For fast page prototyping, these css libraries (i.e. grid frameworks) are very useful. I did notice many issues when attempting to use more complex layouts – there is little room for any deviations, such as adding borders (Blueprint in particular)!
That is when I began adding float-fixes and other css classes to compensate for the issues inherent in these CSS frameworks.
This begged the question - did this truly save me time over a custom css framework based on the specific page layout?
Yes, I do believe it did save time. The basic page structure can be created super-fast. I didn’t have to worry about any heavy lifting just to get a container, subcontainers, and ribbon menus aligned and floated properly. It was just a matter of adding a class definition for the element (<div id=’mydiv’ class=’span-7′>).
I will go into more detail as time permits, and I am going to try the YUI layout grid system. Then I will do a comprehensive analysis of the features and drawbacks of each.
I will also cover how the following jQuery stacks integrate with each framework:
Here is a link to my dev server and the current dev projects I am involved with. Nothing too exciting, in fact, often times the pages are broke due to updates and code changes.
chown – change owner of file system resources on Linux/Unix systems
To change the owner of a file name ‘myfilename.jsp’, do the following:
sudo chown jamessmith myfilename.jsp
To change ownership AND group for All directories and files below the current working directory:
sudo chown -R jamessmith:wheel ./ .*
It IS a CAPITAL R ( – Recursive) and there is a space between the ‘./’ and the ‘.*‘
NOTE: chown can be a very dangerous command – it cannot be undone. Exercise caution when changing ownership on files/directories en mass without a more targeted wildcard (e.g. “chown meuser:mygroup *.jsp” will change ownership of only .jsp files in the present working directory – these are NOT system files and will not result in a system-wide error – though they may mess up your Java App server )
IRS.gov is a very helpful website – fairly well designed and full of useful, and sometimes scary, information.
What we all must do as an employee or independent contractor or corporation is file the proper tax forms when they are due. Don’t be late or you may incur a penalty on top of what you owe.
A start to creating a business entity is to decide on what form that business will take – sole proprietor, independent contractor, limited liability corporation (LLC), S-Type Corporation, or a full-fledged C-Type corporation.
Many consultants would opt for the sole-proprietor or LLC – the simplest forms that require the least administrative overhead. To limit personal liability you must choose other than a sole proprietor which requires registering with a State as a corporate entity. All this info is covered at the IRS website and others (legalzoom.com).
The EIN, or Employer Identification Number, is a number you receive from the IRS that is associated with your business. This allows you to use this number in place of your social security number. Best news – it is FREE and VERY EASY to acquire.
Now, scroll down near the bottom of the page and click the Apply Online Now link text (or use CTRL-F and search for this text).
Click here to start the process to acquire your EIN
You will need: your name, your business name, social security number, address, a phone number, email address, and general business area (manufacturing, consulting, retail, etc).
That is it – Just remember to ALWAYS use your EIN in place of your SS# whenever possible, file your requisite tax forms ON TIME, and enjoy your newfound freedom (and responsibility) as an entrepreneur!
I was recently employed by a very small company as a consultant through a regional tech employment agency. It was my first experience working for a small company with fewer than 2000 employees – this company had less than 12.
During the interview, I noticed there was the personable and relaxed atmosphere. The company was comprised of individuals who had worked together for 12+ years. Even so, as an outsider, I felt very welcomed.
Being used to more formal environments, this was going to be a welcome change; at this small company, there appeared to be a very hands-off management style.
I question the effectiveness of a rules-based organizational culture (versus a person-centered culture) that some of todays corporations institute. At times, such an environment can be so focussed on the rules that they create an oppressive and micromanaged culture that is too beaurocratic to be effective. After doing my very best to acclimate myself to the new code environment – a proprietary framework written in Java/J2EE within - using Eclipse (Helios) , I got down to work creating JSP pages, integrating jQuery (jQuery core and jQuery UI, and plugins – validate, default-value, alphanumeric, extjsoncookie, simplemodal). The documentation for the custom framework as well as the assigned project was very scarce, consisting of a few use-case documents (no diagrams, just words). The data schema was ‘evolving’ during the project, and, the data definitions and relationships were verbally defined – difficult to reference
All in all, not enough documentation to get down and dirty with a project that had a very fast timeline. There were 3 complete site redesigns (aka major changes) in 4 weeks – just when you get progress, you have to start from the beginning.
