Extensible Development

I’ve been thinking about creating my own theme for WordPress for a while now — for over 1 year to be honest. —while looking at a few interesting designs to use as a base. I’m very interested in UX and UI Usability, but lousy at drawing and creating nice graphics. (I can use Photoshop and Fireworks, but the result is never what I had in my head, more like thinking about a Ferrari and ending up with a rusted VW Beetle.)
Read more…

Introduction

As mentioned in my previous blog entry, I’ve been thinking about implementing a wordle/tagul plug-in for Wordpress using CSS3 only. I’ve just spent about 15 minutes experimenting and have already gotten quite far.

The tags

To make things simple I’ve taken the HTML from my own tag cloud, although slightly modified. For CSS3 to work, the tags need to be divided into groups for colour and size, tag-grp-# and tag-score-#.

<div class="widget widget_tag_cloud" id="tag_cloud-2"><h3>Tags</h3>
	<div>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-13 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/agile/">agile</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-31 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/apache/">apache</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-30 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/authentication/">authentication</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-11 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/blog/">blog</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-5 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/development/">Development</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-26 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/economy/">economy</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-21 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/extensibility/">extensibility</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-15 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/filosophy/">filosophy</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-49 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/gnutls/">gnutls</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-16 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/gui/">GUI</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-62 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/http/">http</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-63 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/https/">https</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-27 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/humanresources/">humanresources</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-28 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/innovation/">innovation</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-50 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/javascript/">JavaScript</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-17 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/leadership/">leadership</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-19 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/management/">management</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-34 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/mod_auth/">mod_auth</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-35 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/mod_auth_script/">mod_auth_script</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-32 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/mod_dav/">mod_dav</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-52 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/mod_gnutls/">mod_gnutls</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-64 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/mod_ssl/">mod_ssl</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-36 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/office/">office</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-68 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/open-source/">open source</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-53 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/openssl/">openssl</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-24 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/organisation/">organisation</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-29 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/php/">php</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-9 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/principles/">Principles</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-25 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/roi/">roi</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-18 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/scm/">SCM</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-14 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/scrum/">scrum</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-12 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/software/">software</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-56 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/ssl/">ssl</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-20 tag-grp-3" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/testing/">testing</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-23 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/thinktank/">thinktank</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-65 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/tls/">TLS</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-57 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/ubuntu/">ubuntu</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-39 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/vba/">vba</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-66 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/virtual-hosting/">Virtual Hosting</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-38 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/visualbasic/">visualbasic</a>
		<a title="3 topics" class="tag-score-3 tag-link-33 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/webdav/">WebDAV</a>
		<a title="1 topic" class="tag-score-1 tag-link-40 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/windows/">windows</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-37 tag-grp-1" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/word/">word</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-86 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/wordpress/">wordpress</a>
		<a title="2 topics" class="tag-score-2 tag-link-60 tag-grp-2" href="http://blog.itwarlocks.com/tag/zimbra/">zimbra</a>
	</div>
</div>

The styling

Using CSS3 techniques like transform and transition (-webkit-transform, -webkit-transition, -moz-transform) you can easily get the tags to change then moused over.

/* Generic styles */
body {
	font-family: Arial, Helvetica, Tahoma, sans-serif;
}
a {
	color: #2970A6;
}
/* Wordpress widget style */
.widget {
	padding: 10px 15px 16px;
	width: 400px;
	border: 1px solid #C0C0C0;
}
/* Pretty tag cloud */
.widget_tag_cloud a {
	/* Transform is only applied to block elements, inlineblock preserves the layout: */
	display: inline-block;
	text-decoration: none;
	/* Animate the transitions for color, background and transform: */
	-webkit-transition: color,background,-webkit-transform 1s,1s,0.5s ease-out;
	-moz-transition: color,background 1s ease-out;
}
.widget_tag_cloud a:hover {
	background: #808080;
	color: #FFFFFF;
	/*font-size: 22pt;*/
	padding: 0.5em;
	margin: -0.5em;
	opacity: 0.7;
	-webkit-border-radius: 0.5em;
	-moz-border-radius: 0.5em;
}
/* Tag score determins size.
 * We want the mouse over size to be the same,
 * so different scales for each.
 */
a.tag-score-1 {
	font-size: 0.8em;
}
a.tag-score-1:hover {
	-webkit-transform: scale(2.5) !important; /* 0.8 x 2.5 = 2.0 */
	-moz-transform: scale(2.5) !important;
}
a.tag-score-2 {
	font-size: 1.25em;
}
a.tag-score-2:hover {
	-webkit-transform: scale(1.6) !important; /* 1.25 x 1.6 = 2.0 */
	-moz-transform: scale(1.6) !important;
}
a.tag-score-3 {
	font-size: 2em;
}
a.tag-score-3:hover {
	-webkit-transform: scale(1) !important; /* 2.0 x 1.0 = 2.0 */
	-moz-transform: scale(1) !important;
}
/* Tag groups determine colour. */
a.tag-grp-1 {
	color: #2970A6;
}
a.tag-grp-2 {
	color: #5FC159;
}
a.tag-grp-3 {
	color: #F6872B;
}
/* Some randomly chosen tags to rotate. */
.tag-link-21,
.tag-link-35,
.tag-link-24,
.tag-link-68 {
	-webkit-transform: rotate(90deg);
	-moz-transform: rotate(90deg);
}

The result

• Pretty tag cloud, stage 1
  (Only works perfectly in Webkit; Safari, Chrome and partially in Gecko; Mozilla, Firefox.)

