Monthly Archive for February, 2009

Getting Laconica 0.7.1 working with XAMPP on Windows

Published on February 23, 2009 in Development. 9 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

Getting Laconica 0.7.1 working with XAMPP on Windows
This guide demonstrates how to get Laconica 0.7.1 working with XAMPP on Windows.

First step – download Laconica, and unzip to folder, say, c:\xampp\htdocs\laconica.

Enable InnoDB by heading to c:\xampp\mysql\bin\my.cnf and at line 128 make yours look like this:

# Comment the following if you are using InnoDB tables
#skip-innodb
innodb_data_home_dir = “C:/xampp/mysql/”
innodb_data_file_path = ibdata1:10M:autoextend
innodb_log_group_home_dir = “C:/xampp/mysql/”
innodb_log_arch_dir = “C:/xampp/mysql/”
## You can set .._buffer_pool_size up to 50 – 80 %
## of RAM but beware of setting memory usage too high
innodb_buffer_pool_size = 16M
innodb_additional_mem_pool_size = 2M
## Set .._log_file_size to 25 % of buffer pool size
innodb_log_file_size = 5M
innodb_log_buffer_size = 8M
innodb_flush_log_at_trx_commit = 1
innodb_lock_wait_timeout = 50

Next install curl. Open c:\xampp\apache\bin\php.ini and remove the semicolon in front of:

extension=php_curl.dll

Save the file. Restart Apache. Create a phpinfo page by adding this line to a new file:

phpinfo();

And saving as c:\xampp\htdocs\phpinfo.php. Open in your web browser by going to http://localhost/phpinfo.php. Search for the word Curl, it should appear as a heading.

Next get XMLWriter working. In c:\xampp\apache\bin\php.ini remove the semicolon in front of:

extension=php_xmlwriter.dll

Save the file. Restart Apache. Check your phpinfo page for the header XMLWriter.

While looking at phpinfo, search for the headers “MySQL”, which should be there. Also “GD” should be there, “mbstring”, and “gettext”.

Go back to c:\xampp\apache\bin\php.ini and remove the semicolon in front of:

extension=php_mailparse.dll

And put it after extension=php_mbstring.dll so it looks like:

;extension=php_lzf.dll
;extension=php_maxdb.dll
extension=php_mbstring.dll
extension=php_mailparse.dll
extension=php_exif.dll
extension=php_mcrypt.dll

Save the file. Restart Apache. Check your phpinfo page for the header Mailparse.

Open c:\xampp\apache\conf\httpd.conf. Remove the # in front of:

#LoadModule rewrite_module modules/mod_rewrite.so

Restart your webserver.

Fire up PHPMyAdmin by going to http://localhost/phpmyadmin. If it asks you for a username or password, it’s something you’ve set.

Click on the privileges link. Click the Add a new User link. Add a user, say “Laconica”. Add a password, in this instance “Laconica”. Do think a little about security here, and don’t use my defaults. Select the “Create database with same name and grant all privileges” option. Then click Go.

Select the Laconica database. Click Import, and select the following file:

c:\xampp\htdocs\laconica\db\laconica.sql

Click Go. You should see a whole bunch of Laconica tables.

In Explorer, copy c:\xampp\htdocs\laconica\htaccess.sample to just .htaccess.

Open .htaccess. Change:

RewriteBase /mublog/

To

RewriteBase /laconica/

Or wherever your Laconica installation is.

In Explorer, copy c:\xampp\htdocs\laconica\config.php.sample to just config.php.

Open config.php. Important lines to configure are:

$config['site']['server'] = ‘localhost’;
$config['site']['path'] = ‘laconica’;

These point to your server, and the path you’ve set to laconica.

$config['db']['database'] = ‘mysql://laconica:laconica@localhost/laconica’;

Your MySQL username and password and database.

Uncomment:

#$config['db']['ini_your_db_name'] = $config['db']['schema_location'].’/laconica.ini’;

And change to

$config['db']['ini_laconica'] = $config['db']['schema_location'].’/laconica.ini’;

Also:

$config['site']['fancy'] = true;

Set this as true if you copied over htaccess.sample to .htaccess.

Now go to http://localhost/laconica. It should all work.

Deal A Day Websites – a disruptive business model?

Published on February 11, 2009 in Business, E-Commerce, Great Ideas and Observations from the Web. Closed Tags: , , , , , , .

I’ve been thinking a little about Deal A Day websites, like 1-day, firstin, and offtheback.

All these Deal A Day websites stemmed from the idea of the main Deal A Day website in America, woot.

What is a deal a day website? Where every day there is a new deeply-discounted product for sale, and previous products for sale are removed. This generates a significant amount of excitement and buzz about the website, and ensures that people return to see the new deal each day.

Of course, all these websites are variations of this idea. woot only has one product. 1-day is a twist of fate has three. firstin has five? offtheback has one.

Currently the market leader is 1-day. 1-day has a significant amount of regular visitors, and has won the war of critical mass I believe. Like Amazon, TradeMe, and e-Bay, once you have reached a critical mass of people, there is less incentive for people to visit other sites, and hence all those other sites never grow, and the critical mass site explodes with growth.

Until a disruptive model comes about.

So I set myself thinking about disruptive models to take the 1-day crown of Deal A Day websites in New Zealand. We need to examine why there is a lot of repeat traffic to the site – new products and exclusivity. Once a product has sold out, it is gone and the customer misses out. But instead of being disapointed in the retailer, they are excited to see a good deal, and look forward to tomorrow’s deal. Combined with an active community of users who comment on products and generate content, means that there is a significant attraction for users to return back to the site.

Once a product sells out, that is a lost opportunity for the retailer, as they have lost potential revenue. Is there a way to capitalise on this?

Well we could just constantly replace items on the site. Hence it’s not a deal a day website anymore, but a constant deal website. Obviously the excitement still needs to come from having products that people perceive as being bargins. Second hand products can fit this bill. Each product is unique, and once it’s gone it’s gone, but there is always another product. If we continue to extend this concept out – for second hand markets should we let the market decide the price?

This may be a new disruptive business model – an auction a day website. Since we still need to ensure an item is sold (and not have to wait for an auction to finish), we could implement a dutch auction method where:

  • Three items are listed for sale by auction, whether new or second hand.
  • A maximum price is set by the administrator.
  • Over a period of time set by the administrator, the price decreases by a set amount at set intervals, i.e. $1 a minute.
  • If someone wants to purchase the item, they must balance waiting for a lower price against someone purchasing the item before them.
  • As each product is rare, and unique, there is a high ‘buzz’ factor surrounding the auctions.

There you have it. A new disruptive business model for deal a day websites, called Auction A Day.

As I search for “auction a day” on Google, I see no results. Good luck!

Internet Acceptable Use Policies for small businesses

Published on February 5, 2009 in Business. Closed Tags: , .

So you’ve got a small business, and it’s doing particularly well. You’ve hired a couple of new people, but do they have the same ethic towards the internet as you?

Well maybe, but maybe not. It’s best to clarify these things straight away to avoid embarrassment. Have an Internet Acceptable Use Policy. Clearly define:

  • How much can they use the Internet for personal use;
  • What are acceptable (or unacceptable) sites;
  • How much can they use work email for personal use;
  • Guidance on viruses and protection on the Internet.

There are of course technological solutions to enforce these things. But they cost money, are expensive, and don’t always work. It’s better to use policies to state your approach to the Internet before people start work, and then save the grief of reacting to a problem, rather than proactively stopping it.