This week was largely consumed by work on a Google Maps web site for mobile devices.  I admit it’s not going too well.  For every step forward, it seemed like something else broke, or got glitchy.  One issue I think it so much javascript / ajax going on nowadays on web pages can cause some conflicts.  In addition, html elements show and hide, special effects, etc. can wreak havoc on the layout of the elements.

Then, just after you have things working, check another web browser, and something’s wrong there!  Very frustrating.

I also spent some more time on Adobe Connect – using the API for some reporting.  This was more successful, and I’m getting used to that API and the structure of Connect.

Besides that, the week was filled on other projects for existing clients, with an unusual amount Perl work.  As an aside, Perl used to be the main language for web applications (back in the 90’s).  It’s mostly gone by the wayside, but there is a lot of legacy code out there to maintain, and build on.  It remains a good language, but just no longer a primary web language.

That’s the wrap.

In the early days of the web, scheduled maintenance could be done from time to time, and servers just taken offline for several hours.  However, those days are long gone – at least I thought so, until I came across this from the IRS tonight (8pm EST):

Unfortunately, I can’t pay my taxes to anyone else.  So let’s see, I can post a cat video on Facebook 24x7x365, but pay my taxes…ehh..

This week’s highlight was the launch of a redesigned site for a good client – hardwaresource.com.  This new look makes the site more user friendly and visually appealing.  I turned it live early one morning, moving the files around, and keeping downtime minimal.  No matter how many cutovers I do, there’s always the concern that something goes wrong.  In this case, things went very smoothly, with few hitches.

I’ve also been working more with Adobe Connect.  This is a high end offering for online meetings, training, webinars, and self-paced training and testing.  It’s very comprehensive.  I’ve been doing a lot with the API, mostly to pull data for use with other applications.  It competes in a crowded space (eg. WebEx), but I’m surprised how many features and capabilities the product has.

Here’s my weekly wrap up of activities for the week.

I added gallery functionality just in time for the Drinker’s Choice awards article.  The image bar along the top uses some jquery, and of course there’s lots of php / mysql on the back end.

Another new site using WordPress – this one pretty small, but nice, using a responsive design template – Pharm-spend.com.

As an aside, I’m doing more WordPress sites lately and enjoying the platform and plugins.

The rest of the week included some perl scripting, nothing I can show here, but believe me, it was good stuff.  I also did a fair amount of Sunshop work – hacking it up, upgrading, you name it, I did it.

That’s about it for a busy week.  I’m ready for a rest!

Here’s my work log for the week of March 11, 2013:

– I moved an ecommerce website running Sunshop from 1&1 to Godaddy. The move was precipitated by 1&1’s decision to only support php 5.4 come April, which many programs, including Sunshop, do not currently support. The move was a bit rocky, because getting the SSL certificate working correctly took GoDaddy way to long! We worked around it, though and otherwise the move went pretty smoothly.  This contrasts with another customer service experience…see below.

– Another client with several ecommerce sites (again Sunshop) was having issues with timeouts, and also some SSL certificate trust problems.  The hosting provider Knownhost, provided excellent support, and stuck with us until the issues were resolved.  I learned a lot about CA Intermediate certificates in the process.  Knownhost now joins my favorite hosting providers: Rackspace and Liquidweb.   All provide amazing service.

– I helped a new client with some emergency work getting an authorize.net script working, for taking payments online.

– The week rounded out with a lot of php and perl programming.  Overall it was very busy week.