- Personal

OT: Riding In To Work (Motorcycle)

Wed, 03 Sep 2008 16:08:00 -0700

I have been riding in to work by motorcycle for the last 4 months. I got my motorcycle endorsement at the end of April. I took the Team Oregon Basic Rider Training before getting my endorsement. It was a very fun class. And I really felt prepared to ride on the road after it. So, I'd recommend it or it's equivalent in your state. There were a few reasons that I got a motorcycle. One was to just do something different. You know, shake things up. Another was to save some money. With selling my car and getting a cheap motorcycle, I was able to knock a few grand off my credit cards. :-) Also, I'm getting about 55 MPG. When I fill up, it's like $8. Oh, and insurance is like $160/year. Since I was a new rider, I figured I should get a very cheap bike. That way, I wouldn't cry if I happened to lay it down. So, I got a 1981 Honda CM400 Custom. Here is a picture of my commuter bike. I've already put on almost 2000 miles. Anyone else ride a motorcycle in to work?

I'm an Adobe UG Co-Manager!

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 10:28:00 -0700

As part of a new Adobe initiatives user groups are supposed to have co-managers. So, I will be the new co-manager for the PDXRIA group. The title feels a little like "Assistant to the Regional Manager" ;-). And in more exiting news, Simeon Bateman will be stepping back up as the main manager. We will both do our best to provide engaging presentations and valuable opportunities for networking. For more details see Simeon's blog. P.S. I'm going to try and blog more often.

I Had Fun Yesterday!

Thu, 24 Jan 2008 07:02:00 -0700

We've been really busy at work for years. A lot of the time it feels like a grind. But, yesterday, I really enjoyed myself. I have been working on a project that will get us started on using CFCs for our database access. I know, I know. We're a little late for that train, huh... Well, a huge portion of our application was already written in the FB3 framework before CFCs even existed. That's a lot of procedural momentum. It took me a long time to get approved to start this project (and even longer to fit it in my work schedule). Due to requirements at work, I am using Brian Rinaldi's Illudium PU-36 Code Generator. I made a minor tweek to the generator code so that I could use it outside of the flex interface. And I've been spending some time here and there customizing the generator templates to produce the code I want. Yesterday, I finally got the per-table templates to a good place and started building the service that will pull it all together. As I built that out and made small changes to it and the templates during the day, my test template kept getting cleaner and simpler all day long! I really just wanted to share how exciting it was. I'm doing something that will really help us at work! And I'm proud of it from a technical perspective! I think the last time I was this excited at work was when I proved that we could use AJAX and started making parts of our application much more intuitive. :-) If people are interested in what I'm doing with Brian's generator, how I'm using it, how I'm organizing my CFCs, etc., I could write that up. Anyone?

Review: Xbox 360 Elite

Wed, 26 Dec 2007 13:43:00 -0700

Ok, I really held out as long as I could. I've wanted an Xbox 360 pretty much since they came out. At the time, I just couldn't justify the purchase financially. Then last Christmas, we got a Nintendo Wii (which is excellent for families or parties). Well, this year I'm doing better off financially and I couldn't wait any longer. So, about a week ago I got myself a shiny new Xbox 360 Elite. [More]

OT: Secure Email And Document Delivery

Sun, 30 Sep 2007 13:39:00 -0700

OT: My dad (Jack Phillips) has just finished a project at work for securing email and document transmission. There is a free beta. So, if you have need in your business to send sensitive documents or email securely, go check it out. PositiveDelivery.com

I Have A New Title At Work!

Wed, 05 Sep 2007 08:56:00 -0700

I am going to be the Senior Architect for our ASP model software package at work. I have been cranking out features where I work for years now. It has been full-steam ahead the whole time. It is the busiest job I have ever worked. A very large portion of our application was written in FB3 right before ColdFusion MX came out. There's nothing wrong with that if you only want an HTML front end. The code is fairly clean and well-organized. In the interest of time (and for lack of a better way), the application has continued to be written in procedural FB3. For some time now I have wanted to explore abstracting our data access and business logic into CFCs. I tried pitching it several times. However, we never had the time and resources to do it. Our company has been very successful in the last year. So, now, what was essentially a team of two programmers doing everything has grown to a team of 4 programmers and 1 designer. This has finally given us the resources to tackle re-addressing some foundational stuff in our application. And I finally made a convincing pitch as to why we should. So, I, as the new Senior Architect, will be doing just that! P.S. My blog has been really quiet lately. Embarrassingly quiet. Hopefully, with my new position, I'll have some interesting stuff to blog...

Sturgeon Fishing (Sorry No Tech Stuff Here)

Tue, 17 Jul 2007 19:05:00 -0700

Today, I did something I have wanted to do for a long time. I took a guided fishing trip for trophy sturgeon on the Columbia River. It was actually a belated birthday present for my good friend Jason Fischer. We went with local guide "Sturgeon Frank". Frank has been doing this for a long time. So, he didn't have any problem getting some really nice fish on the line for us. If you haven't ever reeled in a fish that weighs more than you do, I'll just clue you in: It's hard work! If I didn't lose you at "No Tech Stuff" and you aren't a member of PETA, then you might like to go see the photos Jason took of me catching one of these beasts (250-300 pounder).

