Just added some more things to my ‘php-make-like-thing’ on git hub and to the phake-scripts supporting package.
We use a system of ’skel files’ at work that build configuration files for us. I have implemented this system in phake… just to pass the time.
I read more than I write – so here is my Google Reader shared items feed so you can read as much and write as little as me: Read more – much, much more here
Today I pushed a relatively stable version of ‘phake’, a make-like environment written in PHP.
I’ve written this with a few things in mind: there are too many stand-alone PHP scripts in the world. Too many of those scripts don’t have easy to understand options. And, developers are lazy.
Grab it from: http://github.com/danfrost/phaker/tree/master
(more…)
It’s worth doing some things first, before you’ve lost three days debugging some stupid problem.
It’s worth doing this before you debug especially when dealing with troublesome, old, boring, stupid bugs. And confusing bugs. And bugs when you’re tired.
Chances are that you won’t though. Neither do I. We, both of us try six million things that we’d like it to be before we look back at the problem and ask… what is the problem?
My whole obsession with debugging started by trying to find a book on the subject. Here are a few:
Debugging, by David J. Agans promises to help to solve any problem. The methods described in the book are the generic ones I’ll be writing about here – checking the plug; different ways of testing etc. Get “Debugging” from Amazon. David has also created a companion website at http://www.debuggingrules.com/.
Recently at an Amazon event at Channel 4 (http://animoto.com/play/ZmrGxAfrxEJq1sydVYonJg), I mentioned the fact that EC2 didn’t compare favourably to many dedicated hosting packages. I was told that things were going to change and the next morning, reserved instances were announced.
Normal EC2 instances work like this: you buy an instance for an hour, you’re changed $0.10/hr.
Reserved instance: you pay $325 now and for the next year you buy an instance for $0.04/hr when you need it.
Over the next few months, I’m going to do a short series on debugging. Admittedly, debugging is boring, soul crushing and deadly, deadly dull but it must be done.
You can follow this deeply dreary topic on debugging techniques, should you please.
This short series will cover the methods I’ve found through during my experience on many web app projects and those I found, liked and stolen from a selection of the books on the subject.
Why?… because debugging – or just solving apparently complex problems – is what I spend most of my life doing. Every problem starts as a black box and usually ends up being fixed by a few lines of code, if not less. The question is: how to avoid spending your entire life on 3 lines of code.
The techniques I’ve found for solving problems aren’t based on particular tools, programs or programming languages. They apply to many situations because they’re about solving problems, dealing with information, coming up with ideas…
Here’s some of the things I’ll cover:
You are currently browsing the dan/blog blog archives for June, 2009.
