yeah man,

I happened to come across this about an hour ago on the technology times website (http://www.technologytimesng.com/). I gave the site the ultimate litmus test: driving directions from lagos airport to uyo and it passed in flying colors

The owners of that site should be applauded indeed. This is, in my opinion, the way we need to go, as opposed to coming up with myriads of social networks, which is (let's face it) more of an attempt to make money via google ads and less of an attempt to serve the public at large.

Kudos to the mapntl team!

yep,

I don't think you will need cPanel for that. Just hit the button mentioned above, enter your FTP URL and password (I believe - The last version of FrontPage I used was FrontPage 2000 ) and FrontPage will do the rest.

Good luck!

if I may I would like to suggest that rather than make a blanket offer for testing, come up with a testing plan and break it down into different steps (registration, logging in, logging out, load time, etc). This will prevent a situation where you are harassed with the same issues. Basically, you have say, 10 scripts and then you ask volunteers to send you their email addresses. Then you reply them with what they should do, along with a spreadsheet where they record status (pass/fail), comments, etc.

IMHO, by dividing the labor, each test is smaller and more efficient and you can focus on one failed test at a time, instead of looking at the whole picture which could be a bit overwhelming (evolution as opposed to revolution). My suggestion kind of reminds me of what my labor prefect in secondary school told me when it came to cutting wire grass - "when you look at your portion as a whole, you get scared. Divide your portion into mini-portions and before you know it, you will be done"

As always, my 2 cents.

As our way of saying "Thank you" to our 2007 customers, we are offering a special to all those in need of a website. Offer lasts till March 31st, 2008.

For further details, please visit: http://www.acewebdevelopment.net/ace-special.php

Thanks,

Management, Ace Web Solutions
"Redefining Web Development"

Tell me about it niyyie,

During OBJ's rule, it was definitely much better than it is today. Back then if you entered "Nigeria" in google, it would be the first link.

On friday, I wanted to see what the site looked like but cdnt remember the URL. So I went to google but couldn't find the site on the first 3 pages. After about 10 minutes, I decided to check Nigerian embassy sites. One would think all of them would have a link to that site. For where? Finally, I found the link on one of the embassy sites and was embarrassed at what I found.

During my last visit home, I was surprised at 2 things:

1) When I approached various peoples regarding setting up a web shop, 99% told me to forget it and focus instead on things like supermarkets or something in oil and gas.

2) In the calabar/uyo area, I saw many signs that said, "web design". Upon visiting such places, I would get the "standard", "Sir, we don't do web design", to which I would immediately ask, "So why do you have it on your sign outside?"

Even on TV/radio, I can't recall the number of local stations that ran ads with a URL in it. I stress local cos it seemed to me more pple watched super sports or channel O. I was always the odd person out when I would ask whoever it was to switch to NTA so I could catch the news. I was even told that it wasn't uncommon for the 9pm news to be interrupted cos they had to switch to a champions league match (but I digress)!! I won't even mention the fact that many atimes, I would spend 1 hr trying to send 3 emails cos of a slow internet connection at a cafe (do I hear, "it isn't like that in lagos or ph or abuja? my answer here would be, "it doesnt matter. we are all within the boundaries of nigeria. it should be the same everywhere". If I could only send 3 emails in one hour, how long would it take me to upload an entire site?).

Since Nigeria is at least 80% govt-run, it makes sense that the govt should take steps to encourage internet development by providing incentives. Western countries do same with respect to agriculture through heavy subsidies. Right now, sadly, we are blinded by the curse of black gold. Unfortunately, unlike countries like Dubai, we aren't doing much to diversify.

Sorry guys but my recent trip to Nigeria coupled with returning to meet a heavy workload made me almost forget to make this announcement:

On December 4, Webmasters of Africa (WOA) turned 1. In this period of time, a lot has transpired. Among others:

1) Total membership: 151
2) WOA was advertised on radio in Lagos and Akwa Ibom in December 2007
3) Many members have written to tell me they have been contacted by potential clients to submit Requests for Proposal. Even I have been contacted.
4) On a daily basis, the "Find a Webmaster" section receives the most traffic
5) A newsletter, with tips, tricks and stats is mailed out at least once every other month
6) Many have had their coding questions answered
7) I have had the opportunity to communicate/network with many developers.

