Welcome to my Gateway

Unicode Text Formatter1

What’s that site running? / Netcraft2

Phone Number Parser Demo for LibPhoneNumber3

The trusted source for IP address data, leading IP data provider - IPinfo.io4

URL Expander — Unshorten Any Short URL To A Long URL5

GitHub Status6

Expand/Collapse: Stellar Explosion Visible Until September 2024

Stellar Explosion

A conceptual image of how to find Hercules and his mighty globular clusters in the sky created using a planetarium software. Look up after sunset during summer months to find Hercules! Scan between Vega and Arcturus, near the distinct pattern of Corona Borealis. Once you find its stars, use binoculars or a telescope to hunt down the globular clusters M13 and M92. If you enjoy your views of these globular clusters, you’re in luck – look for another great globular, M3, in the nearby constellation of Boötes. Credit: NASA

A conceptual image of how to find Hercules and his mighty globular clusters in the sky created using a planetarium software. Look up after sunset during summer months to find Hercules! Scan between Vega and Arcturus, near the distinct pattern of Corona Borealis. Once you find its stars, use binoculars or a telescope to hunt down the globular clusters M13 and M92. If you enjoy your views of these globular clusters, you’re in luck – look for another great globular, M3, in the nearby constellation of Boötes.
Credit: NASA

Stellar Explosion Visibility Location
• A Giant Explosion in Space Will Happen This Year, And You Can See It : ScienceAlert (08 April 2024)
• Astrophysicist explains science behind once-in-a-lifetime nova outburst that will light up the sky this year (MARCH 19, 2024)
• Once-in-a-Lifetime Viewing Opportunity: Nova Explosion, ‘New’ Star in Northern Crown (FEBRUARY 28, 2024)
• NASA — View Nova Explosion, ‘New’ Star in Northern Crown – Watch the Skies (February 27, 2024)		 2024-03-16 (now) — 2024-09 (September)  
Corona Borealis constellation, lying in a semicircular pattern between the Bootes and Hercules constellations    
Star explosion in the Corona Borealis constellation

This event, set to occur this year, will see T CrB lighting up the Corona Borealis constellation, shining as brightly as the famed North Star, Polaris, for approximately one week.

The exact timing of this stellar spectacle remains uncertain, with NASA forecasting its occurrence sometime between now and September. T CrB is nestled within the Corona Borealis constellation, lying in a semicircular pattern between the Bootes and Hercules constellations.		    


Briefly About Me | [ Details About Me ]

Follow me on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/comm/mynetwork/discovery-see-all?usecase=PEOPLE_FOLLOWS&followMember=ralphhightower

Personality Tests

Test/Website Result
Top Gun Call Sign Lt. Ralph ‘Tahoe’ Hightower7
Myers-Briggs Personality Test® INTP8
CliftonStrength 34™ Ideation | Deliberative | Learner | Input | Strategic
Leaders with great Strategic Thinking strengths are the ones who keep us all focused on what could be. They are constantly absorbing and analyzing information and helping the team make better decisions. People with strength in this domain continually stretch our thinking for the future.
Game of Thrones Personality Test9 Primary Character: Mance Rayder10
Secondary Character: Ser Jaime Lannister11
Tertiary Character: Ygritte12

I freeze time; I photograph. I have 50++ years of computer programming and software development; most recently using C# and .Net. Athough I am retired from software development as a vocation, I am still active for personal projects. I have witnessed two final space flights: the US half of the Apollo/Soyuz Test Project, and Space Shuttle STS-135 Atlantis with the Final Four [CDR Chris Ferguson, PLT Doug Hurley, MS1 Sandra Magnus, MS2 Rex Walheim], as well as the final landing next to the control tower of the Shuttle Landing Facility (200 yards from the runway).

Photography is another creative endeavor that I have enjoyed since 1980. My first camera was the Canon A-1 which was an innovative camera for the 80’s, which I still use. I added one of my bucket list cameras in July 2013, a Canon New F-1 with the AE Finder FN and the AE Motor Drive FN. December 2013, I added a DSLR, the Canon 5D Mark III with the EF 24-105mm f4L. I enjoy photography period. It doesn’t matter if I am shooting film or digital.

