HackniacBLOG

Newbness and Fermentation

The site is finally up after what seems like a few years worth of work, but the software infrastructure that it is built upon is still a serious work in progress. Less than a month ago I started learning PHP, and I actually wrote the code for this website a couple days into the process. It makes sense that the whole thing is a little awkward and tough to maintain, but hopefully time will allow it to mature. Here's a glimpse into the current workings.

Mix & Bake

The process of writing an article starts when I come up with an idea. That idea is developed on paper until I can confidently decide whether it is worth transplanting it to the internet. Once I know it is good enough I go on the computer and copy the article template into a new folder. That template always has a summary in plain text and the article file (in PHP). Sometimes it has an icon, but if that isn't present the website just loads up the default article icon.

Once the template is copied I open up the summary and write that out. It starts with the type of article and then goes onto the actual summary text. The website parses it when it is time to display and figures out what goes where. The next thing to get written is the article itself. That process is pretty unpeasant and crippled right now, because I have to write it out in html. Maybe eventually I'll write a real online editor to make it easy for me.

When everything is written I connect to my web server via ftp and upload the folder containing the necessary files. From then on the website does the work.

In the Robot's Hands Now

The home page of my site has the first chunk of code that makes everything flow. It parses every single summary that is in the article directory and checks if it was labeled as news. If it was then it shows the summary and a read link on the page at the bottom. Eventually, if I write enough articles, that process will get very slow and also take up a lot of room. For the moment that's ok though.

The article list page has the second chunk of code that makes my blog system work. It parses the article directory and pulls out the icons and summarys. It arranges them by date and gives each and every one of them their own little box on the webpage. If articles were lollipops this is the shelf in the store.