Considering this site was my first PHP website, it is near-and-dear to my heart. I must say I am impressed that many have found the site useful enough for them to want to register. Membership numbers may be low, but I would rather have 151 serious-minded individuals than 2 million members, most of whom have nothing to offer.

Could the site use some improvement? Sure. I welcome your input. Since I am swamped with work, I may not get to it right away and/or may not implement it if I feel the effort it will take to do it won't justify the benefits. That notwithstanding, don't feel discouraged to let me know what you think.

To those who have registered, thanks. To those sitting on the fence, you have nothing to lose. Please spread the word and send me any comments/suggestions/criticisms you may have. Deep in my heart, I know that one day, it will definitely be the port-of-call for all those seeking webmasters of African descent for their various web projects. As they say, slow and steady wins the race.

Thanks, and here's to the success of WOA and its members!!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KISS_principle

Note: It's just an acronym. Nothing personal biko nu

There is one acronym that comes to mind. Let me see. Ah, yes! KISS

Unless you need to have something specific to what you want to accomplish, as in, it doesn't exist elsewhere, why go through the time and expense? There are tons of CMS tools out there. Just pick the one that offers the most bang for the buck, so to speak. Sure, by building one yourself, as has been mentioned above, you learn from the experience. Other than that, why re-invent the wheel(s)?

As always, my 2 cents.

diltony,

thanks for the compliments. As always I try my best. Lord willing, there will be more to come in 2008 and beyond.

Thanks once again.

I personally feel the left nav and the various page headers cd use some improvement. Also, y the 3 pictures below the left nav? If they must b there, might I suggest u hv many more of such and randomly generate them?

Finally, I see the date December 11, 107. Wasn't the year 107 ages ago?

I hope these help.

lol timmy,

contrary to popular belief, I wd rather stay, despite the country's shortcomings. The money may not be in web dev, but in other areas. One just has to find and hv the cash/connections to execute.

Besides, if i lv, na only u go chop. I can't let that happen now

By the way, I saw one show that made use of the website you collaborated with someone on (the closeup one). I was proud to tell the person I was watching it with that I knew who worked on the site

just returned from naija. Good to see that the law has been abandoned. Good to also c that for the most part, the women in trousers dressed responsibly.

smart,

na wa for u sef. In this case, i won't go to the N300 place strictly on principle:

When in calabar, i went to 2 places, within walking distance, that charge N150/hr. Both places, so slow, it took me 45 mins to send 3 emails. Then someone told me of a better place. I took a bike for N80 (one-way) there and it cost N100/hr. In other words, I spent N260/hr.

I dey uyo now. I went to 5 places - no light. The one place wey I find, slow as hell. Now I am told there is a better place for N300/hr. Y shd I go there when I could pay 67% less in calabar. Besides, though I have hundreds of unchecked emails, I only reply to 5 or so at a time. To me, it doesn't make sense. There r pple here who r complaining, pple who live here. So if they r complaining about slow system, it means I should be screaming my head off

smart, E b like say u dey for d wrong biz. U suppose dey work for Punch or Sun.

kobo,

apparently, the only way to get such access is to be "on ground". yet, when u r "on ground", u r being run around in circles. I can't tell u the number of people I have talked to in the last 72 hours regarding setting up shop in Nigeria. Pretty much everyone is discouraging. Only one person gave me a positive response. I will be following up with him when I return to the states.

I advertised www.webmastersofafrica.com (WOA) on COOL FM (lagos). I am currently looking at advertising the same site, as well as www.acewebdevelopment.net on AKBC radio. The rates are cheap (cool - N4000 for 30 secs, AKBC - 0 - 40 words for N550, up to 100 words for N1100). I hope and pray the adverts give me and members of WOA in general the exposure and business we deserve.

I will definitely keep you all posted.

speaking of "free money":

There is a website managed by the akwa ibom property investment company, apicoltd.com. While the site was up, it was okay. Then it suddenly went off the air, so to speak. I asked a cousin of mine who works there and he told me that despite the site being offline and him not doing anything new to the site in at least a year, the "webmaster" still gets paid a salary.

Na wa for us nigerians o!

I hear that in naija now, most married women carry, pray for "holy ghost pepper" to rain on their husbands when they are not at home so as to ward off temptation. In fact, someone was telling me of a confession a man made at church claiming his privates were "on fire" while at a hotel with another woman

The above is not a joke, but seriously though, technically, you have already slept with the woman. If you read the bible, you will know that it says, mere looking is the same as the act itself.

