It’s time to banish Internet Explorer

IE sucks!

IE has had an awful reputation. To put it in a simpler language, IE sucks – well, it doesn’t just suck, it sucks badly! In negative terms, it’s slow; it’s vulnerable; it’s outdated. In positive terms, it has more weird attributes, more bugs (IE is probably the father of  the term “CSS hacks“), more usability issues (in its UI). The dead of IE 6 (in reality, Microsoft will continue to support it until 2014) and the emergence of IE9 have made life a bit easier. But IE7 and IE8 are still pretty much out there while IE9, albeit better, still sucks. I’m not here to explain all over again why IE sucks in various aspects since there are tons of articles and even blogs, websites dedicated to that. The fact is the dead of any version of IE is really a milestone in web development. We look forward to say good bye to them – one by one although it’s still far away.

One of, if not arguably the main reason why IE can still survive is because there are still many people using it. For example, there are still 2,7% 1.0 and 1,6% 0.5% of  Vietnamese and Singaporean respectively using IE6 at the moment. What a shame! People just simply don’t know or don’t bother to upgrade, let alone to change, their beloved web browser! If only tens and even hundreds of folks do, never mind; but when thousands and even millions of them do, it becomes a big problem.

This shows how awesome IE is!

It’s so frustrating. My website looks and runs perfectly fine in every single browser that has ever existed, except for Internet Explorer!!!”

Lame, just lame. I’m not even going to bother with this anymore. The only reason why I’m using it right now is to check the compatibility of my website.

Undoubtedly, developers are the ones who suffers most from IEs

But who’s to blame?

Developers are complaining here and there. But they can’t do anything much about it simply because their companies will still continue to support cross-browser compatibility to avoid losing their clients and revenue. So as long as clients still use IE which they do and will, companies and agencies still have to support it, and therefore, web developers still have to suffer the horror of developing and “hacking” codes for IE (If you are an IE user who can see some cool HTML5′ and CSS3′ effects working on your beloved browsers, you should know that it’s not as straight forward as it seems. Developers have to put a lot more efforts just to satisfy your experience in your outdated browsers. Sometimes, it may take up to 40% of the entire developing time just for testing, debugging and hacking for IEs). It’s a vicious circle but who’s to blame?

For business owners, it’s not really their faults, it’s due to business reasons. For clients, it’s not really their faults because it’s their money anyway. They have their rights to be stubborn and demanding. For those who don’t bother to upgrade or change their ancient browsers, it’s not really their faults either because ignorance just seems inevitable. Well, this is all Microsoft’s fault for packaging it with Windows! Its monopoly has lived on to haunt us for probably decades. But Microsoft (and its Windows) is still standing strong and there are no signs that the monopoly would stop any time soon. So, in order to improve the situation, someone must really do something!!

Just do something

Alright, from now onwards I personally pioneer (!?) to stop supporting IE in this website as well as in almost all all Huu Thinh House’s upcoming web projects! If they happen to work in IE, thanks God, it’s a miracle!  I highly encourage you to do the same especially when it comes to personal and non-commercial blog and websites. Let’s eliminate the worst for a better world and let Web developers have more times to build cooler web apps instead of debugging and hacking codes for IEs!

ps: As of now, I still include IE’s prefix (-ms) into my codes whenever possible, which will pontentially support the later versions of IEs. But if IE 10 still sucks (not just better anymore) which I highly suspect, there are no more hopes for IE, Microsoft and those who are and will still be using it.

Never Eat Alone

I. Becoming a Member of the Club

Before my eyes, I saw proof that uccess breeds success and, indeed, the rich do get richer. Their web of friends and associates was the most potent club the people I caddied for had in their bags. Poverty, I realized, wasn’t only a lack of financial resources, it was isolation from the kind of people that could help you make more of yourself.

I came to believe that in some very specific ways life, like golf, is a game, and that the people who know the rules, and know them
well, play it best and succeed. And the rule in life that has unprecedented power is that the individual who knows the right people, for the right reasons, and utilizes the power of these relationships, can become a member of the “club,” whether he started out as a
caddie or not.
To achieve your goals in life, I realized, it matters less how smart you
are, how much innate talent you’re born with, or even, most eye-
opening to me, where you came from and how much you started
out with. Sure all these are important, but they mean little if you
don’t understand one thing: You can’t get there alone. In fact, you can’t get very far at all.

