FastBreed Technologies, Inc.
Where Things Work Right

Important notes:

We have a new phone number - 727-417-7380. Please use this number instead of any you might have found on web sites that led you to this page. Thank you.

All of the software modules offered on this site are free. When the 30 day demo is up just email us at Support and you'll be given a key that will change the demo version you've downloaded into a production version. Keep in mind that all of these program were written specifically for the iSeries (AS/400), version 4.4 and higher (with the exception of Spool Tracker, which is only available for versions 4.5 and 5.1). If you would like the modules enhanced to better fit the needs of your company then we can provide that service. In that case you would also receive the source code as one of the deliverables for the enhancements.

Webfaced versions of the HelpDesk, FAQ Tracker and other applications will soon be offered for sale through one of our business partners. Details and beta versions of these products can be seen by clicking here .

Custom programming services in the various incarnations of the RPG language are also available from FastBreed Technologies. Click here for more details. We also work with another business partner who specializes in both implementing and modifying several different ERP packages. More information about that company can be found on this link .

A section has been added to this web site containing links to companies that have an AS400, iSeries or i5 computer and post their job openings on the web. This is being provided as a free service to programmers working on these machines who need a new job and would find it beneficial to know where some openings are. If you know of an employer who posts their openings on the web please send an email to Support with the word 'Employer' in the subject line so we can add them to this section.

Contents

Random Thoughts I've Had (Harpoon the drowners, ghost torture, etc...)
Random Thoughts of Others (Keep the lights on, more frosting please, etc...)
Writings (Deeds Do Tell, Thank God for Hell, etc...)
Links to companies that have an AS400, iSeries or i5 and publish their job openings on the web
Software product: Profit Pointer
Software product: Rebate Tracer
Software product: Help Desk System
Software product: FAQ Tracker
Software product: Spool Tracker
Software product: Automatic Source Archive
Miscellaneous: Useful Links
Miscellaneous: Stress Reducing Links
Contact Information

Random Thoughts I've Had

1. Vanity scenes -

              This idea combines the fact that people are willing to pay to get their name in print (vanity publishing) with the fact
              that movie studios are already willing to let companies pay for product placement. To make it work a production
              company or studio would offer a new product - people placement (names) in movies. Some of the details involved
              are listed below.

              1. People would be charged an amount based on how big they wanted their name to appear on the screen. For
                  instance, a name on the list of names an actor looks at on the call box outside of an apartment building would
                  cost just a little, a poster advertising a new perfume in a subway station would cost more, an advertisement for
                  Wally's Wonderful World of Widgets on the side of a bus would cost even more, and at the top of the line you
                  could buy a billboard for Last Chance Larry's Pet Shop and Wholesale Meat Company.

2. The price of these people placements would be high enough to take care of whatever it cost to produce the
actual display plus a reasonable margin.

3. Buyers would be able to pick the genre they want the name to appear in so if a guy was buying it as a gift for
his girlfriend he could make sure her name showed up in a romantic movie and not a horror movie.

              4. Allowances would made for deleted scenes. This could be handled by moving a name that's been used to the
                  bottom of the waiting list and only dropping it off when it actually appears in a movie. If the scene the name was
                  in gets deleted during editing then that name would move back up to the top of the list to make sure it made it to
                  the big screen.

2. Hurricane timeshares -

              Living in hurricane country we've always got to know what we're going to do when a hurricane comes. For a lot
              of people that means run like hell. Seems like sticking around would be a lot easier if you could do it safely. That's
              where this idea comes in. There are several companies in this area who have had the foresight to build their
              headquarters so they were strong enough to easily withstand a category 4 hurricane. They could make some extra
              money out of that fact by offering hurricane timeshares. The way it would work is simple - you agree to pay a 10-20
              monthly membership fee to get a timeshare. In return, if a storm hits the company lets you stay in their building for the
              duration of the storm. That would save you the trouble of taking your chances on the road or spending a couple of
              miserable nights in a school shelter. Membership rates could be increased for those who wanted the company to
              store a personal supply of water and whatever onsite for them. I'd sign up for a timeshare like this. There are
              probably a lot of companies that would even pay for the memberships on behalf of their key people so those people
              would stick around and help get the company get back up on its feet faster. Hospitals should definitely do it for the
              staff and their family members to keep them around.

