In the past, I’ve done some freelance Web Development and Web Design for different clients. One question I’ve always had to ask myself is:

How will the user be updating this website?

That question is usually preempted by a question to the client:

Do you have any HTML experience?

I can count (on one hand) the number of times that I’ve heard a yes to this question. To be quite honest, I don’t even know why I ask it anymore. Hardly any of my clients  ever had HTML experience and even if they did, I doubt they’d want to go through the hassle. So this poses the very interesting question How do you pick a CMS (content management system) for a web project?

What Not To Do – Pure HTML is wrong for many reasons

Over the years, I’ve had much experience in this area (what not to do). Gone are the days when people simply wanted a web presence. Those days, things were simple. You fire up your copy of Frontpage (oh how we’ve learned from then) and designed a website for a client and stick it onto an FTP server, and viola; you’re done. Worst case scenario, they call you up seven (7) months later and say they’ve changed their phone number and need you to make an update.

That might have been fine back then, but right now clients expect a lot more for their money. In this day and age when everyone is worried about SEO ranking and the phrase Content Is King has been coined, no one wants to have to call you up (and God forbid; pay you) to make regular updates to their website. It is expected that you provide some sort method of updating their site.

With that said, providing a purely HTML solution is not user friendly and it can be down right dangerous. Do you really want to give your users full access to the HTML files that comprise the website? What if they break something in the layout while editing in Microsoft Word, ugh!. Who would be to blame? You would.

In the past I’ve guarded against this by using the PHP include strategy. The website would be primarily PHP with a folder called “content” sitting there with various HTML files. From there, I would pull any dynamic content that would be needed for the site: Page titles, tag lines, content blocks, etc, using standard PHP includes. This way my layout would stay (relatively) intact and the user would have access to change what they were allowed to change. The problem with this method is that they required some sort of HTML knowledge to modify the content files. They also required knowledge of FTP software and servers. Not to mention, that adding a pages or sections still needed heavy interaction from myself. Needless to say, I’ve grown from then.

Joomla! – It looked like a good idea at first

Early in my college days, I stumbled across Mambo and subsequently Joomla!, it’s current fork. It did so much for you, it had to be good, right? After installing Joomla for a client, I realized what the problem was. It just did too much. There were too many configurations, and simple things were just too hard. Also, last I remember, one of the main navigational structures was generated using and ugly and rigid table structure. Yes, I know it’s been changed by now, but that was part of my initial frustration.

It just felt too heavy for a normal website. No matter how much I restricted the user (by groups – editors as opposed to admins I think) I still got complaints about how complicated the backend interface it was. Added to that fact, the templates (and I stress) at that time were very cookie-cutter. It got to the point where I could eyeball a website built in Joomla.

Since then (over 3 years ago) I haven’t given Joomla a second look. It’s just one of those things that rubs you the wrong way once, and you never look back. Judging by the version numbers, I’m forced to assume that not much has changed. But that’s just an ignorant assumption with no basis, so please don’t hold it against me.

More To Come

I really had no idea this was going to be as long as it turned out. But sometimes I start ranting and never end. Hense, there shall be a part two where I talk about my dive into Wordpress.

All user input is encouranged; ThanX

• Content Management Systems
• Nail in The Coffin – Mamboserver.com Hacked
• Spell Out a Detailed Contract
• Foundation for an Extensible Website Engine with PHP 5
• Joomla Template Tip: Optional Modules

Personally, I’m ecstatic that Microsoft has released Internet Explorer 8. The great part is that they’ve stuck it in the Windows Automatic Updates and they’ve already started rolling it out Windows users. I damn near threw a party to celebrate.

Of course, we won’t be seeing the real benefits for a while (maybe for a few years, even), but the point is, the process has begun. Does this mean we can say goodbye to IE 6, CSS hacks, and IE conditional tags? Well, of course not! It’s never that easy when it comes to Windows or Microsoft. But again, the process has begun.

Am I saying that there are no problems with the other browsers? No I’m not. Try to find an old copy of Firefox 1.5 and load up a current website. It’s going to look very ugly. The point is, Firefox (I’m not sure about the other browsers) has long ago implemented automatic updates to their products. Old versions, simply disappear.

You Just Can’t Make People Happy

For years, Microsoft has been getting flack about old versions of Internet Explorer. The irony is that, now they’ve finally done something about it, but not everyone is happy.

The blogosphere is heating up over some some interesting options in the Internet Explorer 8 installation process. Eager to spread its shiny next-generation browser, IE 8, to the masses, Microsoft has included an option which resets the user’s default browser in what some argue is too subtle a manner. The “Express” option during the IE 8 install is designed to make the install quicker and easier for novice users.

Seriously, What’s The Big Deal?

The funny thing is that, unlike many installations I’ve seen, the “Express” option isn’t checked by default. Both choices are blank. You can’t accidentally perform the Express install by just hitting the Next button (yes, that’s how I perform most of my installs). You have to purposefully click the “Express” button.

However, I don’t see what the big deal is, honestly. I don’t see how this is different from any other browser install. I can’t be sure (I’ve never had a clean install for a while) but, I don’t think there’s a way to stop the Firefox Automatic update, once it gets started. I open up my browser and magically there’s a new version. At least Microsoft takes you through the installation process.

My point is, who cares? If a user is savvy enough to install Firefox or Opera, this is the worst case scenario:

• Install IE 8 and unknowingly set it to default.
• Hit the “Internet” button and be surprised when IE 8 loads up.
• Get’s slightly annoyed
• Click the “Firefox”/”Opera” icon
• Get prompted to make that browser default again.
• Go on with life.

It takes all of 4.5 seconds to correct the problem. Are the other browser makers that scared that people will actually say:

Hmmph, well since it’s already defaulted let me see what it’s about. Wow, IE 8 is actually cool.

So what? Is that really sure a bad thing? If, God forbid, Microsoft finally gets something right and builds a better browser, then what’s the harm in people using it?

Mozilla has nothing to fear from me, personally. I can’t live without my Firefox Add-ons. Or maybe I’m just bias; as long as IE 6 goes away I’ll be happy.

