The Blue Factor Blog

To have CakePHP working with pretty URLs, mod_rewrite has to be enabled.  The following is a how-to for enabling mod_rewrite for Apach2 on Ubuntu.

System info:

/etc/apache2$ cat /proc/version
Linux version 2.6.24-16-server (buildd@palmer) (gcc version 4.2.3 (Ubuntu 4.2.3-2ubuntu7)) #1 SMP Thu Apr 10 13:58:00 UTC 2008


Step 1: Enable mod_rewrite

/etc/apache2$ sudo a2enmod rewrite
Module rewrite installed; run /etc/init.d/apache2 force-reload to enable.

Step 2: Enable .htaccess overrides in the directories:

/etc/apache2$ sudo vi sites-available/default

Change AllowOverride from “None” to “All”; it should look like this afterwards:

<Directory /var/www/>
Options Indexes FollowSymLinks MultiViews
AllowOverride All
Order allow,deny
allow from all
</Directory>

Step 3: Re-start apache

/etc/apache2$ sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 force-reload
* Reloading web server config apache2        [ OK ]

Apache2 configuration is something new to me.  So, this is one of my more interesting moments…

Posted in Programming | No Comments »

It was another well-attended night at the latest Demo Camp: DemoCampOttawa9.

The presenters tonight were:

• SIMtone
• GPU Core - Graphics processor core implemented on Xilinx FPGA
• OurAirports
• picsphere
• Stockify
• Protecode

It was held at the hip Velvet Room, 62 1/2 York Street in the Market, and not at the Clock Tower Brew Pub as per usual in the recent past. Alec Saunders was the emcee for tonight’s event.

My favorite demo was the OurAirports app for the thoughtfulness of the features for its users (mainly amateur pilots).

Here are a couple of pictures from the event:

Posted in Barcamp, democamp, anycamp, Ottawa | No Comments »

Rick Segal of JLA Ventures was in town today, along with Scott Pelton of GrowthWorks Capital, for the Ottawa VC Roundtable session. Overall, it was a very informative session. The mystery surrounding why they pick certain companies to invest in has been lifted for me. Rick is awesome, and should definitely be on every software tech startup’s VCs list. The rest are my notes from the session.

VCs operate by high risk & high reward. Generally for less than $1M in funding, look for Angels. For larger sums, look for VCs.

The best time to talk to him is right after the napkins stage. Plan for 6 months, no shorter than that, to close a VC deal. The 6 months include legals, due diligence, background checks, etc. This is another reason why you need to talk to them as soon as possible.

They want “exits”; they do not want “lifestyle” companies.

Ask the VC what stage do they fund at, and what they do/don’t do.

Most VCs would like to partner with other firms. They’ll get you in front of other people. Besides, it’s also important for you to have diversified capital.

If you want VC money, set 18 months of milestones, like product in beta, a thousand customers, etc. and so that there’s a likely scenario for the company to be worth, say, $10 million.

2 types of VCs:

1. term sheet first: they’ll give you a term sheet almost immediately, but bait & switch later; essentially rip the company from you.

2. check list first: it takes longer to get a term sheet, but they move fast once the term sheet is offered.

JLA Ventures is actively involved in companies that they invest in.

They generally don’t invest in companies heavy with professional services; they like “shrink wrap” product companies for scalability and IP.

Because it’s so cheap to start a business today, there’s a lot of “noise” for similar product offerings. Anybody can have great ideas, but only the successful ones will be able to execute scale, sustainability and promotion.

Patents: process patents like Amazon’s “one-click” do not interest them; true IP patents have value, though they are not the only thing they base on.

For the future, they believe the localization is going to be huge.

Posted in Etc, Innovation, Ottawa | No Comments »

I’m reading Alfie Kohn’s book called The Homework Myth. It triggers to me to think that many corporate knowledge management portals fails because it evolves into a type of mandatory “homework” for the participants.

Kohn suggests that “… homework… should be designed to promote two things: high-quality learning and the desire to keep learning.”

