I...]]> The other day a friend of mine asked me to help him in his task of getting a student enrolment register off the ground. The initial idea was to develop it in Microsoft Access and after some discussion it seemed that a web-based application might be the better option.

I got hold of the requirements and using pen and paper did a rough draft of the different entities and their relationships. When I was satisfied with what I have designed I then proceeded to design the MySQL tables. I thought that because it will be a web application then the database most likely will be MySQL.

Using the phpMyAdmin I designed the tables as I saw fit. Then it occurred to me that I need to show the database schema to my friend. I can use several programs to create the database schema until it occurred to me that MySQL Workbench has such a function.

What does one do? Download and install which I did.

When you first start MySQL Workbench it will show you this:

Click on the option Create Create EER Model From Existing Database. The following window appears:

Click on the Next button and the next window appears. Make sure that you have checked both Connect to DBMS and Retrieve Schema List from Database options:

Click on the next button. Another window appears and shows a list of all databases currently available. Select the one that you want to generate the entity relationship diagram for.

When you click next MySQL Workbench will proceed with retrieving the details of the database.

Click next. There might be a situation where your database has a lot of tables and you are not interested in reverse engineering all of them. Click on the filter button to select only the tables you want to work on.

The entities that you do not want included in the process are moved to the right side (counter intuitive if you’d ask me) and the ones remaining on the left hand side are processed. Click on the execute button to start the reverse engineering process.

Click on next and then finish to end.

You then go to the generated EER diagram and establish the different relationship types between the entities you have selected earlier. Here is the final product of my exercise.

I then exported this diagram to a single page pdf document and sent it to my friend. Now all I have to to is explain the diagram to him. Oh well…

I regularly look at a local job listing site for freelancing jobs (software development / web design and development) and have read more often than not like the following lines:

“I need a website site for my business. Please send some samples of your work and a quote…”

Today, I had lunch at a Thai restaurant. Why I am writing to you about this? Well, because an incident happened in the restaurant that illustrates how not to handle a customer complaint.

To continue, I was quietly eating my lunch, reading tweets I received when I heard someone...]]>  

Photo Credit: shiokfood.com

Today, I had lunch at a Thai restaurant. Why I am writing to you about this? Well, because an incident happened in the restaurant that illustrates how not to handle a customer complaint.

To continue, I was quietly eating my lunch, reading tweets I received when I heard someone calling for the waiteress.

“Excuse me.”

The waitress approached the customer and she began to complain that there were only three pieces of tofu in the lunch she ordered. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Are there really people out there that count how many pieces of tofu they get with their meal? Seriously. (I suppose if you love tofu you would.)

The startled waitress tried to explain why she only got three pieces. At this point I was trying hard not to listen to the conversation (she was seated at a table not very far from where I was) but to no avail as her voice was quite loud. The menu was presented to her showing that if she did choose the other dish she would have had more tofu. She ended by asking if customers only got three pieces of tofu.

A few more words from the customer and the waitress offered to replace her lunch with a new one in order to placate her but she mentioned she did not want a replacement, all she wanted was more tofu.

At this point I finished my lunch, stood up, paid, and left. I assumed that she did get her tofu.

As I was walking back to the office I thought about this incident and the restaurant could have handled the situation much better by giving in to her request rather than explaining to her why she only had three pieces of tofu. If she got the additional tofu immediately she would have had a bad experience turned good and would have a pleasant memory of the incident.

The lesson from this incident is that it is always better to make a client feel special; that they end up feeling or thinking that you gave a bit more that what was really necessary. Doing this makes it easier for you to ask for a referral if you so wish because they will feel obliged to return the favour which is really what you want if you want to grow your business.

I usually used this component to either separate or generate a comma delimited string (depending on what I need at...]]> It is amazing that after so many years of using Delphi I still discover new things that amaze me and one of them is a feature of the TStringList component.

I usually used this component to either separate or generate a comma delimited string (depending on what I need at the current moment).

The other day I was looking at a program that had a method that parsed the output of a credit card reader. The developer of the program decided to use a combination of the Pos and Copy functions whereby he was scanning for the position of a specific delimiter (in this case it was the ‘~’ character) and then using this value copy the appropriate substring. There is nothing wrong with this process. It then occurred to me that maybe I can use the TStringList component.

The question I had was can I specify a different delimiter (the default delimiter is the space or comma). Looking through the properties of the component I came across the ‘Delimiter’ property. This meant that I can specify a different delimiter.

I wrote a little program that accepted a string with several delimiter characters (in this case I used the ‘~’) and then then displayed the output when the user clicks on a button e.g.

