Then watch this video on how the LHC actually works. Pretty cool stuff.

If you want to brush up on your Quantum Mechanics and dive into the world of Superstring Theory, check out Brian Greene’s book called “The Elegant Universe“. It’s a fun book and a fairly easy read, that is until you reach about page 3 when all subatomic hell breaks loose. Okay, it wasn’t that bad, but coming from someone who previously had about 17 seconds worth of exposure to Quantum Mechanics, I probably wouldn’t recommend this as an intro to physics. I do think, however, if you have even a little familiarity with Particle Theory and the like, you will really enjoy this book. It truly is mind blowing. And after you do read it, come back here and please explain to me what the hell a Calibu-Yau is in English. My head hurts just thinking about it…

It’s just a simple website which compares the size of Earth with various other planets and stars. Definitely worth a look.

http://www.rense.com/general72/size.htm

Here is the first image. But that’s just the beginning.

The Victorian Internet — This book was fantastic. My daughter bought it for me at a library book sale for 50 cents. The Victorian Internet chronicles the rise of the telegraph, as well as the astounding effects it had on the world. The most fascinating aspect of the book, to me anyway, was the comparison of the telegraph to the modern day Internet. The cultures surrounding these two technologies were/are eerily similar, each having their own bevy of underground elites. Remember the heyday of IRC? Yeah, like that. This is a must read for any geek.

The Alchemist — First, let me say that I knew nothing about this book, except that it seems to be on every self-help bloggers “favorite books” list. Eventually, after reading about it for the hundredth, I bought the book. I’m really glad I did. The Alchemist is an inspirational (and motivational) book about a young shepherd boy named Santiago and his journey to fulfill his personal legend (aka: his dreams.) And that’s the exact message the story is trying to convey, always follow your dreams! Excellent book if your looking for a good story and a little motivational pick-me-up.

The Dip — Ahh, The Dip. Here we have a well thought out collection of common sense. Yes, common sense. There probably isn’t much in this book that you don’t already know, but it’s good to have a refresher course every now and then. Seth Godin tells us that whatever we do in life, be the best at it. And anything that we can’t be the best at, quit. That’s kind of a crappy summary of the book — Seth actually does give good advice on how and why to live by the aforementioned guidelines. It’s a quick read, less than 100 pages, and could easily be read in one or two sittings. Or in my case, a week. It’s definitely not the best self-improvement book I’ve ever read, but for the money and time invested, it was well worth it.

I’m still not 100% convinced that paying for an online education is a good idea, but the fact that it’s O’Reilly makes me much more curious.

Course List:

For the complete I.T. beginner:

* Introduction to HTML and CSS
* Learn Object-Oriented Programming Using Java
* Linux/Unix Sysadmin I: The Basics of System Administration
* Learn C Programming, Part 1

For the beginner/intermediate student:

* Introduction to PHP
* JavaScript 1: Client-Side Programming
* Learn Perl for CGI Programming
* PHP/SQL 1: Introduction to Database Programming
* Learn SQL for Database Programming
* Learn C Programming, Part 2
* Learn VB-Script
* Learn Unix for Web Programming
* Linux/Unix Sysadmin II: Networking and DNS
* Learn XML

For the intermediate/advanced student:

* JavaScript 2: AJAX
* Linux/Unix Sysadmin III: Unix Services (including email and web servers)
* Linux/Unix Sysadmin IV: Scripting for Administrators, Sed, Awk, and Perl
* Learn Visual Basic .NET
* Learn C#.NET

Phrostbyte holds a certain amount of sentimental value to me. It was an ugly site when it was up, but it was completely original. I wrote the site entirely by hand in html, which I learned as I went along. Later, I added things like javascript and CGI, skills that I had also picked up along the way. I added chat rooms via IRC, integrated into the site with javascript. I embedded multiple search engines within the site. I had reference pages, shout boxes, arcade games, you name it. I wanted to try everything I could. I even had my first taste of SQL, PHP, and CSS with Phrostbyte. It has been a great experience.

I also had a pseudo-blog on my site. This was long before I even new what a blog was. Blogs have been around since the mid 90′s, just not on my side of the net. I was a member of the forumsphere, so to speak, not the blogosphere. On the front page of my site, however, I had a column where I would write on a variety of topics. The mechanism even worked the same way as a traditional blog. Every time I made an entry, the previous entry would be pushed down and replaced with the new one, complete with a time & date stamp. Very blog like, huh? I guess you could say that Phrostbyte was my first real blog.

I’d have to say that my favorite part of Phrostbyte were the discussion boards. I used a great software package called Ikonboard. I later switched to phpBB and then to SMF. As far as free software goes, I still like Ikonboard the best.

It wasn’t the software that made the forums great though. The forums were tiny, with only a hand full of close friends that used it regularly, but it was always active and we always new where to find each other.

The site has been dead for quite some time now and it’s the right time to shut her down. I still have skyecade.net and I’m also working on a new community site which will, in a sense, be replacing Phrostbyte. I hope to officially launch it within the next 2 months.

I would like to bring Phrostbyte back sometime in the future. What form she’ll take I can’t say. I’ll probably use her for some other educational endeavor. Perhaps Python or Ruby. Or maybe even a little Ajax. Time will surely tell.