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Hardware:

Shaker (preferably metal, although plastic will work too)

Large Martini Glass

Refrigerator (seems obvious, I know, but it's important)

Olive Spear

Software:

6 oz Gin or Vodka

A splash of Dry Vermouth

Olives (1 to 3 is traditional) or Lemon Peel

Ice (cubes will work, crushed is better)

Ahead of Time:

Start by refrigerating your vermouth for the amount of time it takes for the bottle to get cold (at least an hour). I'll explain why in a bit. Chill a Martini glass in the refrigerator or the freezer for about 10 minutes. You can go for less time, but I like my Martinis at the lowest possible temperature.

The Mixing:

Take the glass out of the fridge/freezer and pour a small amount of Vermouth into it. Here's the important bit: swirl the vermouth in the glass so that the sides of the glass are coated. DISCARD THE REMAINING VERMOUTH. Spear an olive or two, and put it in the glass. Pour your gin or vodka (gin is better) into a shaker over copious amounts of ice. Shake the living crap out of it. Seriously, shake it like a revival preacher shaking the devil out of a sinner. Strain into the glass, and you're good to go.

Technically you're supposed to eat the olives first, but I won't tell if you don't.

Some Explanation

The reason for refrigerating your vermouth is so that you don't warm your glass when you swirl with it. I know it seems like a waste of good alcohol to toss the vermouth remaining in the glass, but trust me, it makes the end result so much better, that it's well worth it. I suppose you could save it, since it's barely even touched the glass, but that just sounds strange to me.

Also, the reason crushed ice is better than cubes is that the surface are of the crushed ice is significantly greater than that of the cubes (like a heatsink in reverse). Greater surface area equals greater cooling power.

Variation

Now, having said all that, my person favorite variation is to replace the olives with a lemon twist. Take a small twist of lemon rind, rub it around the edge of the glass, throw it in, and pour the gin over that.

Brands

Not to start a flame war, but here are my favorite brands of spirits for use in martinis. I prefer Beefeater gin to all others. As for vodka, Skyy is my personal favorite, as I find Absolut has too much bite for my taste. Haven't gotten around to buying/trying Grey Goose (although I hear it's excellent). I use Martini & Rossi Dry Vermouth.

How do I get PHP5 to work?




Shared and reseller servers, have both PHP4 and PHP5 preinstalled for the client.

Dedicated servers require consultation with the client, before a specific installation is chosen.



By default, PHP4 will handle all PHP requests, except files with the (.php5) extension.



You can utilize PHP5 by...





1. Renaming all of your files and links so they use the (.php5) extension.
   
   
2. Making a change to, or creating a (.htaccess) file, with this line of code below, added to the file.
   
   



 AddHandler application/x-httpd-php5 .php .php5 .php4 .php3 .phtml 




It may just be a different way to achieve the same goal, but this is what I used on another host:

AddType application/x-httpd-php5 .php




NOTE: Some programs and code written for php 4, will not work with php 5. This is why they created version extensions. Many older scripts, still use the code translations, as they have two versions (file.php4 and file.php5), of the code. I recall three items in the Fantastico console, that will not function with php 5. (And I assume that this is the reason we still have php 4 on these servers. If you just told all your code to be processed by php5... and php4 is running... which one is processing your code? Which programs will still run? None, if they were coded for php4. The codes are not backwards compatible. Php 4 code will crash Php 5, and Php 5 code will crash Php 4.)

Configure the Driver



• Note Method 2 Users: Before you carry out this step you must reboot your machine. Or else the fglrx driver will not be in use on xorg.conf and using the aticonfig options will cause a memory dump and not intialise the Driver properly.
  
• Note: An alternative to the aticonfig --initial command is to edit /etc/X11/xorg.conf and replace the string "ati" with "fglrx" in the "Device" section. This way you won't lose your old "Screen" and "Monitor" settings. Afterwards you can use aticonfig for setting overlay etc. Another alternative is aticonfig --initial --force if you encounter issues with the first command.
  
• Note: Alternative in the overlay-type to "Xv" can be "opengl" or "disable" if the TV-out makes problems in videos.
  



[edit] Alternative: Configure the Driver, The Manual Way:




An alternative to the "sudo aticonfig" commands is to edit "/etc/X11/xorg.conf" and change the "Device" section for the video card as shown below. This way you won't lose your old settings.





gksu gedit /etc/X11/xorg.conf




Section "Device"
	[...]
#       Driver          "vesa"
	Driver		"fglrx"
	Option		"VideoOverlay"		"on"
	Option		"OpenGLOverlay"		"off"
	[...]
EndSection











[edit] TV - Out




The composite TV-Out is not working simultaneously with the VGA on my System. To use it I have turned the VGA off and only the TV on. Attention! This command turns off your Monitor!!





sudo aticonfig --enable-monitor=tv




To change back to VGA:





sudo aticonfig --enable-monitor=crt1




Some have had luck with both mirrored.





sudo aticonfig --force-monitor=crt1
sudo aticonfig --enable-monitor=crt1,tv




reboot after that and it should mirror the CRT1 onto the TV.