me talking out loud

Well with the current political unrest in the Philippines I won’t be going to the Philippines with my dad. He will still be going for about 6 weeks - but then he looks and speaks as a native would (He should since that is where he grew up) … I on the other hand take more after my American mom in looks and never learned to speak tagalog - so I would stick out like a sore thumb. Basically being a target…

*sigh* - I was looking forward to the trip. Been about 13 years since I last went to the Philippines. Maybe another time - but somehow I doubt it.

Well I found out what was being a pain for my gallery. Seems my host uses suPHP so the php_value options in the .htaccess files were invalid. Instead you place them in a local php.ini file and set a pointer to it in the .htaccess file.

So now the gallery is up and running - I still need to work out a few kinks but basically all is good. I will soon be uploading some of my new/old dive photos that I have hanging around since I ran out of space on my old hosting.

Well I have taken the plunge and scheduled my test for the MySQL Core Certification. It is on March 22nd at 10:45… and I am so nervous. The company is reimbusing me for the test - though truthfully I would have paid for it myself. It’s only $200 USD.

Cross your fingers and wish me luck - I really hope I pass.

Oops - I made a mistake and posted my last blog entry on my old server after the DB had been moved over … here it is again

“Well I am changing hosting services - even with 5 month remaining on my plan. My current hosting service (ipowerweb - that I have been with for 1.5 years) refuses to upgrade my account to the specifications of the new accounts they are getting. I originally signed up getting 800Mb of space - pretty good, but recently they upped the size to like 5Gb for new accounts. When I asked how I can get the new size applied to my account - they basically said I can’t without renewing my current policy.

I might of actually thought about it if it hadn’t taken 5 days to get a response. I hate lousy customer service especially when I know a number of other hosting services that would be more then willing to take my business.

Anyway - I will be moving my site over to another host (lunarpages) that will credit me the 5 months I am losing from ipowerweb. I have been working with them for my company for about 3 years and have had absolutely no problems with them. Their customer service is top notch. The longest I have ever had to wait for a response to a problem was 24 hours… usually they get back to me within 3 - if I can’t get immediate help on their IRC channel.

Lunarpages has transfered over all my files and databases and will do the DNS work for me. I unfortunately though have to get all the site pages re-organized with all the correct access credetials and links. Should be fun - considering I have never done it before.”

Raj - I know you made a comment to it , but it is also on the other server.

Since then I have gotten the blog back up and almost all of my links work… just the gallery doesn’t want to play… *sigh* will work on that tonight hopefully so I can get our old pictures up and add a few more new ones that I’ve been holding since I ran out of space on the old server.

I have just found a pair of really good Database tutorials. They don’t teach SQL - what they teach is Database design (Data Modeling and Relational Modeling)… ERD’s, referential and entity integrity, normalization. All the good stuff. Now I haven’t read both of them in their entirty… skimmed over parts that I already knew, but read parts that I haven’t used/remembered. There were a few parts that I was taught using slightly different terminology… but I quickly realized/recognised them.

I had completely forgotten about super and subtype heirachies, domains, and the term tuple. The INSERT and DELETE integrety rules was a very clear and concise refresher, and the review of data manipulations using set theory definately made me sit up and get the brain thinking (need to go back again and reread it)… I also found a few things I had never heard of - 4th and 5th normal forms for example.

Definately need to remember this site - I’m sure others will want to look it over and learn… and I’m sure I will point others there to learn a few things.

Well a friend of mine just showed me a couple of really cool Developer tools being provided by Y!. Alot of the code deals with Javascript - but if it saves me from trying to write/hack it - all the better. In no particular order the links include Design Patterns (though from the little I have seen it isn’t the traditional “Gang of Four” type), User Interface Library, Connection Manager for XMLhttpRequest objects, and a Javascript Developer Center.

Free stuff is always a good thing.

Just found this vim plugin today and all I can say is - “Holy cow this is so cool!”

Installed it - set up the correct paths for myself in the _vimrc and altered the defaults for things like author and license in php-doc.vim … Open up an old class I have that I didn’t document well. Set the cursor to whatever class/function I want to document, ctl+P… and the phpdoc block is made for me. Most of it correct (85%), but I do need to make a few tweeks to get it just right. Oh this is so friggin cool. It even supports php4 and php5 syntax elements.

Cartoon blasphemy uproar gathers pace

Talk about a heated arguement. A newspapers right to free speech and an religion’s right to be offended. While I sympathize with the Muslim world for the caricatures and it’s considered blasphamy - I hate to remind them that most religions have at one time or another been insulted, defamed, or even vilified. They however have not asked for the offending party to be killed because of it.

To the muslims I say - Get angry, boycott, denounce the papers. That is your right. Just as it is the newspapers right to free speech.

Well I finally got bored with the default look of wordpress so I hunted up a new CSS and converted the site to match it. I think it looks a little more personal and professional. What do you think?

Just for farts and giggles went to monster.com today to see what the PHP job market is like in the town my husband and I want to go back to after our tour on Guam - Jacksonville, Florida. Had to drag my eyebrows down out of my hair when I saw that my alma mater was looking for a webmaster who has amongst other things PHP skills.

Wonder if they will take a telecommuter? At $40K - I’ll do the job.

Edit - Got back an email from them - only onsite applicants please since they will be “responsible for leading the Web Advisory Committee on campus’.

Been reading a couple of books lately. The “MySQL Certification Study Guide” - so I can get my core certification and “PHP5 Objects, Patterns and Practice” for general knowledge (OO and Design Patterns aren’t one of my strongest points).

Figure I might want to expand my mind a bit.