1. Freelance computer services, Web technologies.   

   Windows 95 and Windows 98 services;  Java 2 applet programming.
   SQL programming.  MS office software support.  Device & PC repair.
   Cable running.  Hard disk & file system maintenance.  Web technology.
   Pentium PCs, laptops, network rewiring.  Tech support:  in person, 
   by email, & by telephone.  Email systems.  Consultation on 
   PC equipment procurement.  Computer virus detection, system cleaning.
   JavaScript apps & encrypted certificates.     

          Standard rate for computer services:  $ 35 per hour - plus, if a hardware repair is contracted for, the sales & shipping cost of parts as needed and agreed to - as of July 31, 2001. (Superseding 9/01/00 rate of $30.00/hr.)  
                                                                  [ Subject to limitations.  Exact fee charged subject to negotiation, as appropriate for equipment serviced and other circumstances.  Some services cheaper, e.g. small electronics. 
                                                                     All advanced programming (e.g. Java, Perl, SQL) starts at $ 42 per hour, as of November 1, 2001.
          - Inquiries on rates/terms welcome! (-Tech support questions will be charged for!)  by email to hess1@bigfoot.com          Please note that all price quotes are good for only up to 3 months after the estimate of   
                                                                     rate is communicated to the customer.  Prices as stated here are subject to change without advance notice. ]

Gross business income per quarter

for the freelance consultantcy of Russell Hess
in the previous 12 months, as of October 2001.

Note: the Second quarter of 2001 was of low yield:  Some income was pending completion,
and there was a shortfall of business.  Graph shows overall tendency to growth, otherwise.

- Projection for the next quarter (October 1 to December 31):
at minimum, about 80% of last (July 1 - September 30);  may turn out to be > 110 %, or more.

- Correct, in retrospect:   earnings for the fourth quarter (vs. the third) are 90.8 %.   It wasn't easy to reach that figure, the business climate being what it has been.

( - Please note:    I operate on (& have) low or zero debt - unlike many firms through the '90s.   So, the figures I graph here are significant in the manner of their appearance. )

• An online freely available sample portion ( - the As, out of A-to-Z - ) of the Short Guide to Douglas Adams' "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" series.  Original. Found only here. To look things up in or just browse through.
• My 'HitchHiker's Guide' page.
• The SF Surrealism page;  Out-of-these-worlds comedy, satire, whimsy, spoofs: ( "What, no awesome pictures?" - No, no pictures yet. )
  • Episode #2 of 'Start Truck'.
  • 'Discovery, No Longer Terrible' (-the sequel and ending to 'Battleship Discovery The Terrible'.)
  • 'Really Brilliant Reviews of the movie 2001'.
• Great Endings from Science Fiction.
• New in January 2002: The Foundation Trilogy as satire - Isaac Asimov's still-distinguished original Foundation novels (the ones written after 1980 do NOT count!) contain a wealth of character sketches of politically satiric intent...
• New:  Dan Simmons' Hyperion quadrilogy of novels - an appreciative summary of its appeal; comprises 'Hyperion', 'The Fall of Hyperion', 'Endymion', & 'The Rise Of Endymion'.
• Lovecraftiana? The Ancestry of Cthulhu Mythos gibberish, a rummage sale from primeval pre-Lovecraft eras, of possible precedents for H.P. Lovecraft's bizarre & uncanny use of nonsense syllables.
  
  
•    - Reviews, of Science Fiction books and videos:
  • 'Komarr', by Lois McMaster Bujold.
  • 'A Civil Campaign',  A Comedy of Biology and Manners', by Lois McMaster Bujold.
  • 'Darwinia', by Robert Charles Wilson.
  • 'Bios', by Robert Charles Wilson.
  • 'Nebula Awards Showcase 2000'   (edited by Gregory Benford).
  • New:  'Cold Allies', by Patricia Anthony.
  • New:   "At the screening of 'Forbidden Planet' on the Washington D.C. National Mall" - an extensive movie review.
  • B movies, laughably bad stuff:
    •   "The 12 typical flaws of Bad B-movies", with examples.
    • New in July 2001:  'MST3K Presents "Mitchell"'.

      - Serious...
• A poem series in ~58 parts. Index / aesthetics / announcement.
• Faust's death, from Goethe's drama:  the original,  & an English / "Americanish" translation.
•  Angel Choir over the dead Faust's soul, with my English translation.
•  "Greatness is more than a choice", poem in three parts.
•  ( Short poem, no title)
• New:  "Changing The Moon", poem of September 22, 2001.
• New:  "The Rhetorical Question", rhythmic verses written September 23, 2001.

      - Very un-serious...
• 'The Fate of the Glorious Devil', with an elegiac addition.
• The Snorer.   - after Edgar Allan Poe, with apologies.

      - Essays on the subject...
• An essay: How many different possible poems are there?
• Edgar Allan Poe's 'Lenore' - the meaning, in my interpretation, of a bitter passage from the poem.

      - Excerpts from the masters...
• Some dramatic wisdom from Robert Browning.
• A favorite from William Butler Yeats' beloved works.
• ...a study-by-subject of Yeats' poems, subject: the moon.  (Two web pages.)  
• Translation of Heinrich Heine's Die Herbstwind;   my English, from the original German.

