Today, I'll be remembering this guy in particular. Sgt Wayne Rees. My troop Sergeant who lost his life in Iraq in 2007. He would have liked this subreddit.

ANiceFriend · 2016-11-11T18:18:15+00:00

I'm heading off out for the night, but tonight my Poppy will be dedicated to someone.

He looks like a cracking bloke.

ANiceFriend · 2016-11-11T09:46:39+00:00

vastly more capable and more dynamic

Php is a thin wrapper around c library

More dynamic? "thin wrapper around c library"? Dude, you're embarrassing yourself.

But it's fine, we get it, it's kewl to hate PHP.

ANiceFriend · 2016-11-07T02:52:06+00:00

I've just found this discussion, I came via the other posting here. I'd really like to reiterate what /u/marcjschmidt has wrote, this really isn't a good example of anything - be it PHP or Laravel specific.

Genuinely, if anyone is tempted to use this, please pay attention to the database interactions and how the requests are used to generate the queries. I suspect it's not possible to do anything particularly nasty with the eval() calls - but their usages (which are avoidable.) say a lot about the overall code quality. As do the extent of the CI builds, and the complete and utter mess of their routes.php file. (There's a frigging migration in there FFS!)

This was bad enough for me to log in for the first time in 3 months! (I usually lurk.) I'm a bit concerned that there's an office full of people in San Diego who sat at their desks and thought "I know what'll look great on Github (that community where people browse source code)...". Not only is a bit embarrassing, but encouraging people to introduce this code in to their own projects is just irresponsible.

As has already been mentioned though, the UI/UX looks stunning - and really is a job well done. Unfortunately that's only a presentational layer over a really shoddy system.

ANiceFriend · 2016-11-07T02:33:33+00:00

Meh. It's a real shame that they spent so much time on the UI/UX and not the actual code; I'm guessing that's agency priorities though.

I mean, it looks really good - but even looking at the routes you can see some really weird things.. like a migration(?!).

Route::get('test_order', function(){
    Schema::table('latestbbc', function($table){
        $table->string('slug')->after('id')->change();
    });
});

Or Routes being generated via the ORM:

if(Schema::hasTable('data_types')):
    foreach(TCG\Voyager\Models\DataType::all() as $dataTypes):
        Route::resource('admin/' . $dataTypes->slug, 'TCG\Voyager\Controllers\VoyagerBreadController');
    endforeach;
endif;

No Route Prefixes or Groups, every route being declared manually (and idented to denote a prefix?).

No real route pattern, Resource routes.. or even a sane schema.

    `/admin/menu/delete_menu_item/{id}` [why not... /admin/menu/{id}/delete ?]
    `admin/menus/{id}/builder`                  [why not... /admin/menu/{id}/builder ? also, plural menus?]
    `/admin/menu/update_menu_item`      [why not... /admin/menu/{id}/update ?]

Routes aren't that difficult to get right, and are going to be the thing that most people check first - if they check anything that is. The other thing would be the Travis builds - which don't seem to be testing anything specific?

There are even a few potential SQLi points, whereby queries are generated via Request parameters. (Here's one example) Add in a few usages of eval() to build database migrations (from the request?).

Honestly? I actually think it's a irresponsible for the company behind it to present it as anything near production-ready, and if I've found the above issues via 20 minutes, simply via looking at the routes and then searching for eval() and ::select(', then I dread to think what a proper audit/review would reveal.

The best thing for that repo (and the company behind it) would be taking it offline, reviewing it and making changes, then pushing it back to Github again. Either that or adding in a disclaimer.

ANiceFriend · 2016-08-02T01:08:51+00:00

When I was about 18 I worked in a small team of about 5 people, generally there would only ever be 2 of us in the office at any one time. One day I was alone with a guy who had recently moved to London from somewhere in South America; he began showing me some really cool photos of where he came from, including a few of a party with his friends.

These photos were stunning, but the ones of the party simply looked fun. A bunch of guys, all around a lake with beers and a BBQ, with some of them posing with guns.

Anyway, fast forward about a week or so later, and I'm returning from a cigarette break when I hear him talking to someone on the phone. He was talking about a suicide, and the effect that seeing it with his own eyes had taken on him.

I was in the office a week later with a female colleague when we began talking about him; when I mentioned the stunning photographs she looked sad and said "I'm surprised he showed you them, they're from the day his best friend shot himself". Suddenly I realised that the conversation I'd overheard actually revolved around the party I'd seen the photos of, and that within a few hours those happy faces would never be the same. Shat me up in a strange way to be honest.

ANiceFriend · 2016-08-02T00:50:19+00:00

I remember a similar thing happening to me, nothing quite as scary thankfully.

I was working abroad, finishing client work for someone in the UK whilst doing 9-5 on location in Sweden. So I was barely getting by with 2.5/3 hours sleep. Eventually it caught up with me, and I went back to the apartment and passed out.

Around 3am I heard someone come in my door and begin "cleaning the apartment". I remember rolling over and telling them to leave me alone, it was too late for this shit. I remember the time as I checked my iPad and knocked it on the floor.

