So about a year ago, I decided I was going to learn a new Microsoft web application framework - ASP.NET MVC. I started reading a bunch of articles and found out not only did I need to understand a Model View Controller architecture but I also should find out about the new .Net stuff that I hadn't learned quite yet - things like generics, lambda expressions, and Language Integrated Query (LINQ). LINQ led me to LINQ to SQL (ouch) and onto the ADO.NET Entities Framework and LINQ to Entities.

Because the MVC framework is much more HTML oriented and because I've always wanted to do a better job on the HTML/CSS/Javascript/AJAX on this site, I had to brush up on CSS. Brushing up on CSS made me want to brush up on Javascript which led me to discover JQuery, a great Javascript Library. JQuery lets me do thing much more easily with AJAX.

I also wanted to get a better blog entry editor. So I started looking around and found tinyMCE.

So what started off as a nice little side project to learn something new, turned into this much bigger learning experience. I've learned a lot technically, but it was also a great way to dive right into how applications are being developed for the web. The experience has really lessened my pre-existing bias against open source projects. JQuery and tinyMCE are great products/projects/applications which I am happy to integrate into my development cycle.

There's still alot of work to do on the site:

• Get photos and photo galleries working 
• Integrate Twitter and Facebook
• Get videos working
• Allow for clean RSS feeds of content
• Integrate AJAX into photo slide shows and blog where appropriate
• Provide a great IPhone/mobile experience

But overall, this has been a great learning experience.

I think for this year, I'm going to take on IPhone development.

See ya later!