2 Nov 2009
We’re currently working closely with our long-time clients, Contiki, on improving the user experience for their customers. Our design team recently deployed a new interface for their search results, which allows their customers to research, save, and compare trips that they’re evaluating for their dream vacation.
12 Aug 2009
Earlier this week, our team accepted a proposal from Blue Box Group, a Ruby on Rails hosting company based out of Tacoma, Washington. With this partnership, Blue Box Group has acquired our hosting product, Rails Boxcar. For more information about the acquisition, read the joint press release.
16 Apr 2009
Okay, not really… but we’re really excited to see the news that Obama has, “highlighted his ambition for the development of high-speed passenger rail lines in at least 10 regions.”
image from nytimes.com
As you know, we’re big fans of traveling by Rail. You can read the article on nytimes.com.
13 Jan 2009
The team at Planet Argon introduces the survey for people who deploy Ruby on Rails applications! That’s right, we’ve decided to collect, organize, and share valuable information about how people are managing their deployment process.
We invite anyone who is involved in the deployment management of Ruby on Rails applications to participate in the Rails Hosting in 2009
survey, which will be close on February 1st. Sometime thereafter we will publish the results, along with the anonymous raw data, for use by everyone in the community—including our competitors. Here at Planet Argon, it is our mission to strengthen and improve our hosting-related products and deployment
services based on real feedback from the trenches. So please, if you have a few minutes to spare, take our survey and help us take a giant step into future of Ruby on Rails hosting.
31 Dec 2008
NEWSLETTER: 012009 – New Years
December 31st, 2008
We wanted to send you a quick note to wish you all a Happy New Year.
Our team had a very successful year and are looking forward to
another great year in 2009. This last year has seen the launch
of client projects that we’ve worked hard on all year, and 2009
brings with it some exciting new products that we will be
announcing in the next few months!
Planet Argon recently helped launch AlphaClone.com, a premier stock
research and portfolio simulation service for individuals and professional
investors alike. Planet Argon worked with the AlphaClone team to design
and develop the product from ideation all the way through deployment.
AlphaClone is hosted using the same technology that powers Rails Boxcar
and is being managed by our team of deployment specialists.
Planet Argon has been collaborating with Contiki, a worldwide leader in
vacations for 18-35 year olds, as the primary Interaction Design and
Development team behind their online presence for nearly two years. In 2008,
we helped grow their community base beyond the 100k member threshold and it
continues to grow as we expand on ways for their customers to connect with
each other before and after their travels through tips, photo sharing, and
planning reunion trips!
In 2008, we began redesigning our deployment and hosting services by turning
Rails Boxcar from a simple VPS into a scalable deployment platform. In addition
to 3 different Boxcar plans, we are now also offering custom managed hosting
packages on dedicated hardware for high-volume sites. These packages leverage
the same technology as our Boxcar plans allowing for simple deployments and
simple scalability. Combined with our new consulting options, we’re giving
our customers access to more ways to grow their sites without the headaches
of managing them.
To top it all off, we recently launched a new site for Rails Boxcar, sporting
a new look, testimonials, and more detailed plan information.
Remember to sign up for our new Rails Boxcar Newsletter! ;-)
Our team is currently working on a collection of internal projects and
consumer-facing products that we will be launching in the first quarter
of 2009. We are still evaluating new client projects for 2009, so if you
know anybody looking for a Design and Development team, don’t hesitate to
have them give us a call at +1 503 445 2456 or contact us online at:
You can also follow us online at:
Again, we hope that you had a great 2008 and are looking forward to a successful 2009!
The Planet Argon team!
Alex, Allison, Carlos, Chris, Dan, Dawn, Gary, and Robby
25 Nov 2008
We were contacted by one of the founders of AlphaClone nearly a year ago. They pitched us on a very complicated project that would need to be simplified so that their customers could easily interact with it. After a vigorous ITER-ZERO process, we kicked off the project last February and earlier today, our clients sent out private-beta invitations to people and we’ve opened up a few features to the public.
They describe themselves as, “AlphaClone is a research service that let’s investors follow the stock ideas of top money managers. AlphaClone simulates, or clones, the performance of investing in these ideas at the time they become public. AlphaClone is the first professional-grade cloning service for self-directed and professional investors alike.” (link)
We’ll go into more details about some of our design decisions in the project in future posts, but did want to invite you all to take a peek at what we’ve been up to for most of the year.
We’re excited to see how people respond to the site and we’re really excited to be part of this innovative project!
Take a look at:
17 Sep 2008
Excluding the morning machine that is Robby; the rest of Planet Argon had rarely, if ever, seen the likes of the beloved office at a grisly 7:15am… until Wednesday, August 27th, that is. The day at the office began and ended before much of the team typically batted their sleep-encrusted eyes awake each morning. Backpacks in tow and jokes amok, the team trekked swiftly to the train station to board the northbound train, destination: Seattle.
For weeks, there had been mounting anticipation of this day of fun peppered with work outside the office. Most of the group had minimal time logged on a train, all were looking forward to seeing the Seattle Mariners vs. the Minnesota Twins, but an ever-so-slight sense of unease wafted about:
>"Did anyone bring their iPhone charger?"
>"Will we be near outlets?"
>"How will we ration battery power?"
>"What time is it?"
>"Who’s playing ‘I Spy’ with me?"
>"Who’s having a beer with me?"
All legitimate concerns for an eclectic team with one goal in sight: Accomplishment. The bar is never too high if fun is the mission, especially when work’s necessities are there to keep the gang’s psyche balanced.