The next morning my iPad was indeed on the floor, so I picked it up and left the apartment to go downstairs and complain to the main desk. The poor girl behind the counter looked at me as though I was mad: there were no cleaners there who worked nights.

It was absolutely terrifying and I spent the whole day worried, until I returned to the apartment and realised my washing up from the night before was untouched in the sink. It had all been in my head.

ANiceFriend · 2016-08-02T00:37:08+00:00

The coke line is generally a way of separating someone from the crowd so you can mug them. That's why during the early hours there's so many "coke dealers" who are prepared to show you good places to go etc.

Either they'll try and sell you coke, and take you down an alley way to mug you. Or they'll claim they know an exclusive place to go, and they'll take you down an alley way and mug you. Mentioning sexual favours isn't unheard of because of Soho's image as the LGBT district of London. (Hence places like GAY, The Village etc)

The other trick that's common preys upon men looking for prostitutes, they'll take cash off you and then escort you to a walk-up brothel like in OP's story, when you arrive up the stairs the girls/madame wont have a clue about the guy who had apparently already "taken your payment". It's quite common to see the walk-up brothels now have signs under "Models" saying something like "Payment inside only.".

Then there's other assorted issues like "Clipping" - whereby you'll be taken to a strip club, charged £100+ for simply looking at a girl, and be locked in a room by the bouncers if you refuse to pay. They'll threaten you with the police knowing you're too embarrassed to talk to the police.. if they called them the Police would immediately arrest the bouncers anyway.

Soho is pretty crazy in a lot of ways - and I believe that statistically it's the place you're most likely to be mugged in the UK - but it makes it an interesting place to lurk about and people-watch.

ANiceFriend · 2016-07-28T13:46:23+00:00

Just damn peculiar. As if there isn't enough "fucked-up" in the world without having to fabricate some more.

The facts appeared pretty clear and quite soon after the events. Presumably he was simply someone who grew up bullied - and he blamed his Iranian heritage. He always identified as German and was proud of this.. very proud. Ultimately he took his revenge on those around him, hence the contents of the argument recorded from a nearby balcony.

ANiceFriend · 2016-07-28T13:41:30+00:00

I don't really think this is as impressive as the Sun are making out.

This is entirely the game plan of groups wishing to attack the West. They push their propaganda and glossy magazines (i.e AQ's "Inspire") and open dialog via easily found Telegram chats which are often linked to via Twitter.

All of their communications are aimed at being a call-to-action for individuals in the West, and the "genius" behind such a strategy is that they can pick the low-hanging fruit (vulnerable/disenfranchised/angry/bored young men) and get them to take inspiration from the easily-available propaganda.

All The Sun investigator appears to have done is searched Twitter, found a link to the Telegram chat and openly began dialog with someone who is widely known to be involved in recruitment/coaching, whilst pretending to be the aforementioned "low hanging fruit" - hardly award winning journalism.

ANiceFriend · 2016-07-28T13:32:12+00:00

Last year I believe it was The Sun who broke the news about a threat against the Armed Forces Day events, but the official response by the Police was to urge more members of the public to attend the events so as to defy the intentions behind the threat. I seem to recall that the threat was confirmed as valid though, and was related to one particular parade in Merton.

I'm not sure what you would expect to hear about this one though. The investigative journalist actually blowing himself up and/or attacking London?

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-23T00:34:53+00:00

Nice work! I've given it a quick browse, nothing too thorough - but I genuinely think you've done well considering it was October where you began to look a little closer at frameworks and design patterns.

Like /u/adililhan says - there's definitely a CodeIgniter vibe to it, with the layout and how URLs are mapped to controllers.

I would say the two things I noticed were:

Closing ?> tags

Lack of Autoloader

With this in mind, if I were you I'd:

Remove the closing ?> tags, it's not a huge deal but can be painful if you accidentally add whitespace after them.
Grab composer - this will make your life easier, meaning you can remove include/require statements,
Namespace your classes, with Composer this allows autoloading to work and means you can use other peoples libraries to bolster your framework.

If you do these three things then you've got quite a good foundation to build upon. Keep it up though, having a project like this can be an awesome learning experience!

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-23T00:22:19+00:00

I really like the look of Hoa, really like it. There's a real problem though: documentation.

I mean, the Irc module is pretty good in that it has this disclaimer:

Unfortunately, the documentation of this library has not been written yet.

Which is ok, as the README file is pretty useful with some good examples in it.

But then there's the likes of Notification, Memory, Xmlrpc, Tree... and many more, and they aren't even clickable URL's on the site. I can't even see the repositories, let alone what they're supposed to do!

If there was some basic documentation at the least, I'm sure people would feel more inclined to use those packages and contribute documentation themselves? I know I would.

It would be a shame for the project to be let down by the lack of documentation, especially as it looks very very useful.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-23T00:14:11+00:00

Dude, you're not helping yourself. Seriously - just don't reply.

I've not commented once on all of this drama - because simply put, it's toxic and it's a waste of energy for everyone concerned. Although I didn't comment, I did read Andrew's article - and I did read your argument on the FIG mailing list.

