Andre Liem

Laravel + Statics + Facade = Confusion for Newcomers

I recently found myself replying to a question on Quora Why-do-Laravel-developers-used-to-ignore-OOP-techniques-and-even-MVC “. At first it sounds like a pretty ignorant question, Laravel is MVC to its core, just like the many MVC frameworks out there. MVC is part of OOP, so what is he talking about? I already had a hunch that there was one thing that he was seeing in the community because I faced it when I first picked up Laravel. It can really be summed up by Facade + Static envy. Continue with reading

My top 10 favourites of being a freelance software developer

I decided to work for myself about 3 years ago (2013) when me and my wife decided to move to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island. It was far from being a clear cut decision. The factors were a mix of cost of living in uber expensive Vancouver, slower pace of life, easier access to child care, less pressure to both work full time… The one thing that was clear cut for me was that the technology sector in Nanaimo is small, very small, so I knew that contracting as a freelancer was my only reliable option for making a living. It took me about 1 year to really get things going, but I can say that it’s been a very enjoyable experience with some mistakes but I would say mostly positive wins. Instead of sharing war stories, which I might do in another post, I thought a good summary of my top 10s would be helpful to those thinking about freelancing or to peers doing it already looking to compare notes.

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How to load images responsively with WordPress

When building or modifying a theme for WordPress that is responsive you’ll likely encounter a small issue around image sizes.

How can you display the optimal image for each viewing device to optimize the speed?

This is a very important area to consider as you don’t want mobile users spending a lot of time waiting for an image to download. This article will walk through a common scenario where you need to display images in a gallery or carousel. Continue with reading

JavaScript Tidbit #1 – object keys and single quotes

Well it’s official, I let my personal blog get dated… as it happens when you have a “busy” life. That being said, my summer resolution is to post up all the things I learn and feel will be useful for the web development community. Instead of crafting  lengthy long posts which take a while to prepare, I’ve decided to take the microblog approach and  share daily learnings or concepts I’ve recently found useful to be reminded about.

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Playspedia – my latest creation

Playspedia is my latest creation that I’ve taken on for 2011. In short, it’s the Ultimate playbook for people to share animated plays with dragging and dropping, and annotating each step. My brother and I created this after running the Ultimatehandbook for many years and realized there was not a simple way for Ultimate players to illustrate plays online. While it’s still in its very early stages, Playspedia has been quickly adopted by the community and shared on various blogs.

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