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TechTopics and You

Andre — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 02:58:29 +0000

GTACM is sponsoring a few series of things called Tech Topics that aim to teach things that aren’t offered at Georgia Tech. They are free of charge and available to everyone. One topic is “Zero Pageloads – The Web With AJAX” taught by me.

What you need to know:

Zero Pageloads – The Web With AJAX. Fridays 4:00pm. Bunger-Henry 311

You can register for it by going to the gtacm blog: http://gtacm.org

signup is here: http://gtacm.com/blog/about/special-interest-groups/techtopics/tt-2102/

Geany and Chrome (or How I Develop)

Andre — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 07:24:19 +0000

This post comes to you via this Skribit suggestion.

Currently I am employed by one company, work pro bono for another, and work with-the-intention-of-getting-paid-in-the-future for a third (along with being a full time student). These three ventures are all very similar in that they are all web development work. For developing in these languages, I have an awesome set of comfortable tools that I use.

Hardware

I am actually quite proud of my setup: AMD 9950 2.6GHz Quad-core, 4 Gigs RAM, a 22″ Acer, and 23″ Dell Monitors. I just recently added a second monitor, and I now can’t develop without it. Whether I’m coding on one and testing in another, or watching a movie on one and working on another, it’s just damn useful to have 3600×1080 resolution to play with. Also have an awesome keyboard that I cannot live without. I got spoiled on my old Macbook Pro with a backlit keyboard, and I do so much work at night (as evidenced by the fact that it is now 2:30am) that it’s kind of neccessary. I also got so used to typing on a low-profile keyboard, that I now struggle to type at all on a regular one.

Linux FTW

I am a little unconventional when it comes to web use in that I use Linux Mint for my main desktop machine. However, this is awesome because it comes with a LAMP stack already built in. Just plop whatever code I want to run into /var/www and i’m good to go! Currently (15 Feb 2010) I am running Apache 2.2.12, PHP 5.2.10-2ubuntu6.4, and MySQL 5.1.37.

Editing

Let me make something very clear. I dislike command-line text editors. That said, I know my way around vim, and nano enough to use them on my remote servers, but on my desktop, I prefer to use graphical editors for ease of use, as I have multiple files open at once (yes, i know about screen)

When I was on Mac, I used and loved TextMates. However, since that does not exist on linux I was forced to move on *tear*. I have briefly tried Bluefish but found it tailoring more to plain HTML writing than a general purpose text editor.

I have settled on Geany. It has projects, an incredibly powerful version of ctags, a very strong search/replace function, a nifty color chooser, and an svn plugin. I also have some custom key-maps set, like ctrl+s to save all open tabs instead of only the current tab in use. Also, for php (and some other languages) it has function recognition (similar to eclipse) and completion. I rely on this function all the time when I can’t remember exactly the name of a function.

Testing

On my local machine, I use Google Chrome Beta as my main browser. I used to used the Dev builds, but as of the 5.0.322.2-r38810 build, the DOM Inspector is non-functional. This affords me the awesome power of the Chrome DOM Inspector (though not as good as Firebug in Firefox) which allows me to debug javascript, as well as test layouts/styles immediately without changing the actual css file.

As a responsible web developer, it is necessary that I test in several different browsers to make sure that my stuff works. I have Sun’s VirtualBox with Windows 7 installed on it and a slue of browsers installed to test as thoroughly as I can.

Thoughts? Complaints? Suggestions? What is your favorite setup?

Management and Software Development

Andre — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 14:50:02 +0000

I have been working for a small startup since about April, and up until last week I was the only active developer. Recently we got some funding and hired 9 other developers that they have now placed me in charge of. This is a bit overwhelming at first. Do we have enough work for 10 people? How often do they need to check in? How much work should I assign them at a time?

These are not fun questions to answer. Because we are just starting getting everyone accustomed to our code base (which needs to be rewritten from scratch) I spend most of my time hunting through our legacy code to answer their questions about where things are. I also spend alot of time getting them up and running with their initial projects.

Point of story, I’m not doing as much actual developing as I would like to right now, but I hope this will change soon.

There will most likely be updates on here as to how this is progressing.

Design and Getting it Right The First Time

Andre — Mon, 20 Jul 2009 14:17:03 +0000

I have a project that I started back in May that is right about feature complete. I used a common CMS because the customer thought that is what they needed. It has several features that I wanted: user management, photo albums, easily extensible.

I thought I needed a fully-built CMS. Jesus was I wrong.

It started off ok enough, built some custom functions into the theme, did some shady things with nodes and pages and detecting which page the user was on. It worked well enough, tricking the theme into displaying things I wanted it to, where I wanted it to. Then the customer wanted something fairly easy: Photo Albums.

Oh. My. Lord. I have never had so much trouble trying to get photos to display. There are a myriad of photo plugins/addons/managers. Somehow, none of them are intuitive or function properly. There is a separate plugin (“module”) just for images. Go ahead, try to tell me what you ACTUALLY need to use it.

Some of the modules straight didn’t work, some needed 14 different other modules just to tell me they didn’t want to work. It was a pain in the butt, but I finally found one that worked fair enough, but still didn’t have what I wanted.

Then the customer wanted something a little more tricky: email lists. I have no clue how to do this. None. I don’t even want to try.