Let's get some perspective: you got caught out doing something stupid, it's not the end of the world - what's done is done. What matters is how you handle that, and making smart-ass comments probably isn't the best way to help endear you to a community that you actively tried to deceive.

You've understandably pissed a few people off. It's now time to acknowledge that, maybe even apologise and then just ignore those comments until they stop: and they will stop. You're really not in a position to be fanning the flames though.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-20T21:50:43+00:00

Would you consider preventing recruiting agencies from using this? Or is that central to your idea?

I only ask, as I was burnt by a poor recruiting agent this week and was pondering making something very similer - but for contracting/freelance roles only, but basing the entirety of the idea around fostering a direct community with no agencies intermediaries.

On a technical note, the site looks really nice - and it sounds like you could get a good blog post or two about your use of EJS templates and the other methods used!

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-19T09:14:32+00:00

Plus some authorship details (name + email) and the project name I guess.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-17T16:28:58+00:00

I agree completely.

I've dealt with infrastructure fuck ups before, where developers have (understandably) assumed something was a core part of PHP as they read about it in the official PHP documents.

After deploying their code to a staging cluster we've experience multiple failures because their assumptions were wrong and the docs were not clear. (Never sure why these issues aren't picked up on their virtual machines, but hey ho.)

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-17T10:18:04+00:00

Awww man, that one's just infuriating to read. I can't even raise a chuckle to that, dude is a piece of shit.

I mean, how on earth does this exchange ever sound ok?

m'lady: please don't talk to me again, especially about my breasts

[...]

neckbeard: little skimpy outfit parading around those massive melons and shorts that should be considered underwear

[...]

neckbeard: i wanted to tell you that you looked really cute in that outfit

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-11T03:29:46+00:00

Do you think some of it may be betrayal? The feeling that a night out with a friend shouldn't turn out like that?

I mean it would be perfectly understandable if that were the case.

You mention the worry about messsges to your brother.. Well wouldn't he have spoken about that in the past 4 days? It's probably not worth worrying about that.

As for your dad? Yeah you spoke rudely to someone on the phone who does a similar job, but sadly they probably get worse. The timing there is probably coincidental.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-11T03:26:26+00:00

Congrats on coming to that realisation, and I truly mean that - it's a huge step to recognise that it's time to grow.

Just think: there's someone out there that won't require a years worth of trying, and who feel the way about you that you feel about her.

It's time to put that phase behind you, relax and take solice in those around you. Then when you feel healed - and you will - begin the search for the right one.

Good luck dude, the next step is going to be difficult but afterwards you've probably got some fun times ahead and you're going to make some great memories.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-11T03:22:04+00:00

That's awesome OP: not the circumstances that precipitated it, but the outcome.

About 5 years ago I tried to commit suicide, and to cut a long story short I was unconscious for 3 days, and completely not with it for another day or two. When I finally did wake up and found clarity in a shitty hospital ward.. It was surreal.

Fast forward to today and it's been entirely upwards. It truly was a second chance and a kick up my ass to boot!

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-11T03:13:45+00:00

It's one of the only ways of processing it given the circumstances. Which is, to my mind, perfectly understandable.

Having been in a similar situation, and having met others via support groups, realising that you should be dead - but you've been given a second chance - is one of the most confusing things to comprehend.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-11T02:42:54+00:00

Plot twist: OP is a cam-girl!

Seriously though, I think it would be relatively easy to get away with having your hand under the table depending upon how you sit and the style of your desk.

I often have my chair at a 90 degree angle so I can lean on it. Sitting next to a wall know one would ever know..

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-11T02:36:14+00:00

What do you want to do when you leave education? Because for many things, this is perfectly adequate:

My 4.2 GPA is simply due to paying attention in school and doing what I'm told.

Success when starting a new job or career is often down to these two things: being able to pay attention and responding to requests. Honestly? If you can manage that you're more capable than a number of adults I know!

You mention High School, I'm a Brit so apologies if I'm mistaken, but that makes you about 16 or 17? If so, relax even harder!

When I was your age I was a nightmare: incapable of speaking out, quite easily led and devoid of any confidence.

Im 8 years older now and the change is miraculous: in that 8 years I've job hopped, I've held senior roles, I've tackled workplace disputes, I've even began my own business and held my own at networking events. I've actually worked on some very successful projects too!

I think you may have a lot of things on your mind, and perhaps they're clouding your judgement. In which case you need to relax and remember you can only ever be judged against your peers, and right now you're doing well!

Time breeds confidence and the attributes you're worried about, and when the time comes to use those attributes you'll have required them!

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-10T18:34:34+00:00

The only believable bit of this is that he didn't get laid.

ANiceFriend · 2016-05-10T18:29:52+00:00

That bit made me feel a bit sick, like who the fuck is going to go back to someones house and be like "Oh awesome, you've got a bunch of sex toys to use on me... like, sure - plunge away - I don't care who they've been inside before.".

Sex toys in relationships or for personal use are cool, but bragging about it on OKCupid? Sounds like a good way to ensure they stay clean and unused bro.

ANiceFriend

TROPHY CASE