@Markalope

PHP/MySQL may not be so difficult…

So as I’ve been working on the plan for “Project X” my assumption has been all along that I am too old and set in my ways to learn enough PHP/MySQL to handle any of it myself. However, somewhere along the line of my life I’ve become the type of person who grooves on reading how-to-books. Lord knows where that desire was when I was actually in school… So anyway, I tossed in a copy of Larry Ullman’s PHP and MySQL for Dynamic Web Sites: Visual QuickPro Guide with a recent Amazon order. I just finished reading the book through - I haven’t gone back and “coded along with Larry” yet, and much to my surprise I’m finding it quite clear, logical and approachable. In fact, a lot of the experience I have has prepared my to move to these concepts quite easily, I think.

I know what you’re saying - “Jeez - who doesn’t know this stuff?!” but  remember I’m a designer and project manager with a long association with computers. I haven’t been able to call myself a programmer since my old BASIC days back in the early80s.  I am however, a bit of an experienced Filemaker Pro developer, and again I am surprised that a lot of that experience (”user friendly” as it is) has given me a good basis to move on up to PHP/MySQL. Until now, my PHP experience has consisted of changing values in Wordpress themes etc. My SQL experience is from the PHPMyAdmin side only, not creating a database or interacting with it in any meaningful way.

So am I planning to code Project X myself then? Hell no. Well, that’s not entirely true. I’ve decided that I’m going to develop the database as a first draft, and then toss some money at one of my “real” developer friends to audit it. Then I’ll stake a stab at the PHP. For some reason, I have a harder time getting my head around PHP than the concepts in SQL, but that’s just me, right now.

I have to say though, that in my experience, Peachpit Press books rock. They’re certainly not the ultimate reference, but their Quickstart Guides have played a very important part in my career up to now. I find them to be a thorough “quick look” at a topic, providing just enough knowledge to feel like I’m informed about a piece of software and know whether or not to explore more. YMMV.

Project X: Starting down the road

I’ve started to develop a web site/application. I’m referring to it as an application, since the site it will live on is pretty much only the display layer of a database application. Therefore, in my mind, it’s a web application and not a web site. This is sort of a different thing for me this time around for the following reasons:

• This is a game-like entertainment thing which is targeted at “the general public”
• I am specifically using search-bait topics in the content of the application such as celebrity names, popular movies, cultural references and other things that “the masses” look for on the Web
• Hopefully this will have a social component with certain community features. I use “social” in the “Web 2.0″ sense, and not the altruistic service-towards-society sense.
• I’d like to do as much of this as possible myself, but it is WAY past my abilities in terms of coding - on both the display and the backend.

This started out as an idea for a book, but was recently resurrected as a web application during a flight to Maui last week. After discussing the basic structure and goals with my wife, we brainstormed a bit and both agreed that this book idea would work well as as web “thing”. So now, I am in the process of figuring out how to get it built, launched and marketed, all the while revealing as little as possible about the idea and spending as little money as possible doing it.

I am a producer/project manager in my real life, so you’d think I’d be able to get a project brief written and put a team together to get this done the right way. That’s the process I’m working on now. I’m also debating how much money I’m willing to invest for things such as the proper coding of the PHP/MySQL bits.  That’s actually the easy part - it’s just decisions. So far, the hard part of all this is taking a step back and making sure that I don’t get do excited about the idea that I try to cobble something together too quickly, or put something out there on the Web that is not bomb-proof and polished. It’s far too easy these days, to be honest, to create sites and applications and loose them on the world. The discipline to fully prepare and make sure something is ready for prime time is going to be a continual struggle.

The good news is - almost all of the URLs I had brainstormed for this site are available. Even my first choice MAY become available in November, since it’s currently sitting dead, I’m hoping to snarf it when it comes up for renewal - it’s such a common phrase that I’m totally surprised it isn’t some really active URL, but no.

I’m going to blog about this process, but I’m not including any details about the specific app or the URLs or whatever until things are nailed down. I’ll be tracking the general process of getting something built though. Let’s see how it goes.

A comment on specialization

Rashmi Sinha posts about How Feature Creep Ruined The Moleskine City Notebooks. I didn’t read the title of the post until after I attempted to post a comment, which at this time is throwing a database error, so…

My comment as follows:

I see your point, although I also see how a person might choose one of these products to keep a travel journal or something for the city in question, which seems to be an ideal use for this sort of product.