Opera’s Solution?

Opera wants the commission to make Microsoft offer alternate browsers using the same Windows Update service the latter relies on to upgrade IE. “That’s one possible remedy,” said Lie, who called it a “must-carry” solution, meaning Windows would have to provide multiple browsers, not just IE.

That is the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. Does Ubuntu automatically install Opera/Safari (hell it might, I’m not really sure but I know it does Firefox)? Does OS X have Firefox/Opera on the list when performing an update? The answer is no! So why would Microsoft do something that stupid? OS X comes with Safari and most regular users don’t question it; Ubuntu comes with Firefox installed and most regular users don’t question it. So what’s the big deal with Microsoft doing the same?

I say leave it up to the user. Right now, it doesn’t matter for a regular user because they are not using a better browser. It doesn’t matter for advanced users, because they know better. Again, this is my bias talking. We’ve started ti slowly inject Internet Explorer 6 with cyanide, now we get to watch it’s slow, painful death; Yay!

Now if we could only get the cooperate enterprise, government, and educational masses to perform the Windows Update, I’ll go ahead and dance a jig.

• Browsers Have Multiple Personalities, Your Designs Should Too
• 5 Ways To Annoy Your Audience
• Make Your Web Site Not Suck In Internet Explorer – IE CSS Min-Height Hack
• HSBC Direct Doesn’t Support Firefox 3.0 – Another Reason To Dump IE 6.0
• Firefox 1.5 Released

Introduction

There are tons of Version Control Systems (VCS) out there: Source Safe (Microsoft’s Baby, which sucks by the way), CVS, and SVN. Git is different from those in one major way: It’s a distributed system as opposed to a centralized one. That means, there is no central repository that users check out revisions from. There can be a central one, but it’s not a requirement. Every use has a complete copy of the entire repository on his system at any one time.

I’m only (intimately) familiar with SVN. So you can read more on the differences between Git and SVN. They range from faster processing, due to the fact that everything is local; to reduced disk space usage by Git.

Personally, Git is a great choice for my type of work. Sometimes, I just want to have Version Control in one directory for one project. I don’t want to get messy with all the central repositories and servers and everything like that. Also, if you travel, you just slap that entire folder on a USB drive and take it to any other computer and continue working. If that computer has Git installed, you can perform your commits or you can wait to commit when you reach home.

Let’s Get Started – Installation and Setup

First off, let me apologize to the Linux users. I found one simple git tutorial for Ubuntu. Everything else pointed to building from source. I guess that’s not that hard.

Windows and OS X users are in luck. There are prepackaged installers for both systems.

For Windows, download the msysgit package and you’re ready to go. If you think you need more of a UI you can get TortoiseGit, which is a shell extension for Windows Explorer. One plus I’ve noticed with this tool is that it has a great diff viewer. Be advised: I’ve been warned that git is slower on a Windows system, so you might want to avoid Windows for those huge projects.

OS X users also have a great option: OS X Git Installer. Or you can build from source like the other Linux users.

There’s not much to set up after that. Most of the Git usage is from the command line, so there’s no need for any other fancy tools.

Now, there are a ton of tutorials out there on how to get started, so I’m not going to bore you with that, but I will highlight some of the things I’ve found.

Hosting Remote Repositories

One of the great advantages I’ve found with Git is that it doesn’t need a central or remote repository. That’s great if you don’t need to work offline. However, that’s not to say it can’t have one.

I’m sure everyone has heard of GitHub. This is, by far, the major Git hosting service. But, there are limitations (of course). Their free plan doesn’t allow private projects and it’s limited to 300 MB in size. There are some other places where you can host Git projects, however if you already pay for a web hosting service you may have all you need.

The only requirement is that the service allows SSH shell access. After that, you’re good to go. There’s a lovely tutorial on how to install git on a shared host. Even if you don’t want to read the tutorial, you can just copy and paste the commands.

Currently, I’m on HostMonster’s hosting service for $8/month. So tacking Git onto that already existing host just made sense.

Git Work Flow (And Modification) I’ve Adopted

Some time ago, I stumbled across this article on web based work flow for Git.

The key idea in this system is that the web site exists on the server as a pair of repositories; a bare repository alongside a conventional repository containing the live site. Two simple Git hooks link the pair, automatically pushing and pulling changes between them.

It’s actually a great idea. You have one central repository or hub and one “live” site. The hub has is a bare repository; it has no workspace and you can’t checkout any files. The prime, however, has it’s own work space, which hosts your live site.

When you push into the hub the hooks (set article for setup) automatically push those changes over to the prime or live repository. Likewise, the prime has hooks that function when a commit is done: they push changes back to the hub. So ideally, all your major development would be pushed to the hub which, in turn, pushes those changes to the live site. Now if you make a one off change to the live site (who says that never happens) you can hit commit and it will push those changes back to your hub.

I don’t need that level of automation for what I’m doing. So, I do have a central repository, however, I push to my live site directly. I have a branch in my project called live when I merge or rebase stuff from master into. I think push this branch to the live site. My live site has a hook that does a simple git reset --HARD in the working directory to update everything.

That’s all I got for now.

• Installing A LAMP Web Server System With Fedora Core 6
• Automate MySQL Database Backup With WebCron – No Cron Jobs? No Problem – Part 1
• Should A Business Use Free Web Hosting?
• AJAX Client Engine (ACE) – Problems
• InsaneGB Review – Free Web Server 5GB Disk Space, 20GB Bandwidth

Fiona King presents 10 Best Ruby/RoR Web Hosts Compared ? 2009 posted at WHDb.

general

Marcus Hochstadt presents Using A CMS For A Content-Rich Website posted at Marcus Hochstadt, saying, “Marcus describes how he migrated one of his static HTML sites into a Content Management System. Which platform did he choose and why?”

javascript

Jason Maletsky presents Show Partial Content, Slide Animate with jQuery posted at Website Builders Resource, saying, “This plugin will show a partial amount of content from a and allow the user to click a link from the title or a link at the bottom to view the rest of the content with a sliding action.”

