Older blog entries for k (starting at number 62)

Geek:

CSS is cool. I've been playing with it a little. Its about time I became a web developer. Unfortunately my site is far too inconsistent to properly benefit from a CSSing.

Note: contextual selectors are one of the simplest yet powerful things I've ever come across when designing HTML.

Geek:

After many hours of frustration with the apparent broken ports/install on a FreeBSD box at home I decided to forego the access -> ODBC -> Postgres idea and just play, for now, with Access.

I decided that I wanted to build a little 'generic object' construction tableset so I could describe all the objects that I owned. Then I could assign them locations, loan status and all sorts of useless information.

Building the tables was easy. Just create a table, set up the fields and tinker with their properties. Creating the references for referential integrity took a minute with the HLP file and a minute with Google but I finally found it - a GUI for, literally, drag-n-drop referential integrity definition.

It was gorgeous.

Now, before you call me a n00b let me just rant a little.

I know Access has its faults. I've used it in the past but thankfully it was 1996 and I've forgotten all of my clue. But it was simple. For someone like me who has spent a few years hand-building SQL tables, carefully crafting web-UIs for accounting databases, service management databases and all kinds of tedious code-stuff I was relieved to be able to just drag-and-drop stuff around. I could see, instantly, the relationship between my tables. And modify it. Admittedly the many-many RI linking is new to me. :-)

And here's the crux of today's post - knowing about "good" relational database design, understanding referential integrity and having experience hacking out mountains of code makes this kind of application development environment very powerful. I know that Access will take my queries and rewrite them into random gibberish, playing havoc with ODBC-interfaced databases unless I'm careful. I know all about Access' performance issues. But, that aside, it mostly works.

In short, I plan on having a whole heap of fun tinkering with database stuff. Because, after years and years of hacking, I realise that this stuff should be easier but easier doesn't mean you should forsake learning the actual theory and burning yourself first.

Now, on a side note, does anyone know of any opensource style schema/report engines that don't suck? I've come across a few written in Java which I'd pay the price on if they didn't require so much system resources just to run.

Then, does anyone know of any useful GUI open source form and reporting utilities? there has to be a better way of developing web-frontends for database applications without writing mounds of php.

khoerling:

Here's my take. You spend your spare time, which is valuable to you, working on this software you're giving away for free. You're expending your own resources - so why should money be any different? Its still a resource, right?

I guess it depends how much you love what you're doing. If you love it and you can justify spending the money on a download.com listing for some reason (feeling good about yourself, ego-feeding, one-upping your mortal enemy) then why not?

Think of it, say, as a car. You spend thousands of dollars on restoring, hm, say an old Mustang. Driving it every day wouldn't be cost effective. You'll still need to care for the thing. How much of your personal resources are you willing to spend maintaining and driving the car? Is it because you're trying to show off something or does it truely bring you happiness?

Advogato:

call me a newbie, but why did rasmus, et al, leave?

Because of the actions of a little annoying spammer? Hm. I'd love to see precisely what was said but it seems their comments have left the building. Does anyone have any links to the trolls and their trolling?

Geek:

I still haven't fired up Delphi yet. The XMLRPC stuff looks relatively cool. I wonder how hard/easy/efficient it is to use. I might write something smallish to browse/modify diary magic using XMLRPC. Hmm.

trs80: what, you mean people actually talk in the corridors rather than sitting on the couches, hugging some SO, not interacting?

No, course not! Of course, there was some random Go playing in one of hte rooms but I'm very interested to hear what you actually think is going on - and how we can use it to our advantage at your planned party. mwahahha.

Life:

Damn, I now remember why I loved dancing in high school. I was always so tired and worn out afterwards but I felt alive. These last few years have left me feeling lethargic and uncreative.

My brother bought a mini-gym a couple of years ago. Its quite cool. One of the advantages of living at home is the exercise equipment he's acquired. Now when I'm bored I don't sit on IRC (much! :) or read slashdot. I grab a 10kg dumbbell and do some lifting.

And it feels good.

I hope I haven't done too much damage in my laziness.

Life:

Yup, the party sucked. I dunno, I must be getting old but getting old should lead you to having less fun (up until you're 30 at least), right?

:-)

There were a few quality moments involving a "discovery" of brown vs pink nipples but the night felt.. tame. Ah, probably not enough rampant alcohol abuse. Maybe next time.

Random:

I dunno why I'm up at 5:30am. Grr. There has been some wicked storms over the last day or so. Quite cool. They've been keeping me up. Ah, this is why I woke up at 5am. Ah!

Geek:

After I've completed a whole swath of work today I'm going to work on some distribution analysis of my per-fitness-value queue .. queues. If they're evenly distributed enough I can try reproduction and death based on random head selections of the queue members. Ah, the joys of experimenting..

Music:

Dance Max 2002, CD1. Lots of Dance remixes of older songs. Its quite cool.

Geek:

I've removed one more O(n) loop from my generation loop. This one dealt with evaluating the individual based on their genetic code (ie generating a 'fitness' based on their genome.) The remaining loops are the renormalisation and numberspace calculation loops - both of which will go away when I've implemented my next selection algorithm(s).

Accident:

My car cost AUD$150 for a new bumper, $10 for a badge and probably $200 for the car tow. 200 metres. grr. I'll try to scab it on insurance - I pay them $1000 a year to insure my damned EA Fairmont, its a ripoff.

Life:

I'm about to finish exercising - which is a bit odd since I've got a bruise or two from the incident. I'm then going to a uni-friend party. Should be amusing. No, wait, it won't - it'll be ${CENSORED_UNTIL_AFTER_PARTY}.

Note to self - leave a much wider gap between you and other cars when driving in the rain. God damn.

(read: the person in front braked, I couldn't brake in time, I lost control, hit the sand dip preventing me from becoming one with the oncoming traffic. stopped. ow.)

I'm ok, I'm a bit shook up, my car requires a pair of lights and some bumper reattachment.

I screwed around some more with the dynamic renormalisation code last night.

Its looking good enough for the next stage - where I play around with a few strange algorithms for selecting suitable candidates for reproduction/death in O(1)ish time.