Author: Joe

Categories
Adventure Sports

Failed Curling Attempt

After watching the 2006 Winter Olympics the Shepherd and I declared that we wanted to play curling after watching much of it on TV that year. Well apparently we had forgotten our mission until 4 years later when the 2010 Winter Olympics came around.

After some brief research we found that the Philadelphia Curling Club was offering a $5 donation class today. So this had to be attended by us.

The Shepherd actually called me at 9:55 AM this morning ready to go. This may not seem early to most, but by his current standards this was an amazing feat and probably summed up just how excited both of us were to finally experience this grand sport.

The ride over took about an hour and a half. We didn’t take a signal wrong turn, which even with GPS we were both proud of.

Upon arriving, we soon discovered that we weren’t the only ones interested in trying out curling. I’d say there was probably 1500-2000 people waiting in a wrapping line outside in the cold with hopes of getting inside to curl.

We waited a good while, with the line barely moving at all. We later found out that there was no chance that we would have an opportunity to curl on this day. Truly tragic news indeed. With our dreams shattered we then decided to get a bite to eat and do something else nearby.

Apparently there isn’t much else to do nearby the curling place. We also somehow took about 4 hours to get back home due to a GPS device that decided to toy with us the remainder of he afternoon. While it was clearly a failed mission, I’m glad we at least followed through with our original plan 4 years ago and gave it a shot. Who knew curling would be this popular.

Categories
Books

Learning Joomla! 1.5 Extension Development

If you’re looking to create extensions for Joomla! 1.5 then you should really check out Learning Joomla! 1.5 Extension Development. I had a project that required a custom component to be created, and the online documentation wasn’t really as good as I’d of liked it to of been.

So I went looking to see if any books had been published recently on extension development. Learning Joomla! 1.5 Extension Development got some decent review online, and I was really stumped with creating my component. So a copy was ordered.

The book does an excellent job of building an extension that makes use of most of the features that would be found in a typical extension. Covering, components, modules, as well as plugins.

With it’s focus on MVC practices, this at first seemed like overkill to me, but once all the features were piling up, it really paid off.

The chapters on creating the admin end of a component were extremely valuable to me. My client now has an easy to use custom component that makes use of the Joomla! admin interface for a seemless CMS experience.

Categories
Development

‘corePHP’ WordPress MU

Just installed and am in the process of configuring the ‘corePHP’ WordPress MU component for Joomla! This nifty component allows a WordPress MU install to run within a Joomla! install.

This is great, you can have a great Joomla! based site that also hosts multiple user WordPress blogs. This is pretty much exactly with these folks were looking for, and it integrates very well with the built in user management as well.

I’m still tinkering with many customizations to get this just how we need it, but most of the difficult work is already done by the component.

Also very convenient are the modules that ‘corePHP’ makes available for this component too. There’s module to display recent blogs, recent posts, etc.

Very good stuff so far.

Categories
Development

GCalendar

I downloaded and installed the GCalendar Joomla! component, and am very impressed thus far with it. I’m a big fan and think that Google Calendar is the best calendering system around, especially with some of their sharing features.

While Joomla! does have some very impressive calendar components available, I was really hoping to include a Google Calendar and this component makes it fairly easy to do just that.

If you already have a Google Calendar, installation and setup of the component is a breeze. It currently offers a custom calendar display or you can embed the standard Google Calendar display into your site as well. It’s great, you get the features of a Google Calendar and the integration with a Joomla! site. Very impressive.

Categories
Adventure

Blizzard 2010

Got a decent amount of snow from the blizzard this weekend. I’d say probably around 16 inches or so, hard to tell with the wind creating drifts all over the place. But 16 is my unofficial figure for where I was.

Saturday morning I woke up to no Comcast. Meaning no TV and even worse no internet! I had planned to work on a few projects while being snowed in, but without internet access that wasn’t going to happen.

Lucky for me one of my favorite activities is shoveling snow. I really enjoy the challenge of taking on mother nature, and this storm was really bringing quite a formidable foe. I began Saturday around 8:00 AM, why I didn’t sleep in more is still a mystery to me. Suppose I was that determined to defeat the snow that the sky had the nerve to throw upon the driveway.

It was a lot and a very heavy snow that I had encountered. Arguably the heaviest snow I can recall, or perhaps I’m just getting that much older. Either way I bundled up as best I could, donned by brand new gloves, and gripped my snow shovel and walked into the windy blizzard.

Several hours later I had created a perfectly clean path for one car to leave should they be daring enough to do so. I knew that this storm was far from over, but kept reminding myself how much easier it would be to shovel just a few inches the next day versus almost 2 feet.

With all that currently could be done against this snow, I now reluctantly turned to the  indoors. I wasn’t exactly snowed in with whom I’d of selected under ideal conditions, so while the shoveling was a challenge, it would truly be nothing compared with being stuck in a home with whom I was stuck there with.

With the TV still out, these people were everywhere I would normally seek solace. With internet still down as well, my options were severely limited as well. I turned to my trusty Nintendo DS to entertain me, and decided to give The Legendary Starfy a try. I had picked up this title at the huge Toys R Us in NYC after some kid highly recommended it.

I owe my sanity this weekend to the mighty snow shovel and Starfy the brave and noble starfish.

Categories
Video Games

Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box

With the snow we got over the weekend I finally had a chance to beat Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box for the DS. I picked it up a few months ago, but have been too busy to really play it much.

It’s a puzzle game, and I do like the puzzles so I had to get it. The made an earlier one a few years back and I played through that one too, and this second one was just as good.

Some of the puzzles are very tough, I think there were 3 or so that I couldn’t solve. I’m very much impressed with the variety and difficulty of the puzzles. Solving a few of them did make me feel rather smart for a moment. Good stuff.