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Web Development 2.0 using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags: web development 2.0, blog carnival.

• Web Development 2.0 Carnival – November 21, 2008
• Web Development 2.0 Carnival – September 24, 2007
• Web Development 2.0 Carnival – September 8, 2007
• The Secret of CakePHP Advanced Routing – Even Better URLs
• Website Promotion with DiscountClick

Christmas Eve have just started at about 12:03 AM, when I logged on and saw that dreaded message:

Your Account Has Exceeded Its CPU Quota

So I did what all normal people do at first: I ignored it. Actually, I had a very good reason to at the time. Since it was 12:03 AM, I assumed that my nightly backup job (backup and compress files and databases) was causing the issue.

So after it happened the next day (a few times) I decided to do some investigation.

The Culprit – Comment Relish

HostMonster does a good job of providing some helpful information that you can use to figure out these issues. I went to the directory: cpu_exceeded_logs and sure enough there was a file with today’s (and yesterday’s) date in there. I opened it up and so a ton of referrences to comments on a Wordpress Blog:

/ramdisk/bin/php5 /home1/user/public_html/domain.com/wp-comments-post.php

That narrowed things down a little bit. The other helpful directory was mysql_slow_queries. Here I found the following query over and over again:
[code='sql']
SELECT c.*, p.*
FROM wp__comments c
INNER JOIN wp__posts p ON p.ID = c.comment_post_ID
LEFT JOIN wp__cr_emailed e ON e.email = c.comment_author_email
WHERE e.email IS NULL AND c.comment_approved = '1'
[/code]

It didn’t take too long to figure out that cr stood for Comment Relish.

A little bit of Googling showed me that in some circles, it’s not a very well liked plugin. Some more searching revealed something a bit more technically helpful.

So there you have it, disable Comment Relish and all is well with the world again.

Best of Both Worlds – Proper Fix Instead of Disabling

Now partly because this was a blog I was hosting for someone else and partly because I’m the type of person who’s never satisfied unless they have the answer to everything, I found a middle ground: Good server performance while still maintaining the functionality of the plugin.

So the main problem isn’t the query. Well maybe it is, but I didn’t want to go redesign the entire plugin. Wordpress performs tons of these queries all the time and they don’t seem to cause issues. The problem is with table indexes (or lack thereof).

Pulling up PHPMyAdmin showed me that there’s no indexes on cr_emailed.email or comments.comment_author_email; both of which are used above. So that’s a simple fix right? Actually, no. Adding an index to the comments table was simple enough; although some people rather not mess with the Wordpress core tables.

The problem is with the table used for Comment Relish: you can’t apply an index on wp__cr_emailed.email because it’s tinytext. Go ahead, try and there’s an error. I guess the author decided on tinytext because it would be smaller than varchar? Not sure if there’s a way arond this or not, but I really wasn’t in the mood to investigate. I’ve used varchar all my life and it’s served me well. So we simply get rid of it, then add the index:
[code='sql']
ALTER TABLE `cr_emailed` CHANGE `email` `email` varchar(255);
ALTER TABLE wp_cr_emailed ADD INDEX ( email )
[/code]

And voila!

Do I Need This With The New Version?

The short answer is yes!
Since this problem has arisen there has been a new version of the plugin put out the combats this problem; there are still many problems with this however:

1. Since this isn’t part of the official Wordpress Plugins, you don’t get the upgrade notice. So I didn’t even know I was running an old version.
2. The author has decided to use to very same 1.0 version number with the new version, so you can’t even tell if you running the old version without examining the code.
3. Although there has been a database fix that uses varchar instead of tinytext and applies an index, this fix is only for creation of a new database. So you won’t get the benefit is your table has already been created with the old code.

Hope this helps you folks who are as curious as I was or those who’ve disabled this plugin because of its issues but secretly miss what it does.

• Wordpress 2.5+ Upload Image Error – Finally Fixed!
• Yay! Wordpress 2.5. Almost Perfect
• Wordpress 2.5 – The Vista of Blog Platforms
• Moving Wordpress To A Different Domain
• Reward Your Regular Readers – Skip The Ads

So you’re all grown up and want Rounded Corners on your site. There’s just one small problem: the normal rounded corners implementation comes with tons of divs used for styles and you’ve got your fellow web developers screaming down your neck about web semantics.

So what’s this funky semantics thing? Basically, we’re looking for a separation of styles and data. We want to keep all the styles in the CSS style sheets and all the data in the XHTML files. Now, I’ve been known to be flexible on this a bit, however it is a great idea with a purpose and in this case, it actually helps us out a ton.

Ignore Me – Take The Easy Way Out

There are two jQuery plugins that can do this instantly, aptly named jQuery Corners and jQuery Corner. Yeah, I know totally different, right? They vary slightly in terms of their capabilities (anti-aliasing, background images, etc.). So if you’re not up to the heavy lifting or your requirements are very light (just basic rounding) these plugins more than fit the bill.

Classic Rounded Corners

Now, if you’re looking for something that regular borders and the plugins above can’t manage, take a look classic implementation of rounded corners. We’re using images to make things look exactly like we want them to.

Essentially, we’re wrapping (if you think visually, it’s more layering actually) tons of divs in order to apply different background images. All these divs are needed because you can only apply one background image to an HTML element.

So a basic run down is that we need four (4) divs for the corners (top left, top right, bottom left, bottom right) and four (4) more for the sides (top, bottom, left, right). This allows us to add the four images in appropriate positions. Please note that all these divs gives us the option of having rounded divs that can be freely resized.

As mentioned about, the problem is that these are eight (8) huge divs, which are not very semantic; not to mention they add useless code to the HTML download.

Some things to note:

• Side Divs First – Top, Bottom, Right, and Left divs must be on the outside of the corners. If not the effect may not come out right. I think it has something to do with transparency, but somethings are easier to fix than to diagnose.
• Check Transparancy – Keep in mind that if your images are PNG you might need to apply some of the horrendous IE 6 hacks.
• Padding and Margins – I don’t think the original article mentioned, however since we are layering divs, they shouldnt’ have any margins. Divs don’t usually do, but depending on your current styles, you might need to reset.
• Perfect Slices – Doesn’t really need much explanation, but your images need to be sliced perfectly so that everything lines up right.

