Posted by Jeffrey on August 21, 2006 – 8:37 am
We’ll I’ve been busy the last few weeks at work but I took a bit of time off and headed for the north end of Algonquin Park, North Tea Lake to be precise. While on my trip I nabbed my Dad’s old Garmin GPS unit and decided to see what I could come up with when I got back. Unfortunately, the particular model I had was a late 90’s version with little memory so it ran out of space on our return trip but I managed to get some fun data.
Searching the web, I came across this page that had a great list of Garmin related resources. I selected one of the FREE GPS apps which fortunately had an option to save as a Google KML file. Doing so I could just import that into a Google Map and volia, my trip for all to see.
I’ve clean up the KML file a bit as there were a bunch of waypoints and data from previous trips but it was pretty quick and dirty. I’m planning on writing a post over at GoogleMapsBook.com about using the Garmin GPS tracking and waypoint info to create a mashup (with the algonquin map) for your own site but until then, I thought posting my 5 minute tracking mashup might be interesting. Zoom in on the river at the start, it’s fun to look at.
The trip was great fun, I’ll post a few pictures sometime as well.
Posted by Jeffrey on August 10, 2006 – 3:08 pm
UPS guy just came. The book is printed! and I assume hitting the shelves any day now!
Posted by Jeffrey on August 8, 2006 – 4:00 pm
The other day a co-worker was asking if it was possible to add additional buttons to the JavaScript confirm box. As far as I knew it wasn’t possible, but there was another option, and probably one that’s a lot cooler and more useful: make our own alert/confirm box. I planned it all out in my head the next morning while cutting greens at the golf course, and hacked a working version together while I was eating my dinner later that day.
So here’s the quick and dirty script. Use it as you please.
The quick features list is:
- Floating ‘window’ with darkened background a la lightbox.js.
- Specifying a defaultButton will execute that button event when the ‘enter/return’ key is pressed.
- Styled using CSS so you can edit it as necessary.
- Asynchronous event triggering similar to an AJAX call. Events are specified using anonymous functions passed into the LertButton() object and triggered when then associated button is clicked.
Remember, I wrote this quickly while I was eating so it’s not a perfect OO solution and is a little hacky. I’ll improve upon it when I get a chance.
Posted by Jeffrey on August 4, 2006 – 1:32 pm
I just finished watching (or listening as there wasn’t much to see) the php|architect ‘Get PHP 5 Certified’ webcast and am looking forward to taking the PHP 5 certification exam at the public launch during the upcoming php|works conference in Toronto. The exam is currently in beta and only a few select ZCE’s have been allowed to test it out.
The exam has been completely re-written but will follow the same multiple choice/multiple answer/fill-in-the-blank format of the previous exam. Also, if you take the test at one of the many testing centers, you still won’t know your final score beyond pass/fail, but you will get a summary of the subjects/areas where you should improve. Helpful for those who fail the test and want to re-take it again.
It’s nice to see the certification process advancing along with the language. It was mentioned during the talk that in the past, PHP has been seen as a hobbyists language but now with the improvements in PHP 5, and the upcoming PHP 6, enterprise has started to accept the language more and more. Certifying yourself can only help you gain credibility, and helps the PHP community gain credibility as well.
From the web cast, there were a few additional points:
- An updated study guide will be released sometime before the conference.
- The cost will be the same as the PHP 4 exam.
- Currently there are no plans to continue the PHP 4 exam AFTER 2006, unless it is demanded by the community. So if you want to get certified in 4, you’d better do it soon.
- Your certification and certificate will distinguish between 4 and 5.
- Those of us who are already certified in PHP 4 will have to re-take the entire exam, no upgrades, but you can get a discount by contacting zend.
For more info on the conference check out the php|architect site and for more info on the exam check out Zend’s site.
