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Tech folks can learn from rap stars about social media

At least, this one did.

I am just finishing watching this hour long interview with Chamillionaire, (found via Both Sides of the Table).  It’s long, but worth listening to.  It is very interesting to see some of the patterns that arise in entreprenuership, venture capital, and the music industry. The key takeaway for me is that the rise of the internet means you are not limited to going through gatekeepers like you used to be (and this is true for entrepreneurs and musicians–check out this interesting company I found out about at Boco last year for a nice intersection of the two).

This isn’t strictly due to the internet (Chamillionaire started with mix tapes), but the internet radically increases the scope and breadth of our reach.  All you have to do is put in the time, blood, sweat and tears, and you can build your audience.  And, most importantly, you can take that audience with you wherever you go (Chamillionaire will when he leaves Universal, and Dion Almaer will as he leaves Palm).

Other highlights/takeaways:

  • control your image–even when you hire or use other people’s services, it is still on you maintain quality
  • you have lots of gifts to give–find out what people want and will pay for
  • go beyond your normal boundaries–when promoting one of his hits, Chamillionaire searched out rappers from beyond the mainstream (NZ, Greece) and leveraged their talents, rather than sticking with pop
  • the best presentation in the world fails if you don’t hold the microphone correctly
  • quora sounds like a useful, for pay, collection of questions and answers

In addition, lots of echos of Gary Vaynerchuk’s great video on building personal brands (cursing).  The user questions (the host took 5-10 during the hour) added a nice touch.  This is the first time I have watched ‘This Week in Venture Capital’ and I found the ‘sponsor breaks’ to be a bit abrupt, but I suppose the host has to pay the bills.

Business Social Media Technology and Society | moore |

Turning on hibernate query caching

Sometimes I write a blog post because I want to say something to others, other times because I want to help others, and sometimes I write one for myself.  This is one of the latter type of posts.

I find that nothing drives home a lesson I learned like writing out the solution on my blog, and more than one time I’ve searched my blog because I remember I had written about a topic of current interest in the past.

If you want hibernate, a java ORM tool, to cache your query results, there’s a section in the hibernate manual. Like most of the hibernate documentation, it’s quite good.  One thing that caught me up, though, is that I thought that all queries were cached, as soon as you had set up the correct configuration in your hibernate xml files and marked your objects as cacheable.

However, this is not the case,  as I learned when I turned on the mysql query log and looked at the calls the interesting web application was making.  I did quite a bit of searching, but the answer was in the same section that told me how to set up the configuration (as well as in this forum post).

…most queries do not benefit from caching or their results. So by default, individual queries are not cached even after enabling query caching. To enable results caching for a particular query, call org.hibernate.Query.setCacheable(true).

Doh!  Following these instructions decreased the page load time for some heavy query pages from 8 seconds to 0.5 seconds (the second time the page was loaded).  Impressive indeed, though the production environment might not see such drastic improvements.

One additional note–you can use query caching for SQLQueries (like group operations) by telling hibernate what the type is of each returned value.  If you don’t use addScalar, but you do mark a SQLQuery as cacheable, you’ll get a java.lang.ArrayIndexOutOfBoundsException when that code executes.  More here.

These articles were helpful to me as I navigated Hibernate caching, above and beyond the reference documentation:

Java MySQL | moore |

Update on GWO for a non profit

Well, after a week or two of data collection, the GWO experiment I had set up for the WILD Foundation caused an issue–apparently it was preventing a javascript shadowbox from working. I didn’t want to get into troubleshooting a javascript component that I had never used on pages I had never seen, so I recommended turning off the experiment to see if that solved the issue.

It did. I knew there was a way to include the GWO javascript just where it was used, on the home page, but I got busy, and by the time I was able to do this, they were hip deep in a website rework. I’ve been involved in website redesigns with too many cooks in the kitchen, so I just asked them to let me know when the dust has settled so I can restart the experiment.

Lessons learned:

  • sometimes volunteer projects take a long time to get to results, and almost definitely will take longer than you plan
  • other opportunities can spring out of volunteering–I showed Emily some space available via another non profit I’m involved in, and she’s looking at possibilities for a fundraiser there.  This never would have happened if I hadn’t volunteered previously
  • the process opened up some ideas for the non profit around changing the home page to highlight things they wanted to focus–sometimes, any perspective from outside an organization is useful

    I’ll let you know when I get a chance to re-enable GWO on the WILD site, but I thought I’d give an update.

