organic Almond (mostly non-fortified) and Silk’s True Almond (fortified with calcium and vitamins D and B12). Silk’s True Almond in particular seems to disappear very fast from my local grocery store’s shelves whenever it goes on sale.

As for other dairy beverage alternatives, I’ve tried hemp milk and unfortunately did not like the taste. (Hemp-based chapstick on the other hand, is quite good.)

August 29, 2012 update: Almond Breeze now uses sunflower lecithin instead of soy lecithin