Most user really doesn't care too much about how fancy or state of the art the software seems to be, all they care about is whether a particular piece of software can do what the user expect them to do, and do it right and fast.
To me personally, I think Google did it right. Most of their services doesn't look fancy, but instead, it is very easy to use, and usually it is fast and less resource intensive. That's the reason why I stick to Chrome, it has all the characteristics of a good software, it stay out of your way. I don't expect much from a browser, and Google Chrome doesn't have much to offer either, and that is the way I like it.
I certainly hope so, because I spent all evening migrating the database server from Mysql to Postgresql. I simply can't tolerate with the slowness of the server any longer. Slipperylips page doesn't even have that much of text, but previously the page took more then 30 seconds to load, not acceptable at all.
Now on a regular PC, it took roughly 5 seconds which is pretty fast.
My linux machine built for web development has finally completed, it has MySQL, PostgreSQL, Apache2, PHP and FTP server all wrap up in one box. It is fast, and it is efficient. You know what? I've also wrote documentation for it, so you guys can build one for yourself too. So stay tune! I will finalize the documentation and will release it shortly.
Thanks to the abundance of time I have in the office recently, I have the opportunity to explore the world of Linux in more depth. While going through the routine of creating a new Virtual Machine for a fresh Suse Linux Install, I stumble upon a new animal called paravisualization. It isn't exactly an animal per-se, but the name they gave for the technology sounds like it.
This is what I learned about paravisualization, thanks to Novell:
"Paravirtualization is key to Xen's ability to achieve drastically better performance than alternative approaches to virtualization available on the market today. Paravirtualization involves making the virtual server OS aware of the fact that it is being virtualized, and enabling the two to collaborate to achieve optimal performance. On Linux, BSD, Solaris x86 the paravirtualized guest sees Xen as an idealized hardware layer, a new form of hardware. Indeed Xen is simply an idealized hardware architecture"
So if you are creating a new VMware for Linux, remember to turn this on in VMWare. For the complete list of benefits, go here:
http://virt.kernelnewbies.org/ParavirtBenefits
If you are like me, and like to fiddle with each aspect of linux with your hands, then you will understand the frustration and of course, the joy of knowing whats going on under the hood, that's what linux is all about.
NTP is Network Time Protocol, it is a simple technology to synchronize the system clock. If you want to set up NTP in linux, you need to fire-up Yast, and install XNTP package. Or simply type:
"yast -i xntp"
Then go to the following directory:
"cd /var/lib/ntp/etc/"
Then uncomment and add the following line at "ntp.conf" using Vi:
--------------------------------------------------------
##
## Outside source of synchronized time
##
server ntp.jaring.my
--------------------------------------------------------
Finally, fire up ntp by keying in:
"service ntp start"
You are done!
I want to try to deploy Slipperylips under different database system, reason is because Mysql is simply over popularized by mainstream tutorials and php text books. I am not sure why, postgreSQL is every bit as powerful as MySQL, and it is as easy to set up as MySQL. Since PostgreSQL is not famous among PHP developer, the server is mostly unused, I can capitalized on that.
If you want to allow PostgreSQL and MySQL to play nicely with PHP, I strongly urge you to move on with Linux. I downloaded and installed the latest PostgreSQL 8.3, MySQL 5.1 and PHP 5. All of them just won't work together for me in my Windows development machine (I am forced to use Windows because of other unrelated project), I fiddled with it for 8 hours yesterday with no vain.
Don't be afraid of linux, embrace it and you will not turn back. If you don't have any free machine laying around, you can check out Virtual Machines to play around.
Friday 10th of September 2010
