me talking out loud

Woot - the book, The PHP Anthology: 101 Essential Tips, Tricks & Hacks, 2nd Edition, has been slash-dotted - and they actually liked it giving it a 9/10 rating. *gasp*

The reviewer, Michael J. Ross, seems to only have 5 major grips with the book overall:

1. Firstly, a reader hoping for a well-edited book will likely become distrustful by the authors’ misuse of the term “that” in place of “who.”
2. Secondly, there are far too many ambiguous comments in the first-person, e.g., “I would dare to say that…” In a book written by five authors, the reader naturally has no idea who is speaking.
3. Thirdly, there is a fair amount of inconsistency in the formatting of the code throughout the book, including indentation and other spacing, as well as variable naming.
4. Also, every instance of a “{” on its own line (presumably to line up vertically with the corresponding “}”), is an antiquated waste of space, since any decent programmer’s editor or integrated development environment (IDE) can do brace matching automatically.
5. Lastly, almost all of the section titles begin with the phrase “How do I.” That is fine within the body of the book, at the beginning of every section. But when dozens of these section titles are listed together in the table of contents, that phrase could be excised so each section’s topic would be faster to spot, and there would be fewer unnecessary words.

I can live with those, (to me they are kinda minor),though I have to admit to being the person with a “{” on a new line - sorry but I like my code formatted that way when I am left to my own devices. Call it a quirk if you will - I like to see my braces visually line up.

On the plus side he remarks:

The chapters on error handling and access control are alone worth the price of the book.

Since I was responsible for the chapter on access control - I will take that as a pat on the back.

Well we made the flight and the drives (though I was hallucinating by the end of the first day - was kinda fun), picked up the dogs and dropped them off at my dad’s and finally made it to Georgia. All is going well except we have no home - but that will take time to find and organize. Luckily we have a room at the TVQ (Temporary Visitors Quarters) on the Kings Bay base - and I have to say - it isn’t to shabby for $30/night.

Today was a busy day. We hit up the Housing office (only got lost twice trying to find it) to see if they have any referrals for the area we want to live in (they don’t). So we took a drive to the area to just look around the area and maybe for a realtor. Liked the area (on a clear drive it is only 20 minutes away from the base) and found a real estate company that seems nice. Got a number of potential places to cruise through the neighborhoods to see if we like them. Talked to the bank about getting a mortgage and need to call a number to get a pre-qualifying value so we have a better idea of how much we can spend. Took a base tour to see some of the base’s services (gas is 2.96 on base) only to find they aren’t many and they are much smaller then we are used to but that is OK since we will primarily getting stuff out in town.

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving so everything will be closed. Sounds like a wonderful time to just sit back and relax for the day. Friday is soon enough to run around some more.

Well we have finished moving out of the house and are now in the hotel - 2 days and a wake up left until we go. Only one problem - the hotels internet in the rooms is out… and with the dogs in the room - I can’t sit around the lobby all day (the lobby internet doesn’t allow irc either) … *sigh*. So I will primarily be offline for a while, least until the get the room internet back up (heavan only knows how long that will be) or we get to the states - whichever happens first.

Yep - in less then one week we will be back in the states. So many things to still get done before the end of the week but everything seems to be organized and scheduled…

1) house - final pack out (Tuesday), final cleaning (in progress), yard cleaned (due by Monday) and final mowing, carpets cleaned (todo this weekend);
2) appliances - picked up on Tuesday;
3) bags packed - mostly - due by Tuesday;
4) dogs - tickets (done), crates (done), flight itinerary (done)… need to contact continental cargo for info on how to turn them in at 4AM, heath certificates (Vet Tuesday 10:20), need to drop that off at Dept of Agriculture for Guam vet to sign - pick up in 24 hours;
5) hotel reservations (accepts dogs) for the few days between when we move out and fly out - done;
6) hotel reservations for when we get there - done - need to reconfirm;
7) car - rented and can be dropped off at the airport when we fly out;
8) family notified - some - need to complete this weekend;
9) landlord final walk through inspection - Sunday;
10) sell the last car - dependent on husband;
11) Our tickets - bought and paid for - have passports available - fly out Sat the 17th at 07:30

Hope that is everything… If not - I am so screwed.

As much as I loved going to Zend Con - I now have to shoot someone from it. Why you ask - simple. They gave me bronchitis (irrelevant that my immune system was depressed from the jet lag ). As many friends know I have been battling a cold since I got back from Zend Con. Last night (Friday evening) along with my now standard hacking cough and runny nose I gained a few other symptoms - an earache, sore throat, and an on again, off again fever. Husband made me go to the Emergency Room since my doctor’s office was closed only to get the diagnosis - bronchitis (same as his). Oh joy.

So now I am drugged to the gills on antibiotics, cough suppressants and decongestants… I hate taking drugs but hopefully I will sometimes soon be able to sleep the whole night through without waking up every couple hours to hack up a lung. I don’t believe I am going to say this but… please drugs - hurry up and work!

In the latest PHP Abstract Podcast with Davey Shafik on Web Services, I actually got a mention because of the book we worked on together. Woot!

As for the podcast - Davey I love the accent. So very hot.