2004 Weblog of Marcel Timmer

• 09-12-2004 - Infancy, puberty, maturity.
• 06-12-2004 - Drs. Suzanne Pietersma
• 11-11-2004 - Known by heart
• 29-09-2004 - Switching over to USB2.0
• 30-08-2004 - Suzanne's Master's certificate in Psychology
• 16-08-2004 - PHP
• 10-07-2004 - Ing. Marcel Timmer
• 26-05-2004 - Farewell party
• 10-05-2004 - Quiet
• 17-04-2004 - Rush hour
• 08-04-2004 - CSS Zen garden
• 04-04-2004 - Implement CSS2, yes or no?
• 19-03-2004 - Opera, isn't that a browser from the past?
• 05-03-2004 - Cascading Style Sheets by Eric Meyer
• 01-03-2004 - Drastic changes in the layout
• 26-02-2004 - My laptop has been repaired
• 30-01-2004 - Vacuum cleaner or mobile hdd?
• 29-01-2004 - Keeping up the screen while typing

Infancy, puberty, maturity.

15:44 8-12-2004

Back in August I mentioned something about CSS Zen Garden in this weblog. Fernando and I decided to postpone the whole thing because of other commitments. Hopefully, one day we will have some time to transform our ideas into one of the 1001 CSS Zen Garden wonders.

So why mention this again, you're thinking! While I was recently browsing my harddisk for the last part of programming I did for the CSS Zen Garden project, I found some of my old material for my pizza selector. I started editing the source code and when I looked at the clock only a glimpse later it actually turned out to be 6 hours later.

The pizza selector has always been one of my babies that never got the opportunity to reach adulthood or puberty. But now I hope to make a change. With some help I'm going to turn my beautiful javascript baby into a commercial succes.

Drs. Suzanne Pietersma

12:24 6-12-2004

Just a small post to inform you that I have made a small website for Suzanne. It's a small summary about the project she is working on. Website Suzanne

Known by heart

14:07 11-11-2004

The last few weeks, I had no courses scheduled at all. So I have been programming quite a lot, finally! With our two new inmates (two young cats, named Teun and Coen) it has been a quite enjoyable time.

I added two new concepts to the concepts page. The first one is fotoalbum+ also known as concept 19, which is a small open source project that aims to develop a simple JavaScript program to generate source codes for internet photo albums.

The second one is SP4U, also known as concept 21. Where SP4U stands for: "Special Price 4 U". This project is more like a personal effort to find out how far I can go from the JavaScript library in my head. Because don't forget: not even one single character in all of my websites has been generated with a WYSIWYG program or what so ever. SP4U is an online fictional second hand computer shop. The source contains a lot of JavaScript and some PHP. Deplorably, I installed what I thought to be just another Windows XP security update. Well, it wasn't. In fact, the update involved an update that controls scripts and ActiveX structures, causing most of my recent hard work to be stopped automatically and being reported as an annoying yellow line at the top of the window. Luckily, they also included an option to disable this wonderful new feature.

Nevertheless, I'm quite happy with all the work I have done lately. I guess I've earned some time to enjoy it.

Switching over to USB2.0

16:38 29-9-2004

Well, today is the day that I have disconnected my IBM Travelstar from its USB1.0 OKION HE113 HDD enclosure and connected it to my new Digiconnect PORTABLE 2,5" HARD DISK DRIVE. I think everyone can imagine the difference between transfer rates of 1mb/s and 480mb/s. It doesn't look very much like the image of it I found on the internet. The aluminium has been painted into stylish grey and the blue led has been changed into a red one.

Most of the time I'm using computers that only support USB up to USB1.1. But most of all I'm thinking of it as being a investment for the future. And of course, with Christmas coming up in a couple of months, I could always request Santa Claus for a USB2.0 controller. I already checked prices at Norrod and they appear to cost approximately €15.

Suzanne's Master's certificate in Psychology

15:42 30-8-2004

Friday Suzanne received her Master's certificate in Psychology. Ofcourse we made it one big party. At the ceremony, that was held in the historical "academiegebouw", also Professor Buunk told a small but really flattering story. Nearly obvious because Suzanne has some extraordinarily results. It did not surprise anyone that Suzanne received her Master's certificate with a Cum Laude predicate.

Afterwards we had a drink and something to eat in a restaurant nearby. She also received some presents. Because I should not neglect my role as her boyfriend, I baught her a nice new mobile telephone: A Siemens A-52. Super slim, tri-band, only 84 grams and some very nice covers coming along. Man, this all sounds European! You can find it at the: Orange E-shop.

PHP

14:30 16-8-2004

After Suzanne buying her very first car last week (a Toyota Starlet), I haven't been sitting behind my PC very much. Nevertheless, I have managed to almost finish my Simple Content Management System. The whole program is based on only 87kb of PHP and XHTML, has a clear GUI and works through a HTTPS connection, energising the idea to bring my web activities to a higher and more commercial level.

Fernando and me decided to lay down the CSS Zen Garden project, at least for the next two months. Fernando's new job and my programming activities just don't leave any room for other stuff.

Ing. Marcel Timmer

10:37 10-7-2004

From today you can call me Ing. Marcel Timmer, and I just can't tell you how proud I am about these three letters. By the way: the abbreviation Ing. stands for Ingenieur, that is quite the same as Bachelor of Science, BsC.

