As a freelancer, I wear many hats. I am a programmer, quality assurance engineer, project manager, gopher, sexy intern, accounts receivable, accounts payable, technical support, information technologies (IT), customer service, human resources, facilities manager, accountant, marketer, and sales person. I’m sure I forgot a few. Today I am wearing my marketing and sales hats. I have committed myself to getting a proposal out the door by lunch.
PHP is exactly the same on Linux and Windows…
PHP is exactly the same on Linux and Windows as long as you are using good coding practices, are not using deprecated variables and functions, are not suppressing error messages, are not porting code from an older version of PHP. See, I maintain code on a project that was originally contracted to someone in the United States who failed to tell his client that all he was doing was outsourcing the project to a foreign company. He lost the contract to me when that foreign company became unresponsive to change requests. Many of the comments and variable names are in a foreign language that I do not recognize. The code looks like the foreign company had once written a CMS and just resell it shoehorning new features with hacks. There are many weaknesses to their code but this is not about judging other developers. This post is to warn that although PHP should conceptually move seamlessly from a Linux environment to a Windows Server environment, in reality it doesn’t.
From the mouths of babes
Evan, 4 years old: "Dad, wassit?"
Me: "It’s called a Slinky."
Evan: "WHOA! Cool!"
frustrationfrustraTIONfruSTRAIONFRUSRATION!
I’ve spent the day trying to accomplish something that should have taken 40 minutes and is preventing me from doing the things I really want to be doing today. Something that I’m not even getting paid for. I feel that I’ve been constantly interrupted. At one point I declared, "I’m taking the next 40 minutes and finishing this" during which time I was interrupted 3 times. So finally a crisis hit. Minor. The 7 year old, the 4 year old, and the dog went missing in the creek. Normally this would not be a big deal but we’ve had substantial rain these past couple of days. Also, I believe there is a sinkhole in the creek that the children do not know about. It’s mostly covered with debris right now. It’s not really on my property and I’ve been wanting to clear the debris away to see if it is the entrance to the rumored cave that is supposedly nearby. Right now, I simply know that water flows into the ground through the debris at that point and I don’t want the children near it. So I channeled Coach Boomer (which I only now realized is one of my heroes, Bruce Campbell!) for some echo location and proceeded to be anything except that great TV dad that I so aspire to be. Several tears later, everyone is safe but mad at me. And I feel like crud.
1994 Was a Long Time Ago – Fix your website!
I need to offer some professional advice to some of you. 1994 was a long time ago. Some things your website should NOT be doing:
- do not resize my browser!
- do not automatically play music or videos! If you insist on doing this, do not loop the music/video and definitely do give me the ability to stop or pause the obnoxiousness.
- do not tell me your website is under construction! Your website should be an ever changing, living, breathing entity. Either hide the elements/pages that are not ready for prime time or put them up as-is and change them when ready. You should have a development server hidden from the public, a staging server which a limited amount of public eyes (testers) can see, and a production server that is live to the world. At the bare minimum you should have a development server and a production server. Never make changes directly on your production server.
Thank you.
Rainy Wednesday
I like the rain…except when it floods my basement but the trench seems in good shape so I don’t anticipate any flooding. I wish I had a nice screened in porch to enjoy the rain. Can’t add anymore words. Work calls.
Of Grasshoppers
Student: Will I be remembered?
Master: Why?
Holding my map upside down
Today did not go as planned.
We are only human
Either she was wrong or I was wrong but it doesn’t matter because now it’s not right. Dammit damage control is expensive!
Seeking Recommendations on Netbooks
We find ourselves on the road a bit too much to be as netsavvy and gadget freaky to not be able to have some productivity happening while out and about. I believe a netbook is an economical means to fill that connectivity hole our family stumbles into far too often. Do you have any suggestions, recommendations, or warnings on netbooks, brands and operating systems?
Via Twitter, I’ve learned that Dell solders memory into the netbook making them not easily upgradeable. I now know about http://www.netbookreviews.net/ thanks to xempt who also recommends NewEgg (a favorite shopping spot of mine). Jfloyd pointed out that lspegman has a Hackintosh netbook with a "few glitches but no biggie." steverb says netbooks are 90% the same hardware and gives kudos to Dell’s keyboard design. svandyke likes the ASUS eee (the company we must acknowledge as breaking the barrier for netbooks) and points to C|Net Reviews. ceffyl1 loves her Acer Aspire One D150. jeanroy gave a TweetBrain response (oops. I accidentally closed the question) with good links:
Here are some great links on netbook reviews. http://www.netbookreviews.com/ http://www.netbookreviews.net/ http://www.laptopmag.com/ http://reviews.cnet.com/best-netbooks/ I hope this helps your question. Please follow me on twitter when you get a chance. www.twitter.com/Jeanroy Thanks =D
Asus eee comparison chart.
Of Grasshoppers
Student: Is it worth it?
Master: Does it matter?
You can’t watch them all the time
I caught the seven year old giving the four year old a wedgie. This is one of those moments I feel for single parents because I could not respond rationally and had to tag myself out calling in the second parent. With Cathy’s help we try to convey that this breaks the "no touching between belly button and knees" rule. The question of concern is not why would you do this? but who did this to you? because obviously she learned it from someone. In my head I jump to the worst case scenarios and am horrified. I run down her list of friends and think of the opportunities where inappropriate play could be happening. We probe without making accusations. Amy relents and claims she didn’t learn it from anyone. Then why would she do it? This morning while watching the cartoon network with Amy and Evan, I have an epiphany; She learned it from television.
Of Grasshoppers
Student: I have experienced true joy!
Master: Why stop?
From the mouths of babes
Evan was cuddling lovingly with Cathy. His head was resting upon her chest as she held him. As I walked by, I stroked his arm as I admired him and continued to toward my office. As I hit the stairs, I hear an excited, curious voice exclaim in question to his mother, "Did you have 3 hands!?"
Still Recovering
Yesterday was calm, relaxing and very stress free. I slept deep with vivid dreams and slept late. My body still feels the recent abuse. My muscles in my arms ache. My mind feels recovered but I know that toward the end of this week the stress will grow because for the first time in a long time my project schedule is empty. This is one of the conundrums of working by yourself; you must be doing sales and the work at the same time. I strive to keep myself booked out two months at a time. Perhaps some greater force is telling me to take a few days off.
