Internet
Anyone interested in web development should have heard about the Model-View-Controller software pattern by now. This pattern emphasizes on separation of application's data model, UI (view), and control logic. The concept itself isn't new and has been around since 1979, but recently there have been many successful implementations of the pattern in the domain of web development.
Like any self-respecting web developer, I started to explore the available frameworks, and quickly settled on Python as a language and TurboGears as a framework. I viewed many webcasts and documents, then decided to practice my newly gained knowledge by writing a basic del.icio.us-like social bookmarking application in TurboGears. Now I'm documenting my work as a tutorial, hoping that other TurboGears newcomers would find something useful in it. The tutorial covers the following concepts:
- Designing data models.
- Developing controller Logic.
- Creating view templates.
- Working with forms and widgets.
There are also sections for the reasons behind my Python/TurboGears choice, and the installation process.
Please read on for the tutorial itself and an attachment of the project's source code at the end. I recommend viewing the code while working with the tutorial, as I didn't include imports or other tiny bits. In addition, the tutorial assumes good knowledge of Python.
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Submitted by Ayman on Fri, 2006/08/18 - 6:17pm.
A while ago I came across the Python Challenge. It is a series of programming challenges that require writing short programs in order to advance through levels. The creator(s) of the site put a lot of effort into it. The challenges are a lot of fun to solve, and the whole thing is very addicting.
If you don't know Python then I suggest you read its tutorial and then start solving the challenges, it will be a great learning experience. If you do know Python, the challenge still has a lot to offer on the educational and fun fronts. It will make you explore a variety of libraries and programming domains.
Most of the levels can be solved with other programming languages as well. However, solving them in Python makes the programmer experience the beauty of Python, its power, and ease of use.
To sum it up, if you enjoy programming, the Python Challenge is for you. I don't remember having so much fun on a website in a long time :)
Ah, and by the way, I'm currently in level 27.
Submitted by Ayman on Sat, 2006/06/17 - 8:02pm.
Syria Planet, the community site for Syrian bloggers, is now online, it features an aggregator of member blogs (Syrian or about Syria), and forums for arranging activities and meetings, and discussing what's going on in Syria and the blogosphere, among the other things.
Check out the site at: www.syplanet.com.
Submitted by Ayman on Wed, 2006/03/08 - 11:47am.
While waiting for ADSL to be enabled in my area, which (I've been told) will happen soon, I did some tinkering with my Gentoo Linux workstation to make it more protected against remote attacks, and I thought of compiling a list of security measures against the dangers of full-time Internet connection. Obviously the list is not complete, but it has tips that can surely help.
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Submitted by Ayman on Sun, 2006/03/05 - 4:44pm.
Submitted by Ayman on Thu, 2006/02/02 - 1:32pm.
This story happened many months ago, I don't remember the exact date, but I still remember the details, a "403 forbidden" error page reminded me of it today, here it goes:
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Submitted by Ayman on Sat, 2006/01/21 - 6:27pm.
The other day while I was browsing an extremely popular Syrian website, I found a very serious vulnerability in its code. I wasn't looking for exploits or anything, but a page URL was screaming "exploit me!". I emailed the site admins notifying them, with their MySQL password and a link that opens the site control panel without any form of authentication as proofs. The problem was fixed later. I won't reveal the identity of the site or the details of the exploit for obvious reasons, but I'll explain the problem in general.
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Submitted by Ayman on Thu, 2006/01/12 - 9:33pm.
Around a year ago I posted about the horrible situation of Internet connection in Syria, to sum it up, the only way to connect to the Internet was through an HTTP proxy, so you could only browse the web, use some IM services, and nothing else, it stayed the same till recently, looks like private ISPs are finally allowed to do business, actually they aren't that "private", as they still use the Syrian Telecom infrastructure, so they are bound to whatever STE decides to do with its infrastructure, but for now, the connection isn't proxied anymore, I'm not that positive about it staying so forever, but we can only hope :)
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Submitted by Ayman on Fri, 2005/09/16 - 7:49pm.
I was phone-interviewed by Baxter Yazbek a couple of months ago, on Firefox localization and the 1.0 release, the interview (along with a nice article on Firefox 1.0) is out now on the 15th of February issue of Asharq Al Awsat newspaper, it's available online too (Arabic).
Baxter called when I was on my way home back from college, I was surprised first, he asked to phone-interview me, we agreed on a time later that day, he called, and it went smooth.
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Submitted by Ayman on Fri, 2005/02/18 - 7:28pm.
The ad looks great, I like the idea of using names to draw Firefox logo. The quotes, the final piece of text are all very well done in my opinion.
I don't really think that the ad will dramatically boost download numbers, but it will sure help, especially that Firefox has been in the media for several months, not only tech, but normal news websites visited by all kinds of people, I think that a good percent of people is familiar with the name Firefox now, so it will be a lot easier to tell them to try it, or easier for them to remember the name, go to the website and download it.
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Submitted by Ayman on Sat, 2004/12/18 - 3:22pm.
