Kristian Lunde

At Orange Bus we all work on MacBook Pro, and when I started up at Orange Bus it was the very first time I used a Mac and OS X. It is now 12 days since that first experience with an Apple computer and though I am still a bit unfamiliar with certain features I am getting in to it, and I really like it. The stuff that I have most problem with are:

The keyboard
I have some trouble finding the keys and key combinations I am used to from both Ubuntu and WinXP. And it probably does not help that the keyboard on the laptop is English, and my external keyboard at work is Norwegian (I was thinking it would be a good idea to bring a Norwegian keyboard to the UK, yeah right).

Changing windows
Moving between different set of windows and the different set of their instances are still a bit unfamiliar. In particular moving between a set of windows of the same application.

Universal access
Universal access is a piece of software which enhances for instance the readability on the Mac, and the key command to activating the speach on the mac must be some command I am used to from Windows or Ubuntu. I am always turning it on, very annoying.

That was the “negative” part about Mac, but that is just things I need to learn. Now let us have a look at the positive stuff in OS X.

Simplicty
I have heard it a million times by mac users, it is so easy to use a mac but I have never really believed them. But they are correct. Using a mac is extremely simple, Apple must have some of the best UI designers in the world. Everything is so amazingly simple. And another thing you just have to love in OS X is how you install software. You open the install file and drag it into the Application folder, and woosh, the application is installed. I would go as far to say that if you are a novice computer user, Mac would probably be the best choice. Lets compare it to moving around. Using a mac is not much harder than walking, in comparison to Microsoft Windows which would be something like controlling a space shuttle.

Flexibility
Well I have been praising Mac for their simplicity right now, but even though it is very easy to use you still have the possibility to do advanced stuff. For instance, since Mac is based on Unix you have a terminal easily accessible and you can use almost all your regular commands

Mail
Mail is a Mac application for managing….. yes you are right, mail. Well Mail is a okay application it works fine, but it is not as good as Microsoft Outlook, but it is yet another example of how simple and intuitive an Apple product can be.

Quicksilver
Quicksilver is a third party software for easy launch of applications. Type “ctrl” + “space” and then start typing the name of the application you want to launch, it automatically find the application and launches it when you hit enter. Brilliant!

At this point I can not see one good reason for going back to MS Windows. I am still very fond of Linux distros like Ubuntu, but Mac and OS X have really impressed me. So I suppose I have to line in with all the other Mac fanatics now (no I am not a mac fanatic, at least not yet).

In Orange Bus we have been looking at our coding style lately. We have created our very own coding standard. Since we base most of our applications on the drupal we chose to use the drupal coding standard as our main source of inspiration.
During our process of creating this coding standard we found a few good links I thought we should share.

Mike @ Orange Bus found these two articles about beautiful and practical code, both these are a must read:

http://www.wilshipley.com/blog/2007/05/pimp-my-code-part-14-be-inflexible.html

http://www.perforce.com/perforce/papers/prettycode.html

Another blog post about line density worth reading is:

http://paul-m-jones.com/?p=276

I got a challenge from Ramona tonight where I should answer a few questions.

1. Name 4 jobs I have had:

• Senior developer @ Derdubor AS
• Software engineer @ Teleplan AS
• Salesman @ Blok Computer Services
• Assisting nurse @ Sarpsborg psychiatric center

2. 4 movies I could watch again:

• Fabuleux destin d’Amélie Poulain, Le
• Lock, stock and two smoking barrels
• Pulp Fiction
• In China they eat dogs

3. Name 4 places I have lived:

• Halden
• Oslo
• Bø
• Sarpsborg

4. Name four tv shows I like:

• The king of Queens
• Two and a half men
• Friends
• Seinfeld

5. Four places I have been on vacation:

• Alfas Del Pi (Spain)
• Karlstad (Sweden)
• Aalborg (Denmark)
• Bournemouth (UK)

6. Four web sites I visit every day:

• Google Reader
• Google Analytics
• Facebook
• Twitter

I pass this on to Mats and Jan Petter and everyone else that feels like answering these questions.

I’ve been hearing this a lot lately, that most framework sucks, well do they?

Mr. Paul M. Jones has a really good article about the subject, he says that when a developer has to do a major change in his mindset and development routines to get used to a new framework, the developer often think that the “framework sucks”.

