I’ve been working a lot these days to complete several big projects, and a handful of smaller ones. They’re all related to PHP and optimization. I’ve been thinking of a switch-based PHP preloading technique, which I’m trying to implement in a couple of projects.

What I’m trying to do exactly is update my CMSs and make a general purpose one, with modules, plug-ins and as many options as possible exposed to users. Let’s pretend I have a job CMS, let’s say (em)phasis JMS, which is about to get updated pretty soon. While it needs to have all the required options, it should be simple to manage (via source code) and easy to load. All those nice features should be able to load only if requested by user.

The switch-based PHP preloading technique is itself a framework to be placed inside any CMS. I might go as far as providing hooks like those from WordPress and be able to plug them into any kind of framework.

This is currently in a planning stage, with mockups and sketches. I hope they’ll move from the planning board to a sandbox CMS soon.

Photo by Scorpions and Centaurs

Yet another social connector. Not sure if it will work, though. But sure as hell it will get patched.

Microsoft Outlook 2010. “The Outlook Social Connector is a set of new features to help keep track of your friends and colleagues while enabling you to grow your professional network. The Outlook Social Connector is available now as part of the Microsoft Office 2010 Beta.” Yeah, I’ve been trying to get my hands on the Beta, but it’s not available just yet.

The news on the Outlook blog stands between 2 patched issues. Hopefully they’ll fix them all by the end of the Beta.

Off topic now, the blog looks quite cool. And they’re using Flash Silverlight as animation platform.

What? Me Outlook?

I usually don’t write about games, not on Blog Tycoon, but this caught my attention as I’m working on a game myself. It’s not about the action, it’s about the atmosphere, skeleton movement, visual FX and overall impression.

The game is pushing about four million polygons more than Halo 3 overall, we were told, with a completely re-written animation system and A.I. The result, Bungie hopes, will be a much more realistic world to look at and be involved with. From the stills and footage we saw, it’s on track to deliver — the game looks phenomenal. It promises to sound great, too, as every sound effect has been re-recorded.

joystiq.com

Textures and lighting are impressive with separately-modelled bolts sitting proud of the girders they support and general background textures looking much less garish than previous Halo games. The guys talked about how this was to be a darker story, a more human story and that is reflected in the surrounding visuals.

Where the game really impresses, though, is the character and weapon models. They zoomed the camera into an assault rifle (which has been redesigned, along with new weapons added – Needle Rifle, with scope, anyone?). The serial number was clearly visible. It’s hard to describe and they wouldn’t let anyone film or take photographs but the rifle model looked completely real. I know that may sound like hyperbole but I mean every word. It looks real.

thesixthaxis.com

And here are my particles tests on my alpha, not-yet-developed game:

No description, no teaser video yet, but I’m heading in the right direction.

Like I promised in a previous post, here is the code required to show latest 5 posts followed by 15 more, like on my homepage. You need to edit the index.php template and add 2 sub-loops separated by wp_reset_query(). Simple as that. Here is the entire index.php code (you should be able to pull the entire loop from there):

<?php get_header();?>
<div id="content">

<br clear="all" /><br />
<?php if(have_posts()) : ?>
 <?php
 query_posts('posts_per_page=5&offset=0');
 while(have_posts()) : the_post();
 ?>
 <div id="post-<?php the_ID();?>" <?php post_class();?>>
 <h2><a href="<?php the_permalink();?>" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to <?php the_title();?>"><?php the_title();?></a></h2>
 <small><?php the_time('j F Y');?> by <?php the_author();?></small>
 <div>
 <div style="float:left; margin-right:8px"><?php echo get_the_image_link(array('Thumbnail','My Thumbnail'),'thumbnail');?></div>
 <?php the_excerpt('Read more &raquo;');?>
 </div>
 <div style="clear:both"></div>
 <p>Category: <?php the_category(', ');?> | <?php comments_popup_link('No comments &#187;', '1 comment &#187;', '% comments &#187;');?><br /><?php the_tags(); ?></p>
 </div>
 <?php endwhile;?>

 <?php wp_reset_query();?>

 <h2>More recent articles</h2>
 <br /><br />
 <?php
 query_posts('posts_per_page=15&offset=6');
 while (have_posts()) : the_post();
 ?>
 <div id="post-<?php the_ID();?>" <?php post_class();?>>
 <p>
 <strong><a href="<?php the_permalink();?>" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent link to <?php the_title();?>"><?php the_title();?></a></strong><br />
 <small><?php the_time('j F Y');?> by <?php the_author();?></small>
 </p>
 </div>
 <?php endwhile;?>

 <div>
 <div><?php next_posts_link(__('&laquo; Older Entries','whiskey'));?></div>
 <div><?php previous_posts_link(__('Newer Entries &raquo;','youdrunk'));?></div>
 </div>

 <?php else : ?>
 <h2>Not found</h2>
 <p>No results found.</p>
 <?php endif;?>
</div>
<?php get_sidebar();?>
<?php get_footer();?>

Download index.php here.

You may have noticed that I’m using an unsanitized function, get_the_image_link, to show a thumbnail next to each excerpt. I noticed it when copying the code. Still waiting for a new version of Whiskey Air?

Did you notice Blog Tycoon’s new theme? It’s still Whiskey Air, but this time it’s dark. And green.

While the light one lacked some functionality and had some errors, I found some time to change some colours and I ended up with completely redoing the design. If you wonder if that’s a “30″ up there, it is. It’s my current age. And I want to live to change the 3 to 4.

The markings and icons below the logotype are my other brands and projects. Also notice the More Articles section below the main 5 posts. Yeah, I know you want a tutorial on that so stay tuned.

I also signed up with Behance and Carbonmade and I’ll soon add my portfolio there.