You said she is a subordinate. That tells me you have the authority to either transfer her elsewhere or get rid of her (again, as the bible says (paraphrasing), "if your right eye causes you to stumble, pluck it out" altogether.

As always, my 2 cents

Thanks very much guys,

Now that I know what's up, I have now added interswitch to my arsenal and I look forward with confidence to implementing such a solution for any client who wants it

Thanks once again.

I believe a javascript component is something you can quickly and easily add to your page(s), something that achieves some kind of functionality. You can write your own, but as is the case here and in general, such a component is usually borrowed from the open source community.

zico:
Here is a link that might help:
http://www.nogray.com/time_picker.php - it has HH and MM but not SS. If you really need SS, can't find any other resource and are really good at javascript, you might want to look at adding to the functionality used to build the time picker I just gave you.

In the future, endeavor to use google

I hope this helps.

adeniyi good catch. I and some others I chat with regularly have noticed this as well.

Astron, the first time I went to your site, the photo of you in the traditional wear in particular threw me off. First off, based on the URL, I was expecting a personal site, in which case that photo in particular makes sense. It was only when I looked at the menu that I saw you were also advertising your web services.

My advice? Get rid of the trado photo and move the photo of you in a suit to the "about us" section. Furthermore, if you insist on having a photo on that page, I would probably also look at making it a little larger and with you (smiling and looking into the camera) sitting at a desk.

In the end, it's your site and you don't have to do a thing. For all we know, the site has probably brought you more business than that of the average person on here. Having said that though, I think you would be better served either with a separate site for your web services or a removal of that trado photo, at the very least, from your present site.

As always, my 2 cents.

adeniyi,

You might want to look at LightBox - http://www.huddletogether.com/projects/lightbox/ - once you are comfortable with version 1, u could then graduate to version 2 which has "next" and "previous" button (visible when you hover over the left or right sides of each photo).

You would start off displaying all the art work in a gallery fashion, then once clicked, lightbox takes over. There are other techniques, but I prefer lightbox cos of its eye candy factor.

Check out an implementation of lightbox 2 on a site I did a while ago: http://ibompeoplescongress.org/ipc-photo-gallery/ipc-jazz-night-photos.php

I hope this helps.

Assuming your language of choice is PHP, here is a script i use a lot. I hope this helps:

error_reporting(0);
$recipient = 'ssss@yahoo.com';
$subject = $_POST['subject'];
$from = $_POST['full_name'];
$emailaddress = $_POST['email_addr'];
$comments = $_POST['comments'];

$subject = "Email from o_oe - " . stripslashes($subject);
$from = stripslashes($from);
$emailaddress = stripslashes($emailaddress);
$comments = stripslashes($comments);

if(!$subject || !$from || !$emailaddress || !$comments) {
echo '<p>You have not faithfully filled out this form. Please go back and try again.</p>';
exit;
}

$sender = "From: ".$emailaddress."\n\r";
$msg = "Message from: $from\n".$comments;
if (mail($recipient, $subject, $msg, $sender))
echo nl2br("<strong>Printed below is the message you sent and which we will receive.:</strong>

<strong>To:</strong> $recipient
<strong>Subject:</strong> $subject
$msg
$sender";
else
echo "Message failed to send";

The section:

if(!$subject || !$from || !$emailaddress || !$comments) {
echo '<p>You have not faithfully filled out this form. Please go back and try again.</p>';
exit;
}

is my backup plan to verify that all required fields are not left blank, on the backend, in the event that a user has javascript turned off.

It may not be the best code in the world, but hey, it works

Ah! so that would mean a trip to Lagos

Oh well.

Thanks for your response, tolushi. I will keep you in mind, In the event that I am slammed with other stuff. By the way, I tried to access flexend.com but got a 404 error.

Thanks,

My people,

As I have been saying for a while, if I don't know something, I am the first to say so. The time has come for me to ask a question. I have combed through as many pages of posts here but haven't found anything, so please if this has been answered before, forgive me and point me to the thread.

Someone called me from Nigeria and asked if I could implement a school site including a feature that would enable students to pay their fees online. Of course I said yes granted I have never coded a Naija site with such a feature but knowing that it would probably work in the same way Ebay does.

