Archive for the ‘Programming’ Category
Posted by Ryan
February 17, 2006
The more I read about SEO (Search Engine Optimization) techniques the more I come to the conclusion that it’s all a bunch of crap. Well, okay… let’s say instead that there’s really only ONE technique and the rest is all a bunch of hype.
Here it is folks. What you are about to read is what thousands of people pay thousands and thousands of dollars a month for:
- Don’t try.
Okay, so I’m only partially serious. I mean, I am serious, but I’m not at the same time.
Out of all the sites I’ve worked on, the ones that rank the best seem to be the ones I try the least on. Okay, so that’s only partially true. The only thing I usually try to do is keep the URLs void of lots of ? and &’s.
Are there people out there that try hard, and do really well because of their efforts? Yes, and if we built similiar sites, they’d get higer rankings in search engines. I’m just sayin’ that if you’re not going to try really hard, you might as well not try at all. Maybe.
I can’t count how many times I’ve read “content is king”, “content is what matters most”, “content content content”. Why is this an issue? Does anyone really read this stuff and think “wow! they’re right!” I mean, hello!! Of course it is!
Ok, I’m done with this short, tounge in cheek rant.
Posted by Ryan
December 16, 2005
Ruby on Rails has been all the buzz for a while now. I first watched some of the video presentations a few weeks ago. Today I went back to www.rubyonrails.com after hearing that they released version 1.0. I don’t remember if it was there before or not, but on their screencasts page they say “Going back to your former treadmill after being exposed to these movies can prove exceedingly painful. Don’t say we didn’t try to warn you.” Well yeah, I was warned, but man it really is painful after watching those videos.
I’ve had these two books for a week or so now, but haven’t had time to start reading. I’m getting anxious!
Programming Ruby
Agile Web Development with Rails
Posted by Ryan
September 1, 2005
I’ve never been accused of spyware/malware until today. Must say I’m a bit surprised.
I promise that my software contains no spyware, malware, adware, etc. It’s clean!
The reason I was accused: apparently Kill Docs was causing this users’s computers to not shut down. Windows XP would just sit there until he manually killed the Kill Docs process. I’ve never seen that before, anyone else had this problem?
Posted by Ryan
May 12, 2005
Yesterday FedEx brought me a 1GB SD memory card for my camera. Up until yesterday I only had the 64MB card that the camera came with. No more worrying about how many pictures I take now! Whoo hoo!
Today, FedEx brought me something significantly more exciting. No, not a wife.
What could it be?
Whoo hoo!
Take off the outer sleeve and you get another box
Opened up
Three CDs (the third you can barely see sticking up out of the sleeve it’s in).
And for posterity sake:
Yes, that’s really Delphi 2.0!
I’m excited to install this. I am, however, making myself wait until I get some things done before I do that. I wasted enough time already taking pictures, resizing them, and putting them on here.
Posted by Ryan
April 18, 2005
I just setup the Backyards of America website with WordPress 1.5. Used the LandZilla theme from Alex King’s WordPress 1.5 theme competition.
I love WordPress!
Posted by Ryan
March 9, 2005
A new website I partially designed is online for all to see: http://www.swingutah.com/ (swing as in swing dancing, not the other kind of “swing”) I say partially designed because I didn’t create the graphics. I put it all together with WordPress 1.5! WordPress 1.5 seriously rocks. I love it.
Anyway, the website will be changing. The main page will be more of a portal than a blog. We just got it up and online to replace the out-of-date site about the 2005 Utah Lindy Exchange.
Feedback appreciated.
Posted by Ryan
February 24, 2005
Wow! A maze made entirely with CSS! And some graphics of course. I’m impressed. Took a few minutes to get through it. Tricky!
As a side note, I really need a new chair. I’ve been slouching way too much the last few days. Maybe that’s also because my back is a bit sore from dancing. Hmmmm…
Posted by Ryan
February 22, 2005
I’m in the process of setting up a WordPress powered website for the Salt Lake City Rotaract Club (will be more of a website than a blog), and while getting some stuff together to teach them how to use it I saw this on the wordpress FAQ (some questions don’t have answers yet):
Can I be part of the development team?
…
How can I put the “bomp” in the “bomp-she-bomp-bomp”?
…
Upon reading that last one I laughed out loud. Needless to say I wasn’t expecting it. I love it when people do things like that.