Riding My Bicycle (Too)

Thu, 14 Jun 2007 09:12:00 -0700

I saw Barney's post about riding to work, and thought that I'd relate my own experience too. I've been over 6 feet tall since junior high. And I was always rail thin. (Some people mistakenly thing I still am.) And, I always had physical jobs. In 1999 I was about 6'4" and 190 lb. And I frequently had double-bacon-cheese burgers for breakfast off the catering wagon. :-) However, around the beginning of this millennium, I started working behind a computer. My brain and my fingers have gotten the bulk of the exercise since then... For the last two years, I've drastically lowered my caloric intake. But, I've still out-grown most of a wardrobe. :-( So, enough of the sob story. Last week I started riding to work! On friday, I bought a bike. My legs complained a little in the beginning. But, I think they have already gotten a little better after a few rides. It's really sad how poorly I've taken care of my health these past years. In high-school, I rode the STP (Seattle to Portland) twice. Riding to work is nice. Portland really is a pretty city. And I've already met 2 people that said they just started riding this week too! I owe it to my family and myself to be healthy. So, here is to a new beginning and better health!

Hello Aggregators!

Thu, 24 May 2007 22:29:00 -0700

Within the last week or so, I got emails from both MXNA and Full As A Goog, both accepting my blog for aggregation. So, this is a quick "Hello" to any new readers. Thank you for stopping by! Come back soon!

Quest For Linux (Spurred By Microsoft Mediocrity)

Sun, 15 Apr 2007 19:30:00 -0700

Warning - This post is a bit of a rant. I have to say, in the past, I've been somewhat of an apologist for Microsoft. Being a developer, I understand how hard it is to maintain a very large code base and roll out changes while staying bug free. Lately though, I just can't justify their mediocre software. (The first draft of this said "crappy software". But, I'm trying to remain objective.) The more I push the edges of their tools, the more I see the cracks. Obviously, lots of you have known for some time that IE 6 could have been much better. I guess I just hadn't tried to do much in it beyond the basics until the last couple of years. In the last year, I've really been working on using CSS and JS to make my code sexy and exciting. I'll be darned if IE doesn't disappoint me daily. I got to see what great strides a company could make, if they tried, when Macromedia updated the Flash AVM for AS3. Macr wanted developers to seriously consider the Flash platform for building enterprise level applications. Well, there were concerns among us developers about performance and the inconsistency of the AS language. Macromedia addressed those concerns by writing a new AVM from scratch with a much improved language and HUGE performance improvements. I think that Macromedia did a stellar job with this. Flex 2 with AS3 is now a solid platform with a lot of buzz around it. The level of competence Macromedia displayed must have raised the bar in my mind for software companies. Because, when I heard that MS had IE 7 in beta, I thought, "They've waited for so long to update IE, surely they'll make a better performing more compliant browser". I know, I know. In my defence, I'm an eternal optimist. I really do expect the best of people. Well, of course I was dissapointed. My best guess is, Microsoft thought, "People sure seem to like that tabbed-browsing thing Firefox has." So, they slapped tabs onto IE 6, applied a graphical coat of paint, and, finally, made it impossible to configure the toolbars to your liking. Then they pushed that sucker out. Ugh! SQL Server 2005 came out a while back. That was pretty pathetic too. I mean, until the first Service Pack, I couldn't run SQL Server Management Studio without it crashing EVERY day. Then we started to find the little stuff. Like, when using a sub-query, if it has a syntax error, it will simply evaluate it as null and then give you results based off of that. That's a big change in behavior from SQL Server 2000. There's plenty of other things, but, this post is getting pretty long. Needless to say, I'm a little disenchanted with Microsoft these days. So what is an intrepid developer to do. I thought that I would try out Linux. I keep hearing about these modern distros that you can just boot into and try out. First I tried Ubuntu, but it had no support for the built-in wifi on my HP DV6000 laptop. So, in reading about how to remedy that, I came across Sabayon Linux. It's actually a pretty cool distro and it did boot up with my wifi card seeming to work. But, it never could quite connect to any access points. A couple times it did, but, the connection was worthless. I spent almost this entire weekend trying to get my laptop running on Linux with support for my wifi card. I'm sad to say that I never did get it working. Furthermore, I managed to lock up Sabayon multiple times. I guess Linux support for my laptop is just not there yet. Don't worry. I haven't given up yet. When I'm done posting this, I'm going to go read up on the other popular distros and get a couple more of them started downloading. I'm even open to the idea of getting an add-on wifi expresscard. So, in summary:
I think that truly great software companies are rare. Microsoft isn't one of them. But, I'm posting this from XP MCE. :-( And my search for a sanctuary from the exemplary mediocrity of Microsoft goes on.

Hello World (Wide Web)!

Sat, 31 Mar 2007 12:50:00 -0700

It's my first blog post and I couldn't resist. And being that it is (my first blog post), I'll introduce myself. My name is Chris Phillips. I'm a Web Application Developer. I work with ColdFusion, HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and SQL every day. I really enjoy my work. A Little Personal History: I tried a few other jobs before I fell into Web Development. Most of them were just a poor fit for my particular personality quirks. Lining up all the parts of a widget at 45% angles on the table before I assembled them really upset my bosses at a previous job. They frequently pointed out that I was slower than the other employees at manufacturing widgets. To which I always responded, "Yes, but my widgets are crafted expertly and lovingly to the exact specifications". Well, they weren't buying that. So, I started taking Web Design classes. Eventually I found ColdFusion. Now, I think that my attention to detail make me a really good fit for this profession. Well, that's enough for now. I'll be posting some actual technical content soon.