Musicalmidget’s Blog

I’ve been working away pretty much all day everyday for the past week on the new MyBB Mods site, which is starting to take shape nicely now. There’s still a few issues to work out but most of the development is now on the admin side of things. I don’t know when it’ll be ready to go live though, so you’ll have to keep an eye out for information on that front.

What originally began as a relatively simple process of adding some new features to the site and perhaps improving the look a little bit, has blown into what is essentially an entire rewrite from the ground up. As I’m sure you can imagine, writing any site from scratch can be a little testing at times. It’s easy to get frustrated when things aren’t working as they should and it sometimes gets a little tedious when you’re at it for long periods of time. But, I’ve got a new “toy”, shall we say, that’s great for when you need ten minutes out from lines and lines of code.

It’s actually a little more than a toy. Enter, the brand spanking new Yamaha DGX-620 (with visible mess and clutter in the background).

A few weeks ago, I thought it would be a good idea to look for a new keyboard. My old one is quite outdated now and doesn’t even have full sized keys. I’m not really a pianist, but I am a budding composer. With both composition and orchestration modules to deal with in my third and final year of university, I thought it would definitely be beneficial to have a keyboard around, particularly if it was the full range and able to connect the computer for MIDI in/out. I had a look around online and went to a number of music shops and quickly realised that the budget I’d set originally, was only really going to get a much newer version of what I already had, in terms of functionality at least. So I upped the budget a bit, and came across the DGX-620.

This thing is absolutely huge. I knew it was a full range piano, but we thought it was going to fit in a specially cleared space. Boy were we wrong! The only place up here where it’ll fit and still connect to the computer, is slap bang in the middle of my floor. So, it gives me much less space for the moment, but each time I turn around from the PC, it’s there. That means, when I’ve been typing and typing lines of code all day and start to feel a short break is needed for my own sanity, what do I see when I turn around? “Well, since it’s there, I may as well play it for ten minutes“. And, ten minutes later, I’m refreshed, in a calm state of mind and ready to get back into it.

There you have it. That’s what’s been keeping me sane recently. It’s also hopefully something that’ll help me pass third year and be worth the trek to find it. It’s certainly something that relieves computer-related stress. I need to learn something other than Bill Bailey’s “BBC News” theme though.

You won’t have seen much of me over these last couple of days. I’ve not vanished off the face of the earth, at least not yet anyway. I’ve instead been beavering away at some of the many new features planned for MyBB Mods, particularly the submissions page. I posted a while ago that I’d started planning and putting together the new system, but the last couple of days I’ve been working almost constantly on turning the plans into a reality. There are so many things to do though, I’m nowhere near finished yet.

I’m very excited about some of the planned features and would love to show you them all, but I’m going to resist for the moment. I will give a related update on the submissions script though. Did I say submissions script rather than submissions page? I did. Thanks to the new features for the site, it simply isn’t feasible to keep all the submission options on one page. Rather, the new and improved script will be split into four steps, two of which are optional.

Step one is where the basic information about the submission is entered. A screenshot of step one is attached to this post. It’s largely the same as the last screenshot I posted, although there are a few differences. Can you spot them? Note that the image is cropped this time. That’s because some of the new features I’ve been working on were also displayed on the page, and tempting though it may be, I’m not ready to reveal them quite yet. I was up until 5AM in the morning working on this, largely because I was fighting as usual with the simplest of javascript code (another hint at something on the page maybe?).

Step two is where the actual submission file is uploaded. Why not allow that in step one you may ask? Well, during step one, a GUID (globally unique identifier) is generated for the submission. This GUID can be added to a the info function of a plugin before it is uploaded in step 2. By adding the GUID, users of the plugin will be able to check for plugin updates with only one click in the new Admin CP that you’ll see in MyBB 1.4. For more information on the feature, see Tikitiki’s related blog entry. The GUID is shown to the user during step two if they’re submitting a plugin, as are suggested instructions for adding the GUID to the plugin file. Below the GUID is the file upload field, which is obviously shown for all submissions. A screenshot of step two is also attached. Note that the “What is this?” and “Show me an example…” links load the associated content below in a javascript controlled drop-down (that wasn’t the javascript causing me problems, so what was? ). Also just a quick note that the existing submissions system has been generating GUIDs for new submissions since the end of March, although they haven’t yet been shown to users for implementation, since only a select few have access to the version checking feature at the moment. However, once MyBB 1.4 is released, users who already have submissions in the MyBB Mods database will be able to see their GUID (or generate one if their submission was made before the end of March 2007) from the site control panel.

Steps three and four are both related to some of the new features I’ve been working on. They’re also both entirely optional, so users who don’t want to make use of them don’t have to go through a submission process that is longer and more complicated than it needs to be. Instead, if a user decided not to make use of one of the features, they can simply skip the step and be done with it. I don’t have any screenshots of these new features for you just yet, but keep an eye on this space.

Although the submissions script still may change before it goes live, the current step four would provide some easy to find additional information about a submission, if the author decided to use it. Not any old information though, something specific. The current step three is also very exciting and could potentially benefit all MyBB users.

Am I being a little vague? All will be revealed soon.

I haven’t even scratched the surface on some of the other things I’ve been working on or have planned. But, after working until 5AM yesterday and from 11AM to now (about 3:30AM) today, I hope the hard work pays off and users can start enjoying the updated site soon.

For about a year now, perhaps more, I’ve been following the making of an independent film online. It generally takes a lot to get me interested in a film, especially one that isn’t finished, as was the case when I discovered this particular film. So, why is it I’ve been so interested?

If you’ve never been good at anything in your life, why would murder be any different?

Patrick has always had a somewhat combative relationship with his little sister Marilyn. But when she brings home her new sci-fi-soap star fiancé Ryan, it’s all out war. When Patrick fails to drive a wedge between the happy couple, he reaches for sharper instruments. Every family has a few skeletons in the closet; A Dog’s Breakfast is the nightmarishly funny mess Patrick makes when he tries to add another to his.

A Dog’s Breakfast is a head smacking, bone breaking, fiancé bashing romp, with a family that just loves themselves to pieces.

A Dog’s Breakfast is written and directed by David Hewlett, known by many as Dr. Rodney McKay on Stargate Atlantis. The cast of the film includes various other familiar faces from the Stargate universe, including Rachel Luttrell (Teyla Emmagan), Christopher Judge (Teal’c), Paul McGillion (Dr. Carson Beckett) and others. Throw that cast in with a comedy story written by David Hewlett and the whole thing starts to sound quite appealing.

Almost a year ago, a short clip from the film was released on YouTube by David Hewlett and partner and producer Jane Loughman. Within a matter of hours, more than 20,000 people had viewed the clip. A similar clip was released about three months later, which also proved quite popular. Finally, the official trailer went live just before Christmas.

Since the first trailer was released I’ve been eagerly awaiting the film. Today, there was finally some good news on that front.

A Dog’s Breakfast is available to download from the iTunes Movie Store and Amazon Unbox. That’s all well and good if you live in the United States, but for the rest of us elsewhere (who outnumber those in the states), we can still do nothing but wait. Thankfully though, an “international” release is due in early 2008. That’s still a long time to wait for a film, especially if you’ve been following it for the best part of a year. It is at least progress, and I look forward to finally seeing the film in all it’s glory.

Anyone that’s interested in the film can check it out on the official website:
http://dgeek.com/
http://adogsbreakfastmovie.com/