All posts by Saro

Viktor Destin – July 2007 Promo Release

Music, Reviews and Rants

My good friend Viktor released his July promo last week and I only recently was able to listen to it. For anyone who’s into EDM (notably minimal/house) then they should definitely listen to the set (cuesheet). Compared to last year’s promo set in July, Viktor has been killing it; he improved his style tenfold. Quality dance floor tracks all over the place.

The tracklist is as follows:

  1. Dusty Kid – Milk
  2. Tommy Four Seven – Click Ball
  3. Nick Miur – I Feel Real (Chopstick Remix)
  4. Leroy Styles – Jus Bounce (Original mix)
  5. Kolombo vs Nemio – Skalpy
  6. Mon, DJ Nexus – Acid Summer (Damon Jee Remix)
  7. Olivier Giacomotto – Gail In The O (John Acquaviva & Damon Jee remix)
  8. DJ F.E.X. & DJ Prinz – Urbaniac (Da Fresh Remix)
  9. Blake – Rock Over You (Paolo Martini Remix)
  10. Gui Boratto – Mr. Decay (Robert Babicz Universum Disco Mix)
  11. Oxia – Not Sure

Listen to it now!

WordPress and osCommerce

Websites

Anyone out there who runs a WordPress site and an osCommerce store will most likely have come across this problem. Let’s say WP is your site’s CMS under http://mydomain.com/ and your osCommerce installation is under http://mydomain.com/catalog/. If you try to access /catalog/admin/ in your browser, you might be greeted by a WordPress 404 page, blocking you from accessing the administrator page. The temporary fix for this solution would be to simply remove/rename the .htaccess file under /catalog/admin/ and login to the administrator section. This is highly annoying and poses a security risk: what if you forget to put the .htaccess file back?

After looking around the web for an answer, I found this solution. In your /catalog/admin/.htaccess file, put the following:

ErrorDocument 401 /[path_to_file]/myerror.html
ErrorDocument 403 /[path_to_file]/myerror.html

Once inserted, create a “myerror.html” file in a directory of your choice (let’s say in the root of http://mydomain.com/) and customize the page with a 401/403 message if you wish. That’s all there is to it!

I found this solution from this page. Their explanation is, and I quote: “HTTP Basic-Auth first sends 401 Unauthorized to request a password from the browser. The webserver tries to serve the corresponding, specified Errordocument. However when the ErrorDocument directive of your webserver is set wrongly, i.e. points to a non-existent file, [WordPress] ends up handling the page-request.”

Cuba 2007

Nightlife, Ramblings, Reviews and Rants

Last week, I came back from Varadero, Cuba. I went with 8 other friends and had a blast. This is the fourth time I visit Cuba and only the second time where I got to experience its nightlife. Now, by all means, Varadero’s nightlive does not compare to Montreal, but it’s still an entertaining scene. I have to admit, I felt mentally and physically refreshed after I came back from the trip. I managed to get some work done and my stress levels have dropped tremendously. I wish I could do this every 6 months!

During the day, my time was spent on the beach. Actually, most of it was spent in the ocean and getting a nice tan on the face. The Cuban beach and ocean do wonders to the body. I notice all my cuticles had disappeared and my nails were super clean. Not that I manicure my nails, but having nice hands like that really do catch the eye.

At night, it was all party (mostly drinking). Some of the clubs we visited included The Pirate’s Cave, The Beach Club/Bar, and International (or Continental) . The first two clubs were fantastic, the first one literally being held in a freshly cooled cave. The second bar was an outdoor (but covered) terrass next to the wonderful Cuban beach. The third club, however, was a flop as there was no air conditioning and the place was packed to the max. The wait times at the bar was also a total disaster: it took me about 15 minutes to purchase a rum and coke! I have to say, I had a lot of fun simply hanging out at the local hotel bar with my buddies and drinking the night away (with some nice Cuban cigars being smoked too). I look forward to those nights everyday now after coming home.

“How come you guys are doing cleans?”

Training

Yesterday, I had the best workout experience in my life. My brother and I were just starting our last exercise of the day, the power cleans, until a fellow gym trainee (who was fairly built) came up to us and asked us how long we have with the olympic lifts area (my gym has a special area for Olympic barbells and weights). At this point, the guy didn’t know we were doing cleans, so he sat back and wanted to jump in during our rest periods. With that said, my brother went up first to perform the power cleans. He quickly finished his first set and sat back down. I got up and the guy came up to us once again, astonished this time, asking “How come you guys are doing cleans?”.

I’m thinking to myself, why wouldn’t I be?

Worried, I asked him: “Umm… are we doing it right?”

The guy replies; “You guys are doing a fantastic job at it. I’m really surprised you guys are doing this exercise since the rare people who usually do it never get it right. You guys have the technique all written down. Great job guys!”

At this point, I never felt so good during a workout. For the remainder of our exercise, we had a good conversation about strength training and how the majority of people who “train” at the gym simply do it to look good (he referred to them as ‘pretty boys’, haha). Alvaro, which we later found out was his name, gave us a few great pointers on the cleans (don’t forget to use your legs) and pretty much reinforced the knowledge I had gained through reading the Starting Strength book.

I felt great after that. Damn great.

Controlled Labs’ Green Bulge Review (Final Take)

Reviews and Rants, Supplements

Last month (or two?) I mentioned about reviewing Green Bulge by Controlled Labs. I never got around to it, so here’s my final take on the supplement.

First, it works. After a week went by when I stopped taking Green Bulge, I immediately lost the “pump” in my body. I didn’t feel as strong as I used to when I was on the pills. In the end, I had to drop by 10-20 lbs on my exercises as they became a bit too difficult for me… but after 2 weeks of training, I came back to my previous strength, albeit not as strong. The supplements DO work, but you need to be taking this stuff often if you want to see improvements in your training. I, for one, will not be taking Creatine supplements again because I find they are not worth my money. I believe proper nutrition can wholly replace all supplements out there and so far I have proved it: I started eating a bit more cleaner than usual and bumped up the protein intake in my body. I noticed results right away… but not as significant when I was taking the Creatine, sadly. Now, I must admit that there is a place for supplements, but they should be supplemented with your existing diet and not substitute it. You cannot simply rely on chemicals to help you out with your diet or solely depend on them thinking they’re all you need. A lot people simply chug down a protein shake thinking it’s a replacement for a meal. Unfortunately those are the people who end up quitting their training when they don’t see anymore results. Anyway, that’s my take on it for now.