Where I Can Be Found

Content Website
CodeProject RalphHightower
Facebook RalphHightower (I spend more time on LinkedIn than I do on Facebook.)
GitHub RalphHightower (Ralph Hightower)
GitLab RalphHightower
GitLab Permanent Vacations
Google Dev RalphHightower
Gravatar RalphHightower
Hackster.io ralph-hightower
IEEE Collabratec RalphHightower
LinkedIn Profile RalphHightower (LinkedIn is where I spend the majority of my time.)
Photography Portfolio (Flickr) RalphHightower
Stack Overflow ralph-hightower
Twitter RalphHightower13
YouTube RalphHightower

Authored Websites

RalphHightower Description
Ralph Hightower/Blog My personal blog; currently anti-Trump. Hopefully, “The Apprentice: White House” won’t get renewed.
RalphHightower GitHub Repositories Primary Website
Azure-Resources Useful Documents for Azure
GM-Canada-OnStar-2G-Sunset Canada sunsetted cellular CDMA 2G technology in 2015. GM Canada figured out how to retain OnStar functionality in affected vehicles without using a dongle like GM USA. Documents from NHTSA (US) nhtsa.gov.
JekyllTestBed Test Bed for Experimentation with Jekyll.
Sushi A place for sushi recipes and checklists for checking off menu items.
NANPATelephoneFormatDetection North American Numbering Plan
SpaceShuttleMissionSchedule14 NASA Space Shuttle Mission Schedule Transfer to Outlook Calendar
RalphHightower/minimaUSCGamecockSandstorm USC Gamecock Sandstorm theme derived from jekyll / minimaa, a one-size-fits-all Jekyll theme for USC Gamecock writers. [Production Ready]

USC Gamecocks

USC — University of South Carolina
USC — College of Engineering and Computing
USC Alumni Association
USC Gamecock Sports
WUSC-FM 90.5 FM15
Carolina Band
University Band
Jazz Bands

NOAA / NWS Space Weather Prediction Center

Malfunction Junction Revamp16

South Carolina Electric Cooperatives Outages Map

 
Ralph Hightower Repository’s Stats
GitHub Streak
RalphHightower's GitHub activity graph
   
 

  1. Handy website to convert plain text for display in Italics, Bold, and Bold Italics ↩

  2. Very useful tool to get information on websites. I use this for gathering information on websites that SPAM me.
    • GoDaddy has a strict policy that prohibits domain names registered with them from sending SPAM. Report domains registered with GoDaddy.
    • Shopify also has a strict policy prohibiting by websites that they host. Report an Issue with a Merchant hosted by Shopify. ↩

  3. google/libphonenumber: Google’s common Java, C++ and JavaScript library for parsing, formatting, and validating international phone numbers. ↩

  4. Geolocate IP Addresses and ownership. ↩

  5. Status Check of GitHub ↩

  6. Get the expanded URL of any shortened URL without clicking on the link. ↩

  7. I’m a Chevy guy and Tahoe is a model name. I love it! ↩

  8. People with INTP preferences are quiet, thoughtful, and analytical. They tend to put a great deal of consideration into everything they do. INTPs are generally easygoing and genuine. They might seem to “zone out” from time to time while they consider new concepts or explore how something works. They are often happiest laying low and working hard behind the scenes. While they may seem impersonal with people they don’t know well, they like to have a close group of people they open up to. They are naturally adept at building structural models or coming up with new concepts for solving problems. They tend to see the world as a system that can be analyzed, and this is how they approach just about everything in life.
    • 4.8% of the population • 5.8% of men • 4.0% of women •
    × analytical × conceptual × logical ×
    × quiet × independent × easygoing ×
    × complex × driven × curious ×
    × questioning × methodical × values competence ×
    × self-critical × thoughtful × innovative ×
    × problem solver × reflective × autonomous × ↩

  9. I had to Google the GOT Personality Test. Oh, I don’t subscribe to HBO, so all I know of Game of Thrones is that’s it’s sorta like King Arthur set in medieval times.
    I took the GOT Personality Test. I saw that reference in a LinkedIn news article about using personality tests to get the right balance of different personalities. I think using a personality test to determine employment is a form of discrimination and I use that rather strictly because there’s race discrimination and gender discrimination. ↩

  10. Primary Character: Mance Rayder
    Nickname: King Beyond the Wall
    Traits: Inspiring, Formidable, Pioneer
    Your primary character is Mance Rayder. You are a charismatic, calm, and determined man with strong leadership qualities. You tend to rise quickly through the ranks of any organization you enter. You have good social and diplomatic skills, allowing you to collaborate with many different types of people. You have an honest yet stern persona which earns you respect and admiration of those around you. You are very trusting which can be your greatest weakness. You value freedom above all else. ↩

