Ranting Kenya

So I’ve played the Xbox Live Arcade game Castle Crashers (the trial). I really like it. It’s fun, it’s funny, looks good etc etc… Now, most of my friends list won’t be downloading this, so I haven’t played any co-op and probably won’t. Never the less, I think I’m going to buy it.

However, I’ve heard lots of noise on the internet about how the online play is broken. Basically seriously broken. What I don’t understand is the following: If every game has to go through Microsoft certification, why doesn’t this game work better? I understand it’s not a play test program, but nobody came accross this bug already? REALLY? (I feel like Kevin Pereira all of a sudden)

I know I could use all the strategy I can get. This game plays different than the original.

Installing a server on your local machine

First, I’d like to apologize to the Linux and Mac users, this post will be scewed towards Windows users. I will try to offer the alternatives, but I haven’t actually implemented them myself.

So with that out of the way, what you need to download is WAMP (Windows Apache MySQL PHP). This is truly the simplest way to get a server on your windows machine up and running. You don’t even have to mess around configuring the php.ini file or anything like that. Just double click this installer and you’re ready to go.

Afterwards you’ll see a small icon on your taskbar. You’re basically up and running. If you click on it, you’ll get a small menu. Clicking “www Directory” will take you to the directory you should be putting your new site files. To create a new project, and have an area to store everything, just create a new folder in this “www” directory. Name it “blog”, and that’s where your index.php and other files will reside.

If you click on the wamp server in the taskbar and then choose “Localhost”, it will open your default browser and send you to a page summarizing and providing links that you’ll be using frequently. You’ll also see “blog” under the “your projects” section.

By the way, if you’re looking for a really good text editor that works with a multitude of files, search for Notepad++. It’s my personal favorite.

Ever wanted to create a simple blog without needing to do the whole Wordpress deal? Maybe you just want to create something on your local machine for your own personal use. Heck, coding your own blog is also a good way to show a potential employer that you have at least some coding chops.

Well, I’m going to attempt to help the absolute beginner create just that. I myself am no PHP expert, but I’ve managed to learn enough that I think I could help other beginners. I’m sure some of the ways that I’m coding things are not necessarily the best possible method, but I’m open to comments and suggestions. I’m learning too, after all.

So what type of sections will these posts cover? Well as of right now this is my plan (I’m sure it’ll change soon):

• Installing a server on your local machine
• Creating your database and tables
• Connecting your PHP pages to the database
• Setting Privileges
• Creating the various pages (front page with loop, individual posts etc.)
• Creating the forms for content entry
• Post tagging
• Integrating Tiny MCE for content entry
• Allowing simple user comments
• Creating a tag cloud
• Working with excerpts (both automatic and custom)
• Uploading images to your server

Some things I’d like to include but will won’t necessarily includes user logins, admin logins, and security.

I’m going to assume then that you know basic (X)HTML at the very least. Minimal CSS knowledge will also help in a few spots.

I’m hoping this will help other beginners get over some of the bumps and hitches that I’ve experienced more quickly than when I was facing with them.

I have no exact timeline for when these posts will come out, but my plan will be to post at least once a week.