Dynamic Divs

Now, this is where the beauty of jQuery comes in. This is a modification of this tutorial. We’re going to use javascript to inject these divs where we need them.

This is the markup we are aiming for:
[code='html']

[/code]

I know, messy right? Although the original article mentions wrapping these around your main div, but it works perfectly fine by putting them inside. Also, it enables us to do some fun stuff later on. Since all these guys have no padding, the inner class is needed to apply needed padding for contents. You could just apply these styles to bl however, I don’t want to have to remember which one of these is the inner one.

Here’s out basic CSS
[code='css']
.t {background: url(t.png) 0 0 repeat-x;}
.b {background: url(b.png) 0 100% repeat-x}
.l {background: url(l.png) 0 0 repeat-y;}
.r {background: url(r.png) 100% 0 repeat-y;}
.bl {background: url(bl.png) 0 100% no-repeat;}
.br {background: url(br.png) 100% 100% no-repeat;}
.tl {background: url(tl.png) 0 0 no-repeat;}
.tr {background: url(tr.png) 100% 0 no-repeat;}
[/code]

Notice we’re repeating the images used for the sides, so slice accordingly.

With jQuery, this is the only HTML that you need:
[code='html']

[/code]

Now, isn’t that much nicer?

Now, here’s the magical jQuery code:
[code='javascript']
$(document).ready(function() {
$(".rounded").wrapInner('

');
});
[/code]

Now, I might have made a typo, so you may need to check. The wrapInner( ) function does exactly what it says (sort of): it wraps your content with those nested divs, but on the inside.

Um, yeah, that’s about it. Cool huh?

Yes, It’s Extensible

Now you can use this and apply it to tons of different rounded corners on your site. Simply add the rounded class to the div in question. eg:
[code='html']

[/code]

Then you modify your CSS to apply the new images:
[code='css']
.widget .t {background: url(widget-t.png);}
.widget .b {background: url(widget-b.png);}
.widget .l {background: url(widget-l.png);}
.widget .r {background: url(widget-r.png);}
.widget .bl {background: url(widget-bl.png);}
.widget .br {background: url(widget-br.png);}
.widget .tl {background: url(widget-tl.png);}
.widget .tr {background: url(widget-tr.png);}
[/code]

Now you see why we’re wrapping inside the div, instead of outside. That way, we can target different images for different divs on the site, without changing any javascript calls. Cool huh?

Now technically, we don’t need the images on the original divs, however I haven’t found a clean (shorthand) way of applying background positions and repeats without an image URL.

Hope you enjoyed and hope it works.

• The Lazy Developer’s Way to Rounded Corners in CSS – Rounded Corner Generators
• Create 3 Column CSS Layouts Like A CSS God!
• Nifty Corners: Rounded Corners Without Images
• See How Easily You Can Increase Page Load Time 10 Fold With jQuery
• Wordpress Widgets

So I’m sitting here last night minding my own business and Chris Coyier sends out a tweet talking about how it took him 10 minutes to upgrade. So I figure, why not? I already had the Wordpress Automatic Upgrade plugin ready to go, so I figured it would be a breeze. I guess I was wrong.

What Went Wrong

So I follow all the steps in the automatic upgrade. Everything seems to be going fine, however after the database upgrade I was bumped back into the admin screen. Everything was looking totally screwed up. Icons were scattered all over, colors were wrong, things were positioned incorrectly. It basically looked like the CSS style sheet was screwed up for some reason.

So I figured that my CSS and possibly JS files are still cached on my browser and that’s what causing the problem. So I did a screen refresh; nothing. I did a forced refresh; nothing. I cleared the cache; nothing. I cleared all the cookies; nothing. I started up Internet Explorer; nothing.

So the obvious answer was that something was wrong with the automatic upgrade plugin. I spent the next 20 minutes installing manually (twice) just to get back to scare one. Maybe it was the host? Maybe it was my machine? Maybe my internet connection?

What Actually Happened – My Server Setup, That’s What

Now I need to brief you a lil’ bit on the stuff I have set up on my server.

Some time ago, I was researching serving up compressed (Gzipped) data from my blog. Now I think Wordpress has an option for this, at least they used to. Regardless, I use WP-SuperCache and I know that it has that functionality. However, what would really be great is if I could gzip my CSS and JS files. That’s what paying too much attention to Website Grader does to you.

The first problem is that my current host doesn’t support mod_gzip. Therefore I had to use a less elegant method. I didn’t want to use any PHP method, since I figured that would be too much work for the server. So, this is my setup (don’t worry, I’ll most details later):

• Setup Apache rewrites to point all JS and CSS files to js.gz and css.gz if available. Here, I also set expires headers for way in the future.
• Download and compile minifying script
• Gzip minified scripts
• Set up the above in a daily cron job

Now, those of you chuckling right now, have seen huge mess that this is going to develop into. Basically, I make the server serve up compressed versions of the stles and JavaScript if available.

So, after doing the Wordpress upgrade, although I had brand. new .css and .js files, my .js.gz and .css.gz files were still from Wordpress 2.6.5. No wonder my admin screen was in a mess.

Sorry for blaming you, Mr. 2.7. So far everything looks great, I must say.

• InsaneGB Review – Free Web Server 5GB Disk Space, 20GB Bandwidth
• Yay! Wordpress 2.5. Almost Perfect
• Moving Wordpress To A Different Domain
• CakePHP Installation Guide: Just Add Water and 2 Medium Eggs
• FeedBurner + Google search cache = Instant Blog Back Up

Dereck presents My Google Penalty and My Response posted at I Will Not Die.

Sly presents 5 Search Engine Optimization Tips for Wordpress Blogs posted at Slyvisions dot Com.

Although I’m more or less devoted to CakePHP as my PHP Frameowrk, it’s also good to diversify sometimes. Greg Allard presents Quick Thumbnails in Django posted at Code Spatter.

