Adrian Hayter’s Blog

At midnight yesterday the final Harry Potter book went on sale, and like all the previous ones, millions of people gathered outside of book stores worldwide to buy it. Some more level headed fans decided to buy it online and have some sleep instead.

It’s general knowledge amongst my friends that I am not a fan of the boy wizard. Sure I read the first one (who didn’t) and got into the series since it was aimed at my age group at the time. However by book 4 things were starting to get repetitive. The endless cycle went something like this:

Harry is stuck at home bored out of his tiny mind. He gets in some sort of trouble with either his family or the wizarding world but ends up getting rescued by his faithful friends and the entire situation being sorted out. He then attends Hogwarts and learns some magic whilst doing several things that are actually linked to the plot. Then at the end he faces some evil and has to defeat it (or run away as he does with Voldemort) with the help from his friends. Finally he goes home to his boring muggle life…that is until the next book, where the cycle repeats itself.

As I grew up and read other books I just simply grew out of Harry Potter in favour of better written works. I’m sure that the books are great fun for kids to read, but they are not for adults (even though some adults claim to enjoy them). The writing is just too childish and simple to compete with other fantasy authors such as Paul Stewart, writer of the Edge Chronicles (one of my favourite fantasy collections).

So when millions of youngsters were eagerly reading through Harry Potter 7 today, I was on Wikipedia reading the plot. I wanted to know how it all ends of course, but this way it took 5 minutes and I didn’t have to read 608 pages of the actual book, which would most probably have bored me to tears. I’m not mean enough to give spoilers away, but I will say that it does end nicely.

Where JK will go from here is a mystery. She has built up a large fan base so far and I am sure any other book she writes will instantly have millions of pre-orders. I just hope it turns out to be better than her first attempt.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Right, so earlier this week my host (HostNine) decided to suspend DrPoodle.com (and therefore AdrianHayter.com):

Hi,

We had to suspended this account due to the issues it was causing on the server.

root@server1 [~]# ps aufx |grep php5
root 24656 0.0 0.0 5044 620 pts/0 S+ 11:53 0:00 \_ grep php5
drpoodle 22190 0.0 0.2 24260 11588 ? S 11:43 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22218 0.0 0.2 25100 11516 ? S 11:43 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22254 0.0 0.2 23864 11656 ? S 11:43 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22259 0.0 0.2 23900 11592 ? S 11:43 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22354 0.0 0.2 23828 11524 ? S 11:44 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22540 0.0 0.2 23748 11528 ? S 11:44 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22587 0.0 0.2 24028 11524 ? S 11:45 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22724 0.0 0.2 24872 11600 ? S 11:45 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22726 0.0 0.2 23892 11532 ? S 11:45 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 22954 0.0 0.2 24676 11524 ? S 11:46 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 23190 0.0 0.2 25380 11532 ? S 11:47 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel/cgi-sys/php5.bin
drpoodle 23430 0.0 0.2 24628 11536 ? S 11:48 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel
drpoodle 23683 0.0 0.2 23980 11528 ? S 11:49 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel
drpoodle 23913 0.0 0.2 24412 11664 ? S 11:50 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel
drpoodle 24378 0.1 0.2 25228 11520 ? S 11:52 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel
drpoodle 24391 0.2 0.2 24044 11592 ? S 11:52 0:00 /usr/local/cpanel
root@server1 [~]#
Regards,
Alex Jankuv
Support Manager

Of course as soon as I got the above email I jumped into action, and emailed them back asking for an explanation of the server log (I cannot read them to save my life) and how I could get my website back online. I also checked my ftp and cpanel access because if all went horrible wrong I would need backups of the files and database in order to move hosts…but alas…both had also been suspended.

The following day I received this email:

Hi,

Did you receive a larger than normal amount of traffic that day?

Regards,
Ben Gabler
Operations Manager

This made me a bit confused, because since my ftp and cpanel access had been revoked, I did not have any access to the stats which would have provided me with that very answer. However what made me even more concerned was the fact that HostNine could have easily looked at the stats themselves since they own the server.

After several more emails between me and them, it emerged that they had absolutely no idea what they were doing. They told me it was all my fault and that I had to find the script that was causing the problem…without cpanel or ftp access…an impossible task. When I pointed this out to them they turned round and started spouting rubbish like “we don’t debug scripts” even when I told them that I would happily debug the script if they actually gave me access to it.

Eventually I lost it, sent them an e-rant and told them they were the worst hosting company I had ever dealt with.

So, the good news is that we have a new server, and this time we are our own hosts because I teamed up with a friend of mine, MiNT and bought a VPS (Virtual Private Server) which means we can host multiple websites without paying extra hosting bills.