Posted by Ryan
February 18, 2005
A site I design and now maintain (but do not own) has just gone live today. It’s called BackyardDiscounts. We sell stuff ranging from barbecue grills to playground equipment. Basically, stuff for your backyard. We are going to be adding hot tub/spa accessories, more backyard/outdoor furniture, more bbq grills, more hammocks, etc. Right now there isn’t a huge selection of products online, but we’re constantly adding more (about every other day).
I really like how the site turned out. Please let me know what you think. If you have any comments on the CSS/XHTML I’m interested in hearing them. I don’t have access to a Mac so I don’t know what it looks like in Safari. Now… the site does use tables for it’s layout (I know! I know!). I wanted to make it easy for someone else less experienced (not that I’m the best) to change in the future without ripping their eyes out. So since it’s in tables I really really doubt any good browsers will have problems with the CSS. The only browser work around was for IE (surprise!), using “html > body”.
For the shopping cart and e-commerce, I decided to use ICCart, by Home on the Web. I know them very well and really like the ICCart backend system. It rocks. If you’re running a drop ship business there is no better solution.
I created the site with Dreamweaver MX , TopStyle Lite, and EditPlus.
All of this is only a partial shameless plug since I don’t own any of the sites or services I’ve mentioned (especially not the last three). So give me some slack, okay? ;)
www.backyarddiscounts.com
Posted by Ryan
February 3, 2005
It may just be because I’ve been very out of touch with what has been happening on the web for the past two weeks (lots of work being the reason), but it seems odd that there hasn’t been a buzz about MSN.com’s complete CSS Redesign. People went nuts when Yahoo did it to their home page.
Way to go MSN.
Posted by Ryan
January 31, 2005
Back in December I mentioned in a post that I’d lost a flow chart and spec sheet that I had hand written. Well I finally found it last night around 1 AM (haven’t looked since December I might add, and finding it last night was an accident). I haven’t had much time to work on this specific project anyway so it hasn’t been a big deal. Glad to finally have it again though.
Posted by Ryan
January 27, 2005
I seem to go through phases. Some days, months, weeks, whatever I want to mess around with CSS and lots of design oriented things, although I’m generally not very good at design. Other times though all I want is to code code code (not CSS/XHTML code). For the last month all I’ve wanted to do is write code. Problem is, I’m in the middle of several design projects, but I can’t seem to get into them enough to get them done in any good amount of time! Give me a text editor and let me write code! No more data entry, CSS, tables, or Dreamweaver! No more HTML, XHTML, or CSS (well, unless needed for the following…). I want PHP. I want MySQL. I want JavaScript. I want to swing dance! But I digress, but I also can’t help it. I really love swing dancing. Anyway, I can’t seem to get myself to really put my full efforts into these other projects. While I don’t want this geek code phase to pass I really need to finish what I’ve started with the design projects.
I also need to get off my rear end and do something besides programming and swing dancing. I need to hang out with some people (preferrably girls) in non-dancing environments, but I digress. Skiing was fun last week. I need to get my film developed. I need a digital camera. Okay, I want a digital camera. I want to get my film developed. I need to go buy a USB key. Okay so I don’t need that either. What was I talking about again?
Posted by Ryan
December 22, 2004
Looking at my statistics I notice quite a few people find me looking for “Wordpress down down categories” or “Wordpress order categories”. Since the page they find is for creating a drop down box for your Wordpress categories I figured I might as well post how to sort your categories alphabetically in ascending or descending order.
Update: I’m such a dork. I should think through these things more before I go posting. If you really want to read my original solution, go ahead and click the link at the end of this to go to the next page. However, it’s much easier to just edit one little line in index.php:
Line #71 in the default template:
<?php wp_list_cats(); ?>
Change that to:
<?php wp_list_cats(’sort_column=name’); ?>
If you want the list sorted descending:
<?php wp_list_cats(’sort_column=name&sort_order=desc’); ?>
That’s it! Read more about the wp_list_cats function on the Wordpress Wiki and what arguments you can pass to it.
Related: list_cats function on the Wordpress Wiki.
Posted by Ryan
November 12, 2004
Speaking of color pickers, here’s a list of online color pickers I like. I’m missing one of my favorites though. I thought I had it bookmarked, but I guess it went to find all the socks and other misc. items I’ve lost. If I find it again, I’ll add it to this list. :)
Color palette creator
Color Schemer Online
Color Scheme Generator 2
Color Match 5K (IE Only)
Are there any other good ones you that you know of?