Here is the first try:

Here is the code:

procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
var
  InputLine : TStringList;
begin
  InputLine := TStringList.Create;

  InputLine.Delimiter := '~';
  InputLine.Text := Edit1.Text;

  Memo1.Lines.AddStrings(InputLine);

  FreeAndNil(InputLine);

end;

It seemed that the parsing did not work and it is because of the Text property being used. Changing the line:

InputLine.Text := Edit1.Text;

to

InputLine.DelimitedText := Edit1.Text;

did the trick. Here is how it looks now:

Knowing how to parse a string with a different delimiter from a comma or space makes it much easier to handle input from different types of input devices.

The other interesting thing is that it can also handle the reverse process i.e. having separate words or text being combined into a single string with a specified delimiter character. Like so:

Clicking on button 2 results in the following:

The code for this is:

procedure TForm1.Button2Click(Sender: TObject);
var
  InputLine : TStringList;
begin
  InputLine := TStringList.Create;

  InputLine.Delimiter := '~';
  InputLine.AddStrings(Memo1.lines);

  Edit1.Text := InputLine.DelimitedText;
  FreeAndNil(InputLine);
end;

A few days ago I responded to a “WordPress Developer Wanted” advertisement that appeared in a local freelancing website. The advertisement contained the following: “I am looking for a developer with wordpress knowledge.”. I sent an email indicating that I did have the skill and knowledge he/she was looking...]]>

A few days ago I responded to a “WordPress Developer Wanted” advertisement that appeared in a local freelancing website. The advertisement contained the following: “I am looking for a developer with wordpress knowledge.”. I sent an email indicating that I did have the skill and knowledge he/she was looking for. Within five (5) minutes I received a reply which contained six words:

Hi what is your hourly rate?

Whoa! What immediately came to my mind was that she (I did find out in the reply) was shopping around for the most affordable rate (cheapest?). For a brief moment I was tempted to quote a really ridiculous rate but in the end I sent my reply quoting her hourly rate.

Silence.

I have not heard from her since and I am assuming that she found somebody that had a rate that fit her budget. Enough said.

“When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the...]]> I came across this statement that is attributed to Steve Jobs (he does not need any introduction, I think even aliens in other planets would know who he is):

“When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.” – Steve Jobs

This mindset of his can bee seen in the quality of the products that Apple has produced. Not only in their products but even in the way they present the Apple stores; the packaging of the different product items; even the bag they use to put the things people bought. And because of this, people do not mind paying premium price for their stuff. I suppose people can sniff and notice quality if they see one and the tricky part is the challenge of maintaining this high level of quality day in day out or in today’s corporate speak 24 x 7 x 365.

As I commented in the blog post where I found this attributed statement, the builders of the great basilicas during the Renaissance period were not the cutting-corners kind of workers. One can see that they took great care in doing their work well even though whatever they were building / making will be placed in a part of the edifice that no one will ever notice or even see e.g. at the top of the cupola of the basilica.

It is quite sad to see nowadays that in the rush to be on the market first or to make a quick profit products of inferior quality are constantly being produced. I am not saying that everyone is guilty of this but rather the virtue of trying to done one’s work well, whatever that may be, is become rarer and rarer.

What are some strategies that one can employ to be able to do their work really well i.e. with outstanding quality?

Knowledge

One has to have a good grasp of the subject matter he or she is working on. Take the example of a husband who is not a plumber but tries to fix a leaking faucet illustrates this point. It may take him half a day to do the job while a competent plumber will do it in an hour or less.

In some cases one is presented with a task that is slightly foreign and the proper attitude would be to find out more about the task as well as consulting those people who have work on similar tasks in the past. To pretend that one has the knowledge but clearly has not is doing himself a great disservice and his client or employer as well.

Focus

You cannot do a job really well if you do not put all your attention to it. Some may argue that nowadays multitasking is the thing but here is the challenge: I think that the work will be done better if full attention is given to it. Of course, appropriate breaks in between the task are also necessary but only long enough to be able to continue till the end.

Prior to starting remove any form of distraction that you think may be in your way e.g. if really necessary turn off the mobile phone or only take phone calls or really urgent nature; do not work on your emails during this time, again only very important emails should catch your attention.

Perseverance

I also term this as lasting the distance. It is a very human to have the energy and vitality present when starting a task or project or endeavour. As time goes on the energy, enthusiasm, and desire start waning and then the initially exciting task becomes like a ball-and-chain that one has to drag along the road. There will be crests and troughs in your work and you just have to ride them. Well-timed breaks can help one persevere throug a task. If you are that kind of person then by all means have your breaks but just make sure that they do not become distractions (see focus above).

I am sure there are other habits that will come into play when trying to produce work of appreciable quality but start concentrating on these three (3) things and if you keep at it your work will improve in quality.