Author: Arné Klopper

Wow, this is google in 1998:

http://web.archive.org/web/19981202230410/http://www.google.com/

Amazing how they started …

The last couple of weeks has been real hectic.

Since I left my permanent job in November 2005 I’ve been busy none-stop.

I started my own company, where I do contract work for numerous companies. In the first month I already made 3x more than I did at the old company.

I then also have my side projects, which are an SMS competition management product, which is finished but needs a nice web interface(when I have time) which I have a few clients.

The other project on which I’m working is the GOGLY project, which I hope and intent to finish by half March somewhere which is going to make me a millionaire or hope thats the case. If you do not try you won’t know.

And of course lets not forget IntoShape which takes a great deal of my time.

And on the other side I’m busy with contract work for a very exciting project that I cannot give too much info about but all I can mention is that it has to do with eLearning, and that my SMS services will also benefit from this…. 😉

Well, that is just a recap of what I do every day…

Now, some of my projects are almost or near completion but need some time to finish them completely.

I am looking at hiring a development dude to help me out and as one of the contract companies wants me to take over the dev department(so I’ll hire them staff) this will become a reality.

Well, by now everybody knows about the upcoming BlogMad blog traffic genrator/exchanger – call it what you will .

With great anticipation everybody is waiting anxiously for the outcome of this one.

I am one of the priveledged persons that was selected to be a beta tester, and yesterday the testing started in full fling.

So, hopefully now I can post some cool insider screenshots … stay tuned !!

Today we had some problems with a database getting slow, then we had to vacuum that baby .!!

As records are updated in Postgres, files become a bit unorganized and bulky. This condition can get very bad as more records are updated and added.

Vacuum is a command that sort of makes the problem better for you.

When run the first time on a database that has run for quite some time, you will immediately see the performance increase.

There are three(/4) types of Vacuums that can be done on a database

1. VACUUM
This is a standard vacuum. Least intensive and just marked the unused spaced in the file.

2. ANALYZE VACUUM
This updates the index.

3. FULL
This physically removes the unused spaced in the file.

Usage :
VACUUM [ FULL ] [ FREEZE ] [ VERBOSE ] ANALYZE [ table [ (column [, …] ) ] ]

Finally I decided on a premade theme.

I like this Desert theme, looks really nifty.

One problem I have is that the links are not categorized anymore, usually it was organized in cats like Blogs, Cool Sites etc.

I’ll fix that at a later stage, I don’t think it would be a biggy.

Well, there was the MillionDollarWebsite(can’t seem to find the URL), the guy made his million, now these guys are really going to some troubles promoting and making it worth your while.

They’ve got the magic ingredients: GIRLS and CARS.

I think these guys are really original, and so what if they make a quick buck, they really have a nifty idea, check our www.smashmyviper.com

I always worked on mySQL, or as far back as I can remember, and usually when searching for a variable in a string you just do a LIKE, and it doesn’t worry about case(case insensitive).


SELECT user_id FROM tblUser WHERE first_name LIKE '%$searchVariable%'


BUT with PostGres the LIKE is case sensitive(aaarghhh).

In PostGres you would do something like this:

$variable = strtolower($variable);

Wish I could find a way just to make this step 1 line shorter…. maybe on of those cool PostGres custom function thingies….

Ha, I’m certified(now also in the physical world).

Zend, the people that initially started with the Zend Engine and started the whole PHP revolution, provides certification for programmers all over the world to be able to get Zend Certified!!

Last year(29 September 2004) I took up to the challenge and took the exam, and past with flying color(actually they only say pass) Last month I received the proof, a certificate(already framed by Zend) and a product CD, and some cool stickers and a nice letter congratulating me on my accomplishment.

I was the fourth person in South Africa to be certified ( link here ) as a Zend PHP Certified Engineer.

I also received an email from the people at Zend giving us the rights to use a special logo, cause we are one of the first 1000 PHP ZCE..

I said I’ll post some thoughts about AJAX on my blog … and guess what … This post is not it …

I’m still struggling to write some decent document, but I’ll get to it … promise 😉

As a matter a fact, I yesterday started working again with a whole AJAX framework crossed with a templating system, very nice

I am also starting a new project(Project GOGLY) which will also take advantage of this technology.

I’ve spent most of the day thinking about a new project I wanna start that could maybe be one of those projects that will make me Retire in a years’ time .. (NOT !!!).

Anyways, I’ve been thinking about giving this new project a name, and I’ve got a name, but if I publish it, people will know what I’m about to do, so for now I’m CodeNaming it GOGLY, and here is a small hint about this project, it is in the ADVERTISING category of the internet …

I’ll be keeping you posted about this one 😉 It is going to be a bomb