What I learned from this experience is:
Clear, concise, and complete documentation is VERY important – not just words, but diagrams (use-case, process, flow, data, etc) – for any web application. Smaller companies may not necessarily have the resources to accomplish this in a meaningful way, so be sure to set time aside upfront to create the essential docs to keep your team productive.
A large enough team to bounce ideas off of is a tremendous asset – 3 or more developers working together with different skill sets is, in my experience, a minimum number - when there is a tight timeline. That provides you with the necessary division of labor – MVC. If time is not a primary factor, then a team of one front and one back-end developer would suffice.
Having the developers intimately involved with the evolving design (database, page flow, SEO, UI, etc) benefits the company greatly. There is an internalization and participation with the requirements that adds value during the code creation process – the more you know, the more you can do.
Timing is critical - having the third-party designs ready BEFORE a developer gets on site, a development path defined, class and data definitions documented (particularly with a custom framework), and a team of resources that are available at a moments notice for any roadblocks that arise.
The working environment and culture at the small company was far superior to that of a large corporation for my personality and work style. I was lucky in two more ways – the company president was exceptionally competent and creative (with a tech background), and the lead Java framework developer was a very gifted programmer.
When approached to take on a project with a speedy timeline, it behooves the consultant to weight the pros and cons of working with any business entity. Before agreeing to consult:
review the available documentation for the project -
are they concise, appropriate, and cover the breadth of the project?
get a list of assets you will have ready access to during the various phases of the project life-cycle.
who will you be able to contact for business/marketing and technical issues outside of your area of expertise?
Business analysts, project managers, content experts, etc.
make sure that the budget is realistic and you will not push the project over that thin, and sometimes arbitrary, profit-margin.
You don’t want to get on a sinking ship – if the budget is not realistic, let the company know.
is the time-line reasonable/attainable given the above information?
If you see a lack of any of the above attributes, you may be wise to walk away IF the company is not receptive to scaling back, adding assets, or proactively creating the necessary documentation. If they want to understand and are willing to alter core aspects of the project, you may be joining a winning team that extends beyond this project.
When analyzing most things in my life, I use the simplistic who, what, when, where, how, why matrix. That, I will define in a later blog – if it even needs defining
Thank you for reading – Vic.
“The only reason for time is so that everything doesn’t happen at once.” – Albert Einstein
CodeIgniter is my (current) favorite development platform for the PHP language. It is lightweight, robust, and fairly easy to learn compared to Zend or Symfony.
As with every framework, there are issues with the documentation being too light or too heavy – seldom just right. CodeIgniter documentation is excellent – once you get past the first couple of days digesting the syntax of the framework.
I was attempting to use the ‘directory’ helper. This is a helper composed of a method that gets the names of files (and subdirectories) within a path and populates a multi-dimensional array with the results. Two lines of code rather than around 10 for a pure PHP version that has the same features.
The key to getting this method to work was using the relative path and not an HTTP request. If you use the base_url(), it will not work. For my need, it was simply hard coding the path into my code:
$dirPath = "./this/is/the/directory/to/scan/";
$this->load->helper('directory');
$arrDirList = directory_map($dirPath);
Then, I used
foreach ($arrDirList as $key=>$value) { ... }
using the $key as the directory names to build my anchor tags and name the link.
foreach ($themeFiles as $key=>$value) {
I had originally used a
$dirPath = $base_url() . "path/to/directory/"; // BAD X X X
Tabs are simple to implement in jQuery – once you understand the basic structure of the tab element.
First, be sure to include the appropriate jquery libs – jquery base and the jquery ui. Also, the jquery ui tabs lib must be included – this is usually done through jquery.ui.base (containing only @import directives [@import url("jquery.ui.tabs.css");]).
