eAction

On September 3, 2005 I installed SuSE 9.3 with the help of a man who phoned me long distance several times to walk me through the installation to make sure everything would go well. It did, except for the KMail.

I’d already learned to use and like KMail - part of the KDE suite of programs that is on most Linux operating systems now - while I was working in Mandrake 9.2. I was sure I would simply copy in my backed up emails and be off and running.

Well, it didn’t work that way. Much as every other program seemed to be bigger and better and more wonderful than anything I had experienced so far, my KMail program did not work right. I’m afraid I have not recorded in my journals the details of my initial problems, but I recall that I had trouble getting my backed up emails to show up in my KMail folders. Then as I set up my accounts and tried to send out test emails I got error messages that were new and confusing to me. I could certainly go online with my Firefox web browser, and I did receive some emails when I tried to download them, but I could not for the life of me send any email out!

I took off several days from my otherwise busy work schedule to research this problem and get it solved. That involved reading the SuSE manual, and doing Google searches online, and checking out even the vaguest links to look for the right steps to take.

To get ahold of Fred, the man who walked me through the install by phone, I went online, used one of my web mail interfaces, and let him know that I had serious problems getting KMail to send email out. When he did reply a couple of days later, he really could not see how that might have happened. His installations for everyone else had always gone perfectly.

Ugh! Up a tree! What to do next?

I learned a lot of other things on the side, while I sought answers. For instance, I found that I had a browser on my computer called Opera, and it could be used for email. But it wasn’t my KMail, and couldn’t get enthused about switching to that.

From the manual I found out about the kmailrc file and got instructions from Fred to try to change permissions on it, and to make a backup copy before I changed a line or two in it. I tried that, and got no further with sending emails.

Someone from the Christian Linux Users Group (a mailing list I belonged to) suggested just giving up on KMail and switching to Thunderbird. I’d tried Thunderbird before I left Windows and was not impressed with that. I really didn’t want to go that route, However, I had other email programs in this SuSE 9.3, so I tried them out. Evolution never got off the ground. I got error messages trying to open it the first time, and every time after. But I’d tried that one out too in Mandrake, and didn’t like the way it saved messages. So I didn’t feel too badly about it not working.

I did read about and tried out Mutt and Pine. These are plain text email programs that work in the konsole, like from a command line. No graphics. That sent me off for several days reading up web pages on how to set up and run these programs.
I worked at it, and got some emails downloaded, but sending was some sort of problem too. Until I read that they use different hidden programs, like sendmail and procmail, and that these two do not like to work side by side on the same computer.

Meaning what? I have to go with one or the other? I got frustrated and discouraged.

I began to ask myself other questions for alternatives. What about uninstalling KMail and re-installing it? But then I needed to export the emails that had come down into my inbox, but which I had not answered yet. So off to hunt for that answer.

Fred sent new advice: delete the file (kmailrc) as root, with KMail closed, then remove all the files in /opt/kde3/share/apps/kmail then open KMail up again and try to create a new account. I tried that. Nope. No sending of email in my outbox.

I tried changing settings in Mail Transfer Agent in YaST (the master control area), but it did nothing, so I changed it back.

Resigned, I did a complete uninstall of KMail, and re-installed it again from YaST. I set up some email accounts all over again, and still no go.

I went back to studying up on Mutt. I really felt my learning curve had been plenty steep enough, but I was getting desperate and willing to learn Links that I went back to a number of times were;

http://jmcpherson.org/mutt.html
http://www.mutt.org/
http://tldp.org/HOWTO/Mutt-GnuPG-PGP-HOWTO-4.html
http://tldp.org/HOWTO/FTP.html

I even discovered how to give a command at the Konsole command line to fetch my mail from my ISP mail servers into Mutt and Pine.
________________________________________________________________________________
the command is: fetchmail -u
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Pine, by the way seemed easier to catch on to, but didn’t come with as high kudos as Mutt when I read up on these.

About that time my niece and her 14 month old daughter came for a visit of four days. I decided to declare myself on vacation and to ignore my email problems and focus on enjoying our guests for those four days.

