I decided to setup a corporate blog at work. This is going to be run by 2 (well, for now 3) people right now, our development department. I have already posted a few articles (mostly ripped from this blog). So check it out, too!
Posted: May 9th, 2009 under Uncategorized.
Comments: none
This is a reply to Rails is a Step by bryanp. Check out metabahn for some awesome guys who really know their stuff. I’m posting it here also because it got pretty long.
First off, I agree with the sentiment of the post, Rails is not the best way in all situations, just like PHP, Sinatra, Merb, Grails and whatever that busted C++ web framework is called are not the best way for every situation. However, Rails is a pretty good way.
I believe that Rails is sufficiently versatile that most web-based applications could be written successfully in Rails. Partly because of the limited domain in which web applications are created, and partly because of the sheer amount of mental power behind Rails development right now.
Many of the Rails Consultancies springing up (Hashrocket, ENTP, etc…) are using rails almost exclusively. Does this mean they are treating rails as the destination? Well, not exactly. Rails just happens to be the tool they’re most comfortable with.
A lot of what is heard from the Rails super-evangelists is just that, someone pumping religion as the end-all be-all of whatever domain they’re in. However, I would venture to say that the vast majority of the the top Rails developers would say that Rails is not the best suite of tools for every situation.
It seems that the lash-back against Rails in the latter part of 2008 was less about the technology itself, and more about a) the hype building up around rails since 2005 b) the high profile outages of Twitter, c) spreading of FUD about something new by a minority that didn’t like Rails for various (not necessarily invalid) reasons.
It happens all the time. A very vocal minority will try something new, decided they don’t like it, and let everyone else know they don’t like it and why you shouldn’t either. They share their opinions as fact, over-generalize and spin information, and use community rivalries as reasons to dismiss whatever it is they hate. I think it’s less a technology issue than a human nature issue.
That said. Rails IS NOT the be-all end-all of web development. You should devote time to exploring new tools, ideas, and technologies. That’s how you grow, however when you find something you like, you tend to stick with it. Nobody pays the bills by jumping to every new flavor of the month; eventually you have to produce something.
Posted: March 11th, 2009 under Ruby on Rails.
Comments: none
I’m trying to figure out what the best way to allow a user to delete an account with regards to usability, and allowing a user to make a mistake and immediately undo it. However, deleting all information from a user’s account is a fairly large operation, requiring a lot of data disappearing. Undoing this is no small feat. I want to know what you think is the best way to allow a user to delete an account while still allowing for them to change their mind?
Posted: February 27th, 2009 under Uncategorized.
Comments: 1
Well, I’ve gotten a pretty positive response from the idea to bring some parties to Madison, so I guess I’ll go ahead with planning it. Any help would be greatly appreciated. As of right now, I’m looking for advice on how to get this thing pulled off, but sooner or later, i’ll be looking for people to help with stuff, like finding a sound system, work the door, drop dope beatz, and other stuff like that. If you have any helpful words, just leave a comment, or shoot me an email at pj.davis@gmail.com
Thanks for all the support so far, and hopefully we can get this ball rolling soon.
Posted: February 23rd, 2009 under Uncategorized.
Comments: 1
This is just the rough draft for an idea I have.
I really want to relive the old days of the warehouse parties and massives. I am by no means a promoter, and was only ever a party kid in the late 90’s before everything stopped. I really want to bring them back though, but I’ll need some help.
This is all still very pre-planing stage, but I’d like to have 3 or 4 parties this year, with a big New Year’s party to top it off, and see where it goes from there.
I haven’t picked out a venue, although I have insanity skatepark in mind.
First, I’d like to have at least 25 people say they’ll show up and bring a friend or 2. I’m hoping this will get around 35 people guaranteed in the door the first night.
I’d also like to have 4 people do promotion work pro bono. Yes I know, you don’t want to work for free, but I really need some people who share the vision with me and help. You’ll get in free, but that’s about all I can promise you.
I want 2 sponsors. Actual sponsors with banners hanging on the floor and logos on flyers.
3 or 4 DJ’s, at least 2 hour sets. none of this 45 Minute crap. I want you to bang peoples socks off for 2 hours at least.
Styles I would like:
Happy Hardcore (this one is taken by me already, hehe!)
Jungle
Drum & Bass
Whatever the hell jchot plays.
dirty electro
idm (i think, whatever the weird stuff is)
Update:
I would also like people to help plan this, since I’ve never done it before. Any kind of help or guidance would be very much appreciated.
Posted: February 19th, 2009 under Uncategorized.