              There would have to be some sore of protection against people buying in at the beginning of hurricane season and
              then canceling out at the end. Maybe a management company could oversee all of the details and refuse to allow
              anyone who previously canceled out to buy back in within a set number of years.

              Note #1: The timeshare membership fee would work more along the lines of a monthly storage site rental fee instead
              of the way normal timeshare properties work. Companies wouldn't be willing to participate if they thought people
              were purchasing a vested interest in their properties.

Note #2: Other regions where temporary disasters strike could also offer this kind of timeshare.

3. Harpoon the drowners -

              Lifeguard stations should be equipped with a harpoon-type gun that can be used to shoot a wide, circular raft
              (about 20 feet in diameter) beyond someone who's drowning. The raft would inflate on impact and could be pulled
              back in towards the victim using an electric reel attached to the harpoon gun.

Laura's comment: A life preserver exists now with straps that enclose around any limb a person may stick through
it's hole.

              My response: Hadn't heard about the life preservers that have holes capable of closing around any limb stuck in
              them but that would be an excellent addition to the raft. Instead of flipping over onto a drowning person it could
              have holes all along the rim to secure any limbs stuck in them. This would also let a second swimmer be rescued at
              the same time - perhaps someone who'd tried to rescue the first victim and wound up in trouble themselves.

4. Good looking dead dudes -

              That's the club I want to join when I die. Some smart funeral chain should offer the following alternative to
              embalming and cremation since a lot of people don't like the idea of becoming either gray goop or a pile of dirt as
              time passes.

              There are already companies that irradiate meat to lengthen its shelf life - why not irradiate corpses? The body
              could be put on display as usual after the irradiation (with a little makeup to offset the process), and then re-irradiated
              and vacuum sealed after the wake. That would destroy the microbes that normally turn bodies into gray goop and
              extend your shelf life in the coffin for a long long time. It could be called the 'Jeremy Bentham Special'.

5. Building a better shallow end -

              A lot of swimming pools really don't have a shallow end that parents can let their youngest children use. These
              kids have to wear floaties or a life vest and never get to stand up in the water. A small, collapsible mini-pool that fits
              inside the regular pool would take care of that. This mini-pool would have a solid plastic floor, mesh netting sides,
              and four corner poles (connected by crossbars under the floor to help it keep its shape). The floor could be raised or
              lowered using notches on the corner poles (one side would be moved higher up on a poles than the other to create a
              flat surface where the floor of the pool slopes down). I'd still put floaties or a vest on the kids but at least this way
              they could play in their own shallow end without always having to float around without their feet touching the ground.

6. Raise the Babel (or how to really get rid of spam) -

              One way to get rid of spam would be to destroy the business model of the people who pay spammers to send
              their messages. If we raised the response rate from a typical .01% to 20% and made sure that the new bogus
              responses looked real it would quickly become uneconomical for anyone to pay a spammer to send out spam.
              They'd waste too much time going through all of the responses to find the legitimate ones. A law creating a quasi-
              governmental company to take care of this would also be needed to offset any charges of fraud.

7. Bad boy student exchange program -

              In many 1st world countries (and isn't that an egotistical label), it's more than just the bright kids who could benefit
              from a more worldly education. There are a lot of delinquents who'd benefit from learning the value of the things
              they're rebelling against too. An alternative student exchange program would do that.

              Instead of sending delinquents to a juvenile justice program for a year or two we'd just trade them to a family in one
              of the world's poorer countries who have some children of their own that they'd like to send here (places like Haiti,
              Madagascar, Bangladesh, etc..) The program would provide doctors on a region by region basis to make sure the
              delinquents didn't die (paying for their care out of the now unused residential funds we've saved by not sending the
              kids to a juvenile facility). The doctors would also provide health care to the rest of the family as an added benefit.
              Other than that the delinquents would have to live with the family as one of their own, eating the same food, doing the
              same work. These places would be so out of the way that running away wouldn't be an option (they wouldn't even
              speak the language in most cases, dampening their enthusiasm for such a course).

