Lab

Last night I wrote first draft of specification for djauthy.

I presented djauthy almost a month ago at the Christchurch Python Meeting, but I sat down to put together comprehensive specification only now.

The specification is here: djauthy - simple authentication using one time tokens, OpenID and OAuth.

Your feedback is welcome and appreciated.

I will be releasing djauthy under one of the open source licenses in the near future.

It seems this is an important and so far quite successful week for one of my projects. I am talking about the co-working arrangement that I would like to set up here in Christchurch.

I have had two important meetings related to the project. The first one was with a friend who is interested in co-investing in my idea. That's a good sign .

I have also had a coffee and talked about co-working with Ben. Ben is an entrepreneur, based here in Christchurch and we share the same ideas about collaborative business model. It was really good to talk to him and get such important feedback about it. I really appreciated it.

It would be great to hear from anyone who is interested in co-working so we have a chat about it. If you think it's something you would like to do, please contact me at "marek (dot) kuziel (at) encode (dot) net (dot) nz".

Alright. Few talks later and a blog post lost because of expired seesion I am back from BarCampChristchurch.

We're doing pretty well I reckon. 30+ people showed up so far, we had 6 talks covering Web2.0, SaaS, Search, User-Centered design, email and OpenID.

You may want to check out Ben's coverage of all talks we've had so far (with photos).

I was quite surprised how hard is to explain to people who never heard of OpenID, how OpenID actually works. At the end a real example of how OpenID works helped. Phew. I never thought it's that hard. Lesson learned.

At the moment "gadgets" talk is on. For all rugby fans out there is http://web.rugbymate.co.nz/ site which is a portable mobile guide for Rgby World Cup 2007.

Phil talked about his play with Arduino and also promoted TVIC group (btw. next dinner is next week).

We've four talks in front of us and then planning session for BarCampChristchurch2.

Ben Kepes talks on SaaS. So, what in hell is SaaS anyway? SaaS = Software as Service.

ie. TradeMe - replacement of second hands shop online. Look what happens when you want buy a heater

SaaS/s: Pros and Cons: simpler, more incremental (add stuff as you go), threats, generally lower margin.

SaaS/v: substitue, but..; value add. Pros and Cons: conception - hard; harder to execute - more complex; needs more cash - maybe; more secure once created

Advice: look for SaaS/v model; user-centric design (make stuff *people* want to use); get advice from someone who knows their stuff;

Stuff to think about: community; power of networks; aggregation of revenue streams

Howdy,

So, we've started. BarCampChristchurch in on since 10:30am

Seth started with his talk about Web2.0. For more information see his blog entry.

At the moment discussion goes about Mindmaps, Creative Commons in New Zealand and copyright protection.

Video recordings are being made and we're hanging on Freenode IRC #barcamp-chch

It all started on the TVIC mailing list as an idea to have lunch/coffee together sometime. Then Seth suggested we should organize small BarCamp event here in Christchurch. So we do.

What is that BarCamp thingy, anyway?

BarCamp is an internation network of unconferences. It's an open event where content is provided by the participants. The idea is that everyone who attends BarCamp should do a presentation. Focus of the unconference is usually on web applications, open source technologies, etc. More information about what the BarCamp is can be found on Wikipedia.

Who, When, Where, What?

BarCamp Christchurch is a first BarCamp organized in New Zealand. Two days were proposed: Friday 31st August, or Friday 7th September. It all is going to happen at the Canterbury Innovation Incubator on Armagh street. If you're interested to attend please watch barcamp.org/BarCampChristchurch page for the latest information about the event.

First of all, contratulations to Seth and the team at Interclue!

We all know that this was long road for you guys and I think I can say we're all happy to hear that you launched today.

For those of you who don't have a clue what I am talking about, get the Interclue Firefox plugin and find out youself.

Clueful browsing everyone!

This is a book I have been awaiting for a quite long time! The book about new version of the PEAR Installer (note: PEAR Installer is part of the PEAR package), the package that allows you to deploy your PHP projects anywhere without a hassle.