Next step

As can be seen, the layout of the tags is not right. This cannot be done with CSS, so this is where I’ll be using some jQuery in the next step. The biggest challenges will be the algorithm and font-size/letter calculations in the browser.

Introduction

I recently came across Highcharts, a great JavaScript library for creating charts. It uses canvas where it can, supports skins (easily changed with CSS). I’ve been searching/waiting for a decent JavaScript based charting API and it has finally arrived.

Seeing as I’m a wordpressaholic I’m of course going to try and get it into Wordpress. Although that might turn out to be quite more than I can chew.

Read more…

Knowledge is power, or for developers it’s skill. Or is it?

Before the time of Google developers were required to learn, remember and never forget the knowledge they needed to perform their work. I might be a bit of a dinosaur in that way, since I’d rather simply know than rely too much on Google. The media has reported cases of student relying more and more on Google (or Bing or anyother web search.) No longer is anyone required to know everything, the web answers all questions.

A fun example is something that actually happens around me sometimes. Since I live and work in Sweden many Operating Systems are in Swedish. Everything is in Swedish, even the error messages. That’s a great feat of the developers to successfully implement I18n, but sometimes other developers can’t find the solution to their problems because they don’t know the English version.

A well known expression in the programming world is RTFM, but this is becoming a relic of an older age, these days a new expression is more valid, STFG.

Unfortunately the expression “Knowledge is power” is still very true. Search engines hold more and more knowledge and thus power. Since it’s all free and open, there is absolutely no problem with that, in fact it’s great. It means everyone can share the knowledge. The real problem is that the people who are supposed to have the knowledge in their brains are become reliant on web search. What happens if the web is not accessible when they need it, or – god forbid – companies like Google and Microsoft start putting a price on that knowledge?

Yes, web search can solve many problems and provide a wealth of knowledge. But don’t just remember the URL to the knowledge you require, remember the actual knowledge instead. Reading news feeds about new techniques in HTML, CSS, JAVA, .NET, Ruby, etc. is great. But you should remember it, quite easy if you experiment with what you’ve read. Doing it stores more in the mind than reading about it.

Go ahead, STFG. Experiment, do, develop, extend and Remember.

Last week Åsa, a colleague at Steria Sundsvall, had a link to a great article by Kelly Waters: 3 Reasons Why I Wouldn’t Do Agile Software Development.

…
There are some circumstances where an organisation’s culture is possibly too different to successfully adopt agile. At the moment I can think of only 3 reasons why I wouldn’t do agile software development:

1. If I was working for an organisation that believed it needed complete clarity about a solution before it could start a project. I believe this is a false positive, and it would be very hard to adopt agile in an environment where key stakeholders insist on this.

2. If I was working for an organisation where the relevant product owners couldn’t – or wouldn’t – commit to being actively involved throughout the project. I really do believe that active user involvement is the first principle of agile, and imperative for a project to succeed.

3. If I was working with a team that I didn’t believe could cope with ambiguity, or didn’t have sufficient communication skills to collaborate effectively with business colleagues or customers.
…

This week I hit number 1. The past 2,5 months I’ve been working at Statens Pensjonkasse in Oslo Norway.
From now on the team I’m in will be completely responsible for the production and delivery of new maintenance releases of the main application used by SPK. We went through the process of producing, testing and delivering the next version and something very interesting came up…

A complete new version of the application (front, middle and back-end) is being made by another group – a quite large group where Steria Norway is also involved – using Adobe Flex and Java. The project is called Perform and uses modern technologies and techniques, Scrum among others.

When we took over maintenance of SPK’s current system, they gave an introduction course to Scrum and said it was up to us if we wanted to maintain their application using waterfall or Scrum. As an agile evangelist and ScrumMaster I of course felt the urge to choose Scrum, but was that right?

Until now the entire maintenance period had been quite ad-hoc with lots of Service Desk issues coming in and ad-hoc solutions being needed. (But that’s another story…) This meant there was no real opportunity to think about the development process. But now that we’re taking over as maintenance release team and need to plan more ahead, I had assumed we’d go Scrum. That however, seems quite impossible, even quite unsuitable.

The way new releases are prepared is quite glued to the waterfall development process that has been used until now and as we see it, that cannot be changed. Yet. (I’m not giving up hope.) The customer first gives us a list of open issues that need to be a part of the next release, we estimate the time required, they approve, we build. Then the testing starts… Testing is done in at least 2 phases, system test and acceptance test. We learned that both are done manually and that they’re identical. During the system test phase a person manually goes through all the tests, if all tests pass someone goes through all the tests again but calls it acceptance phase. This hair raising principle is the main reason for not being able to apply Scrum, since it cannt be changed. It may be possible to change it later, but that might take a year and this version of the application is planned to be superseded by Perform in a few years, so it doesn’t really feel like it’s worth the struggle. Just for the experience and sake of Scrum I should try, but probably won’t.
The reason the production and testing procedures are as is, is because of how the application has designed and written. Almost all of the functional code is written in C and embedded SQL. C is hard to fit into Continuous Integration and the embedded SQL is so complex that we dare not even think about mocking/simulation or automation. (A typical SQL task runs for at least 10 hours before any results/errors can be seen.) Even if we did manage to rewrite the code so it was testable with CI, the environment the building (make, nmake) run in and the application environment are so hard-coded that it would take weeks to make it more modular and portable (with portable I mean being able to build and run anywhere without breaking dependencies). (The windows client build process has dependencies that are only built in the Unix server process, but that discussion is off-topic.)

It is quite a shame, but Scrum is not the way to go this time. At least we’ll be able to use Scrum internally while implementing the next release, since Agile/Scrum can always be applied within a waterfall (or other) wrapping.