Personally I’ve been the kind of developer who like to write my own frameworks from scratch, and yes that also mean that I’ve written a couple of frameworks for myself, and threw them away. Since I like to write things from the scratch I’ve also been a bit critical to other frameworks,and I do understand term “all frameworks sucks”. When you’ve written your own framework, you know how it works, and it works just the way you want it to, at least that was the goal of writing it in the first place. It also gives you the possibility to change or add functionality in the core of the framework rather easily.

The advantages with a “off the shelf” framework can sometimes be intriguing, with a little bit of effort you can become darn efficent with this kind of framework, that will of course require a bit from the developer to learn the framework. Another bonus about learning a new framework is that you pick up on some of the bright ideas the developers have implemented in their framework.

I do not think that all frameworks sucks but, there are some frameworks out there that do not match my mindset at all, there is no secret that I’m not a huge fan of large enterprise frameworks with a wide extent of xml files and structures (I’m not naming any names, but the Java world have a few of these). Why on earth would you need to define a new page in three different xml files to get it working?

I’ve heard a lot about Code Ignitor and it sounds like a promising framework, I have not had the time to have a look at it yet. I am familiar with the Zend framework and EZ components which probably are more of a set of building bricks than frameworks, both of these are quite good and comfortable to work with.

Recently I’ve started to look at the Drupal. I realize that Drupal is more of a content management system than a framework, but it has its similarities to a framework. So far I still think Drupal “sucks” but I do however like the simplicity of writing modules. What I do not like at all is the “lack” of OOP, and yes I know Drupal have its own way of implementing OOP, but I still feels thats is a little bit awkward, I am a bit of a OOP junkie
Anyway I see the potential of Drupal and look forward to getting to know it better. I believe I eventually will like Drupal because it is easy to extend, you get a lot of stuff for free because someone has already written it for you and it is a big community around it with a lot of smart developers. There is probably a reason why Drupal is one of the largest PHP framework out there.

Since I am moving to the UK, I do not need a car in Norway anymore, and I am therefore selling my car.

See the full ad in finn.no (in Norwegian):

http://www.finn.no/finn/car/object?finnkode=15172038

The title says it all, I’m on skype, my username is: kristianlunde.

That’s about it for now.

EOF.

Have you ever wondered how it would be like to have a completely different line of work than your acctual work?
I have had this thought a few times and I’ve come up with a list of jobs I find interesting, some of them are not realistic at all since it requires years of studies and work experience, but I still choose to mention them. Other jobs would probably only be interesting in a week or so. The jobs are randomly listed and not listed by most wanted

Okay here we go:

• Crosswords author (sounds interesting enough, but just for a week or so).
• Helicopter pilot (requires years of studies and flight experience)
• Architect
• Work at a local recycling factory (only for a week, just to see what they actually do there)
• Athlete (but I guess that don’t count as a line of work)
• Carpenter
• Professional photographer
• Car designer
• Chef (I really like cooking)
• Millionaire

Please add a comment if you have a list of jobs you’d like to try out.

The past three weeks I’ve been in Newcastle (UK). I posted a blog entry about a month ago, stating that I’ll be leaving my current position in Derdubor AS and start up in Orange Bus, well Orange Bus is located in the heart of Newcastle, so I am moving to the UK

The past weeks have been used to find a place to live in Newcastle, waiting in offices (there is a lot of waiting when you try to get all the papers and stuff you need) to get a bank account and so on. Everything is now settled, I think My new home is being wired next week, so then I’ll be able to get online from home. The only thing missing right now is a UK mobile phone, but that will be sorted out in the beginning of November.

Now I am back in Norway to complete my last month at Derdubor AS before I go back to the UK and Orange Bus

Torunn in Orange Bus submitted a wallpaper for Smashing Magazines October wallpaper download, and it got in Congratulations Torunn and Orange Bus, and good work Torunn

Guess what wallpaper I’ve got on my computer this month?

I’ve not been completely satisfied with my previous wordpress theme, it worked okay but it took a lot of dead space on the top (approx 300px). I have been looking at other themes for a while now and today I found one I liked a lot, it is called journalist and is created by Lucian E. Marin.

Have a look at his wordpress themes at: http://lucianmarin.com/page/themes/.

BTW: I added a twitter widget on the site to day as well (widget name: Twitter tools).