So far I have transferred DrPoodle.com and AdrianHayter.com across to the new server, and will be setting up my new website MyBBTools.com on it as well.

-Adrian

Popularity: 1% [?]

For those who use my community website (DrPoodle.com) and especially the forums, you will know that I have been using MyBB as a free forum software for just less than a year. After a few months with phpBB, we decided to make the switch because of everything MyBB offered. Over the years I have become part of the MyBB Community, learning about the software and writing plugins to help put new features into it.

A few weeks ago, Chris Boulton, the head developer of MyBB wrote about Support and Development positions that were opening up at MyBB. It was a chance to join the MyBB Team and help support and/or develop one of the upcoming and promising Bulletin Boards in the world, and it was an offer I couldn’t ignore.

So I wrote a PM to Chris and stated my intentions of applying to become a Support Rep, based on my years of “experience” with MyBB and how devoted I was to the MyBB Project. As soon as I had sent it I signed into the MyBB IRC channel and started talking about the application with everyone in there. It seemed like everyone wanted a shot at becoming a support rep (the promise of MyBB 1.4 access was very enticing) and all we could do was wait…

So today, after many weeks of waiting, Chris finally reveals 4 new members of the MyBB Team…and it just so happens that one of them was me! I was instantly on a high…with everyone congratulating me, my new super mod status, and access to the Staff Forum. It took a few days for me just to calm down and get things in perspective.

So now I am a member of the MyBB Team, supporting people around the community and helping out wherever I can…not to mention having my name and links plastered around the net. I hope to become a developer one day when my php is up to the standards of the MyBB project…so watch this space!

Popularity: 2% [?]

So here I am, half past midnight with a fresh copy of WordPress installed on my new website. As you can tell by the title, this is going to be anything but a linguistic adventure, and for that I apologise in advance.

My name is Adrian Hayter and I am a 19 years old student currently residing in the United Kingdom. I say “student” but this is in fact false since I have yet to start my course at University. Technically speaking I am a Core Administrator at a pensions company, but the job is only temporary and I like to think ahead, so to make matters clearer, I will refer to myself as a student. In September 2007 I am embarking on a 3 year course in Computer Science with Artificial Intelligence at Royal Holloway, University of London.

As you have probably guessed by now, computers are my passion and I have been interested in them ever since I was introduced to my father’s old IBM machine (Windows 3.1…you are sorely missed!) and this interest has been magnified throughout my life. I have had experience with most versions of Windows, Mac OS X, and more recently Linux (Ubuntu). Being the son of a software engineer had a load of perks, and not just an abundance of PCs around the house! We were one of the first families in my area (that I know of) to get Internet access which came with the ever so lovely CompuServe connection software (”Welcome to CompuServe!”…anyone?). Since that day I was hooked on all things to do with the internet, which admittedly wasn’t that much at the time (this was before Google had even been contemplated remember). As time passed though, and more and more people got interested in what would become a global phenomenon, I learnt more about how the “web” worked.

At age 15 I was taught the basics of HTML, the first web language, and I started writing offline web pages that I stored on my home computer. It was also around this time that I acquired my Internet Alias: “DrPoodle”, which I obtained through a series of events that I will not go into at this precise moment. Suffice to say, DrPoodle has become a large part of my life online and indeed offline, which brings me neatly onto the next section.

In 2004, the video game “Halo 2″ was released with Xbox Live functionalities. Already a Halo fan, I became an intent online gamer…to the point of obsession. My XBL Gamertag was, unsurprisingly, DrPoodle, and it was through the medium of online gaming that I met some truly remarkable people who I still consider very close friends. However, with us all thousands of miles apart, we needed somewhere to be sociable and have group discussions about various topics. It was at this point that I decided to take the plunge into the world of websites, and on 15th April 2005, I created DrPoodle.com.

My first attempts at a full blown website were…less than satisfactory, but as time went by, I got better and more skilled, learning XHTML, CSS, and PHP. Fast forward 2 years, and the same website is barely recognisable. It was a recent decision of mine to relinquish my personal hold on DrPoodle.com, mainly because the community had grown so much that I felt it would be hardly fair to attribute everything to myself. So even though it still bears my Internet Alias as a name, DrPoodle.com is a Community Discussion site, aimed towards advocates of Freedom of Speech and Expression.

It was also because of this choice, that I started this website…my new personal website, AdrianHayter.com. On this website I will write regular blog posts to do with certain aspects of my life and my interests. Hopefully people will be interested…if not, well, that’s just the way it goes.

-Adrian Hayter

*Note: I will be making a new theme in the near future. I can only describe this one as “Fat iPod” and it needs to go…

Popularity: 3% [?]