Scott Bradford: Off on a Tangent

Code of Virginia Supports Claims of Breakaway Churches

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Following the U.S. Episcopal Church (part of the Anglican Communion) deciding to endorse homosexual activity and, in the process, abandon the Bible as guiding document of the church, eleven Episcopal congregations in Virginia voted (by membership majority) to leave the U.S. Episcopal Church and align themselves with a more Biblical Anglican group, the Congregation of Anglicans in North America (CANA).

While not challenging the right of a congregation to leave the denomination by majority vote if it chooses, the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia has chosen to try and exert property ownership over the eleven church properties in question and, essentially, evict the breakaway church congregations. This created an interesting legal conundrum—the deeds of the properties are held in trust by the Board of Trustees of the individual church (which seceded), but the trust beneficiary is the diocese and the diocese retains ownership by denomination policy in the event of a congregational secession.

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Browser Screenshot Bonanza

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This will likely be of no interest to you unless you’re a nerd (so apologies in advance to my non-nerdy readers). As many of you know, I endeavor to make this site compatible with every major, current web browser—and even a few non-major, non-current web browsers—to ensure that you can enjoy my site no matter your platform or browser preference.

For every major revision of my site, I check it in all of the supported browsers to make sure it works as-expected. To do this, I need to run multiple desktop operating systems on my MacBook Pro (using both Parallels Desktop and Q [Mac Version of QEMU]). In addition, I check the site on two real mobile phones (running Windows Mobile 6 and Palm OS 5.4) and several phone development emulators on my computer (Apple iPhone, Blackberry, and OHA Android).

This isn’t new. What is new, however, is screenshots of the site in all supported browsers are now linked from supported browser list on the About the Site page. I only did one shot per browser, so multi-platform browsers (like Firefox) get one screenshot (usually from Mac OS X) as a representative sample. The only screenshot I couldn’t get was of Blazer in Palm OS 5.4 (the screen capture apps kept crashing the phone), so I just took a photo of the phone and cropped it down—that’s why it’s a lower quality shot than the rest.

Nerds, rejoice.

Your Tax and Tuition Money: Building Hotels

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So, let’s say that you run a publicly-funded state university . . . you know, a university like George Mason University. The school is a public institution—owned and operated by the Commonwealth of Virginia—that receives much of its money from state tax revenues and the rest from ‘use fees’ (tuition, etc.). If you could obtain, say, 30 million dollars for this school that you run, what would you use it for?

Dorm buildings? Parking lots? Academic programs?

Well, if you’re Alan Merten—the GMU president who presided over bank-breaking tuition increases (115 percent over the four years I attended)—you wouldn’t waste 30 million dollars on supporting the mission of the university or the needs of the tax- and tuition-paying public. Heck, he doesn’t even intend to waste it on the sports program. No, the Washington Post reports that GMU leadership wants to use our money to build a for-profit hotel and conference center.

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Numb the Face, Numb the Brain?

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I’ve never much liked the idea of the cosmetic use of ‘Botox’, given that the drug is—essentially—the same toxin that causes botulism, which causes damage to nerve function and paralyzes muscles and kills people. Yeah, that sounds like a good, friendly drug to inject into one’s face to smooth out some wrinkles. Good thinking.

Regardless, there may be some medical backing to my gut rejection of the use of Botox. As reported by Bloomberg.com, the Botox neurotoxin can move from a muscle injection site to the central nervous system, including the brain, in tests with rats. Granted, rats aren’t people, but it might be a good idea to check this out a little more carefully before we use a potentially deadly neurotoxin for such a superficial purpose as smoothing wrinkles.

10 Steps to Less Painful CMMI Procedures

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Capability Maturity Model Integration (CMMI) is used by many businesses in an effort to improve their internal processes and, particularly in government contracting, to become eligible for contracts that require appraisal at a certain CMMI level. CMMI procedures, while beneficial, are often poorly implemented by small and mid-sized companies and require a disproportionate amount of time and effort on the part of middle-managers filling out duplicative paperwork. Poorly implemented CMMI policies result in managers taking shortcuts, undermining the otherwise positive benefits of CMMI and putting companies at risk of failing CMMI appraisal audits. There are ten simple steps that an organization—whether CMMI appraised or seeking such appraisal—can follow to make CMMI less painful and more effective.

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Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.