johnph77's Blog

Home from Las Vegas. Tournament was going well until the last game, then couldn't get a thing. Oh, well.....

Meeting and dinner with old friends was great. Worth the entire trip.

Didn't work at work the entire weekend. Finished some web pages, though, and that was about it for anything serious.

Back to the mines tomorrow. I think I might be rested enough.

Underway for Las Vegas tomorrow for a pinochle tournament at the Fitz and meetings with old friends. Be back Monday evening.

Ordered new computers. Both Dells, both with WUXGA (1920x1200) screen resolution. Laptop will have full keyboard (numeric keypad included), 17" widescreen display. Desktop will have 24" widescreen - provided I can fit it into my rather cramped workstation. Vista Ultimate, 4 Gb RAM on both, in anticipation of the 64-bit op systems. Due to arrive here before the middle of next month. Reason for Dells? I had been a loyal Gateway fan/booster for 10 years, but when I inquired there they told me that they no longer build "custom" computers. Evidently their corporate philosophy has shifted solely to the retail market and they're only interested in selling "on-the-shelf" models. Anything additional has to be purchased/added from the aftermarket. They lost a pretty good-sized sale and they lost a customer.

Work goes slowly, as other priorities keep creeping in. Three items needing attention:

Conversion to the new structure - about 75% complete. Some snags, but going well.
PDF files - working on the last Phase II file - should be finished next week. That'll be my road project this weekend.
Phase III completion - on hold, probably until the new structure is in place.

In addition, I need to redo the hard copy. That'll take some dedicated time, paper and toner when it happens.

I'm also doing some experimental work with Excel - I've never used it extensively but I may be forced into using it if Lotus 123 doesn't work with Vista. I'll find out when the new computers arrive.

See y'all next week.....

I had done some statistical data file development to ease the way when it came to building the web files for Phase III - big mistake. In building the web files I found some errors in the data files and all of them either have to be corrected or rebuilt. Since there may be other errors in them down the road, I've chosen to delete the data files and rebuild them when and as they become required. While there wasn't a lot of work involved it did take time, and I'm not particularly pleased about that. So much for advance planning.

But, with that, I've decided to bite the bullet and do the reorganization I referred to in December. There'll be time involved with no increase in output, but it was going to happen sooner or later anyway, and I might as well get it over and done with. Progress on the new files goes well - less time involved than I thought it would take.

I'm going to take a break from this for a couple of days to work on the Keno project and to build some web pages for a friend of mine.

New laptop power supply received and installed today. Recharging batteries. All is well. I'll finish the PDF file I'm currently working on - about 3-5 days - then go back to Phase III work.

Received an inquiry as to the Keno Extra game at Red Rock, Las Vegas. On my list of things to do.

The power outage a couple of days ago knocked out the A/C power supply on the laptop. There's no way to charge the batteries in it now. Some of the files necessary to complete Phase III are on it, but the batteries are dead and there's no other way to get at the files, so progress is at a standstill until the replacement power supply arrives, hopefully early next week. In the interim I'll be working on other things, such as completing one of the PDF files, all of which is on the desktop. As Linda Ellerbe used to say, "And so it goes."

If there's time I want to put in some effort looking at new lottery games - it's been a while, but that doesn't look good. I also want to redo most of the tables in the payout page.

Was all set to watch the Super Bowl - beer in the fridge, snacks built - turned on the TV, watched the first two sets of downs, then POW! Power outage. Lasted until 6 AM today. So much for that. But the beer and food were still good.

Phase III winds toward completion. Working on getting the 66 web pages completed. Paperwork sent. Slogging along, but going reasonably well.

Data entry for both sections complete - a couple of days late, but OK - ready to start working on files necessary for paperwork submission and website publication. Periodically worked on PDF files and some lottery spreadsheets for a change in scenery. There are text files that still have to be constructed but foundation for doing so is in place. Should be a snap - if any errors remain they are few and far between.

Was asked if I had any plans beyond completion of this job and if I would be interested in the same type of work once this project is ended - I replied I had no plans but this thing probably will go on for another year, at least, what with all I still have to do. They've asked me to keep my options open. Could be more work on the horizon.

There'll be over 25Mb in files published before this phase is complete, then on to Phase IV. I'm reasonably satisfied with how Phase III is going, but it awaits client approval and I won't get that until submissions are made. On the other hand, I'm my own worst critic.

First section of Phase III is complete, two days ahead of schedule. Nothing in Phase III will be published until data entry in both sections is complete, a change from Phases I and II. This will eliminate most of the data entry corrections needed but may increase display errors - time will tell.