  11. Secondary Character: Ser Jaime Lannister
    Nickname: The Kingslayer
    Traits: Arrogant, Sarcastic, Apathetic
    Your secondary character is Ser Jaime Lannister. You are charming and capable of impeccable politeness in the right circumstances. In the wrong circumstances, others perceive you to be disdainful, sarcastic and arrogant. However your arrogance may just be confidence, as you excel in a number of areas, including intelligence. You don’t mock others over minor failings but you are usually very blunt. You typically just say what you are thinking without regard to the feelings of those that you perceive as incompetent. You regard ruthlessness as a virtue and behave in an unapologetically amoral way. You’re not politically ambitious and sly maneuvering is not your way. ↩

  12. Tertiary Character: Ygritte
    Nickname: Ygritte
    Traits: Wild, Uncoventional, Determined
    Your tertiary character is Ygritte. You are brave and unconventional. You have a mind of your own and prefer not to conform with the demands of societu’re cunning and value freedom above all else. You’re loyal, but also very passionate and you follow to your heart much more than your head. You live a very fulfilled life, chasing your dreams but this sometimes causes others to mistrust you although you have little enmity in your heart. ↩

  13. As of April 27, 2023, I deactivated my Twitter account based on this Elon Musk tweet:
    @ElonMusk: Anyone making materially false statements on this platform will get Community Noted, including you, me, Tucker, advertisers, head of state, etc. No exceptions.
    Convince the people and let the chips fall where they may.
    @RalphHightower: Seriously? Yet you welcomed back a pathological liar, Donald Trump, who incited and welcomed violence in an attempted coup d’état on January 6 in the storming of the U.S. Capitol. Twitter has gone to HELL! ↩

  14. Support ended with wheelstop of Space Shuttle Atlantis on July 21, 2011 with the end of the Space Shuttle fleet. ↩

  15. WUSC-FM was an AM Radio 📻 broadcast station when I was a student. ↩

  16. South Carolina Department of Transportation DOT prefers that this massive revamp project to minimize the wrecks and traffic jams at the junctions of I-26, I-20, and I-126 be called “Carolina Crossroads”. ↩

  • 2024-09-12 12:46:35 PM

    Trump Really Wants to be Dictator

    Why Trump’s comments about ABC’s broadcast license matter

    The problem isn’t just that Donald Trump threatened a network’s broadcast license. The problem is that he keeps threatening networks’ broadcast licenses.
    Sept. 12, 2024, 9:28 AM EDT
    By Steve Benen [^11]: Kim Jong Un letters with Trump: A window into the leaders’ ‘special friendship’ / CNN Politics. By Jamie Gangel and Jeremy Herb, CNN.Updated 6:48 PM EDT, Wed September 9, 2020

  • 2024-09-11 11:27:00 PM

    The Debate: Prosecutorial Logic Versus Toddler Gibberish

    The Debate: Prosecutorial Logic versus Toddler Gibberish1

    1. My mother taught high school English and she instilled the proper use of English and grammar. As such, I cannot listen to Donald Trump speak and mangle words and grammar. It is like listening to fingernails screech across a blackboard. ↩

  • 2024-09-11 01:14:15 PM

    9/11/2001 Remembered

    I remember the day well. I was listening to the radio when I heard the DJ announce that a plane had crashed into one of the World Trade Centers; initially, they thought that it was a small airplane. I turned on the TV to watch the second passenger jet purposefully fly into the second World Trade Center. I said to myself, “al-Qaeda.” This wasn’t the first time that they attacked America.

  • 2024-09-11 12:00:00 AM

    Prosecutorial Logic versus Toddler Gibberish

    The Debate: Prosecutorial Logic versus Toddler Gibberish1

    1. My mother taught high school English and she instilled the proper use of English and grammar. As such, I cannot listen to Donald Trump speak and mangle words and grammar. It is like listening to fingernails screech across a blackboard. ↩

  • 2024-09-08 01:14:15 PM

    America Don't Need No Skinking Oligarch

    Donald Trump Could Turn Elon Musk into an American Oligarch

  • 2023-09-12 01:14:15 PM

    Watching the Debate

    Watching the Debate — Differences in Facial Expressions

  • 2009-12-24 12:58:00 AM

    Donald Trump is a Fucking Idiot

    Reason for Starting a Blog

    I initially started out putting my opinions of Trump on this page, Opinions/Donald Trump Is a Fucking Idiot / Ralph Hightower.

    But it has become too unwieldy to keep it updated, so I switched to the blogging format.

    I was an independent voter, but watching The Apprentice: White House unfold in what was then known as the Republican Primary.

    Both political parties fucked up in 2016.

    • The Democrats chose Hillary because it was “her turn”.
    • Whereas the Republicans chose the worst of the worst. The Republican Party died in 2016. It is now the Trump Party, and also his legal defense fund for business, personal, and also government legal problems.

