This is my first post on my new blog. The blog is a sort of present I made to myself for my 40th birthday. Which is today.

I know I could have use any existing blog software or (even easier) a blog hosting service for free. But having played with web technologies for so much time, and having to build a small blog for a client, I decided to go ahead and roll out my own blog. What you see is the (unfinished) result of a couple of days of work. I'll get back later describing the technologies behind this blog, for now suffice to say it runs on a Debian Linux box, uses servers written in Delphi and compiled with Kylix, and is based on an XML document architecture.

What else? I'm not sure what I'll be blogging about, but I'll certainly include Delphi stuff, XML, web development, .NET, Linux, open source software, and anything else technically oriented. I know I'll have to resist posting about politics and related issues, but I'll try to do my best.

And in case you don't know me, I'm the author of 8 Mastering Delphi books published around the world (the last was released a few weeks ago), an advanced Delphi tome (Delphi Developer's Handbook), three C++ books, online books (more on those another time), and many articles and conference papers. You can find out more on my "regular" web site, www.marcocantu.com. I'm also the proud recipient of the Spirit of Delphi award.

This is all for now. Not much for a first post... but I'll need to get back to get the feedback portion working. If you want to talk back to me for now you'll have to use my regular newsgroups on delphi.newswhat.com. See you soon.