Author Archives: James McParlane

About James McParlane

CTO Massive Interactive. Ex Computer Whiz Kid - Now Grumpy Old Guru.

JavaScript Speed Trials – Post IV – JavaScript Namespaces

Posted on January 9, 2006 by James McParlane

Continuing my analysis of JavaScript performance. For this test I’m testing the impact of the current trend of JavaScript namespaces. Namespaces In this test 500000 iterations of the main function are performed. The depth of the namespace varies from 1 … Continue reading →

We Lost The War. Welcome To The World Of Tomorrow

Posted on January 8, 2006 by James McParlane

Between Xmas and New Year, Rop Gronggrijp (NL) and Frank Riegel (DE) held two impressive but surpringly depressive speeches at the 22nd Chaos Computer Club conference in Berlin. Here is Frank’s contribution.

Posted in Politics, Rants | Leave a comment

Why I Still Won't Use The prototype.js JavaScript Library

Posted on January 7, 2006 by James McParlane

I was not prepared for the amount of responses I got to my last article. There really are two camps – and they sit around fires making pointy sticks. The most constructive was from Rob Sanheim with this post, which got me … Continue reading →

Posted in AJAX, JavaScript, Rants | 10 Comments

Why I Don't Use The prototype.js JavaScript Library

Posted on January 6, 2006 by James McParlane

When it comes to JavaScript there is one issue for which there seems to be two polarised camps, and that is the question of extending the inbuilt JavaScript Array and Object types via the prototype object. There are those who … Continue reading →

Posted in JavaScript, Rants, Web2.0 | 27 Comments

There Is No Problem That Can't Be Solved With Large Enough Hash Table

Posted on December 27, 2005 by James McParlane

I first used this quote when referring to the z-buffering used in ID first person shooter Castle Wolfenstein. While not strictly a hash table, its a philosophy of “the audacity of scale” that I have maintained since my demo coding days. Q: How … Continue reading →

Posted in Nostalgia for Misspent Youth, Rants | Leave a comment

'Twas the Night Before Christmas (or A Visit from St. Nicholas) by Clement Clarke Moore

Posted on December 24, 2005 by James McParlane

‘Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the housenot a creature was stirring, not even a mouse.The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there. The children were nestled all snug … Continue reading →

Posted in Rants, Web0.0 | Leave a comment

Ookle

Posted on December 23, 2005 by James McParlane

Just got an IM from Michael Air (whom I have met) with this link revealing the penultimate veil on he and Scott Johnson‘s secret little project. Now, I’m not superstitious, but he announced this an hour after I found my lost phone next to … Continue reading →

Posted in Ookle, Web2.0 | Leave a comment

Outback Tele-Conference

Posted on December 21, 2005 by James McParlane

There is something to be said for holding a tele-conference with the engineers and executives of two of the largest companies in Australia while standing on a fencepost, on a hill, in the back paddock of a farm somewhere in … Continue reading →

Posted in Downtime, Web0.0 | Leave a comment

Distinctly Told Not To Mow During The Day

Posted on December 21, 2005 by James McParlane

About 1km down the road someone decided to mow their subdivided block. In the kind of heat we get, a mower can hit a rock and cause a spark, or in this case just spontaneously burst into flames. Folk from … Continue reading →

Posted in Downtime, Web0.0 | Leave a comment

The Minimal HTML Document Defined

Posted on December 14, 2005 by James McParlane

Great article by Gez Lemon on the Minimal HTML document and the difference between required tags and required elements.

Posted in CSS, JavaScript | Leave a comment