Margaret Garcia presents Top 20 iPhone Apps for Entrepreneurs posted at Web Design Schools Guide.

That concludes this edition. Submit your blog article to the next edition of Web Development 2 using our carnival submission form. Past posts and future hosts can be found on our blog carnival index page.

Technorati tags: web development 2, blog carnival.

• Web Development 2.0 Carnival – December 26, 2008
• Web Development 2.0 Carnival – September 24, 2007
• Web Development 2.0 Carnival – September 8, 2007
• HTML Tutorial
• Fixing the Back Button and Enabling Bookmarking for AJAX Apps

After Pascal, I was looking into something visual. Hence, I fell into Visual Basic 5.0. Yeah, I know, I’m sorry.

Legal Issues

Now this was my first step towards the open source community. I must admit, that I downloaded a pirated copy and ran with it for a while. Now, that was all well and good when I was sitting home playing around with stuff. But when it came to actually, to producing something for a market, you can’t (or should I say, shouldn’t) do that with pirated software.

After that, I got into web development. For this, there was a plethora of free tools available, for use. So I did that for a while. When I got back to college, I got into C++ (using Visual Studio, but still essentially free). That was a step in the right direction. However, as the semesters went on, we got more into using the .NET library. However, for my web development I never got into ASP.

The First Real Plunge into Open Source – Enter PHP

Bit by bit, web development gave way to web programming. This is where PHP came in. I got more familiar with PHP when I started working on different projects for clients. I chose PHP for a few main reasons:

1. Free Documentation: I could learn almost everything I needed through online documentation.
2. Cost: My first problem was hosting. ASP hosts used to be almost twice as expensive as their Linux counterparts.

The Open Source Misconception

One of the problems that people have with Open Source is that they think that it’s unsupported. People seem to think that open source software is written by a bunch of kids in basements or something. This is not the case, by any means.  For example, a lot of the Linux distributions are totally free and totally supported.  Wake up people; free doesn’t mean unsupported. The whole “You get what you pay for” isn’t always true.

Why I Use Open Source Software

For my personal web development, I run a very small team and we do work part time. This is no time to shell out $6,000 for a standard license of SQL Server 2005. MySQL server 5.0 is a very robust database server. It should be able to handle itself in a lot of the situations that people think they need to throw SQL Server at. Where, MySQL fails to deliver, PostgreSQL should be more than sufficient.

Open source software and products just make life easier. Take examples like, jQuery and CakePHP. Would it be possible for an in-house team to come up with the same thing? Yes, sure? But why? Especially when a team (not just one guy) has put years into one special product. The price of the software does not dictate it’s quality.

What Not To Do

Now, one word of wisdom: All open source software isn’t the same. You need to do your research before diving into open source. Look up research about the product’s history, community support, and most importantly the support. If you run a very small shop, then almost anything will work for you; especially since you’re main goal would be to keep costs down.

However, a large company should not thumb their nose at open source software either. Unless you have a team dedicated to doing one task, and doing it well, why not utilise a tried and true method? Why do we always feel the need to reinvent the wheel? Seriously, your team may be extremely skilled, but can you guys really crank out a better Javascript Framework than jQuery? I doubt it.

Take a hint from one of the largest; Microsoft has recenlty started shipping jQuery with their .NET 3.5 framework. They even have intellisense support for it in Visual Studio. Open source is the way of the future, as long as we learn to use it correctly.

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Reasonable Requirements

Now some of these requirements I can understand. Some of them are actually reasonable. I can deal with a minimum length; although these days they seem to be getting longer than eight (8) characters.

I just don’t think that I need this type of protection. Although I don’t use the same password for every website (any more, lol). Currently, I use an algorithm to generate a password for a new site. It’s a combination of a common stem or base and appending the service name that I’m logging into (eg. Yahoo, Gmail, etc.)

My Problem With Requirements

Currently, my stem only consists of lowercase letters and numbers. I know it’s not the most secure base, but it’s long enough and it serves the purpose. What I can’t stand is a site that needs me to enter a special character or an upper case character.

Call me crazy, I just hate having to hit the stupid <Shift> key when I need to be typing in a password. Hell, I hate holding down the shift key, period. So for all you website administrators out there, please don’t force me to do anything I don’t want to. The only thing this results in, is me forgetting my password the next time I come to your site.

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You’re Out On Your Own

The problem right now is that, you’re all on your own. You need to describe your data on your own. So, on with it:

Here’s your model code:
[code='php']
class Contact extends AppModel {
var $name = 'Contact';
var $useTable = false; // Not using the database, of course.

// All the fancy validation you could ever want.
var $validate = array(
'name' => array(
'rule' => '/.+/',
'allowEmpty' => false,
'required' => true,
),
'subject' => array(
'rule' => array('minLength', 5),
'message' => 'Subject must be 5 characters long'
),
'email' => array(
'rule' => 'email',
'message' => 'Please enter a valid email address'
),
);

// This is where the magic happens
function schema() {
return array (
'name' => array('type' => 'string', 'length' => 60),
'email' => array('type' => 'string', 'length' => 60),
'message' => array('type' => 'text', 'length' => 2000),
'subject' => array('type' => 'string', 'length' => 100),
);
}
}
[/code]

What The User Sees

I think the model’s the hardest part. The view is ridiculous:
[code='php']
echo $form->create(null, array('action' => 'index'));
echo $form->input('name');
echo $form->input('email');
echo $form->input('subject');
echo $form->input('message');
echo $form->submit();
echo $form->end();
[/code]
I know; you’re disappointed right? Sorry.

How Do We Control All This?