I visited interswitch's site and determined that webPay is what I need. I even downloaded and read the accompanying catalogue. The problem is, they make no mention of transaction or set up fees. They don't even mention how to sign up. They just list benefits.

For those of us on here who have implemented a payment solution online via interswitch, please enlighten me and perhaps others on how to get started, fee structure, etc.

Thanks in advance.

rufaai,

as you hv rightly noted, "pple aint the same". Our fingers aren't the same length. Some like you learn better via resources, others are born with it, others learn better by paying someone and some learn better via a mentor.

Some pple, even with resources, for whatever reason can't seem to muster the confidence in them to think they are capable of cranking out even a single line of code even though they are perhaps better than others. This is where a mentor comes in. Such a person would ideally be good at finding out how best the person learns and how to bring out the best in the person. A mentor by the way doesn't have to impart knowledge alone. Providing A23 with a pc and helping him set up his environment/providing him more than 30 mins of internet access are also forms of mentoring.

I am not saying resources aren't a good thing or a start. I am saying that if A23 feels a mentor is what he needs, then I am sure he has done the necessary thinking to come to this conclusion.

A23, I would love to be of assistance but I am not there. Having said that, I wish you luck in your search for whatever it is you need to get the web dev ball rolling for you.

It depends on requirements.

What r the requirements? What is the deadline (is this a rush-delivery?)

worldbest,

I personally don't comment on blogs cos either:

1) It is pre-packaged - nothing special. I have seen many blogs that look exactly like your own, with only the content being the difference.

2) It is your personal playground so anything goes.

If it is possible to customize it, do so and get back to me.

Thanks,

lol goldenimp,

Thanks. Truth be told, e b like say Seun don put juju for dis forum cos I can't stay for 5 minutes without checking what postings are out there

Thanks once again. I am humbled by your response.

methodman:
Either my way or astron's will work. However, in the event you don't have admin rights on your computer OR you don't know how to download/install an executable OR you find yourself using a computer other than yours where the owner does not want you to install any software on it, you have no choice but to use cPanel. So regardless, make cPanel your friend.

Are the above scenarios over-thought and over-kill? Sure. I live my life trying to come up with all possible scenarios/options for a situation, that's all

I hope this helps.

Therein lies the uselessness of certifications. If you know how to cram, you will pass. Does this mean you know what you crammed for like the back of your hand? Most likely not.

If I were an employer, the mere mention of a certification would make me administer an on-the-spot exam to verify how much you know.

Am I saying certification is bad? Nope. I have a few myself (by the way, I only have them because my employer at the time required/paid for it ). What I am saying though is, just like it says (paraphrasing) in the Bible, all works (insert, "certifications" here) without faith (insert, "experience", here) is nothing.

If the environment you find yourself in requires a certification in order to make you stand out amongst your peers, go for it. Otherwise, save your time/money, read books and apply what you have read to solving real-world examples. Eventually, you will be like old wine - you'll "taste" better with time.

As always, my 2 cents.

depending on version:

1) Click on "file manager"

2) drill down to the directory where you want to upload your files. Atimes, this may mean starting from /home/(your account name/public_html

3) click "upload".

4) check the "overwrite existing files" checkbox if you want to overwrite an existing file. Otherwise, you will get a warning that upload didn't succeed.

5) click "browse" button. Navigate to particular file. Again, depending on version, files may get uploaded automatically or you have to explicitly hit "enter"

6) Verify on your server that the file you uploaded exists.

I hope this helps.

lol smartsoft,

u sef. no big deal about that site o! As I have said all along, with me, u get what u pay for. You pay me N50K, u get one thing, u pay me N100K, u get another. You pay me N1million, then all hell breaks loose!

In the US at least, when going through the requirements for a job (and I have gone through a lot), to the best of my knowledge, I have never seen corel draw. I have seen photoshop and fireworks, but not corel draw. Based on this alone, I will say photoshop.

Short, sharp and simple

simple: you independently verify that the information you see on any site is true (or not)

how: as nduaj said, visit similar sites, check customer ratings, check to see if there are any complaints against the company (in the US, that can be found via the Better Business Bureau), ask friends/family.

In general, stick with established sites, no matter how expensive their product/service may be.

I hope this helps.