Now, imagine if you take replace the word “homework” with “knowledge management”, or any other knowledge initiatives you’re responsible for. Any engagements designed with this in mind will definitely be more successful.

Posted in Community, Strategy | No Comments »

Since my attendance at various *camps in the Ottawa area last year, I really enjoy meeting the various entrepreneurs and developers at these events. They are a great resource for people in technology.

Part of the purpose for this blog is to share my experiences at these events. One thing unique that I would like to bring is to take photos of these events and share them — to bring the readers a closer experience.

I started by taking photoes with my little point-and-shoot Canon A630. Low-light and general snap performance was not up to par, so I went out and bought an entry-level SLR, the Canon Rebel XT. It’s a great camera, but again, taking pictures at indoor events at night with the stock 18-55mm lens did not cut it either — the performance was better, but images are still blurry. I took quite a few pics at the Refresh Ottawa event, and luckily, a couple of pictures came out ok. (The write-up for that event is on StartupOttawa.com.)

Thinking it is caused of the small aperture and the hand-share, I thought maybe the 50mm lens with f/1.8 (much cheaper than a decent image stabilized lens, which is what really should work), would do the trick. The results are better, but, no cigar… The focus length provides too much zoom and does not work well for crowded indoor events.

So… at the next event, I’ll try to use the stock lens again, but jack up the ISO to the max; the pictures will be noisy, but might be good enough. Sorry to all the folks that let me take their pictures to be posted, but the pictures just don’t look nice (so I don’t end up posting them)…

Another note, in case you’re wondering… It takes a bit of time to upload pictures, process them, crop, resize and upload them to a blog… just a bit too cumbersome for an occasional blogger like me. Sigh…

Posted in Etc | No Comments »

Bob Reichert from the NRC (National Research Council) announced in DemoCamp Ottawa 8 that, if your startup is seeking research grants and/or general questions regarding IRAP, you can contact him at 613.993.7890 or Bob.Reichert at nrc.gc.ca.

Posted in Innovation, Ottawa | No Comments »

These companies has announced at DemoCamp Ottawa 8 on Monday that they are looking for staff, software developers and others, to join their team:

Thornley Fallis / 76 Design

Real Decoy

FavQuest (part-time, sweat-equity? for now)

Posted in Barcamp, democamp, anycamp, Ottawa | No Comments »

The latest DemoCamp a couple of nights ago was interesting. A few observations:

• no dominant technology platform used across the board (asp.net, java , php, etc.)

• product maturity ranges from fairly polished commercial (DevShop) to various stages of “beta” (FavQuest, FriendsRoll)

• a professional emcee (David Schellenberg of LiVE 88.5) really helps makes it a better event

In addition to the wiki for this event, there’s a pretty good over-all recap of the event on StartupOttawa.com if you’re interested for a better coverage.

Posted in Barcamp, democamp, anycamp, Ottawa | No Comments »

Google Sites just came out. It’s quite well put-together, and much nicer than other Wiki’s. However, I don’t think it will get main-stream adoption yet. (Btw: it’s the re-worked JotSpot Wiki engine after they bought it at the end of 2006.)

See it in action at http://sites.google.com/ or watch this video:

Posted in Tech news | No Comments »

Innovation is the key to success everywhere you look. It even applies beautifully in low-tech environments like restaurants.

I’m a big fan of the show Kitchen Nightmares. In today’s episode, Mixing Bowl, the eye opener for the despaired owners is that the number of local restaurants has grown 10 times in the last 10 years, but they haven’t changed a bit. So, how to win in  this situaion?

Gordon’s solution? It is not to simply improve or extend their menu offerings (something we tech companies do so often without thinking about the bigger picture). It is “innovation” as applied in their local context: offer something “nobody else” has, but obviously lacking, in that geographic area: a healthy menu.

The result? Innovation is the key that, together with the new efforts by the staff, helps the restaurant back on a profitable course.

Posted in Innovation, Strategy | No Comments »