So, here’s your controller. I was going to leave that up to you, but it’s so simple that I can’t help it:
[code='php']
class ContactController extends AppController
{
var $name = 'Contact';
var $uses = 'Contact';
var $helpers = array('Html', 'Form', 'Javascript');
var $components = array('Email', 'Session');
function index(){
if(isset($this->data)) {
$this->Contact->create($this->data);
// There is no save(), so we need to validate manually.
if($this->Contact->validates()){
$this->Email->to = Configure::read('CONTACT_EMAIL');
$this->Email->replyTo = $this->data['Contact']['email'];
$this->Email->from = $this->data['Contact']['name'].' <'.$this->data['Contact']['email'].'>';
$this->Email->subject = 'Contact Form: '.$this->data['Contact']['subject'];
//$this->Email->delivery = 'debug';
if ($this->Email->send($this->data['Contact']['message'])) {
$this->Session->setFlash('Thank you for contacting us');
//$this->redirect('/');
} else {
$this->Session->setFlash('Mail Not Sent');
}
$this->redirect(array('action' => 'index'));
} else {
$this->Session->setFlash('Please Correct Errors');
//$this->redirect('/contacts');
}
}
}
}
[/code]

After I got halfway through this, I remembered that Snook had written something very similar, sorry J.

There’s one subtle difference that I’ve noticed, that I need to point out.
var $_schema as apposed to function schema(). In the original CakePHP code, one of the major actions of Model::function() is to return var Model::$_shema. So, Tom-ay-to/Tom-a-to; it really doesn’t matter.

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The Problem

But the other day, I decided to open a second account with HSBC and I got the following error:

A Technical Error Has Occurred

I was only trying to transfer money from one account to another, I didn’t get it. So I figured there must be some problem with the website right? So I wait it out for a few days to let them fix their problem. But alas, the next time I checked, same problem. So finally, I decided to write their Tech Support and I got the following back in a lovely email:

Recently our website had some updates that your Internet browser may not
yet recognize.  As such, please delete your browser’s cookies and
temporary Internet files and attempt the transfer again.   If you are
still unable to perform the transfer, please contact us at the number
below so that we may help troubleshoot the problem.

The following are HSBC-supported browsers:

Windows:
Internet Explorer – versions 6.0 and 7.0
Mozilla/FireFox ? version 1.5 and 2.0

Macintosh:
Safari ? version 2.0

So I followed the instructions: I cleared my cache and deleted my cookies (even though it pained me), but it still didn’t work. I sat there and scratched my head for a minute before I finally realized what the heck was going on. Then I loaded up my copy of Internet Explorer 7.0 and did a transfer with no problems. Then I read the rest of the email. Yep, the recent updates to the website were not compatible with Firefox 3.0. Now I don’t understand something, because it’s not like there was any fancy AJAX functions. I just click the button that says transfer.  Later I found a link to HSBC’s Support Page and found this remedy to my problem:

1) Keep your browser up-to-date.
HSBC Direct website supports MS Internet Explorer 5.5 SP4 or higher.
Currently HSBC Direct website does not support other web browsers such Firefox & Mozilla, Please use MS Internet Explorer and keep your computer & browser up-to-date.

So, let me get this straight, I need to keep my browser updated, but not too updated. OK, HSBC.

What I Think Happened

So let me take a wild crack at what happened, some executives at HSBC made the decision for the new updates on the website and they insisted that the developers support older browsers; IE 6, for example. Usually, there’s not much wrong with this if it’s done right. They got away with some hackish code that seems to work for what they had at the time, then Fireofx 3.0 came out with this strange idea called standards compliance and just messed up their whole backwards compatible world.

Again, let me point of this is what I think happened, but this is a classic reason, why we should be supporting better standards for web development.

But all of this is easier said than done. Before going down any path, you need to examine your market before making such decisions. But you also need to consider future markets. How much is it going to cost to fix this lil boo boo? Possibly a lot. Are they going to fix it anytime soon? I’m guessing no. I don’t think Firefox 3.0 (seeing, that it’s just a few months old) has any sort of market share that they are going to care much. So all you Linux and Mac users better not follow all those upgrade warnings for your browser. You won’t be able to transfer funds. Typical example of powerful people in expensive suits making decisions about technology.

What Should Be Done

Now, I’m not anti-Microsoft or even anti-IE-6, but I am anti-stuff-that-wastes-my-time. The problem isn’t IE 6 per say. IE 6 had a purpose, back in 2001 and (for the most part) it fulfilled that purpose. The real problem is that we’re trying to implement 2008 technology on a 7 year old platform. You don’t really see this many other places in the tech world. New software comes out and you don’t have enough RAM, then tough nuts, you need to upgrade. Microsoft is notorious for this actually. SQL Server 2005 refuses to restore a backup fro SQL Server 2000, and they say tough nuts. The brand new Call of Duty 4 for the XBox 360 (I assume) won’t run on a regular XBox will it? Nor do PS3 games work on PS2 and Nintendo Wii games don’t work on a Gamecube. So I’m really tired of hearing this crap about IE 6 is being pushed by the market and not the industry. The industry controls the market. A lot of IE 6 users don’t really know any better. They got IE 6 and people make accommodations for them in the name of backwards compatibility.

Now, I’ve heard people say that all this browser compatibility issues is due to “developer whining”. And, they’d be right to a certain extent. But what very few realize, is that developer whining often translates directly to a dollar figure. The more time that goes into patching crappy, workaround code for older browsers; the less time that’s being spent on new development and fixing legitimate bugs. And when some HSBC-like snafu happens, someone needs to fix it. Now plain out boycott is a bit harsh. There are some people that can’t upgrade for good reason (the folks in the cooperate office with the older PCs that they don’t have rights to install stuff on). But I’m much in support of the gentle nudge approach like is done on Save The Developers:

[sourcecode language='html'][/sourcecode]

This brings up a nice lil’ AJAX-ish looking slide down image in the upper right corner with the details on why the user should upgrade. And no, it’s not a ploy to push Firefox. The first link on the page is to download IE 7. Even though, I’m a Firefox lover, I might not be using it if I started browsing with IE 7. To be honest, tabbed browsing is what did it for me. It had nothing to do with compatibility, with code, etc; because at that time I didn’t know better and didn’t care.

