Me, a Web Developer?
When people ask me what I do for a living I tend to simply say "Web Developer". Depending on who I am talking to I might elaborate on this lowly sounding role. If so I'll confuse them with talk of Intranets, which I'll tell them, are like "internal company websites". Sometimes I'll even add a really bad example of what purpose an Intranet might serve. How do you describe an intranet application to the layman?
This is better than the mix of jobs I've told people I've had in the past - Software Developer, IT Consultant and Computer Programmer. Still, Web Developer is probably not quite true either. Maybe I'll settle for just saying Domino Expert and see where that gets me. Having said this, it's not that I haven't created websites. It's just that they're normally as favours for mates, normally in PHP and normally nothing to shout about.
Yesterday however, a Domino website I created went live, bringing the total number of Domino websites I've worked on to two. First there was KwikKopy and now there's ShowLED.
ShowLED was previously a Flash-based site stored in HTML files. Content management was obviously a problem. My task was to convert the design from Flash to CSS and give it a Domino backend where they could amend details. I also added the multi-lingual option.
Tonight I am off to Derbyshire for a knees-up in disguise as a "business meeting". One of the guys who owned the pub has moved to a farm in The Peak District with his wife. They're converting some barns in to holiday cottages and need a website to promote them. In comes I.
The challenge I've set myself is to develop this site solely on the Mac Mini. Can it be done? I don't see why not. I've got trial versions of BBEdit, Transmit and GraphicConverter. That gives me 30 days to get it done. Is there anything else I might need?
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Nice looking web site for the LED folks.
I found another virtual PC product for the Mac, but haven't tried it yet;
{Link}
This one is only $69, so it's on my to-do list to try it. If I could run ND6 on my Mini I could stop using Windows all together.
Looks good Ed. Let us know how you get on with it.
I install and use the free xcode for text file editing.
Jake, I remember your interest in PHP some time ago. If this site is dynamic, why don't you look at doing it in Rails? People rave about how easy and fast it is to get sites up using it. I don't know if Rails will be your thing, but there are a range of videos on getting started {Link}
Brendon. I found the XCode page on Apple's site but there's nothing about how to install/run/use it. Am I being stupid.
Bernard. When learning a language, as I still am with PHP, I prefer to do it from basic text editors and learn from the ground up.
Scratch that. I just did a Spotlight search for "xcode" and there it is. You've got to love Tiger.
Wich part of Computerthingymajigger don't you like as a jobdescription? Sort of explains everything I think.
Hm. I detect a real need to confabulate some job titles we can all put on our nice business cards that say in a word or two (at most) what in essence it is that we do for a living.
I like Professional Hacker, but that has the obvious negative connoations that leave potential customer s wondering at your intentions. IT Consultant is pretty vanilla, and when is the last time you actually 'consulted' someone in information technology? Don't we more often consult on how ideas might be improved and presented in one technological medium or another? Domino Expert is too focussed, Jake - you're far more than that my friend.
I'm sure someone has a clever idea or two. Phr34k1n9 H4cker? Geek? I've used Technologist once or twice, seems higher band than Consultant but just as generic.
Hey Jake,
One comment on ShowLED. Firefox displays the familiar Domino icon in the browsing tab from the favicon info. FYI.
Ok. Two Comments. Not too shabby!
Jerry
Hey,
Not sure what a "knees-up" is, but don't hurt yourself. How about the free TextWrangler, Smultron, SubEthaEdit or even Taco HTML Edit? I'm going to assume that these are static web pages and not content driven, so be sure to use loads of animated gifs of people falling drunk off bar stools.
Other Mac apps I like:
QuickSilver
OmniGraffle
iWork (Pages/Keynote)
Don't forget Firefox with WebDeveloper extension and Remote Desktop Connection to connect to your XP box.
Following up on Ed's post: I installed GuestPC last night and installed a Windows 2000 on it. Took a bit longer than expected (but that might have been due to me doing all sorts of other stuff at the same moment) but the performance of the virtual machine afterwards was pretty good (actually a lot better than VirtualPC). I haven't installed Designer on it yet but last night's performance was promising ... Note that this is on a dual G5 (2,5 Ghz) so it might be a bit less on a Mini or a i/Powerbook....
If you're going to use a virtual pc I highly recommend trading in BBEdit for Macromedia Homesite.