With a projected high of a mere 64 degrees, the team wasn’t phased as they settled into the high-back Amtrak seats; various breakfast foods and their mini army of MacBooks strewn across the conveniently placed tables.
A winding 4 hours to reach the stadium which happened to be mere steps from the station left the team with ample time to accomplish tasks across the board. The lack of a true wi-fi connection didn’t hinder Allison, Robby, Chris, Gary and Alex from setting up a bluetooth network with each other.
Beers in hand and game faces on, a grueling battle of wits ensued between Alex and Dawn; Travel Scrabble style.
Upon arrival, with some lovely beers and tasty meals to follow; the posse ventured through the waves of mediocre merchandise vendors into the bowels of the manmade-strocity that is Safeco Field.
The game itself proved to be pretty fruitful, with the Mariners pulling ahead only for the Twins to ultimately reign victorious, 5 to 6. Details can be viewed here.
The game may have been over, but the day trip was in full swing. The ride back proved to be a time when everybody at Planet Argon loosened their collars, so to speak. Work was hammered through, unfortunately nobody was hammered. Games modern and classic were played, jokes too lewd for the internetz were uttered and carried on well through their peak. Observational humor stayed strong, a child with the voice of an alien and the curious name of ‘Elliot’ (E.T. anyone?) dashed through the aisles much to our amusement… Hilarity ensued when he donned a hoody just like his 1980s fictional counterpart.
Also not captured on film were shenanigans involving a suspicious program “PhotoBooth”, which many cite as the reason society is crumbling. Dubbed the “Photobooth Palz” by onlookers, the culprits allegedly were creating questionably inhuman images with nothing more than their own faces and hands. Any information or details should not be reported to authorities.
To the dismay of many, including the Argonistas, the train became delayed by approximately 1 hour; just mere tiptoes from the Vancouver, WA station after the conductor announced a freight train “left a huge mess”… Which of course prompted the team to speculate on what really happened:
>"Foul play"
>"A train surprise"
>"A drug bust"
>"Large-beaded necklaces"
>"Elllllllllllliot!"
Alex was permitted to exclude himself from the no-table discussion as he was studying Planet Argon’s bible, Still Life With Woodpecker by Tom Robbins.
Planet Argon arrived back in Portland on the heavy side of 10:00pm, reprogrammed indefinitely by the day’s happenings.
It was a bleary-eyed journey, never low on laughter or yawns. Cliches aside, the literal traveling definitely made the entire excursion worthwhile… Anybody can simply go to a baseball game, but it takes a true posse to mix business with pleasure and find solace in the transit itself.
19 Jun 2008
We were fortunate to be able to sponsor Ignite Portland 3, which was held at the Baghdad theatre in Portland, Oregon.
What is Ignite? Let’s let them answer that (from Ignite Portland site)
“If you had five minutes on stage what would you say? What if you only got 20 slides and they rotated automatically after 15 seconds? Around the world geeks have been putting together Ignite nights to show their answers.”1
Several of us from Planet Argon came down to enjoy the evening. Here are a few videos that I (Robby) took on my Flip.
A Short Course On How to Ride Freight Trains – Gerry Van Zand
Don’t get mad, make a video! – Phillip Kerman
(coming soon)
As sponsors, we had an opportunity to go up in front of the audience for 15 seconds. Allison got up to introduce everybody to Planet Argon.
Additionally, it was fun to watch just how active Twitter was during this event.
Thanks to everyone who came up to introduce themselves and to all the speakers for making it an fun and educational evening!
1 http://www.igniteportland.com/about/
2 As sponsors, we had an opportunity to go up in front of the audience for 15 seconds to pitch our company.
10 Apr 2008
By popular demand.. we’re happy to announce that we’ve just rolled out monthly subscription plans for Boxcar, our professional VPS hosting solution for Ruby on Rails applications. That’s right! You can now order a new Boxcar on a month-to-month basis for just $99/month.
Our team has been building a completely new account management and billing system for the past few months and just launched the initial version. Our aim was to get the essentials out to our customers and work with them to learn more about their goals for managing their Boxcars. Over the next few months, we’ll be building automation tools to simplify the process for deploying Ruby on Rails applications to your Boxcar. Be sure to stay tuned and follow Boxcar on twitter as we’ll be posting information there as we launch these changes.
For more information, visit railsboxcar.com or contact us.
2 Apr 2008
If you’ve been a hosting customer of ours over the past few years, you’re likely familiar with our IRC channel for live hosting support. We’ve recently decided to move more of our efforts online and moving to Campfire, which is where we spend a good portion of our day collaborating together anyway.
There are a number of ways that you can get your hosting questions answered.
If you have any questions or problems, first take a moment to check out the PLANET ARGON Documentation Project. We teamed with several of our friendly hosting customers to create numerous tutorials related to managing hosting accounts on our servers:
You can find a lot of tutorials that have been written by other great customers like you. Don’t hesitate to correct any typos, mistakes or stale information in the Documentation Project.
Perhaps you have a question that wasn’t answered by the tutorials; post a message or read previous posts on our community forums.
Before you ask a question or respond to another question, please read our our posting guidelines.
If you didn’t find what you need in any of the tutorials or forums, the next place that you should go is our live chat room.
Stop by our Campfire web-based chat room. We’re typically there during our standard hours of support.
Drop by and introduce yourself; ask a question, answer a question.
If none of the resources above have helped you solve your problem, you should submit a support ticket to our technical staff or call us at +1 503 445 2457, +1 877 55 ARGON.
Have a project that needs help?