    New Tech Meetup Useful Tools | moore |

    Avoid primitive object wrappers as return values for GWT javascript overlays

    Just a warning, if you build javascript overlay types, you should make sure to only use primitives and strings as primary members of your overlay classes.  I’ve already written about overlay types once before, and here’s the GWT documentation.  If you dig a bit deeper in the GWT documentation, you see this quote:

    JavaScript non-string objects always marshal as JavaScriptObject$

    I was using a java.lang.Double as the return value for one of my overlay objects, and it was fine until I tried to do any math on it.  Nothing would seem to turn the value into a Double or a double, yet no exceptions were thrown.  After some sleuthing in web mode, it turned out that the value returned when I was trying to parse it was NaN, even though when I output it to the screen, the value looked like a double.  I guess it was being treated as a JavaScriptObject$.

    Easily enough fixed, just make sure that you don’t use any objects wrappers of primitives in an overlay type.

    GWT | moore |

    Namespace Collisions, NS_ERROR_XPC_CANT_CONVERT_WN_TO_FUN and GWT

    So, the abstraction layer provided by GWT just leaked–well, more of a flood than a leak.

    I am working on a site that is pulling in an html fragment which included some javascript code via an XML HttpRequest.  This new code will make paging the results of a search quicker, hopefully leading to happier users.  For reasons too obscure to go into, I was creating a variable named ‘r1’ which I was then adding to the DOM.  The name was completely arbitrary, and was due to laziness (hey, why type 3 characters when you can type 2?).

    Fast forward to today, when we’re getting ready to launch the update.  Occasionally, but not often, code that GWT was executing was throwing an exception.  One of the other developers found it because some functionality was disabled.  Here’s what that exception looked like:

    exception: (NS_ERROR_XPC_CANT_CONVERT_WN_TO_FUN): Cannot convert WrappedNative to function
    QueryInterface: function QueryInterface() {
    [native code]
    }
    result: 2153185293
    filename: http://stageserver/gwt/2B17113CD349EDFD95DC846F38AB0857.cache.html
    lineNumber: 4268
    columnNumber: 0
    inner: null
    data: null
    initialize: function initialize() {
    [native code]
    }

    Now, usually, the first thing I do when I see an exception is to recompile the GWT with -style DETAILED instead of -style OBF and see where the error occurs.  However, when I did that, I didn’t see the error message any more.

    OK, I added more debugging.  If I added a certain number of alert statements, the error message was nowhere to be found.  OK, go back to the previous code.  Try different pages, different browsers.  Sometimes the exception reared its head, other times it didn’t.  It appeared on some browsers and not others. Sprinkled alerts throughout the code, found the exact line where the exception was being thrown.  All that line did was create a click listener.

    Nothing really clear on google; however, this post was useful in pointing to the error message being a collision between a function name and a DOM element.  Searching the GWT google group was not helpful.   I tried using the Firebug debugger, but on obfuscated source, it was not helpful to me.

    These kind of bugs make me want to tear out my hair.  Hardly reproducible bugs are no fun. However, I finally found the issue (if I hadn’t, I’d still be working and wouldn’t be posting, that’s for sure).

    How I finally solved it:  I was getting a line number.  I finally edited the generated GWT .cache.html file and added some newlines.  This would let me find out exactly which function was really causing the issue.

    And, lo and behold, the problematic function was named ‘r1’.

    Changing the name of the DOM element fixed this issue. Beware short named javascript DOM elements when working with GWT.

    Hope this helps you.

    GWT Web Applications | moore |

    GWT Marketplace

    Two years ago, I surveyed the state of GWT widgets.  It was pretty fragmented and a bit confusing.  While I haven’t been paying very close attention, I don’t think things have changed much.

    I was browsing around the GWT google group, and found this interesting announcement.

    I’m a huge fan of GWT and the only problem I have with it is not really a problem with GWT but with the fact that there isn’t a centralized place for registering component and associated tools AFAIK.  I have created an application to do this which is available at http://gwtmarketplace.appspot.com/

    I visited the marketplace and while it is currently in its infancy, it could be very useful. If you have GWT code that you want to share with the world, consider registering it. I added gwt-crypto, which I help maintain.