Now as a developer, I would love to see a boycott, but that’s not realistic; because like it or not, IE 6.0 still has a large grasp (at least 25%) on the market. However, I do explain the problems with IE 6.0 and I explain to them why it’s going to take more time and cost more to develop for. It’s simple Math: it takes time to do all those JavaScript and CSS hacks.

So we need to cuddling the users of Internet Explorer 6.0: ween them off the bottle, get the thumb out of their mouth, get them off the tit and on some formula. All IE 6.0 users, it’s time to ditch the Pampers a get some Big Boy Pants. 2001 was a long time ago, in the life of web technology, it’s time to grow up.

• 5 Ways To Annoy Your Audience
• Internet Explorer 8 – The Drama Begins
• Make Your Web Site Not Suck In Internet Explorer – IE CSS Min-Height Hack
• Browsers Have Multiple Personalities, Your Designs Should Too
• Blog Theme Designers Given Up on IE 6?

My Set Up

I won’t go into detail, but I think being on Dreamhost has something to do with it, because trying all this on my local PC with XAMPP Lite on Windows XP.

Here’s What I Tried

In addition to trying all of the above on my existing blogs, I’ve tried the fresh install approach. I installed a fresh copy of Wordpress and then bit by bit, I copied in database tables. All seemed to go fine, for a while, then (for some reason) I would just get that error again. It didn’t matter what the browswer was either. When I attempt to insert an image the screen would blank out.

Here’s The Problem

I noticed that the stuff would always break when I copied over the options table to my Wordpress database. So after many, many hours and copying records (almost) one by one into the newly installed Wordpress database, I’ve finally narrowed it down. The Wordpress address (URL) needs to be all lowercase or else the thing just doesn’t work. I don’t really have an explanation for it and frankly, after all this time, I don’t really care; I’m just happy it finally works.

Now, I suppose that it’s my fault for wanting fancy looking URLs, so I take the blame.

Hope everyone else finds this helpful.

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Now, I’m having mixed emotions about this. On one hand, I’m happy that people are finally putting the nail in IE 6.0’s coffin. However, I’m slightly pissed that I can’t use these themes. I, more than anyone, should know the reasons why we should abaondon IE 6.0 and move on to better, more productive web development and enjoyment. But, the purist in me still doesn’t want to leave the poor saps who are trapped behind the veil (whether is by software contraints or ignorance) of Internet Explorer 6.0 behind.

Browser statistics show that IE 6 still maintains between 26% and 37% of the web browser market. Right now, that’s just too many people to ignore.

• I Hate Internet Explorer 6.0 Even More
• 5 Ways To Annoy Your Audience
• IE Hack: CSS Centering – Another Reason I Hate Internet Explorer
• LinkMania: January 18, 2007
• Internet Explorer 8 – The Drama Begins

Here’s The Problem

ie-css-min-height-hack
This is how normal people horizontally center block elements using CSS: You slap on a width (I mean, that should be obvious enough right?). Then you set the left and right margins to auto, and Voilà, centered!
[sourcecode language='css']
body #box {
margin: 0 auto;
width: 780px;
}
[/sourcecode]

Well except in Internet Explorer and some older browsers.

Fixing The Problem

This one is a bit nicer than the CSS min-height hack. You need to use the text-align property to center for the element above, because Internet Explorer sucks and doesn’t understand the auto margin. Now too fix this, you need to reset the text-align to left.

[sourcecode language='css']
body {
text-align: center;
}

body #box {
margin: 0 auto;
padding: 56px 0 20px;
width: 780px;
text-align: left;
}
[/sourcecode]

That’s it folks!

• Make Your Web Site Not Suck In Internet Explorer – IE CSS Min-Height Hack
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• I Think I Owe IE 6 An Apology, Nah.
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• HSBC Direct Doesn’t Support Firefox 3.0 – Another Reason To Dump IE 6.0

The Min-Height Problem

I know a lot of you have had this problem in the past. It’s gotten so bad for me that, at one point, I’ve just stopped using them. Bottom line, Internet Explorer pretends it doesn’t see the min-height property. It uses the regular height property as a min-height. Confused? Let me make it a bit simpler:

Firefox

The height property is a fixed size. It doesn’t shrink and it doesn’t expand with content.

The min-height property is exactly what it says: it gives the element a minimum height, but it still expands with the content of the element. It’s perfect for if you have an element that will just look totally ugly if you it’s empty.

Internet Explorer

The height property is interpreted as a minimum height, funny enough. Doesn’t that suck?

IE CSS Min-Height Hack

But here’s the good news, there’s a fix/hack. Now mind you, there are tons of different ways to get around this issue. There’s conditional IE tags, there’s Javascript hacks, etc. I’ll focus on two, which I like. So here’s what we’re working with:
[sourcecode language='css']
#box {
min-height:100px;
}
[/sourcecode]

Solution/Hack One

Since, IE doesn’t understand min-height, we have to force a regular height on the element that the other browsers can’t see:
[sourcecode language='css']
#box {
min-height:100px;
}
/* mac hide \*/
* html #box{height:500px}
/* end hide */
[/sourcecode]

To me personally, this feels right (because we’re doing something specifically for IE and hiding it from other browsers), except for one thing: it involves two hacks. As the comments suggest, IE 5 (I think) for MAC does implement the height property correctly. This just gets worse and worse, doesn’t it?

Solution/Hack Two

[sourcecode language='css']
#box {
min-height:100px;
height: 100px;
}

html > body #box {
height: auto;
}
[/sourcecode]

Here’s the explanation: We set min-height for Firefox (and other well behaved browsers), then we immediately set the height property so that IE can be happy. This has the effect of, essentially, defeating the purpose of min-height for the proper browser. We then use the CSS child selectors (which, conveniently IE can’t see), to set the height back to auto and make everyone happy.

There’s a slight problem when using 100% heights that I don’t really want to get into, but you can see a fix for it here.

Why I love this hack, is because it’s a little bit cleaner. But the really great part about this is that, because we only set height to auto as a fix, we can fix multiple elements all in one line:
[sourcecode language='css']
html > body #box,html > body #box2,html > body #box3,html > body #box4, html > body #etc {
height: auto;
}
[/sourcecode]

Well folks, there we have it. The nasty subject of CSS hacks. Hope this helps.