He was living proof that success
in golf, and in life, had nothing to do with class. It was about
access (yes, and talent, at least in his case).
Arnie was inspirational proof that your past need not be prologue to your future.

Profound lesson about the power of generosity! When you help others, they often help you.

Success in
any field, but especially in business, is about working with people,
not against them.

p.5

Becoming a Member of the Club Dont Keep Score

It’s better to give before you recieve. And never keep score. If your interactions are ruled by generosity, your rewardds will follow suit.

What’s Your Mission?

Build It Before You Need It

The most important thing is to get to know these people as friends, not potential customers. p,43

Too often, we get cuahgt up efficiently doing ineffective things, focusing solely on the work that will get us through the day. The idea isn’t to find oneself another environment tmr – be it a new job or a new economy – but to be constantly creating the environment and community you want for yourself, no matter what may occur. p.44

You can only truly gain someones’s trust and commitment little by little over time. p.45

::how to create the kind of community that can help further your carreer: p.45

–

The Genius of Audacity

Every time I start to set limits to what I can and can’t do, or fear starts to creep into my thinking, I remeber that Big Wheel tri-cycle. I remind myself how people with low tolerance for rish, whose behavior is guided by fear, have a low propensity for success. p50

It never hurts to ask.

The worst anyone can say is no. If they choose not to give their time or their help, it’s their loss. p.50  – Good Philosophy

Few things you can do today to make good on that commitment and get more comfortable at being audacious in social situations:

• Find a role model.
• Learn to speak.
• Get involved.
• Get threapy.
• Just do it. => You’ll get comfortable with the idea of rejection. With that perspective, even failure becomes a step forward.

I came to believe that in some very specific ways life, like golf,
is a game, and that the people who know the rules, and know them
well, play it best and succeed. And the rule in life that has unprece-
dented power is that the individual who knows the right people,
for the right reasons, and utilizes the power of these relationships,
can become a member of the “club,” whether he started out as a
caddie or not.
This realization came with some empowering implications. To
achieve your goals in life, I realized, it matters less how smart you
are, how much innate talent you’re born with, or even, most eye-
opening to me, where you came from and how much you started
out with. Sure all these are important, but they mean little if you
don’t understand one thing: You can’t get there alone. In fact, you
can’t get very far at all.

My dishes

crème caramel flan 😀 It failed at first 🙁

But became nicer this time 😀

Pasta <3

My Life Map

To get the most of your life, it is important to see how your life is doing. While you can do it at the micro level by looking at your single day or week, it is even more important to see it at the macro level.”

Starting from 2009, I divide each year into 3 parts:

2009

– Semester 1 (Jan to April)
Deeply in love

– Semester 2 (May – August)
Graduate from high school. Involve in a sad luv triangle. Come to Singapore for tertiary education

– Semester 3 (September – December)
Focused & get good start at the first University semester

2010

– Semester 1 (Jan to April)
NA

– Semester 2 (May – August)
Choose to follow web development

– Semester 3 (September – December)
@Hoi An w Class 12. Give up in University’s top class.
@Tioman w a Hung & a Phuong (first time). Read “Rich Dad; Poor Dad”

2011

– Semester 1 (Jan to April)
Do Chichi as my “side” & final year project. Prepare well for the last semester

– Semester 2 (May – August)
Create huuthinhhouse.com

– Semester 3 (September – December)
Graduate. Get my first job soon after. Think of a personal dev blog

2012

– Semester 1 (Jan to April)
Do front-end development for LeeRit.com (from the last Dec?). Create XYZ.

– Semester 2 (May – August)
In love. @KL. Start another blog called Rexy hosted at huuthinhhouse.com. Buy thevietnamwar domain.

– Semester 3 (September – December)
Start the VNW; Continue with LeeRit.com; experiment with some CSS3 stuff @ labs.huuthinhhouse.com

2013

– Semester 1 (Jan to April)
@Malacca. Stop doing LeeRit.com. Do Rexy.me (Jan version). Switch to rexy.me domain.
Getta know a good friend – Go -> everything is kinda changed.
@Phuket – first company trip.
Have my heart broken for … too long (from mar till june/july)
@Langkawi.