Posted by Ryan
November 11, 2004
I just posted this as a comment over on “Jeff’s Junk“. I thought it was interesting enough to post here so all 3 of you out there could read it too.
On programmers as designers
Ever notice how most sites run by programmers have the worst designs ever?
I’m lucky to have good help with my blog. :) Not that it’s the best, but it’s not ugly at least.
My comment:
This happened to me just today:
I work for a web development company. I write PHP, MySQL, CSS, and XHTML. The graphics are done by a really good graphics guy… as it should be. When I first layout a site in CSS I don’t know what colors the designer wants so I make some up. I try using those online color picker tools, but the end product still isn’t that great.
So today my boss was talking to the graphics guy on the phone and pointed him to one of the styles I created. The guy’s response was “is that header SUPPOSED to be that color?” My boss responded “Ryan’s a good programmer, but is about as colorblind as they come” or something like that. I don’t remember exactly. Seriously, I’m not colorblind, but making things look pretty is not what I do best.
I have yet to meet a good designer who is also really good at programming. I would love to see the work of someone who claims to be good at both. If they are excellent at both congrats!
Posted by Ryan
November 5, 2004
I’ve been playing around with displaying XML with CSS today and have been having a blast. Of course, IE’s CSS support is even worse when it comes to XML, but it’s still fun. Once I get something useful done with some decent formatting that’s actually consistent in IE, Mozilla, and Opera I’ll post it for all to see (still no access to Safari on a regular basis).
Posted by Ryan
October 22, 2004
I don’t particularly enjoy answering the question “What do you do for a living?” Let me explain why. When people ask me that question I usually respond by saying either “I’m a programmer” or “I’m a programmer”. Sometimes though, depending on the perceived geekiness of the person I’m talking to, I’m daring enough to say “I’m a web developer. I write software to sell or give away on ryanware.com. I do custom programming for Home on the Web, Inc. I do custom programming for diapershop.com. I do custom programming for kiwi-designs.com. I take phone calls for 4wheelsupply.com and sometimes update that website. I do customer support for Home on the Web, Inc. clients. I also work on other personal web projects that will be announced sometime in distant future.” It’s kinda funny actually, if I go off on the whole spill when they really are rather computer illiterate their eyes kinda glaze over with the description of all the things I do.
On a recent project I was working on for one of the previously mentioned companies I got a good chuckle (chuckle, isn’t that a nice word?) out of the something the client said to my friend. It went something like this:
Client: “I want it to do this and this and this and this and this. Oh and this too.”
My friend: “We can’t do that with the amount of money you have to spend.”
Client: “Why? Can’t you just do it? Just make it work. Oh, by the way I’d like it to do this as well.”
My friend: “We could just do it, but it’d take a good amount of time and would cost you way more than you’re willing to pay.”
I don’t know if the client ever really understood why we couldn’t “just do it” with the amount of money they wanted to spend. After all, it’s all just point and click, right? Maybe they’re not smart enough.
This kind of thing happens all the time, which is why I especially loved this: If Architects Had To Work Like Web Designers… :-D
Found via Simply Geeky
Posted by Ryan
October 21, 2004
Note: If you’re looking for how to sort your category list I’ve posted that here.
Update: 10-23: Fixed another typo! Sometimes the way wordpress filters posts can be really annoying!
Update 10-22: I’ve fixed a few typos and things that got screwed up by Wordpress when I posted. :)
I just finished a quick hack for Wordpress (I don't use it on this site) and thought I'd post it here for everyone else.
There may be an easier/better way to do it, but this is how I did it. Let me know if there's a better way.
You'l need to edit two files. template-functions-category.php and index.php
Be sure to make backups of these files before changing anything!!
(more…)
Posted by Ryan
October 12, 2004
Well, it’s another day and my typing has returned to normal. (see previous post) :-D
Time Thingy 2.0 is getting close to being done. If anyone is interested in beta testing, please e-mail me at betatest at ryanware dot com.
As a side note, I’ve spent some time yesterday and today reading some of the articles over at Dexterity Software. I’ve learned a lot and am looking forward to reading the rest. If you do any shareware developing I highly recommend reading them. Actually, if you run any kind of business, do any marketing, or just need a productivity boost in what you do I suggest checking them out.