• IE Hack: CSS Centering – Another Reason I Hate Internet Explorer
• Internet Explorer 8 – The Drama Begins
• Browsers Have Multiple Personalities, Your Designs Should Too
• 5 Ways To Annoy Your Audience
• I Hate Internet Explorer 6.0 Even More

They Say PHP Sucks

You’ll hear the same claims every single time: “Google PHP Sucks you’ll see how much PHP sucks”. Oh please! This is some of what the haters usually use for the argument:

• “There are too many functions“
• PHP Isn’t OOP
• Everything is strung together – This claim usually talks about the interaction between PHP and/or SQL

In Defense of PHP

The number one claim is that everything in PHP feels like it’s clunky and may fall apart at any time. Granted, I’ll be the first to admit that I hate boring SQL queries. Keyword here is boring. Within the past year, I’ve really gotten to see that SQL has a lot of power. Learning of all of awesome power, just makes me hate writing crap like:
[sourcecode language='sql']
select title, body, post_date from posts where id = 32
[/sourcecode]

Functions, Functions, Functions

I, myself, have never really understood the “too many functions” argument. Maybe it does make the documentation a bit muggy to get through, but how many functions that are in there have very little to do with me. I don’t care, I just use a handful of them.

PHP is OPP – That’s All There Is To It

We need to make a distinction here: PHP 5 is Object Oriented. The problem is a lot of PHP code that you can find out there isn’t. PHP has this classic gift and a curse: it makes it damn easy to get something functional out the door in a hurry.

I mean, I’d love to see a bit more OOP, but that’s an implementation issue. And the piles of arrays for data storage are a lil’ bit of a pain, but again, that’s an implementation issue.

PHP Is Not A Framework – Get Over It

Now, I know what you’re thinking: “Baz, you’re a lazy bastard, that’s isn’t so hard to write”. And you’re be totally right. But after the 25th time writing this or some simple variation of this, you can’t help but feel that you’re wasting your time. Now here’s the kicker: This isn’t a problem isolated to PHP. Most other programming languages (listen to me well: Programming Languages) suffer the same fate. You’re going to see SQL strung out throughout code in any language, I don’t see why people keep blaming PHP for this.

This is a classic in the PHP vs. Rails saga. Haters often compare PHP, a simple programming (scripting even) language to a very complex web development framework. I don’t care what you say, but that’s like comparing a factory stock model car to a car with 2 years of work and $20,000 of after market parts. Luckily, the folks at Rails Envy have made an attempt at clearing this up with their mention of CakePHP:

Time To Take Responsibility

As programmers and web developers, I think it’s time to take a lil’ bit of responsibility for the type of code we write. I don’t know about you, but regardless of the language, I can write some very nasty code. It all depends on the frame of mind. I’ve seen varying levels of PHP code: I’ve seen dozens and dozens of code blocks (not functions) in one index.php file. I’ve also seen nice, clean, refactored, DRY code.

Granted, PHP makes it a bit easier to be lazy, but do we blame the language for that? Come on guys, let’s put on our big boy pants, read a book about code design, and apply it to any language that you’re coding in. PHP powers some of the largest sites on the internet, someone’s doing it right. Stop being mad because you can’t. Stop using the programming language as a crutch and learn how to apply proper coding techniques to any language.

Bottom Line:

Some of the largest sites on the internet — sites you probably interact with on a daily basis — are written in PHP. If PHP sucks so profoundly, why is it powering so much of the internet?

The only conclusion I can draw is that building a compelling application is far more important than choice of language. While PHP wouldn’t be my choice, and if pressed, I might argue that it should never be the choice for any rational human being sitting in front of a computer, I can’t argue with the results.

Source: PHP Sucks, But It Doesn’t Matter [Coding Horror]

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As of Changeset 6918 this has now been integrated into the CakePHP core. So, we’ll have something to look forward to in the official release of CakePHP 1.2. Mind you, there may be a lot of other hidden gems in there, I just haven’t been paying attention lately .

Most of the functionality is as we remember, with a few exceptions:

• $this->Article->restrict(’Comment’) now becomes
  $this->Article->contain(’Comment’)
• $this->Article->find(’all’, array(’restrict’ => array(’User’))); turns into
  $this->Article->find(’all’, array(’contain’ => array(’User’)));

For a complete list of the differences and changes you can check out the
Containable Test Cases for excellent examples of how to use this to it’s full potential.

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[Shameless Plug]

Enter 3HN Designs.com

3HN Designs comprises of a group of, you guessed it, three (3) developers that have a common goal: to provide quality designs at an affordable price.

Services Provided include:

• Website Design
• Web Application Development
• Logos
• Search Engine Optimization
• etc.

They offer static web design, along with a custom CMS approach and other forum, gallery, and shopping cart scripts.

Under The Hood

So what does the finished product comprise of? Well it depends on what you pay for. At the base price of $500.00, you’ll come away with a nice, fresh looking XHTML/CSS web site that you can mangle to your hearts content.

If you choose to shell out a lil’ bit more, you get something a little more flexible, in that it’s dynamic and you can edit a change the content at your leisure. Now this is my favorite part: it’s written in CakePHP. Nothing flashy, just a editable regions using FCKEditor or TinyMCE. There are also some nice generic options that can be changed, such as: site name, contact email address (for the contact form), etc.

So, if you’re in over your head on a project or you just don’t have the time to deal with a website right now, head over to 3HN Designs for Quality Website Design

[/Shameless Plug]

P.S. I say they because it’s a little bit less shameless then we

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With all the Twitter Rails scaling issues, it’s funny to see this headline from TechCrunch. Guys over at Twitter have renounced this claim though.

Will this make me abandon my quest for learning Ruby on Rails? I highly doubt it. Scaling becomes an issue on extremely high traffic sites. And a lot of the issues that come into play with such a high traffic site, can be easily remedied by things like optimizing queries and caching.

Source: Twitter Said To Be Abandoning Ruby on Rails [TechCrunch]

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