Now, I am using a PHP framework and starting from scratch. Back in May when I started, I had never used a framework before. I used this same one on another project about a month ago, and have had favorable results. So now, I’m firing up my text editor and trying again.

This is going to be less of a headache than you think. CakePHP is very easy to set up with user privileges, and once there, it’s just a matter of moving my functions to the proper Models and tweaking some of the pages.

More to come when this is done. Hopefully.

Programmers and Regular People

Andre — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 18:18:04 +0000

A hard concept for some people (especially people like me) is that not everyone has the same knowledge base you do. Think about how you would describe what you to to a non-technical person. It’s a hard reality to grasp when you are immersed in code all day. Even the websites that you visit probably have content for people like you.

Everyone Else

I have this problem alot. I spend all day reading articles and blogs about programming, by programmers, for programmers, and I forget that not everyone else in the world is a programmer. I recently read a (rather old, but still relevant) article explaining the biculturalism in software programming. I would like to think of myself as a UNIX developer. I don’t even own a Windows computer (I do dual boot, and have a virtual machine both running Windows 7). At home I have a laptop running Ubuntu Netbook Remix, and a desktop running Linux Mint. Sometimes I have to just take stock and recognize that there are a very very very small number of people who do what I do. It just seems like a disproportionate number because it’s all around me.

Just remember that users are stupid. They aren’t stupid like, us. They’re even worse.

Windows 7 and Vista Drivers

Andre — Tue, 19 May 2009 17:53:54 +0000

Preface: I will do my best to avoid the lavish praise of Windows 7 and stick to my opinions about running Vista drivers throughout this post. If I diverge, please verbally abuse me.

I recently built a new box with some mildly impressive specs. It can handle just about anything I throw at it, even surpassing crysis required specs. I decided a while back that I was going to dual boot with Linux and Windows because I wanted to be able to game with my snazzy new rig. I went with Linux Mint and have been really pleased. (Again, no OS reviewing, possibly later). I also went with Windows 7 RC and have been equally pleased (minus a few odd crashes when starting up games).

The main worry I had when choosing Windows 7 was that there are clearly no drivers for it yet. And having purchased an awesome video card, this was a genuine concern that I wouldn’t be able to use it to it’s full potential. Worry not. I can run Call of Duty: World at War on full blast (even hosting a co-op campaign) with absolutely no problem. I have yet to try something that will actually tax the video card (like the above mentioned crysis, which I may still do), but for the time being, I am supremely happy with the driver support.

And of course the Nvidia card I have has awesome Linux support too.

May and Christmas

Andre — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 18:36:18 +0000

Since summer is almost here (finals are nearly done at least) I figured I’d ring in Christmas in July a bit early. The topic, holiday cover songs.

I grew up not celebrating Christmas, so I was never exposed to these sorts of “jingles” outside of blandly reciting them over and over and over in elementary school. Now, I have a bit more experience under my belt and have come across two covers of holiday classics, “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” and “Oh Holy Night”.

1) “Baby, It’s Cold Outside” – Greta Salpeter (The Hush Sound) & Thomas Dutton (Forgive Durden).
I think this is my favorite because it’s so upbeat and a bit comical. Not quite sure where this came from, but I’m happy it did.

2) “Oh Holy Night” – Brand New
Not a big fan of this song in general just because it’s so slow and boring. But I love me some Brand New, so it’s whatever. This is off their “Holiday EP”. This is the only holiday song on the EP tho.

Enjoy the warmth!

Ambition and College

Andre — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 05:51:52 +0000

Like many of my fellow students at Tech, I didn’t have to work much through high school. I showed up to class and got my A (ok, maybe a B here or there). I was on cruise control and I’m positive there are alot of people who can relate. Then came college.

To quote Talladega Nights, “If you’re not in first, you’re in last”. That is (for the most part) a very applicable philosophy here at Tech. Fortunately, I’ve come to terms with the fact that I’m mediocre at best. This, however, does not mean that I lack anything like ambition or drive or the will to succeed. I just accept that there are smarter people in the world than me. I try not to beat myself up for not being the best and the brightest. I’ve already proven I’m in the top echelon by getting this far.

A Bit Of Ambition

Having established that I’m a tad lazy, I can now point out that last summer was spent working for myself doing freelance design/production of websites. (seems to be the cool-kid thing to do for bored CS majors here). Now, however, I’m looking for a bit more of a steady income and am attempting to acquire a (real) job for this summer. This also takes a bit of ambition. Attending job fairs, sending out endless resumes, going on nerve wracking interviews. (As a side note, i didn’t know you could spell wracking with or without the ‘w’). Especially when you are a 3rd year CS major with no (real) internship and/or work experience under your belt.

About 3 months into my undergrad career here at Tech, I found myself already doing side projects. Learning new languages, trying things that weren’t part of the homework assignment. It was then that I realized that yes, I am in the correct major. I’m a nerd, I love making computers do awesome things, I love wowing people and showing them the amazing capabilities of the machine sitting in front of them. Ask anyone who is successful in their respective field why they are successful, and without a doubt they will tell you it’s because they enjoy what they do. Not only was it their ambition to succeed, but because they don’t have to “work”, it’s fun.

So I guess what I’m trying to say is: I work hard at what I do because I love it. Please hire me?