When they left I came back to my work schedule and decided that life had halted long enough. As much as possible I was going to get back to my regular writing, web design and other schedules, and I would go online to answer my most important emails from the web interfaces, copying and pasting email contents into my Kate editor so I could save them, and I would only work on the KMail problem when I had time. My life had to go on!

It was a number of weeks like this before I suddenly discovered the most simple answer to my KMail problem.

To be continued… in two weeks.

Imagine a reporter stopped you on the street, stuck a microphone into your face, and asked you, “To what would you credit your success so far?” What is the first thing that would pop into your mind? (Besides perhaps, “Success? In what?”)

Assuming that reporter takes time to patiently wait while you think for a minute. Would you suddenly think, “Wait a sec… If I get to choose the area I’ve had success in, it would be ___________ .” (You fill in the blank).

Now, with that in mind, how quickly could you say what contributed to your success in that area?

There is a reason I’m on this theme. It is important to consider how we have come as far as we have, because in that is the clue as to our further success. But more than that, if we share our testimonial or story of how we were helped, particularly if we thank those who helped us, we can be a blessing to others, and encourage others to seek the same kind of help.

“What goes around comes around.” (old saying).

You have seen those web pages, particularly if it is trying to sell something, where the sales copy is interrupted with quotes from people who have already reviewed or tried out that product and found it to be useful and of excellent quality. Seeing their names and faces gives you the impression that this is really great, popular stuff!

That’s the whole point of those testimonials. I recently read the advice of a writer of good advertising copy and he said one of the smartest things you can do for your web site, is to post testimonials of your satisfied customers everywhere. It makes you seem more trustworthy and reliable.

Which raises some questions. Like, what if you have had no enthusiastic customers yet? Or, how do you get customers to give you such nice praise? Can I expect rewards if I send thank you notes to sellers of products I really like?

Answer 1. If you have no customers yet, it might be wise to arrange with some friends or well-known individuals to give them a free product in return for their testimonial. That is not as great as an unsolicited testimonial, but just so you have something to put up at the beginning, most business people find that acceptable.

Answer 2. You get customers to give you nice praise by checking with them after a few days and asking them if they have any problems, and if they indicate all is well, ask them if they’d be kind enough to give you a testimonial. The majority of people never think of giving thanks.They have to be asked quite bluntly for feedback. Do it politely, of course. You know how seldom you do it yourself, right?

Answer 3. A true testimonial should not be bought, however, as I just said, so few people go back to say thanks when they get purchase or receive something useful and valuable, that if you do so, that person is going to fall all over you with gratitude and you will likely benefit from better service, advance notice of special deals, bragging on you to others, etc. The most useful testimonial, you’ll notice after a while, is one that describes how that particular product or site, or service has been a great boon and help to you. Remember, it will be mixed in with the sales copy.

Now, that person shouldn’t really use your note of praise on a web site without first asking your permission. When they do, you can graciously say, “That would okay, I think. Will you be including a link to MY site with that?” Usually they are most happy to. Take that link as your prize. Because people will click on it to see what you are really like, and what you have to offer. It becomes FREE advertising for you!

Which reminds me…. (hint-hint). I should love to get some testimonials for my web sites. I must start checking with friends and happy clients to see if they’d write and allow me to use their kind words.

Guess it would only be fair then, to go offer some testimonials to sites and services I have really liked!

Even better than testimonials, I love to read success stories that show how people solved their problem, perhaps with a certain product. How they learned to use it, what special features worked best for them, etc. This week I’ve read some terrific success stories about the SiteBuildIt! system for creating a web business, even if you know nothing about html coding, etc. These come with great pictures and surprising links. Very well done! Case-Studies

One that stands out for me even yet, is the young wife who had a hair salon in her home, but was tired of always having clients come in during the evening, so she couldn’t even spend time with her husband and children. In a round about way she learned of SBI and wrote an e-book about hair styles, and then an SBI site on the subject. Now she writes articles for a New York hair magazine, and has given up taking clients at home. She can work on the site while the kids nap or play, and spend her evenings with her husband. She is earning enough to pay for family vacations - which they could never afford before!

