Application Development Sample

Originally posted: March 1 2005 @ 18:25 ET

Quick Information:

Resume in Open Office format, and doc format

Cover Letter in Open Office format, and doc format

Site samples MTLS.us, Lanier.com, BinaryGeek Smarty Template Demonstration

As a PHP contractor I've had many requests for work samples. I've decided to make a single post to my weblog to satisfy most of the requests that I receive.

Since I primarily develop DB driven applications, the most you could see of these projects is a login screen. I will add (with the client's permission) a reference to a recent project. The client came to me requesting a site that had a Flash/Shockwave feel but without the requirement of a Flash plugin. The client works on several government contracts and wanted something that would stand out from his competition. Since most of the machines used by military personnel are locked down, installing browser plugins would be impossible for many of the sites visitors. Since the business of my client (Chemical Engineering) is rather dull to read about, I chose to use a lot of imagery from the client's research as well as royalty free stock photography. I also incorporated a layout with few straight lines to contrast the "data sheet" look that is so common in the industry. Navigating through this site you will see that the content and imagery change in response to your exploration without the need to click and load a new page. And if you resize your browser window short enough to allow scrolling on one of the pages using the "data layout" you can scroll the page to notice a neat CSS/DHTML trick that produces a 3D optical illusion. The translucent paper appears to be sliding underneath the brushed aluminum page frame which casts a shadow over the text, while the image of the earth below the "paper" stays in place. To clarify, I've attached a screen shot:

(My code is thoroughly tested to ensure cross browser compliance.)

The most important thing I do is write DB driven PHP. This is very difficult to demonstrate without allowing access to secured areas, or wasting resources on a demo environment. I can, however, show you the features this client received with their project:

1. Site layouts developed using Smarty Templates.


2. Code is clean, well documented, and Object Oriented, as seen here.


3. "Alternative PHP Cache" and memcached eliminate the overhead of generating pages on the fly.


4. Client opted for the use of text files rather than a database. (Although I repurpose code to save clients time and money, I am still flexible and am not limited to what I feel is best.)


5. Client manages their own content using a full featured "Content Management System." You can see a demo of the CMS.

Let hardware retailers know that you don’t want to pay for Windows!

Places like Buy.com are now accepting user comments to the company as well as reviews for other users. The Linux community has been notoriously good about adding notes about Linux compatibility to product reviews. That is getting a lot of attention. But the problem is that before the general Linux user can (or at least should) post Linux related comment, they should have some experience with the hardware.

This is the cool thing about Buy.com's suggestion box: You can make comments directly to the company without having to have experience. I just posted the following comment about the ThinkPad R60 Intel Celeron M 420 1.6GHz:

This would be a great Linux machine if it could be purchased without Windows. There is no reason for a Linux user to spend money on a Microsoft OS. That money could buy extra RAM!

I have a ThinkPad T60 which is very similar to this machine, but has a Core Duo processor. The important thing is that it has ALL INTEL hardware, which means full hardware compatibility and Beryl with no proprietary video drivers.

Sophia Grace Bronosky is born

No time blog. Born 12/16/07 @ 7:47am 8 pounds 9 ounces. Find photos on my flickr page.

Updated Resume

A while back I decided to try Writely.com (now owned by Google). The only document I had in Word format was my resume, so I uploaded it. It's not the best way to write/modify a document, but it is pretty interesting and probably the best way to do t on the web.
You can see it here.