Continued building files necessary for the reorganization. Found a way to build the links pages to make editing a snap - and appearance is tight and compact. Nothing for public viewing yet, but it's a neat and efficient format.

Experimented with putting some of the larger lottery files into PDF format. It appears that some of the truly huge files I would like to publish aren't much better in PDF format than raw text files. But the conversion of some project files to PDF goes on and goes well.

It's been a good week.

A few weeks ago I started experimenting with publishing work to PDF files, as some of the HTML files in this project would be massive if published as a whole. It's a promising format - file size, and therefore access time, is reduced by about 75%. This might come in handy if and when I try to redo some of the larger lottery and Keno files on my site, particularly the tables. I just haven't had the time to fool around much with this, but, as far as work goes, it shows promise.

PDF file prep is time-consuming - I want it to be correctly formatted before publishing to PDF. As in HTML, PDF does not do a good job of accepting the whitespace necessary to keep data in columnar form, even with non-scalable fonts. Maybe there's a way to do this that I haven't found yet. PDF pages print out very nicely, even effortlessly converting odd paper sizes to the standard 8-1/2x11.

Phase III completion is on schedule. The first section should be complete later this month.

I've also started working on the files that will be necessary once the new reorganization takes place. The first edition of the navigation page is complete. I'll be testing the linkage this weekend.

I've known for some time that a major reorganization of the project would have to take place - the additional requirements have outstripped the capability of the structure of the output as it was originally designed. Sometime next spring the structure will be replaced. It will affect the paperwork already sent, but that's not a big deal, except for the volume involved. I've just finished submitting the proposals for the restructuring to the client for approval.

Phase III goes well, if a little more slowly than I'd like.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, all.

Phase II complete, pages posted, paperwork sent. Phase III goes, but more slowly than anticipated.

Took a shot at Phase V, trying to find the best way to accomplish that part of the work. Phases V and VI should go well - no paperwork. Found a display error in Phase I, corrected.

Took some time to build lottery files to list all white ball possibilities in PowerBall and MegaMillions sorted by sum. The files are large - over 100Mb each, but it was a nice break getting back into programming mode to achieve the end results. At this time I have no intentions of publishing them - just too large.

Phase II nears completion - paperwork ought to be sent out and web pages posted Monday. Some display errata slowing things down but at least they've been eliminated. Then it'll be straight into Phase III.

Quite a while back the client and I had talked about ways to skew the input to provide an additional basis for analysis without the necessity for extensive additional programming. The idea was to bend the outward limits of probability given the existing data. I think I may have found a method of accomplishing this. It has yet to be tested but, if successful, the whole project will grow by more than 10%. The new output can be incorporated into the existing structure with minimum intrusion and effort. It's a long way off, though - I won't touch it until the original work is completed. It is an interesting concept - I'm looking forward to working with it.

The lottery analysis spreadsheet progresses slowly - haven't devoted a lot of time to it lately.   

.....work. The trap that was established by Phase II caught two offsetting errors in Phase I. In all likelihood, these errors would have been statistically insignificant with regards to the overall project but the fact that they were caught gives credence to the effectiveness of the quality assurance portion that was built into this project.

And, speaking of Phase I, that part is virtually complete. The web pages are built and uploaded, the paperwork is ready to go. The only thing left to do is a QA check of the web pages. Phase II might be done before the end of the year, but I might be overly optimistic here.

Half of Phase I, II released - about 60Mb upload, over 200Mb sent by CD and over 400 pages of documentation. More than half of the paperwork may come back for mods - that'll be a major time eater. Not completely satisfied with appearance but functionality is good. The second half of the phases has hit a snag, corrections being made - but that's the purpose of error traps. It took long enough for the first part of the phases to be subnitted. Hopeful that Phase I can be complete before the end of the month, Phase II a couple of weeks later - but this probably is optimistic. Then continuation of Phase III, start of Phase IV can go.

Coding Excel spreadsheet re pairs analysis for a friend during breaks. While it's not that difficult it does take time, of which I don't have much of right now.

Enjoy your holidays, all. 

Phase II wasn't supposed to happen. Phase III (originally Phase II) came from an entirely different set of data. The current Phase II was designed as an error check on Phase I but developed into a phase of its own. It has now provided a backup for Phase I. Through a lot of creativity, inventiveness, ingenuity and brute force I think recovery is complete. There was a lot of work involved - I haven't left home except to pick up mail for the last few days.

Additional changes were made to certain files to ease recovery should the same set of circumstances reappear.

I'm now at the point where appearance of website pages is an issue now under discussion. That's a good thing, since that will be the last part of each and every phase. Progress is being made.

When everything is under control I'm going to work on an analysis spreadsheet for a friend - should be interesting, and a break from what I'm doing.