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Reaching the limits of PHP

PHP

First off, I rather like PHP. PHP 5 at least, I think PHP 4 was – and remains – a dog’s dinner of a thing at best. But for 90% (at least) of webpages, PHP is a pretty decent solution. Retrieval of data from databases, display of that data, no worries. Minimal learning curve, support for high-level constructs like objects and exceptions, several frameworks available – PHP’s a damn good choice in the vast majority of cases.

Thing is, right now I’m trying to put together a bit of code to act as a proof of concept, and – more fool me – I tried to use PHP to do it, figuring I’d save some time. No such luck. Turns out, trying to create data in PHP is a lot harder than trying to manipulate or display it.… Read the rest

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New job, new role, new challanges…

General

I’ve officially left Enovation Solutions as of 1700 on Friday, and as of 0900 on Monday, I go to work for dotMobi as a senior software engineer, to work on some more technically-oriented stuff. More specifically, I’m working with Andrea Trasatti on the new Device Database project announced recently (more here). I’ve been trying to get into more and more technically demanding roles over the past two years, but I’ve always been split between sysadmin and development roles; I still like both sides of the house, but it’s going to be interesting pursuing the development side alone for a little while, especially in this area, where I’m basicly writing tools for other developers. … Read the rest

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Kubuntu 7.10

Linux

Gutsy Gibbon.

*sigh*

Not a fan of the name. But, I’ve got that X server memory hole in Feisty on my machine and Gutsy supposedly has the fix. Tried it at home last night on my dual-booting laptop (XP and Feisty until last night). Insert CD, reboot off CD, let it run.

Perfect installation. Haven’t had time to play with the neat cool 3D stuff yet, but the successful autodetection and the full setup was very impressive, especially compared to the bad old days when autosetup was a fast way to lock your machine up or worse, but nothing more! Have to say, I still like Debian for servers, but for desktop machines, I’m sold on the Ubuntu model. I don’t install my desktop often enough to become an expert on the process, so an idiot’s interface is a good thing for that for me.… Read the rest

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