A brother and sister have a series of sites now on planning birthday parties for kids. They travel around the world and have a lot of fun, just stopping once in a while to check on their sites. Case-Studies

June 2005

Tuesday morning, I opened KWord in my Mandrake 9.1 which was on a separate drive from my Windows 98. I pulled up some files on a floppy disk from my old 286 computer downstairs (which I use only for super private stuff). The first one I had converted to RTF and it opened okay, but when I opened the second one, KWord “hung up” or greyed out, and I couldn’t close it or do anything with it. In Windows-lingo, it crashed.

In Linux lingo, I know now that I just needed to give the “kill” command for that one program, and I could open it again and start over. However, I didn’t know that yet.

I spent from about 9:30 to 11:30 searching online for how to deal with this. I knew that in a Linux operating system one should NOT shut down and reboot to solve a crash. That’s a Windows’ cure. But I got impatient and decided to shut down and reboot.

Only now I couldn’t get into Mandrake. It was all seized up! I re-installed my Mandrake suite, but on the empty half of the 40GB drive, just in case I could fix the first installation. When I came into my NEW Mandrake, my cursor was missing. I struggled to fix it, but couldn’t get into the area of Mandrake Control, for the settings as I couldn’t see where the mouse was clicking.

In the afternoon (sigh!) I re-installed Mandrake again. Still the same problem. I explored the SuSE LIVE! CD (it stays on the CD, not the hard drive), and via SuSE was able to see that my partitions were still all there, so I went to look for answers on the net, with my older computer, using dial-up. I couldn’t find anything really helpful, so in the evening I came back and installed Mandrake again for the 3rd time.

While in the custom partitioning stage I decided to risk a Rescue partition click. My sister-in-law Penny called, and I was talking to her when it stopped and I saw my hard drive wiped clean! Both Mandrake installations all gone!

As I moaned and grieved Penny tried to comfort me by saying it was all just “stuff.” People matter more than our stuff.

I know all that! I usually always put people first.

What she didn’t know was how many web sites I’ve been working on, how many writing projects, graphics… and not all for just me - clients too.

I still had stuff on the 10 GB drive with Windows, but it had been locked off to me since Easter when I had a crash because of some virus from a popup ad. What I had lost now, was all the stuff I’d gathered and set up since Easter. I had not been able to figure out how to do backups to CDs, but had been saving everything to a separate partition on this drive. If I had NOT tried that “Rescue Partition” button I would still have it. (SIGH!)

I finished that third install. (I was getting VERY familiar with that routine), and late that night I hunted up manuals and instructions on backups. I was resolved not to do anything else until I had learned how to do backups on CDs. Close to midnight I went to bed, feeling odd. Like I ought to be physically sick. My heart was certainly in mourning.

All of the next two days I sought out and managed to learn a steep mountain of information. Finally I could do backups on a program sitting right there in my Mandrake suite of over 900 programs. It was called X-CD-Roast. I also learned a number of commands to use in the Konsole like a real Geek.

I still needed to learn more about changing file permissions, but I thought it is safe now to try to re-build my “stuff” in that Mandrake operating system. Remembering my move to this computer in November of 2004, and my transition into Mandrake only after Easter I realized that it would take a few weeks. All my big blogging plans were on hold.

I was able to download my sites and the ones I look after, so I had copies of them again, but the work I had not uploaded yet… well, I had to do it over.

Same with the kids’ book I’d started on the previous weekend, and the article I wrote Saturday night for the local weekly paper’s centennial project. A big batch of graphics I had cropped and re-sized, all had to be done over. About 80+ tracts that I had scanned for a shopping cart - need to be done over. Never mind all my email addresses. If certain friends would not write me, I had no way of getting to them!

Not even Christmas always goes perfectly in every home. So are you still licking wounds from unkind things that were said or done? If so, you are probably finding it hard to get back into a mood to work at your business venture. Your body and your mind conspire to make you feel ill or cause events to keep you from your work.

Even if you are back into your routines, there is that invisible, nagging cloud over your head that keeps you from concentrating and getting enthused about your work plans. Your mind keeps replaying scenarios of how it went or how it should have gone if you’d had the courage to say thus and so.

You want to know something?

If you let it, that will eat you up, and ruin your business.

Take you-know-who - yourself - by the scruff of the neck and shake some sense into your head.