When using the jquery ui library for tabs, you must create tabs using an unordered list and list items containing <anchor html elements:
<ul>
<li>
<a href='#tabs-1'>This is tab 1</a>
</li>
<li>
<a href='#tabs-2'>This is tab 2</a>
</li>
</ul>
jQuery UI Tabs thus degrade gracefully to a list of links when Javascript is turned off in a client browser
You must also wrap the tabs in a container that is bound to an object reference and listener that implements the 'hidden' jquery ui tab classes on your custom tab.
Now, wrap the ul in a tab that will not close until the content panes are defined....
<div id='tabs'>
<ul>
<li>
<a href='#tabs-1'>This is tab 1</a>
</li>
<li>
<a href='#tabs-2'>This is tab 2</a>
</li>
</ul>
...
<!-- close the 'tabs' container>
</div>
Now that the <div id='tabs' and the referenced <anchor tabs are properly named, you can define the contents of each tab pane.
<div id='tabs-1'>
This is the contents of tabs-1
</div>
<div id='tabs-2'>
This is the contents of tabs-2
</div>
Now, place the contents WITHIN the < div id='tabs' > container...
<div id='tabs'>
<ul>
<li>
<a href='#tabs-1'>This is tab 1</a>
</li>
<li>
<a href='#tabs-2'>This is tab 2</a>
</li>
</ul>
<div id='tabs-1'>
This is the contents of tabs-1
</div>
<div id='tabs-2'>
This is the contents of tabs-2
</div>
</div>
Now, we need to associate the above construct with a jQuery initializer - linking the <tabs> with the jQuery UI code containing the binding code:
You can name a jquery tabs container anything - you just have to use that for the content pane tabs.
<div id='myTabs'>
Each bookmark reference would then follow the following semantic:
<a href="#myTabs-1"> and <a href="myTabs-2">
The -1 and -2 (dash 1 and dash 2) are very significant and must be followed for the jQ UI to pain these anchors as tabs.
content pane (aka: contentpane) the wrapper (named anything - I like contentpane or tabs_contentpane) that contains the container divs that further contain the html to display when the tab is clicked (in focus).
This content can be
inline html
an included page using jQuery .load("url")
a pre-fetched server-side include (<%@ include file='tabcontent2.jsp %> or <? include("filename.php") ?>
I just finished a short run using the scrum method of Agile project management: stories, retros, sprints and all. It was a very educational experience since I had never been a part of a project that used ‘formal’ Agile development.
- First, Agile sounds cool. There is an inherent power and affinity to like the word ‘agile’, to say ‘I am agile’, ‘we have an agile development team’, ‘our business model is agile’. The power in a word cannot be understated – business wants to be agile; developers like to be seen as agile.
A few operational definitions. Agile software development is short term goal oriented – component directed. The idea is to get a bunch of software developers working on a project by picking components (‘stories‘) from a master list of ‘backlog’ items and completing those individual components within a short period of time – called a ‘sprint‘. The typical goal of the sprint is a complete sub-component, one that can be demonstrated during the ‘retrospective‘ as a stand-alone element. Some shops even demand that these components are ‘go-live’ ready.
The first deficit with Agile project management appears when there are components that are comprised of multiple smaller sub-components that are not separated into different stories. For example, a form page. A form page is composed of the following: the HTML wrapper, CSS formatting, the form proper, business rules for managing the form input/processing/output, form content validation and security, other user interface components, data definition/acquisition layers (db abstraction/ORM), and presentation components. There may be Ajax components to the form, as well as validation, and visual/auditory Fx via JavaScript.
The failings of Agile comes to light where ‘expectations’ are concerned. Business expects a completed components at the end of a sprint. Anyone who has designed and developed a full blown web application (as opposed to a ‘site’, ‘page’, or ‘component/widget’) understands the iterative nature of such a ‘process’. The final result is most often a group of components that can be reused to simplify program maintenance and improve program performance through re-factoring to optimize the total application developed over the duration of the project.
