Hello and Welcome. My name is Jess Mann, and this is my site.
It should be pretty evident that this site isn't yet finished. Browse around to get a feel for who I am, and help yourself to the files on the download page. However, don't be alarmed if content is lacking here or there or a link is broken. I know. You're not even supposed to be here yet.|
Currently in testing mode HomeI am a developer and system administrator; I work professionally in both fields, and do various technical contracting work on the side. This page has one, clear, purpose: This website is devoted to my professional life, and is mostly aimed at addressing questions of professional contacts. You can think of this webpage as sort of an interactive resume. Above this text, you will see 6 tabs, all either describing a different area of my life, or providing tools with which you can better acclimate yourself with my interests and skills.
 Please feel free to browse around. If there is something that you would like to discuss profesionally with me, I'm doing contracting work and personal projects nearly all the time, and would be happy to hear from you. Send me an email over on the contact page, and I'll get back to you as soon as possible!  AboutStarting in early 2007, I began freelancing professionally as a computer programmer and system administrator. The experience I had during this time was extraordinary, and allowed me to greatly expand my skills in the IT industry through working on a variety of vastly different projects. After leaving MediaWhiz in January of 2008, I was offered a one-month project for $25,000, which encouraged me to begin freelancing full-time. I started Ellyria Creative a few months later, and have had a great deal of success since. In my personal life, I am constantly looking for ways to improve myself, and to do something meaningful; I plan to volunteer with the Peace Corps in 4 years, and I have begun volunteering for BBBS and Habitat for Humanity in my spare time. My ultimate goal is to bring this personal passion of mine to a professional level, by finding a way to work for a company whose mission I very strongly believe in. Twitter UpdatesProjectsVarious projects I've worked on.
Significant or Long Term Projects
Small or Short Term Projects
Skills
DownloadsHere is a list of applications and scripts I have to offer for download. These are released to the public domain unless otherwise
noted. Browse down to the bottom of the page for sorting options.
Telnet Chatroom (Java) This application is an example of a telnet chatroom. It was written with the intention of teaching Java to a young C programmer, so it is commented beyond thoroughly. However, it is both functional and stable. The application is broken up into two classes: The server class, which handles all server responsibility, and the Descriptor class, which handles the I|O of a user, and stores the entirety of that user's information. The package is zipped up, containing only those two class files. SoftHashMap (Java) This is a SoftHashMap implementation. Essentially, it is an implementation of a HashMap using Soft references. By doing so, elements in the hashmap will automatically be collected by the garbage collector when necessary, so long as they aren''t being references elsewhere in the application. This implementation was introduced to me by a kind Java ''expert'' when I was just getting used to the intricacies of Java, and since then, I have adapted it in various ways to suit my needs. In return for his kindsness, I'm providing it here for others to make use of. This download is only the .java class. Server Stats (Python) Foremost, this script should be considered unfinished. It is lacking comments, and I haven't done tests on it since months before providing it here. I am providing it only in the hopes that it would be useful to someone to use as a reference (similar to pseudo-code). It was working well the last time it was tested, but I can make NO guarantee that such is still the case. This mini-application is intended to act as a server, which (upon request) queries the host for load information, weights that information, and returns a result (as a percentage). Primarily, it queries the "server-statistics" page (available from apache), and makes use of the php statistics listed there. It would be useful, in that respect, in combination with load balancing hardware, where the LB would query this application for load information, and direct requests to the least loaded server. To use this software, you will have to change the authentication information (for the server-statistics page) in the CP_Configuration.py file, and the name of the server to query information about. Then, you will need to create a custom filter for those statistics. You can either modify the basic "Filter" class, or you can extend it by creating a subclass which implements the function defined as: "def createFilterList(self)". You may use the class CP_Filter (located in Filter.py) as an example of how to do this. These files are sharded rather substantially (there are 7 files in total). To start it up, run the CP_Serveragent.py file. Again, this should be considered pseudo-code ONLY! Send SMS Via PHP (PHP) This php script can be plugged into any php-enabled website, and used to send sms alerts to any cell phone (regardless of carrier). It uses tm4b.com as an SMS gateway, so the only requirement is for the site owner to register there, and add a minimal amount of funds to their account (it's only a couple cents per message, I believe). The script draws from their implementation suggestions, but also combines a number of methods to allow the functionality to be used regardless of what extensions are loaded into php. It will first try to make the request via curl, then via sockets, and then via a plain http request. On error, it sends an email to a specified email address. This download is the php file only. JS Distance Script (Javascript) This script determines the distance between two addresses. It is intended for use in a shipping calculator, whereby the distance between the addresses could be calculated to weight the calculation. To perform, it determines route information from google maps (and so requires a google maps API key), then it determines the distance, weights it based on the parameters supplied, and returns the result. There is probably a faster way to do this than loading a map from google, but it is sufficient for the purpose it was intended. (It usually takes between 1 and 2 seconds). This download includes the distance.js file only. check_queue (Python) This script is intended for use with nagios for checking the state/stability of a server. It takes a variety of command-line arguments, with which it connects to a local or remote MySQL db to check the state of a given table. Currently, a check on the number of rows is performed, but the framework is in place to allow for duplicate entry and invalid data checks as well. Its primary purpose should be obvious: To check that a queue table hasn't exceeded a given size, and if so, report on why that is so. It is written in python, and requires the MySQLdb and optparse libraries. Change Every User's Password (Bash) This is a very short shell script which changes every user's password via the 'mkpasswd' *nix command. It generates a list of system users from the /etc/passwd file, not including users who aren't able to login, and not including root, and then proceeds to change the password for each user. Those passwords are then stored in a passwords.txt file. For security purposes, make sure to delete the file and the script after use, or chmod both to 700 with user/group of root. adjust_screen (Javascript) This script provides the ability to adjust the min-height and min-width of any element or group of elements based on the client's screen size. The initial problem was that, under w3c's XHTML 1.1 dtd, rendering in firefox, after the main content div was resized via javascript, the body of the page (Defined as a height of 100%) was resized down with it. Unfortunately, hardcoding a min-height into the body tag would have created needless scrolling for users with smaller screens (or been insufficient, resulting again in blank white space below the end of the body after being resized). So, this script was created to add a min-height attribute to the body tag according to the user's screen size. Note: The bottom of the script contains a window onload modifier, which automatically modifies all elements of the class "resizeHeight" and "resizeWidth" by the screen height and width, respectively. This download contains a single javascript file. Address|Phone|Email Regex (PHP) This download contains three regular expressions, packaged as php functions. They match against a US mailing address, phone number, or email address, respectively. While this could be used for data mining (please don't), they're also out there in other forms... so this should not contribute to the field. (Please!). Mostly, it's a demonstration of my regex capabilities, and to be used for form validation. Browse by Category
ContactYou may use this form to contact me, or send an email to the address listed to the right. Contact UsDue to abuse, please manually send an email via the email address to the right.
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