WOW!
Wednesday, November 03, 2010
It's been so long since my last update, I almost forgot about this Blog!
Since my last update back in March, my wife and i have made the decision to buy a house!
Being in no position to apply for a Mortgage at the moment and the rental situation in Sydney in shambles, a move into my Mother in-laws house was inevitable.
So i come Friday we will be moving out of our independent life and back in with 'Mummy'. It shouldn't be to bad though as MIL (Mother In Law) is only home occasionally due to the long hours at work.
Living rent free for the next 2 years might also be kind of nice ; )
Childs Play
Monday, March 01, 2010
Ok, so how did i end up with this gash on my forehead?
When you take a 3 year old running at full speed before tripping and landing teeth first on your head, that's generally what happens.....
Yesterday i was playing with my children. I was laying on the ground as i regularly do while they take turns jumping on me, when suddenly the older of the two (Gretchen) runs off down the hall laughing hysterically. The little guy (Riley), decides 'that looks fun' and takes off after her. Left laying in the middle of the floor, waiting for them to come back, i zone out a little. The stomping coming back down the hallways snaps me back to reality, but only just in time to hear the pattern of footsteps change as she trips. I feel her head hit mine. The tears start flowing, and after lots of mummy and daddy cuddles i was ok... as was she..... ; )
Yes, the gash to my forehead is nothing, more concerning is that my little girl has knocked a 'baby' tooth loose.
She is not in any pain and she is able to eat, which would suggest that she is going to live! A trip to the dentist may be in order though, depending on how she goes over the next couple of days.
Coding Practices
Thursday, February 25, 2010
I learnt my lesson with the 'quick and easy' route a long while back, realising that it is better to spend more time on the design of the program rather then just getting the job done.
Remember in programing, it pays to be conservative. By sticking to coding standards and architectural rules, you will most likely end up with a more flexible, portable and manageable application.
Widely used in many programing / scripting language frameworks is the Model-View-Controller (MVC) architectural pattern. When properly implemented, the MVC helps separate domain logic (or raw data), requests for that data and the user interface, into 3 separate entities.
The Model:
The model is the domain specific representation of data which is used by the application. If we were developing a simple web application which required a connection to the database, this is the place we the query would be made, returning only the raw data. The Model does not define were a connection is made or when the connection occurs, simply holds the logic for retrieving the raw data.
The View:
The view is the data presentation layer within the model. The view does nothing more then display the raw data collected at the model. In a simple terms a view could be a html or XML template used to display data from the model.
The Controller:
The controller is the director, or router of requests for information. In a web application the controller handles requests sent from the browser and directs the request to the appropriate model / view.
A great way of sampling the MVC in practice is to review some of the frameworks that are built upon it. We have several applications based on the CodeIgniter PHP framework, but there are many other similar PHP frameworks out there that are MVC based. Another good sample of the MVC in action is Joomla, a very popular Open Source Content Managment System (CMS).
Projects, Portfolio
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Australian Internet Censorship
Tuesday, February 23, 2010
The Australian Labour Government's clean feed initiative, by now most of us should be aware of this what this means.
Until late last year Labor did not have enough seats in the Senate to pass enact this legislation. This all changed on December 15th then a 'new' legislation labelled ''Measures to improve safety of the Internet for families" was given the green light.
I am not entirely sure what has changed in this new legislation, limited research there does not appear to be any difference. Take a look for yourself > http://www.minister.dbcde.gov.au/media/media_releases/2009/115/ (media release)
So what can you do? Well, besides getting outraged, there are still a number of things which might help. A Quick Internet search on 'Australian Internet censorship' will return numerous results including web sites and even YouTube rants protesting protesting the filter. A useful site which gives some meaningful advice is http://nocleanfeed.com.
While this may seem like 'too little, to late' for some people, i say its never too late to make an impact.