    GWT | moore |

    My experience implementing GWO for a non profit, part 2

    I was finally able to get access to the wild.org server via FTP (previous cliffhanger resolved).  After cautioning me to be very careful (“please proceed with caution and help keep wild.org from blowing up…warnings from my IT guy”) Emily handed over FTP access.

    I proceeded very carefully.

    We had already had discussions about what we were going to vary to test the donation button.  Pictures, location of button, text of button, and text around button were the major variables.  One of the hard things about GWO is deciding what to test–the possibilities are infinite.  Even with our handful of variables, we ended up dropping some options and still have 100 variations to test!

    Actually installing GWO was pretty easy.  The only wrinkle was the fact that the goal was a click of a button and not another page.  This post was helpful.  One item that that post didn’t cover was validation–GWO doesn’t let you start an experiment if the program can’t verify that the script tags are installed correctly.  Since we were doing a non standard install, I gimmicked up a goal page for validation, then added the goal tracking to the onclick event as described in the post.

    So, the experiment is currently running on The WILD Foundation homepage.  It’s been running for about a week, and has only 1 non test conversion.  I worry that we are not testing big enough changes (a donate lightbox, rework the entire front page), but I think it makes sense to let the test run for a few weeks and see what kind of data we get.

    Consulting New Tech Meetup | moore |

    Musings on php development as a career path

    I was at a TedXBoulder preparty last night.  Ran into some really interesting folks–the usual tech folks, but also Charles, a high flying audio engineer (we’re talking Wembley stadium), Emily, a money manager bizdev lady ($30 million, minimum, please) and Donna, an engineer on leave from a big aerospace firm who is interested in entrepreneurialism.  Really looking forward to the talks on Saturday (tickets apparently still available).  I also ran into an old friend, roommate and colleague.

    We chatted about a wide variety of topics, but one stuck out in my mind.  His brother is getting back into software development, and is starting out doing a lot of php.  Fair enough–it’s a great language, I’ve done a fair bit of it, and one can write good, maintainable, fase code with it.  But last night, we agreed that if you don’t want to be competing against, how do I say this politely, the lowest common denominator, it is wise to develop your software dev skills elsewhere, into one of three paths.  I thought it’d make a good blog post.  As I see it, the three options are

    • a compiled language–C#, Java, c, erlang: these tend to be used by large companies
    • a sexy dynamic language–Ruby, javascript (especially server side), groovy, python, clojure, lisp: my feeling is that these are more used by startups
    • particular packages in php–magento, drupal: these are often more configuration than coding, but can be customized to produce astonishingly powerful applications

    The end goal, to be clear, is not to avoid php, but just to avoid competing against developers who are likely to undercut you.  For example, I knew of someone, in the US, who was doing contract php work for $18/hr a few years ago.  I just don’t think that’s someone with whom you want to be competing for business (I certainly don’t!).  Following one of the above career development paths will help you avoid that.  I personally have followed the first and third paths, with some dabbling in the second.

    Jobs PHP Programming | moore | |   career development php tedxboulder

    Blogger adds support for pages

    I’m a big believer in simple websites that users can maintain–I wrote about how to set one up in less than two hours.  Snarky comments from Ralph aside, it’s a great way to get onto the web and add that much more credibility to any business you’re doing.

    Blogger and WordPress.com are the two big options for easy, free web sites.  Blogger gives you more freedom in most ways, but until recently, came with a big downside–you couldn’t create standalone pages (for contact info, ‘about us’, etc)–everything had to be a post.  That’s changed: blogger now lets you create up to 10 stand alone pages.

    Awesome!

    Blog Web Applications | moore |

    My Firefox plugins

    I recently moved to a new computer, and have been rebuilding my desktop environment.  I just wanted to list my Firefox plugins for future reference.

    • The Web Developer Toolbar lets you view css, disable javascript, resize your browser precisely, outline block elements and so much more.
    • Colorzilla is invaluable for a developer like me to copy a color palate correctly.
    • S3Fox lets you manage Amazon S3 buckets and their content.
    • Firebug lets you examine web pages in detail, including network operations/
    • YSlow is an add on for Firebug that evaluates site performance based on a variety of metrics
    • Some kind of whois tool–sometimes you need to know who registered that domain name

    These are my drop dead extensions for typical web development work.  What am I missing?  Do you have any to recommend?

    Useful Tools Web Applications | moore |