As of version 1.4.0, PEAR (Installer) contains channel support, that allows PHP developers to deploy their PHP projects via their own channel server!

As a PHP developer, you might had been playing with the idea to automate deployment processes for your PHP (web)applications, right? OK, maybe not. Frankly, I don't know anyone else in person, who would have tried to do deployment of the entire websites, or PHP applications using PEAR Installer and own channel server. I hope this book will change this  soon.

Joshua Porter wrote his seven reasons why he thinks web apps projects fail (not just) these bubble2.0 days.

It is very interesting reading, so hurry up, click click on the link, read it and learn!

His blog post: 7 Reasons Why Web Apps Fail

And as a bonus here's one link, Jim sent me about Characterizing People as Non-Linear, First-Order Components in Software Development.

After those years in web business, I must only agree with the text. People are actually the main reason that causes projects to succeed or fail.

UPDATE: Joshua posted 7 More Reasons Why Web Apps Fail.

I work on a new project, or rather on a set of small projects by creating small PEAR packages, that will provide my own native PEAR commands.

My intention is to create simple tools, that would potentially save me a lot of time when it comes to repetitive tasks. See for example my Kuziel_PEAR_Command_Database package which is the first official package of the whole project).

I reckon "don't repeat yourself" is a good rule, however, you have to put a lot of energy to create such a tools to be able to do so. Hence, why I started work on this "project".

I discussed the idea of the project in our cosy private IRC chat room with Jim to get his opinions on this.

Note: You can read about the importance of instant feedback in a post by Matt on 37signals's blog.

Anyway, if you think about repetitive tasks, it is mostly about some sort of generation of something. Generation of code, configurations, and so on.

And here comes the problem. Actually, not really a problem, but rather something worth to discuss, before you start doing generators of any sort.

So, the thing is that in some cases it is not very clear who owns the copyright of the generated code!

Jim, raised the question about this on RoR's forum bridge.

And if case you're interested, you can also read his thoughts about it, in his post Who owns your code?

As for my project, I think I need to spend some time over the weekend re-reading parts of Innovation happens elsewhere, where open source licencing and copyright issues are discussed very well and also keep my eye on the RoR forum's discussion to see where it will go.

And as for now: "All your code are belong to us …"

I've packaged and deployed to my PEAR channel new version of Kuziel_PEAR_Command_Database package.

For those of you who don't know what is it about, this package provides native PEAR commands for DB_DataObject and MDB2_Schema packages which will help you when it comes to generating DB DataObject classes and/or MDB2 schemas.

For more information about the package please read my previous Kuziel_PEAR_Command_Database package entry.

Actually, I'd be interested if anyone uses this package (beside me and those of you who I bothered with it ). Please, leave me a comment if you're using it. Thanks!

Here are the release notes for version 1.0.3:

Fix: short options for 'mdb2-create-schema' command were too long (2 characters) instead of   required one character which caused that after installation almost all PEAR commands disappeared   and it was unpossible to do anything with the PEAR repository.In case you have previus version installed and this happend to you. Solution how to fix this   is to remove all files of this package (lib/PEAR/Command/Database.xml and   lib/PEAR/Command/Database.php) and upgrade to this, fixed, version.

Important note: This version contains following options set for MDB2 Schema

• portability = MDB2_PORTABILITY_ALL ^ MDB2_PORTABILITY_FIX_CASE
• seqcol_name = id

Here's the link to the 2006 SXSW podcast coverage:
http://2006.sxsw.com/coverage/podcasts/

Among other things, you can download & listen to podcasts about AJAX, design of next generation of web apps, open science and podcasting 2.0.

I already pointed my podcatcher (Bashpodder) to the feed and looking forward to listen to it.

Note: you can also find there video coverage and some video blogs from the SXSW 2006.

A month ago (or so) I registered for the Sun Developer Network (SDN). As a bonus for joining in, they offered free hardcopy of the book '