RailsConf Europe 2007 Berlin Session Notes
Posted on September 23, 2007
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Posted on September 23, 2007
Filed Under Analytics, Apple, Business, CSS/XHTML, Daily Thoughts, Design, Hardware, Hosting, Marketing, Mobile Tech, PHP/MySQL, Productivity, Quotes, Ranting, Ruby on Rails, SEO, Security, Startup, SugarStats, Tech, Travel, Web, WebDev
New Design. Freakin Finally
Posted on August 18, 2007
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After a few years I’ve finally put a new face on this blog. Though I haven’t been updating as much as I would have liked lately, that will change. Keeping things simple, I went with the nice Vertigo Blue theme and modified it a bit.
So big thanks to Brian Gardner, great work man and thanks for the theme 
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Posted on August 18, 2007
Filed Under Art & Design, CSS/XHTML, Daily Thoughts, Design, Hosting, Marketing, PHP/MySQL, Ranting, Tech, Web
RFacebook Rails Plugin
Posted on August 6, 2007
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I came across the RFacebook plugin at http://rfacebook.rubyforge.org/ and it looks pretty cool. I might have to look into this for SugarStats/Facebook integration. Check it out.
” RFacebook is a Ruby interface to the Facebook API. It hides all the nitty-gritty details behind a beautiful Ruby front-end, allowing you to focus on writing great code.And now, with the RFacebook on Rails plugin, you can have even more Facebook goodness in Rails. Besides extensions for controllers, views, and models, it even has a great debug panel that lets you see what’s going on behind the scenes.”
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Posted on August 6, 2007
Filed Under Analytics, CSS/XHTML, Daily Thoughts, Design, Mobile Tech, PHP/MySQL, Ruby on Rails, Tech, Web
Seattle Conference on Scalability Vids up on Google Video
Posted on July 22, 2007
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Man, if there was ever a good reason for video podcasts and video ipods it is so I could watch from beginning to end all the conference sessions that were always too expensive or too far away. 
But they just put up a bunch of great videos from the Seattle Conf on Scalability. Some of the good talks include:
- Building Scalable Systems (GTalk as an example).
- How verisigns worldwide DNS system scales
- How YouTube Scaled
Great stuff, check it out: http://video.google.com/videosearch?q&docid=6202268628085731280
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Posted on July 22, 2007
Filed Under Business, Daily Thoughts, Entertainment, General, Hardware, Hosting, Marketing, Mobile Tech, PHP/MySQL, Ruby on Rails, Startup, Tech, WebSubscription Based Services, Paypal and TrustCommerce aka “Integrating recurring payments into SugarStats.com with Rails”
Posted on May 17, 2007
1 CommentThe guys over at ActiveReload posted an interesting article on their experiences integrating subscription-based recurring payments into their app Lighthouse.
Check it out: Dealing with subscription payments
Its funny as we’re having a similar situation with SugarStats.com . We’re on the last stretch before a public launch and all that is remaining is to get the payment processing integration finished.
We wanted (really really wanted) to have all our subscription issues magically handled by PayPal in one clean, managed solution. It didn’t turn out like that.
Actually, I had changed my mind and the direction of the project multiple times! First it was paypal, got it about 80% implemented and realized some new limitations. We then decided to switch to TrustCommerce, but with so much invested with implementing PayPal it was a little difficult to just throw that all away. We also didn’t want to leave out all the people who want to pay via PayPal as of course, TrustCommerce won’t fulfill that need.
Upon further deliberation we decided since it was almost done to finish the PayPal solution since it could process credit cards too. It can process credit cards right? It says it right on their website, users don’t even need to create a PayPal account! Yes, that would have been ideal. After many hours Google searching, API crawling and forum question asking the answer was found. It can process credit cards… For one-time payments and not subscriptions. Great.
But now the decision is final, TrustCommerce and credit card subscription process direct from the website and finish the PayPal subscriptions after launch. But it is our own faults for second guessing and really not doing all the homeworked needed.
Dealing with TrustCommerce has been a breeze so far. Their service, Citadel, is specifically made for recurring subscriptions. They even say it’s “A dream come true for the subscription based business.”, now I’m seeing the truth in that. Their API is as clean and clear as can be and they even have a Rails Plugin (The TrustCommerce Subscription Plugin) that makes implemention DEAD simple.Another good element, as it was with PayPal as well, is that TrustCommerce’ Citadel keeps all Credit Card information secure on their servers along with automatically handle all the payments and invoicing (as it should be). Though we’ve still built our own house record-keeping solution for subscriptions and payment records.
Since the code base is about 80% done, we’re fairly sure we’re going to add PayPal subscriptions down the road. But so close to deadline, this takes priority though I wouldn’t be surprised (I love Rails) if we get both in there before launch
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Posted on May 17, 2007
Filed Under Analytics, Business, CSS/XHTML, Daily Thoughts, Design, General, Hardware, Hosting, Marketing, Mobile Tech, PHP/MySQL, Productivity, Ruby on Rails, SEO, Startup, SugarStats, Tech, Travel, Web
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I'm Marston and here you'll find my rantings, rhetoric and other useful info. I dig tech, photography, quantum physics and organic food. I'm the founder of SugarStats.com and thats my days developing.
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