      - Java...
• New, September 2001:  'Materia': generates manual info on a given Java Class, by the mechanism of 'self-reflection' using java.reflect; useful if your manual is unavailable or outdated.   Download as a ZIP archive, or as all the other individual files (which are all necessary), and place the files in the same directory, with java.exe and javac.exe in the PATH. [Note: This utility is for Windows/DOS, not UNIX or LINUX.] When run with correct parameters, will generate and open a text file with complete information on the Constructors, Fields, and Methods of the Java Class specified.
  

      - JavaScript...
• New:  'XBMgraphics' - a JavaScript sketch program using the old X-bitmap format ( now universally implemented, but not in MS Explorer < 5, which may not render your work but will generate the graphic file code properly - Navigator > 3 renders this format A-OK ).    Create your own thumbnails right here! (in monochrome) 100% free, see page code for freeware / shareware terms.
  - Also New:  'XBMgraphics in 16 x 16 pixel format demo/freeware/shareware.
  
• 'Stopwatch Online'
  
• UpSky Window Manager - for high-powered web surfing / multiaccess.
  
• What JavaScript version do you have? Find what JavaScript version is running (if enabled) on your browser.
• A JavaScript backward-compatibility patch method for the 'do' function, which was first found in JavaScript version 1.2 . . .

      - HTML, Web Design...
• Past versions & revisions of websites I've built:
  • The "Original UpSky" of 2/12/98, shortly after I began building it.
  • The UpSky2 of 8/26/98.
  • The UpSky2 of 11/18/98.
  • The UpSky2 of 4/27/99.

Astronomer Royal data list (biographical sketches & info summary), in honor of the Royal Greenwich Observatory's closing on Oct. 31 1998 ...R.I.P.	Tsiolkovsky's epitaph.
Sky View Wunderground.com	'A critic of the Constitution of the United States' - an essay on Constitutionalism, privacy, rights, and maybe more). - UpSky's Astronomer Royals page got listed at OpenHere in the category Professional - Astronomy - History. (March 23 2000.)

• JavaScript Online Scientific Calculator.
  
• Statistics about bicycling uniforms and helmets.

• Chestnuts: the chestnut tree, microwave cooking them, a new look at their eating-quality, and a needed improvement in their storage and marketing, et cetera.
  
• A recipe that won't save the world in this new millennium: Caesar's Beans Squared.

X. All the rest;   Miscellanea:

• New, September 2001:  A proposed means of preventing further occurrence of disasters caused by deliberately crashed hijacked airplanes, as happened on Tuesday September 11 2001 - otherwise known as 'Terror Tuesday'.
• Music by composers influenced by 20th-Century Fasicsm. (-in RealAudio and WAV)
• More Great Endings
• Many I.Q. tests and quizzes
• Speculation on 'Negative Intelligence Quotient' and proposal for a new sort of IQ test
• Ingenious Gentleman's Sayings.
• A place to find odd or weird pages, which has listed 'UpSky'.
•  About the Zapruder film of President Kennedy's assassination... New Oct 13, 2000. -completed Aug 2001.

Tell the Webmaster! ...not your life history, but all suggestions and comments are welcome.  Email link to <hess1@bigfoot.com>.
( . . . you are guaranteed not to be put on a mailing list nor subjected to email ads - except my signature block of course. )

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This website's twin: 9 of the above categories with different content, at 'UpSky'.

(In case you wonder, "What happened to 5 (or 6, 7, 8) ?" - - see F.A.Q.)
               ( "Initial italics:    Why?" )

UpSky2 being updated... January 2, 2002 ... also November 2 & 25, October 14 & 18 & 23, September 19 & 27, August 4 & ~ 15 & 21, July 24 & 30 2001.   ( - Frequently updated also, in 2000, and in 1999.)


Since August 1998, UpSky2 has had visitors.
FastCounter by LinkExchange

(local counter, in development, May 1 2000.)

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Awards:

The Knowledge Is Power Award, for 'UpSky', May 1999.

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                  'Icarus', down to earth - Less exalted and more negative :    Life patience and fools! Beating dead horses! Ineptitude verse! A cure for hair problems...! ...and more! (Updated, November 2001.)

Block Sender List Club at UpSky2.

   - You too can
FIGHT SPAMateurs* !!

A Nightmare Scenario

The logical end result of the current Spam junk-e-mail scene, is email services resembling current systems for transmitting secure data:      To send to someone will require not only the right email address [ analogous to a 'public key' ], but also the correct Subject line code [ as a 'private key' analogue ].
...Email systems would be, in this nightmare scenario, designed to filter out all email with subject lines not equal to ( for instance ) "iD:Qs0196s24QQz3". (...more about this possible future...)

     [ . . .Watch this space, more to come soon . . . Links to be activated:

Maxims against spam      Spam hater's glossary

Block Sender List, category 1 - ground for inclusion

A definition of what exactly constitutes true spam of the most offensive varieties encountered. ]


* ( - a "Spamateur" is what you get when you cross a spammer with something amateurish - not pretty. )

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