– Semester 2 (May – August)
@Bangkok & Chaingmai w Lem
Get promoted. Fail to create a mastermind group.
@Muine w Lem. Work with various freelancer. Start building my own team.

– Semester 3 (September – December)
Have my own lean team (2,3,4,5,6)   😡 <3
Do my 2013’s highlights

2014

– Semester 1 (Jan to April)
@Yangon w Vinh @ Leo’s wedding
– Tet; install Adsense, have much more passive income; contact an American Professor; have an idea of what becomes known as imaginee. Everything goes pretty well; team grows further to max. 7 people until @ Broke up w @Kubia on ~ April, 21

– Semester 2 (May – August)
Use Fiverr. Manage to survive in May. It’s better but feel like I self-employ. Stop!
Left with me & Lam. Get lost…
First freelance project done & paid! thanks @TLBB @Maytha
Officially start to build imaginee.net. Apply PR. Go suddenly leaves for U.S. so do Lem in July – meet a few new people thanks to Go.

– Semester 3 (September – December)
+ Travel solo to @Batam & @JB
+ Continue to somewhat partner with #TLBB – another project done; plus #bridgeapp
+ Do one-sentence journal
+ Half done with 2014 Review

2015

* Semester 1 (Jan to April)
– Take the IELTS (2nd time) for Australian PR (17 & 19 Jan) > 7 band score
– Uncle Lam passed away…
– Went to Bangkok on a company trip.

* Semester 2 (May – August)
– Attended Tony Robbins’ Business Mastery 3-day event in 6-8 May
– Attended the NAC in July where I bought a high ticket III 3-day workshop
– Attended the PJ’s III in Aug
– Went to Luang Prabang (Laos) & Seam Reap (Angkor Wat – Cambodia)!!

* Semester 3 (September – December)
– Build my team (from 3 to 4, 5 to 6 people at the end of the year including me)
– Everything’s going well on track until my trip to Dito’s hometown in early October
– Slightly unfocused after the trip
– Manage to launch the free version of PDA on WordPress though #Nov27
– A few freelance projects from mid till end of Nov.
+ I decided to try Scrum for my team (the book I bought at Semarang airport)
+ I at certain times couldn’t manage the team meeting – out of control
+ I gave in some of the team’s unwise requests (filming intro video, etc.)
> Failed to achieve my financial & the team’s goal – 1,000 subscribers – this year
– Went to BJ & SH China in a long 9-day trip on Xmas & New Year!!

2016

* Semester 1 (Jan to April)

• Love!? #Tu
• Intro Maytha to work with aH on GSToeic project after LNY #Feb
  I don’t really know what was happening during those 2 weeks, she gave up working on both #Freelance & side projects. A good farewell!? 😉
• Re-working on the VNW e-book again after kinda dissolving BWPS team #Mar?

* Semester 2 (May – August)

• Launch the VNW e-book after more than 1 year procastination! :O #Jun
• Terminate a few unsuccessful ventures/websites! #Imaginee #AMiracle
• Open my Silver Saving account on UOB – my first online trading account! #Aug
• Travel to BKK & have lots of fun!! #Aug
• My team reaches the final on a local 5-aside tournament – get my first Silver medal! #Aug

* Semester 3 (September – December)

• Travel to Semarang & Jogjakarta! A fun short trip! (end of Oct)
• Attend 2 Value Investing College workshops #MarryBuffet
  Too soon to invest?
• Launch Prevent Direct Access plugin before X’mas (23rd) & get the first sale 5 days after that! #Dec

Last updated on 28th of February, March 14th 2013, February 16, 2014 September 8, 2014, January 20, 2015, January 10, 2016

Learned from Examine Your Life with a Simple Life

Give

From September, 2012 I have decided to put 5% 10% 6.5% of my monthly salary to a so-called “Give” account.

So if anyone or any organization needs to raise money for charity or educational purposes and such, feel free to drop me an email to hht[at]xmail[dot]com specifying your needs and money requests.

I will respond to every reasonable and legitimate request, giving at most half of the current account balance per request. Although it’s apparently not a lot of money, I hope it will help somebody in need.

A list of my donations:

* Haiyan Typhoon Donations – What a terrible catastrophe for Philippines & Vietnam!

* It may not succeed in raising the required funds but it does change a lot of things. As I said, if I’m lucky enough to meet someone like that, I would ask her to marry me tomorrow!