However -

I think the larger message here is feature creep, and the propensity of designers and product managers to assume that a product, already popular, would be even MORE popular and well-loved if it did… well.. everything.

Note that this does not mean doing everything well.

Simplicity, and excellence of a chosen set of functions, should be enough of a goal.

This has particular resonance for me at this time, since I am in the process of developing a web app with a very simple premise. It is very easy to see how the design of this nascent application of mine could get creepy. A certain well-known word processor comes to mind.

Random thoughts associated with this idea:

The iPod. Simplicity of function, but getting creepy. Games?

The target of some searches….

Somebody’s been Googling the heck out of me this past week, by name and in combination with things like my employer’s name, and the term livejournal, and a few phrases that are pretty easily pulled out of my various public profiles. I keep a pretty small “googleprint” (which is my phrase for a person’s visibility on Google) mainly because most of my blogging activity is done behind either a pen name or my nickname, and I’m no longer active on message boards and the like where my name might appear.

Wonder what’s up with all the searches?

Thanks for the traffic, Lorelle!

Lorelle is a hit magnet. Get yourself mentioned in one of her posts, and you’re getting some traffic. Of course, it helps to have something useful posted.

Wordcamp: Categorized List of Attendee’s Blogs

This is as complete as I can make it, and it’s made from the attendees list on 2007.wordcamp.org. Patrick Havens did an excellent job on wordcamp.info telling us a little about each attendee, but so far as I know, this is the first semi-organized list of all the blogs. Note that this is just the “main” blog link that people included (if they chose to do so) on the Wordcamp registration form. Also, there are some sites that did not include a blog - I haven’t included those sites - this list is JUST FOR BLOGS. There are a couple sites that appear to be using Wordpress to manage the site but don’t include a blog. Those, I also left out. Anyone whose blog is on a business website and the blog’s content is dealing with the business, even if there’s some LOLcats or Wordcamp reviews in there, you’re “Corporate”. That includes a few design practices, but not all of them.

Oh, and anything that requires a signup is not on the list, sorry BuddySlim.

If you have a beef with your category - leave it in comments. Yes, the term “geekery” could be applied to pretty much any of these - I went with the “most obvious” theme to determine a site’s “category”. Also, I’ve not included anyone who has a blog, but no posts. If you’re displaying only the “Hello World” post, you’ll get on the list when there’s content. There are only a couple of non-English blogs on the list, just listed among the others.

Here’s the list: It’s very big - I’m putting behind a cut. I may turn this into a page for ease of reference: More »

Go Forth and Read: It’s a big world out there

Wow - long title for a short post isn’t it. I’m working on my master list of Wordcamper’s blogs, and I found this post on Kingsley 2.0:

Nokia Kicking MotoButt. This is News?

It’s short, and worth a read. It’s good to remember that there are more people “outside” our circle than “inside”. Whatever that circle may be.

Wordcamp: Link list of the presenters’ blogs

Here is a list of the presenters at WordCamp and their blogs. In most cases I have linked to people’s “personal” blogs where that was a choice, and then there are people like Mark Jaquith that requested links to their main page since they have several blogs. Thanks to all you presenters for your time and preparation. I definitely am glad I came down for WordCamp this year.

• Dan Kuykendall - Mighty Seek
• John Dvorak - Dvorak Uncensored
• Ok Malik - GigaOM
• Lorelle VanFossen - Lorelle on Wordpress
• Jeremy Wright - Ensight.org
• Lloyd Budd - A Fool’s Wisdom
• Mark Jaquith - MarkJaquith.com
• Robert Hoekman, Jr. - RHJR - The Blog
• Matt Cutts - Gadgets, Google, and SEO
• Barry Abrahamson - Barry on Wordpress
• Matt Mullenweg - PhotoMatt
• Rashmi Sinha - Everyday Cognition on the Web
• Dave Winer - Scripting Annex
• Liz Danzico - Bobulate

I’ll be doing this for the attendees blogs as well, organized by category. That will take me a bit, so be patient, and don’t bogart my idea!

What I learned at WordCamp: Stuff I want to check out

https://www.socialmediacards.com

http://www.slideshare.net

WP-Mobile plug in

Headin’ off to camp

Sitting on line at PDX, waiting to head down to the Bay Area for WordCamp. We’ll see how this goes. Could be a fun weekend. Probably won’t get to WordCamp until just before noon, which sucks, but there’s no good early flights on Saturdays. I’m sure there will be plenty of geeking left over.