I think the best way to compare Waterfall with Agile is that Agile is concerned with ‘events‘ and waterfall is concerned with the flow of app development that results in a completed product – the ’outcome‘. Conceptually, both are correct – an app is a bunch of ‘events’ that interact to produce some result, and, an app is a business process that must be satisfied through a series of components that elicit a specific outcome, or ‘result’.
Sprints are like a course that is made up of a bunch of quizzes with no final exam. It is the accumulation of grades over the course. A waterfall project is a course with NO quizzes - only a final exam, and, maybe a mid-term.
Waterfall methodology emphasizes pre-defining all components so, in theory, the development portion is very short lived. More time is invested in defining the components and laying out the look and feel of a site than is actually set aside to code them. Planning is everything.
What often time occurs using the waterfall method is, in Agile parlance, a bunch of backlogged items become evident very near the end of the project. For developers, it becomes a ‘marathon’ to complete the project on time – often times with few, if any, functional components to demo for stakeholders (ie business owners).
Other deficits in the waterfall methodology are scope creep and the effects of incorrect estimation of build time (coding & system administration). Since the planning portion is so long, items are often added that should extend the duration of coding, but seldom do. Most projects have a go-live date that is seldom altered, even though the scope of the project increases. As a component is added or altered, reality would dictate altering the estimated due date – but that seldom happens.
<psych aside>Human nature, for many people, dictates that we want to satisfy the needs of others – particularly superiors or people who can advance our careers. The waterfall method plays on that human tendency to the advantage of the stakeholder at the expense of the development team. It is difficult for many of us to say an unequivocal ‘NO’ to the VP of marketing or sales when they have a ‘really good idea’ for a feature that will add a developer-month to the project. The problem arises when the project is past due, and that feature that the VP loved so much three months earlier in the planning stage is all but forgotten – it no longer carries the same emotional power it did earlier. All that matters now is that the developers are late delivering the project.</psych aside>
Pure scrum can be effective when modules are very compartmentalized – there is little co-dependence on other modules. It becomes nonsensical to use Agile when the overall system has many dependencies UNLESS there is an agreement that modules will be enhanced and integrated at a later date when the ancillary modules that, say, perform form validation, are complete.
When you get right down to it, Agile is a good way to reduce the upfront cost of a project and put most of the design and planning on the developers – which is, in my opinion, a good thing. A less is more approach that can be effective for the largest project, so long as the stories reflect reality.
The Linux ‘history‘ command is very beneficial when trying to debug a system, remember a previously executed command, or keep track of recent steps taken in a multi-command process. One omission to the default setup is the time and date the command was run.
There is a file in the home directory of all users called the .bashrc file (the period is not a typo – it is a hidden file). Add the following line to get the ‘history’ output with a time and date stamp:
export HISTTIMEFORMAT="%F %T "
You can enter this at the command line and then run the ‘history’ command to view the new output. (more…)
To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under Heaven.
There is a time to sow, and a time to reap…
This Biblical verse is true in agriculture, personal life, as well as merchandising and marketing. You can have the best new ‘feature’ to your web site, but the timing of the release should be carefully considered. If your feature is of minimal impact to the navigation and overall familiarity (look and feel) of the site, then there is little risk in implementation. If, however, you are planning a complete redesign of the presentation and business logic layers, you may consider the time of year for the release.
Why: One retail chain that I had worked for decided that their website needed an upgrade. That was an understatement - the existing site was very dated in both style and functionality. Many features that the underlying web framework offered were inaccessible due to a prior rushed upgrade that ‘broke’ what is a very robust J2EE-based framework. Business and IT knew that a complete rewrite was the only way to efficiently keep the site extensible, maintainable, and scalable. The initial launch date was early September, with a fudge factor of a couple of weeks.
As the months of planning a preparation, design, coding, and testing went by, it was clear that the target date would be missed – by about 2 months! That brought the time of the upgrade to the apex of annual holiday sales season. While this may initially sound like the perfect time to release the site to the customer base, a little more thought might suggest that the opposite is true – it may be the exact wrong time.
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