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July 5, 2008

Plugging leaks

Lately it seems like my main contribution to Hab.la is fixing bugs. It’s definitely not sexy, but someone has to do it.

Today I finally fixed an obscure memory leak. Pretty much the only clue we had is that, after several weeks of running, the Hab.la server would use up all available memory. It took hours and hours and hours to track down the source, and then the fix turned out to be just two lines of code. (All the coders reading this are nodding their heads right now…)

At any rate, the fix is in. This should slightly improve stability, and maybe even make Hab.la a hair faster. But most likely, you’ll never notice.

Now it’s back to work on a far more exciting feature.

Filed under  //   bugs   leaks   memory   server   teasers  

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June 21, 2007

A "freeze" is a breakdance technique that involves halting all body motion.

OK, phase 2 of the Hab.la beta officially begins .. right .. about .... now.

Here's the scoop:

  • Hab.la is open to new accounts for a limited time-- you don't need an invitation code any more. We want to get a bunch of new users to test everything in more real-world conditions, so go ahead and join the party.
  • We've frozen Hab.la's features for the time being. This means we have hopefully also frozen Hab.la's bugs, so everything should break slightly less often than it has been. (Emphasis on "should.")

    We will naturally fix any critical bugs we find, and of course we're working on new features as well-- they just won't show up on the site for a bit.

So go ahead, make an account, tell your friends, and have a blast. And if you do come across any bugs or difficulties, the forum is a great place to complain about them.

Filed under  //   beta   bugs   feature   forum   freeze  

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June 19, 2007

I'm at a loss for a better title than "what's new"

Lots of new stuff. Maybe I should update more than once every two weeks. OK, let's see here...

  • We realized that the main web page didn't really ever explain what exactly Hab.la is, so we created a tour (with a little help from a beta tester-- thanks Dad.)
  • Several users were confused by seeing "me" and "you" in the chat windows, so now it uses your actual Hab.la username instead.
  • Nearly all Mac users have iChat pre-installed, and most Linux users are probably already using Gaim or Pidgin, but we figured most Windows users don't already have a Jabber client. We wanted to ease the pain of installing a new IM program and figuring out how to add your Hab.la account. So I wrote a wrapper around the Pidgin installer; now you can download Pidgin with your Hab.la account already set up. (Overkill? Maybe, but the computer hasn't complained yet.)
  • Ben came up with a crazy hack to allow you to add Hab.la to sites where Javascript is disabled (e.g., MySpace or Facebook). Details forthcoming.

We've also been diligently fixing bugs that have vexed our testers, and the next phase of the beta will officially begin very, very soon. Maybe as soon as tonight if I'm feeling ambitious. Or maybe not, if I'm feeling like going to the beach instead.

Filed under  //   beach   beta   bugs   documentation   myspace   pidgin   tour  

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June 5, 2007

Hab.la observed in its natural habitat

Hi.

Rumor has it that a few people are actually running Hab.la on their sites now, so we've been fixing the first round of bugs caught in the wild. None of us actually use IE, so Hab.la has been really broken for IE users without us noticing. Apparently I'm the only one who even has a Windows machine right now, so I got the privilege of tackling that.

Oddly enough, the most requested feature so far is the ability to customize the color scheme. That should be available in a day or two. It's actually done already; I just haven't merged it into production yet, and the weather is really nice right now, so hell if I'm going to do that now.

That is all.

EDIT: check out http://www.stdeviant.com/testx.html for an example of a custom color theme.

Filed under  //   beta   bugs   colors   ie   nice   ui   weather  

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