    The Republican Party died in July 2024, when the convention chose the most temperamental, volatile, unfit, and unqualified candidate among the “Dirty Two Dozen”. It is now known as the Trump Party.

    Characteristics of Trump:

    1. Boastful
    2. Bully
    3. Charlatan
    4. Cheater
    5. Con Artist
    6. Conceited
    7. Criminal
    8. Crybaby1
    9. Deceitful
    10. Dictator
    11. Draft Dodger
    12. Egotistical
    13. Fat
    14. Felon
    15. Fraud
    16. Fragile
    17. Gaslighter
    18. Grifter
    19. Huckster
    20. Mean
    21. Megalomaniac
    22. Misogynist
    23. Obese
    24. Pathological Lia
    25. Petty
    26. Philandere
    27. Rotund
    28. Sore Loser
    29. Spoiled Brat
    30. Sore Winner2
    31. “Terrible Twos”
    32. Tax Cheat
    33. Toddler
    34. Unfit
    35. Unqualified
    36. Volatile
    37. Whiner
    38. Zipper Problems3

    The Only Person That Can Change My Assessment of Trump

    The only person that can convince me that Donald Trump is not a fucking idiot is Donald Trump himself.

    How?

    • Tame your temper! Quit throwing Trumper Tantrums!
    • Quit your pathological lying and tell the God-damned truth!
    • Grow up and start treating people with respect. I.e., quit that childish behavior of calling people names.
    • Be a true leader! A true leader recognizes team members, and subordinates for their accomplishment, and accepts the blame when things fail. A true leader does not use intimidation and fear.
    • Accept the fact that the president lives under a microscope. You will be praised by some and condemned others.

    Trump may act “presidential” for five minutes, but it is impossible for him to be an adult.

    Government Ain’t Business

    Government is not a business and should not be run as a business. Government provides services and has laws to manage the smooth functioning of society. Trump has no business experience running a large corporation having executive officers with a board of directors as independent advisors. The Trump Organization is simply a large family-run business, which he runs like a dictatorship.

    Leadership

    Leadership is not intimidation and fear. Trump has absolutely, no fucking clue as to how government works. He thinks that he can run government like his family owned business. Trump thinks that he can just bark orders and people will jump through hoops like a circus poodle and that he can fire and hire federal employees at will.

    A true leader recognizes and praises their team for their successes and accepts blame and responsibility when things fail. Trump claims credit for others’ accomplishment, the “I did that all by myself!”, and blames others for his failures, the “It’s not my fault.”4

    The Apprentice: White House

    As can be seen in the Presidential Rankings Survey - Historians Rank the Top 10 Presidents / C-SPAN Survey on Presidents 2021, section 17 of this page, Trump places dead last among modern day president’s.

    Trump may have been a breath of fresh air, but nothing has changed about Trump. He’s still a bull in a china shop. After four years, Trump still thinks that he can run America like a dictatorship.

    Nepotism and Cronyism

    Trump’s executive office and cabinet was rife with nepotism and cronyism.

    Trump’s daughter, Ivanka Kushner and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, were unqualified to be part of his executive office.

    Cult Worship and Idolatry

    Acolytes and Sycophants

    Senator Lindsey Graham (T-SC) has the attention span of a squirrel. After the attempted insurrection on January 6, 2021, Graham said “That’s it! I’m done with Trump.” He was on NBC’s Meet The Press after the failed assassination of Trump in 2024. He said that he was supposed to play golf with Trump that weekend. Graham is one of Trump’s sycophants. He has he head so far up Trump’s ass that he doesn’t know if it’s night or day.

    Senator Tim Scott (T-SC) – Meet the Press. May 5, 2024 refused to answer a simple ‘yes/no’ answer to the question “Will you accept the election results if Trump loses?”. As one of Trump’s acolytes, Scott is Trump’s “lawn jockey”. He does not have the courage to stand for what’s right.

    Opinion / The Messianic Trump Cult - POLITICO. 08/31/2022 01:46 PM EDT

    Opinion by Jack Shafer

    The One Way History Shows Trump’s Personality Cult Will End - POLITICO. 04/16/2022 07:00 AM EDT

    By MICHAEL KRUSE

    1. Trump whining “It’s not fair!” ↩

    2. The “I got bigger crowds!” falsehood comparing his inaugural crowd to Obama’s. ↩

    3. Bill Clinton has the same problem. He can’t keep his pants fly closed around women. ↩

    4. The Victim Card. Trump plays the victim card when things don’t go his way, or fail. “It’s not my fault. It’s the Democrats fault.” Or someone else’s fault. ↩