              At the end of their sentence the delinquents would be brought back home, hopefully with a better appreciation for
              what they have here. The families that took them in would be granted citizenship in the country the delinquents came
              from as their reward for participating in the program. (Sort of like the current S Visa in the US, only aimed at a
              different type of cooperation.)

8. Six degrees of computation -

This idea would require a simple computer program that displayed a screen asking 3 questions -

1. What equation/formula are you interested in?

2. What constant do you want replaced?

3. How many degrees of separation do you want?

              After you answer the questions the program would search a database that had been pre-loaded with as many
              standard equations / formulae as possible (engineering books are full of them) looking for ones that said the
              chosen constant equaled something else. The first equation it found would then be used as a replacement value in
              the formula you chose. For example, if E=MC2 was the formula you picked and C was the constant you wanted
              replaced then the C might be replaced by f*w (frequency times wavelength). This would be the first degree of
              separation. Next, each constant in the replacement value (f and w in our example) would be replaced with
              equivalent values found for them. That would be the second degree of separation. This process would continue
              until you got the number of degrees of separation you asked for. Then the result would be displayed for review.
              Some new and surprising connections would surely come up because the program would in effect be a divergent
              thinker (someone who can take two ideas from seemingly unrelated disciplines and connect them to form a new
              idea).

The following two rules would have to be enforced in order to make this program work -

1. Each constant must always mean the same thing: m=mass, c=speed of light, etc..

2. No replacement formula could have a constant that had already been used in a previous formula (preventing
recursive logic).

Additional Notes:

              The computer program's choice would be based on on its sequential reading of the formulae in the database. A
              default setting of one would make it pick the first valid replacement it found. That could be changed though just by
              adding another question to the prompt screen that asked the user if they wanted to replace the default selection
              criteria with a different number. If the user keyed a 5 into that field then the program would always pick the 5th
              replacement formula it found.

Or a Y/N "random" flag could be added to the prompt screen that would make the program pick a random valid
replacement in the sequence of possibilities when it was changed to a "Y".

             Or a Y/N "common" flag could be added to the prompt screen that would make the program pick a replacement
              whose constants were found most often in the database when it was changed to a "Y" (increasing the odds that
              whoever was reading the results would be familiar with the values found in them).

9. Downy hangers -

              The piece of paper that comes on hangers from the Cleaners is called a 'cape'. Since people seem to like the smell
              of fabric softener it might be profitable for Cleaners to start offering a choice of scented capes on the hangers. That
              way the fragrance would last a lot longer. You wouldn't want to combine too many different scents in one closet
              though - they might combine to form a single, strong, undesirable odor.

10. Saving babies (carseat safety) -

              In Florida there's a serious problem that often comes up - someone leaves their child in a carseat while they go run
              an errand. With the windows closed the inside of the car rapidly heats up and the child dies. It would be nice if
              carseats came with a weight sensor, temperature gauge and alarm, all connected so that if the temperature rose
              above a certain point and the carseat detected a child in it then the alarm would sound. (It would be nice if this came
              with an optional attachment that would hook onto the inside of a window - the idea being that if the alarm sounded
              for more than a few minutes it would blow a hole in the window.)

Random Thoughts of Others

New ideas added 01/07/05 starting at number 11
New ideas added 11/01/04 starting at number 4

1. Keep the lights on -

               In general, Alzheimer's patients get more agitated later in the day as the sun starts to go down. It might make them
               happier if at least one window in their room was fitted with an artificial daylight scene that had a full spectrum light
               source coming in from behind it. The light source would be timed to gradually increase in brightness as the light
               from the other windows dimmed at sunset.

2. More frosting please -

Supermarket bakeries should offer the option of adding more frosting to your cake. A lot of people would take it
since that's the best part of the cake.

3. Faster than the speed of light (part 2) -

               Suppose a bullet train is traveling down a track at 97,000 miles per second and it passes an oncoming train
               traveling at the same speed. If a hook on the first train grabs a loop on a spool of wire sticking out from the other
               train, how fast will anything attached to the axle of that spool be traveling? (Under these conditions neither train will
               be traveling faster than the speed of light but they'll be receding from each other faster than light.)

Click here to submit an idea. If it's interesting I'll add it to this section. (Put "Idea" in subject line).

Writings