After summer I will start with the Master's of Science programme Biomedical Engineering at the University Groningen For now, I will first have a few weeks holiday. Possibly, I can start working on some Internet projects again.

Farewell party

17:27 26-5-2004

Last week Maarten Trilsbeek contacted me. He was organizing a farewell party for all the last year students within the engineering department of our institute. He wanted to have a website where students could subscribe for the party. We talked for 15 minutes after which I decided to just start typing.

That same evening I finished the complete xhtml and css programming for the whole website. The graphics following the day after. Today I also finished the php programming.

I'm quite happy with it, as it looks right now. Especially when I consider the short time I made the whole thingy. Now I have to start writing on my final report again. Hopefully next month I can start doing some serious programming again.

Quiet

16:48 10-5-2004

I have to admit, its very silent here. My activities on web development are as good as null at the moment. I did put some new concepts at the (obvious) concepts page, number 12 and 13.

The reason for my recess is that within a week from today I will have to hand in my concept report... yes indeed, its my sweat your smelling! Hopefully I'll very soon be able to resume my work again.

Rush hour

19:35 17-4-2004

Still wondering about what the subject will be of the design for Dave Sheas: CSS Zen Garden, I think I have to postpone the whole thing for a few weeks. My project at the university is taking quite a bit of my time. On a good day I can add only few characters to the css file, not even starting about the graphics that will have to support the design.

In the meanwhile I extended the list in the previous post, on which subjects would be suitable for the CSS Zen garden design.

CSS Zen garden

9:52 8-4-2004

For months Fernando has been pushing me to create a style for Dave Sheas: CSS Zen Garden. Finally I have made my decision: I'm going to do it. The only question is: what will be the theme? I have been thinking about making it an improved and superior version of my Tropical FruitKick! concept. But no... that one just won't have the magic.

So now I'm wondering around all day what kinds of topics would be nice. I came up with the following idea's:

If you have any suggestions let me know, if you have nice pictures I could be able to use, let me know too!

Implement CSS2, yes or no?

20:33 4-4-2004

As you can see I have changed the style of this website over the weekend. I think its quite an improvement, but if you disagree please share your opinion with me! I have doubted if I should publish the new style sheet already. The fact is that I can't make up my mind when it comes to the question if I should make use of CSS2 features. My main concern is the content: property, a feature that changes content while I think CSS stands for style. Nothing more and nothing less.

I started reasoning about this while noticing the growing use of the :content tag to apply multiple background images to elements. Understand me correct: I think this is very usefull. My mind starts to jam when it comes to adding quotes or other typographic content to an element. I could easily change the quote divs on this website by:

I think this is a development that crosses the border on what CSS should do. Not even starting the discussion on what this feature could do in a public access website, where people start thinking how the quote appeared in their post. Please share your opinion on this topic with me.

Opera, isn't that a browser from the past?

20:27 19-3-2004

Oh my God! There are still people believing in Opera! Read these words by Ethan Marcotte.

He does say some fair-minded things about Internet Explorer:

My friend Fernando also told me I should check out the latest version of Opera. Should I? Man this is hard!

Cascading Style Sheets by Eric Meyer

22:33 5-3-2004

Today I started reading Cascading Style Sheets "The definitive guide" by Eric Meyer. You can ask yourselves why I would start reading a book on CSS that was published back in 2000, but you will be surprised how much is discussed in Meyers book that I have forgotten all about. The book is giving me a lot to think about. Especially now I have started improving the HTML and CSS of this website.

Drastic changes in the layout

7:09 1-3-2004

As you can see I have made some drastic changes in the layout and content of the website. The different themes that made use of the styleswitch have been removed. These changes are intended to be the first in a series of changes that should increase the usability of this website.

My laptop has been repaired

19:35 26-2-2004

Today I was surprised to receive an email from compaq that my laptop has been repaired. Unfortunately, the did not accept all my complaints such as the loose keyboard and questionable quality of the floppy drive. Something what surprised me most when I went to pick up my laptop was the totally replaced screen. Apparently they do not have any less drastically method to repair this defect.

Vacuum cleaner or mobile hdd?

16:24 30-1-2004

While copying all the data to the mobile HDD I noticed I forgot to think about one thing: transfer speed. Because the enclosure is only USB 1.0 the transfer speed reaches up to maximally 1mb/s. Nevertheless, I'm quite happy with it. My girlfriend says it makes the sound of a vacuum cleaner, but I think that's a bit exaggerated. It fortunattely works without the external power supply, so it can be used as a "mobile" harddisk as it should be.

Keeping up the screen while typing

14:19 29-1-2004

Sad, but true...I'll have to bring my Compaq Presario 901EA Laptop back to the shop where I bought it 18 months ago. The hinges have completely lost their function: keeping up the screen. Does this mean I can not do anything in HTML programming for weeks? Fortunately not, because a few days before my father visited a local computer fair. Through a mini lottery he won something he could not identify. Not having MMS, I had to pay a visit to him to identify it. It proofed to be a portable 2.5" HDD enclosure. Still not understanding what he could do with it, he decided I could have it. After a short search through some of the 2nd hand trading websites, I found a nice 10GB IBM HDD. So: problem solved!