Comments: 6
When you’re writing your spec files in RSpec, it is my belief that you should spec out even the validations that you add (validates_presence_of, validates_uniqueness_of, etc..). Even though these are core parts of Rails, your spec file should be able to be read by someone with little background in development and still get what is required of your application. Validating that a field is present and required is part of these specifications, so they should be there. However, testing to make sure something is always present isn’t necessarily exciting, and you’re basically doing the same thing over and over. Making sure that if a field is nil, it’s not saved to the database, and it give back an error. So I wrote something that will test to make sure that these fields are always valid. If this is already in RSpec, or something similar; or if you know a better way to do this, please let me know.
def validate_presence_of(klass, fields)
fields.each do |field|
it "should include #{field}" do
lambda do
instance = klass.create(field.to_sym => nil)
instance.errors.on(field.to_sym).should_not be_nil
end.should_not change(klass, :count)
end
end
end
Stick that in your spec helper file, and now you can just add
validate_presence_of(SomeClass, %w(afield another_field field3 ))
to your model specs, and you’ve just saved yourself alot of typing, and it’s still pretty clear what you’re trying to test.
Posted: January 15th, 2009 under Uncategorized.
Comments: 1
I was trying to import the subversion repository for our central application to git tonight, and I ran into some problems.
First, I tried to install the svn2git gem, but i kept getting:
ERROR: could not find gem svn2git locally or in a repository
and James Coglan doesn’t have github gems enabled on the repository. So I had to clone the repository and install the gem manually. Read more »
Posted: January 9th, 2009 under Computers, Ruby on Rails, Subversion, git, os x.
Comments: 3
Have yourself a Merry Christmas with this new mix I put together the other day.
DJ Kurt - I’ll Make Ya’s Hardcore 2008
DJ Kurt - On The Downlow
Implex - Lost It
Euphoria feat. Casper - Hardcore Overdose
MC Storm Vs. Sy & Unknown - Fuck You
Vagabond - Poisonous
Voodoo & Serano - Overload (Hixxy & Re-Con Remix)
Antix - HTiD
Stabilized - Learn 2 Dance
Seduction & Al Storm - Spin It Back
Dougal & Gammer - Nobody Likes the Records
Fracus & Gavin G - Run From Me
Styles & Breeze feat. Mc Storm - Dark Like Vader
Art of Fighters - System Reload
Dreadhed - Pussy Like Bitches
Tha Playah - The One
Posted: December 11th, 2008 under Music.
Comments: none
I was clicking around on StackOverflow.com earlier, trying to fix a problem with an application I was working on, when i got interested in the Creative Commons license badge at the bottom. I clicked on it, and read over what you could do with it. The CC licenses offer a pretty good amount of freedom to muck about with others content, which is good because it allows people to create derivative works that expand the human sphere of experience. I mean, without derivative works, you wouldn’t have Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead (best play evar!)
It turns out that StackOverflows content is licensed under Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic, basically meaning that you can Distribute freely, and derive content(remix) from the work.
Anyway, I saw at the bottom there was an upgrade for the license (what can’t be upgraded these days) and was reading through the different verbiage on the 3.0 license. The only real change on the dumbed down page was adding ‘or a compatible’ to the list of derivative works licensing requirements. Seems innocuous enough, however, in the legaleeze (e.g. Legal Code) …
You may Distribute or Publicly Perform an Adaptation only under the terms of: (i) this License; (ii) a later version of this License with the same License Elements as this License; (iii) a Creative Commons jurisdiction license (either this or a later license version) that contains the same License Elements as this License (e.g., Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 US)); (iv) a Creative Commons Compatible License.
Part (iv) looks kind of cool. It means if I found another license that was kinda like this that I liked better, I could license my derivative work under that. That’s very neat of Creative Commons, letting me change licenses. HOWEVER.
“Creative Commons Compatible License” means a license that is listed at http://creativecommons.org/compatiblelicenses that has been approved by Creative Commons as being essentially equivalent to this License, including, at a minimum, because that license: (i) contains terms that have the same purpose, meaning and effect as the License Elements of this License; and, (ii) explicitly permits the relicensing of adaptations of works made available under that license under this License or a Creative Commons jurisdiction license with the same License Elements as this License.
So let’s check out http://creativecommons.org/compatiblelicenses and tell me how many licenses you see there. Yeah, none. So, if you use a Creative Commons license, your content is, for the foreseeable future, trapped in a Creative Commons License.
Posted: December 6th, 2008 under Uncategorized.
Comments: none
Posted: November 26th, 2008 under Blogging.
Comments: none