Just to prove I haven’t been sitting on my hands these last few months, here’s a few screenshots from the Open Translate script. It’s slowly coming together. I’ve spruced up the UI with some dynamic JS and AJAX for speed, but there’s still plenty to do. A good chunk of the backend is now complete: project managers can add and update project data, project versions, categories, translators, personal preferences, version settings, project settings and more. The full data export options are still limited, and for the initial version I’m only going to offer PHP format (since that’s what Form Tools requires). The entire UI supports bi-directionality and pulls all text from separate language files.

I’ll begin work on the Translators section soon, so I’ll be able to make it available to Form Tools translators. Pretty cool!

Well, what a surprise.

Like most people, I get overwhelmed by politics since just about everything is open for argument – everyone has their own view and who’s to say one view is better or worse than another? Without devoting the time to research the issues, you may as well throw your hands in the air and go play some Nintendo. Tack on the sheer mind-numbingness of today’s political discourse in the media and it’s a wonder anyone follows politics at all.

But the invasion of Iraq and its consequences is – and was – an absolute no-brainer. This didn’t require any political savvy whatsoever, just a modicum of common sense. Of course it’s resulted in more terrorism. Of course it’s resulted in more pain, suffering and death.

I slap my forehead in disgust.

A couple more math problems & responses my girlfriend sent me.

My nerdy co-workers tell me that the real answer to the ramp problem is 1.72.

Just a few things to report, in no particular order:

• I spent today at the Vancouver PHP Conference. I saw a couple of good speeches: first, Rasmus Lerdorf – the inventor of PHP – presented the keynote speech. It covered rather a lot of ground, but he showed some rather interesting techniques in benchmarking and locating speed bottlenecks in PHP scripts. There was also a dry, but informative lecture by Andrei Zmievski on unicode support in PHP 6. Interesting, but I found myself wondering more about the current limitations in PHP 5.
• I finally got round to installing Wordpress on the Form Tools site to manage the news, so now I’ll be posting all Form Tools-related news there instead of here.
• The translation project continues… I’m now able to manage projects, project managers, data and translator accounts. Next comes the ability for translators to view and actually translate the data. Should be a doddle (heavy sarcasm).
• I’ve started work on a couple of new contract jobs for Salvation Army and BP (Beyond Petroleum). The Sally Ann gig in particular is pretty big. I’m shooting to getting it done by the end of the month.