Matthew Lang

My in-laws have a new home in Canada, so a few changes to the sleeping arrangements. They still have a great spot outside for a quiet coffee though.

I’m trying to build a bit more flexibility into a Rails application by adding the ability to have multiple widgets on the one page.

From a presentation perspective, the problem looks easy. Any number of widgets for a page can be modelled to be presented as a complete web page. It doesn’t matter how the data is put together, e.g. flat files, canned models, hard-coded HTML.

What complicates the problem is how the user creates and manipulates these widgets to their needs. I’ve seen enough back-end interfaces for various products to know it can be done. The Mailbrew interface, which has similar functionality, is how I want this feature to work.

Instead of sitting at the text editor and blindly coding my way out of this, I’ve been using my iPad to sketch out a few ideas of how widgets of different shapes will relate to the page, and how a page will assemble these widgets. The problem is starting to unravel now.

Might be time for another coffee.

For the last few months, I’ve been building a content management system aimed at a particular industry.

I’m close to finishing the first working version of the product. There are still a few things to do, like account management and theme options, but these are trivial things that will not present any problems.

While reviewing the CMS source code this morning, I spotted a way that I can refactor a part of the CMS. The change involves simplifying the different content from multiple types of content to a single base content model that I can base other content on. This is a significant structural change to the product. It involves changes in how the CMS presents and manages the content.

If I spend the time making the change now, it would be much easier to handle any created content and migrations of data in the future.

If I schedule the switch for later on after the release, I’ll always know that I have this change in the structure to make and will be presented with an increasing problem of migrating data.

Thinking on it, I like the idea of taking the hit now and getting this right before the product gets released. I’m just wondering now why I didn’t see this before when I was modeling the content for the CMS.

I’m with Kurt on this, amen brother.

In my diet plan you can have as much coffee as you like. Because in my diet, you drink coffee because it tastes so damned good.

— Blah, blah, blah by Kurt Harden

The blogroll has been chirping about coffee shops. First it was Future Lawyer:

First, some of us refuse to pay 3 to 5 dollars for a cup of coffee, so we don’t spend a lot of time in Starbucks. But, we do have lunch at Panera Bread, and we don’t use the public WiFi there either. At least, we don’t use it without first tunneling through a VPN.

— Why Lawyers Should Never Use Starbucks WiFi by Future Lawyer

Then Cultural Offering.

I freely admit that I dislike Starbucks. On the few of occasions I have been in the chain - airports, a meeting or two, and when an employee needed to throw up (seemed the perfect spot) - I found myself wanting to tell the students to try the library and the adults to try a tie and a home office.

— The shoes bother me the most by Cultural Offering

Then Execupundit.

I like Starbucks. It is a convenient and comfortable meeting spot. I ignore the computer users who are tapping away at, no doubt, the next War and Peace. The Americano is a nice watered-down version of their strong coffee. When ordering I still use small, medium, and large rather than their menu lingo. That immediately signals “out of touch” to the staff and thus is desirable.

— The Starbucks Experience: In But Not Of by Execupundit

I’m fortunate enough to have a coffee shop in town that isn’t Starbucks, has plenty of seating and has some damn good coffee for those mornings when I need it to make the code flow.

And yes I also say small, medium or large.

Some essential coffeeshop tips and etiquette from the peeps over at DNSimple.

When you order your first drink ask for it straight away. Having a good relationship with the staff is important so give a good tip. I usually give 40%-50% on the first visit. That really helps get a good start with the people working there.

— Working in coffeeshops by DNSimple

I need to breakout from the home office a bit more often now that the good weather is just around the corner. Paisley only has a couple of good coffee shops worth working in though.

… coffee.

Once I start the coffee I have five minutes to make sure the dog doesn’t chase the deer into the woods of get sprayed by a skunk. I shine the tactical flashlight over the yard and then open the screen door…

Then I wait for the coffee. This is a important routine.

— The first thing I do by Kurt Harden

Even if you don’t drink coffee, this is a must buy if you’re a cycling fan.

via PedalConsumption

Start a new coffee shop that prides itself on not only making better tasting coffee and food and provides a better customer service, but also pays their UK taxes.