Weekend stuff
Jul. 10th, 2006 08:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
johnridleyI spent the weekend alternating between futzing around the yard, and writing a web app, doing each for about an hour at a time. The pond now has a decent border of mulch, and we have a variety of specimen plants ready to go in as soon as we decide where. I've also got mulching fever and will probably wind up spending another $100 on mulch and landscaping cloth; we have a lot of plants that need a border to keep me from whipping them when trimming grass.
I can see why mulch gets used so much in landscaping. It's a lot easier and faster than the alternative (planting and maintaining ground cover), and it makes maintenance a lot easier as well. My father-in-law apparently said that mulching/chipping areas was a sign of "lazy landscapers." I've decided to look on "lazy" in landscaping the same way as I do in programming; as a major virtue. Besides, what I'm doing can't really be considered "landscaping" - more like "disconnected improvement" - over the course of years, making some disconnected islands of design in the yard, hoping that they slowly merge into one big area... that I don't have to mow.
The web app is nearly fully functional but exceedingly ugly and fairly clunky. I'm still finding my legs with AJAX, figuring out how much to use. The answer seems to be "either zero or all." If you're going to require it to do some functions, you may as well do all of it like that, because it does make for a nicer interface and makes it easier to maintain state, etc.
I've been very careful not to upload the app to my public web server, because what I'm doing with it is JUST close enough to what I'm doing at work that it would fit into the category of "research". On one hand, almost every skill I use at work that's new is something that I acquired by doing "for fun" stuff at home over the last 15 years, and my boss appreciates that and doesn't mind a bit of mucking around at work. OTOH, I do have work to do, and if I brought this thing in at all, I'd probably work on it all day.
I can see why mulch gets used so much in landscaping. It's a lot easier and faster than the alternative (planting and maintaining ground cover), and it makes maintenance a lot easier as well. My father-in-law apparently said that mulching/chipping areas was a sign of "lazy landscapers." I've decided to look on "lazy" in landscaping the same way as I do in programming; as a major virtue. Besides, what I'm doing can't really be considered "landscaping" - more like "disconnected improvement" - over the course of years, making some disconnected islands of design in the yard, hoping that they slowly merge into one big area... that I don't have to mow.
The web app is nearly fully functional but exceedingly ugly and fairly clunky. I'm still finding my legs with AJAX, figuring out how much to use. The answer seems to be "either zero or all." If you're going to require it to do some functions, you may as well do all of it like that, because it does make for a nicer interface and makes it easier to maintain state, etc.
I've been very careful not to upload the app to my public web server, because what I'm doing with it is JUST close enough to what I'm doing at work that it would fit into the category of "research". On one hand, almost every skill I use at work that's new is something that I acquired by doing "for fun" stuff at home over the last 15 years, and my boss appreciates that and doesn't mind a bit of mucking around at work. OTOH, I do have work to do, and if I brought this thing in at all, I'd probably work on it all day.
no subject
Date: 2006-07-14 02:41 pm (UTC)