Facts: You can’t undo the past by reviewing it over and over; you must forgive and let go, and turn the guilty parties over to God; ask to have your mind and heart cleansed, and filled with God’s Spirit for wisdom and love and grace. Answer yourself why you’re in that work, and what is God’s will for your life - then get on with it.

There. I trust that helps!

At the end or start of a new year, I like to take some days or half-days off to sort out a lot of things in my mind. It’s too easy throughout the year to be so busy I just plod along doing the next thing, and forget why I’m doing it. What if I’ve slipped off base? Many little projects can cause us to veer off on tangents. Am I still doing what God wants me to do? Do I have projects on my agenda list that I ought to drop? Are there better ones to take up?

And the big question; how am I going to get it all done? My timetable will need some adjustments!

So I take some days where at a slower pace, I pray and review all these things, starting with the basics, and working up to the details. I go slow enough so I can hear God’s Spirit speak to my intuition and let me know when something is not right, or a certain other little responsibility needs a block of time to get done.

By the end of three or four days like this, I have a fresh gungho attitude towards my goals and aims. Knowing why I’m doing what I do, renews my motivation. Unfinished projects from last year that are still worthy get moved to this year’s agenda and schedule, and some that have petered down get ejected altogether.

Last year I found myself interested in selling on eBay, but I gave up another program that wasn’t bringing in any results to make room for it. After some initial research, I managed to “try” to sell one book, which didn’t get a single bid. Then I got busy with trying to help Dad by selling his cross necklaces he began to make in May. I thought that was a temporary interruption in my time for eBay, but when I looked at it now, months later, I realized that I’d lost my interest and enthusiasm for it. Perhaps because of that first failure, to be fair, but this year I scraped that right off my calendar.

There are so many little pros and cons to consider, but when pressing ahead in a normal work week, one just doesn’t take time to weigh them carefully. So my planning retreats at the end/beginning of the year, (and sometimes I can sneak in a day for it around my birthday at the end of July), these are priceless for getting a new grip on all my irons in the fire.

That may be a cliche from a blacksmith’s workshop, but since I have many projects and planning all running concurrently, it seems apt for my situation. By giving each regular little blocks of time, I eventually get many things done. But if I don’t take time to list what I got accomplished and celebrate them, they begin to blur together like a room with far too much clutter and too many do-dads hanging around and clashing both colours and impressions.

I recommend this goals, agendas, and calendar housecleaning highly to you. I’m eager to get on with my work this year. I’m not like those who moan about breaking their new year’s resolutions within so many days. I don’t have vague resolutions - I have plans and timetables, and I know that I’ll work hard at them. I won’t get everything done, but I’ll get far more done than if I had NOT made plans and schedules.

Make a list of all you DID get done last year. Think back carefully, if you didn’t make lists to check off, you have only your memory to rely on. Maybe you’ll have to ask some family members or friends what they recall. You might be surprised at how productive you were.

Now make a sensible list of all the things you’d like to work on this year, and what time of the day or week you will work at them. Write it down, or make charts and tables. Pin them up where you will see them often.

You’ll be amazed.

By the way, are you wondering what I got done in 2005?
Okay.
1. I got about half-way finished writing a new novel

2. I compiled three e-books for myself, and 1 for a friend

3. I produced a children’s book for my nieces’ kids to teach them Low German

4. I checked out RSS feeds and changed my two ezines to become blogs, and added two more

5. I practiced at writing good sales pages

6. Some of my affiliate links paid off with commissions

7. I switched completely from a Windows 98 operating system to Mandrake and then to SuSE (both Linux)
(that involved a far larger learning curve than I’d anticipated!)

8. I researched eBay selling

9. I built a web site for a missionary friend, so they could earn cash on the side

10. I got about 1/3 of my 500+ page web site on my novel renovated.

11. I also renovated about half of another mission web site I am in charge of

12. I produced a short-run of a genealogy book in print and as an e-book over Christmas while not feeling well

13. I worked as the Resource Room Librarian in Sunday School on Sunday mornings,

14. And I took Dad on three different weekend holiday trips!

What do you think? Planning works, doesn’t it?