Fixing · 1 July 2001
In advance of a walk over the line into XML, I’ve been fixing some of the kludginess in the works hereabouts, peeling off bits of brittle masking tape, pulling pennies from the fusebox. Much forehead slapping comes with learning the difference between beginning and moderate knowledge of PHP: what previously amounted to several large scripts in many documents – most redundant and heel-dragging, many just stupidly constructed – has been rendered down to a handful of svelte functions which now sit poised and alert, like German businessmen.
I wonder if others follow a similar route when learning new systems: obsession with the idea of learning it, followed by the purchase of costly reference materials, none of which are ever read, really, because it’s just so much more satisfying to keep trying and trying, repeating the same mistakes. That way, when at last you make something work, you feel for a moment like the God of All Creation.
Of course when you try to do it again, to repeat the glorious triumph, sense-memory of how hard it was the first time kicks in, recommending you’d be better off trying out that other thing over there.
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