* Small Donation to Stephen for his awesome website

* I’ve recently made a donation of US $100 as a sincere thanks to Steve Pavlina for his awesome book & articles. I’ve learned & benefited a lot from your works. Thank you once again!

* SGP $150 2013 CYN

* SGP $68 jp farewell

* Lots of small donations to various Singapore charities raised by local students. I love that!

You must have breakfast!

I’ve seen lots of people skipping breakfast. Of course, they’ve got enough reasonable excuses. “Gotta go to work early, waking up late, too rushed to prepare breakfast” just to name a few. But guys, breakfast is the most important meal of the day. So don’t ever ever skip it.

8 Health Reasons You Should Never Skip Breakfast

My Dream Girl

I think I’ve loved and experienced enough to basically know what I am looking for from a girl. Having said that, I don’t wish to find an exactly same girl nor expect any girls to be this ideal. It’s just a clumsy and ugly drawing of my dream girl.

Here’s SHE after I turn 25  😈 😛 

Basically she is the ONE who turns me ON physically and especially “educationally!”

#1. She’s physically & “educationally” ATTRACTIVE! <3

# So far while I’ve dated some “hot girls”, “Miss Uni” and “dream girls” of many guys, I’ve also dated some very (or below) average-looking girls and felt pretty content. So I’m probably not so picky in terms of look though I believe I deserve an attractive one! 😀 😀 (Looking at my idols, who have a very beautiful & intelligent wife, I ask myself “Why can’t I?) Anyways, she should be presentable & knows how to dress up & be sexy at the very least! 😛

## Many girls find me hard to understand (but interesting) as I always "makes me think!" It’s not that I pretend to be mysterious and hard to understand (I do sometimes to be honest) but rather than I and they have different ways of communicating & understanding things. To put it in a different way, “we’re not quite in the same level (of education, mindset, etc..)” as in the words of a “really tall & hot female friend” of mine. I generally find girls who can more or less read my mind & understand my jokes attractive!

In short, I like those who UNDERSTAND & SUPPORT me, and at the same time, can CHALLENGE me to move forward. Nice & too submissive girls are not attractive either.

#2. She is OPEN-MINDED!

In other words, she is willing to LISTEN (to new ideas, opinions, etc.) and CHANGE! Some Many people (both girls and guys) simple don’t(!!!) even if they claim they do! That’s probably the foundation of everything I want from her in our world. If she’s open-minded,

• she will be willing to try new (“weird”) things;
• she will happily accept our differences and changes;
• she is (or will be) a free thinker;
• she is a B/I! (vs E/S – don’t know what these words stand for? Please read Rich Dad Poor Dad!)
• she will READ…

#3. She shares some basic interests, hobbies & MISSIONS!

Sports (football), intimacy and traveling are all essential parts of my life. So are HERS hopefully! More importantly, she’s PASSIONATE about what she does and loves!

She also knows that we’re here not only to enjoy what life can offer us but also to make it a BETTER place!

—-

the “OLD” HER

Alright, here is She whose characteristics are described in no particular order:

She

… is tall and physically attractive

… makes tasty & yummy family meals

.. smiles (bashfully)

… appreciates what she’s having

… forgives and forgets her old wounds

… is – a free thinker – mentally free from any taboos.

… accepts a tattoo name of the girl who has made a life-turn impact on me together with her name in my body. JK. haha.

.. plays (- treats her work as play)

… loves doing unconventional things & enjoys breaking rules together

… is hard on herself and selective about whom she lets in

… enjoys watching a full, long and “boring” football match together

… doesn’t care what movie we’re watching as long as we’re touching

… likes to wear skirt – short skirt? awesome :xxxxxxxx 😀

… is willing to remove the word “impossible” out of her vocabulary

.. hugs (from the front, tightly)

… likes walking under the rain hand in hand

… bares her soul when making love

… likes dark, candlelight & love songs atmosphere

… appreciates my sincere reminders that she’s beautiful and that I love her

… loves pausing to kiss – suddenly, slowly & passionately

… stays just beside me when I need her most without me saying anything

.. laughs (out loud)

21 😡

… writes, reads & listens

… loves traveling & exploring the world

24 😛

I will keep updating it until I settle down. (Last updated on Nov 17, 2012 Oct 25, 2015)