Code code code

code code code, blog blog blog. 2 things I should do more often. I've been tweeting a lot more lately. Not like you or anyone else really cares, but I had to. My geekiness depends on it.

So I have a TON of pet projects for web sites, blogs, domain names, that I just NEVER get around to working on. When I do, it's rare. So tonight, I opened up Eclipse, and looked at code I haven't touched in at least a year or more. As is often the case, I decided to rewrite a good chunk of it. It's not terrible code, I just think I can do it a better way. I'll reuse a lot of it, but make adjustments here and there. I've been writing my own framework in PHP 5. I know there are tons of PHP frameworks out there, but for me it's not about just grabbing someone else's stuff to get things done, it's about learning how to do it. First iterations were kind of kludgy so I rewrote it a couple of times, and now I'm rewriting it yet again. I've learned a lot about classes, subclasses, inheritance, etc...

Once those pieces are done, I can proceed with some of the sites I wanted to do.

I have domains and blogs related to subjects I'm interested in such as hockey, politics, and technology. As I get through some of these projects, I will post info about them.

Projects, code and other things...

I've been learning a lot lately. For the last few months at work I've been on a team working on a new virtual world for kids done entirely with Flex 3. It took some getting used to, but now I'm totally into it. Flex Builder is an excellent IDE for working in Flex. It's built on Eclipse and integrates well with the Flex framework and compiler. Definitely worth the money.

I'm also learning to use jQuery and starting to get the hang of it. I've worked with object-oriented-like javascript before, building the framework myself, and then worked with the prototype framework and scriptaculous. jQuery blows them away with its ease of use and capabilities. It's a very powerful tool.

On another project I had to work on parsing rss feeds from youtube using some custom javascript. It worked out pretty well, got it to parse a user's video feed as well as custom playlists.

I've been working on my own facebook app, but due to sheer laziness, I never actually finished and launched it. I missed the boat on the app craze and it looks like the pool has been diluted. I may still finish it and release it, but I'm not too concerned over it now. If anything, by working on some apps at work and on my own app at home, I've learned a lot about REST and about the facebook platform. Anyone needs a facebook app, just let me know.

I've been doing a lot of reading on PHP 5. I've been away from PHP in my professional life, but have kept up with it on my own. I switched over to PHP 5 a year ago and started writing my own framework with database abstraction layers, classes and subclasses, etc... It's fun stuff.

What's it all mean? I have some personal projects I need to work on over the next 2-3 months and they'll be utilizing these skills. I hope to get at least one done before hockey season starts. Once the puck drops, I spend more time watching reading and posting about hockey than I should be on my projects.