Posted by Ryan
October 7, 2004
I’ve always enjoyed programming Windows applications. I’ve only recently started to really enjoy web development. While there are a lot of things I find missing in web development, there’s one big thing that makes it so appealing…
Notepad Is Still The Best HTML Tool
When I first began working on my personal Web site nine years ago, the HTML coding tools were in their infancy. (Not to mention that the whole concept of a personal site was virtually unheard of.) I taught myself enough HTML to be dangerous, hired a couple of kids to do the coding, and Strom.com was born. Over the years, I kept the site updated using Notepad and some cheat sheets taken from a few books at the time. Since then, I have resisted all attempts at making things fancier, and have continued to use Notepad and then Microsoft Word to update the pages on my site.
Before you go read the article and come back here screaming “but he isn’t saying notepad is great” I want to say that, yes, I know. His point is that even with all the technology we have we still depend on a simple tool like Notepad way too much.
… the tools should be better by now, and Notepad shouldn’t be the default development environment. Maybe by the time I launch a site in 2014 (boy does that seem like a long way off) we’ll be using something that can finally make Notepad obsolete.
My point, however, is different. I love a lot of the tools out there. Dreamweaver and other WYSIWYG tools make designing pages so much faster than hand coding everything. But! They’re not really necessary. You can live without them. You don’t have to fork out thousands of dollars to have a really good looking, dynamic website. It’s possible to do it with Notepad. Of course, you can also use Notepad and some compiler to create software for Windows, but not many people do that anymore. It’s so much easier to drag and drop than to hard code what your software should look like.
Anyway… web development, for someone like me with a very limited budget, is so appealing if only for the fact that I don’t HAVE to spend hundreds or even thousands of dollars every few years for development tools. Unless, of course, I really want to, but I don’t really see that happening. A good text editor with color coding and multiple undos/redos is good enough for me!
I, of course, reserve the right to change my opinion at any time. :-D
Posted by Ryan
September 30, 2004
I hate popup windows with about 3 passions (red, magenta, and anti-utopia 2), but they do have their place. So I guess I only hate the ones that don’t fit into that very fine specification. :) They are very useful for bringing up, for example, larger images when you click on a thumbnail, or bringing up a small help window, or other similar uses.
About a week ago I needed a popup window that used a default size and position for the window unless otherwise specified. So I modified an exisiting JavaScript script to do just that. I added/modified a whopping 100 characters to the script, but hey, I googled on this and didn’t find one like it so I thought I’d post it. So here it is in all it’s glory.
(more…)
Posted by Ryan
September 23, 2004
I’ve received quite a bit of feedback on Time Thingy lately. A lot of people really like it and have some good ideas for it.
All of my applications started from something I wanted. A lot of new feature ideas come from things I need or want. So since I don’t use Time Thingy anymore, I’m not really sure what other people need or want. So I’m completely open to ideas. Do you have any suggestions? Comments? Jokes?
So why did I name it “Time Thingy” anyway? The reason is a great one. Really. Okay okay… I just couldn’t think of anything better. Actually, I probably gave it that name thinking it would be temporary, but never thought of anything else so it stuck. I wrote it beacuse I had way too many programs running in the system tray and wanted to get rid of the Microsoft clock, but still have a clock visible somewhere. I didn’t think it would be as popular as it is. People use it in ways I never would have thought of. No, nobody uses it to time how many bags of cheetos they can eat in 34 minutes. At least not that I know of anyway. Do you?
By the way… Real Passwords 1.5 was released a few days ago. I’ve buried it’s announcement with more posts so I might as well add another shameless plug in for it! :-D
Posted by Ryan
September 16, 2004
Switching between programming languages can really cause some confusion! Today I couldn’t figure out what in tarnation was wrong with my PHP script! It looked right, but it said there was a syntax error! What are you talking about? It’s fine!!! The problem I was having had to do with arrays. The problem was so dang simple that I couldn’t see it! I kept looking for something more complex. Anyway, if you do any programming at all you should get a good laugh out of this.
In PHP, to call an item in an array the syntax is like this: $var[1];
In Visual Basic, however, it’s var(1)
What I was trying to do was: $var(1);
Blasted square brackets!! Parenthesis, square brackets, parenthesis, square brackets. ARGH!
I guess working on the new version of Real Passwords in VB has my mind all kinds of confused. I’m surprised this is the only thing that got me today. :-D
