February 17

Hi everyone, hope everybody’s doing well. Sorry I’m a few days late with the usual update, rather unwell at the moment, but should hopefully recover soon (all my usual health problems).

AWS Test Environment

I’ve finished setting up a test environment for the site on AWS, rather than a localhost one. It helps in making more certain that everything is running correctly; there were a few things to iron out, but that’s done now.

AWS email bug

I spent a few days completely stumped by a bug in AWS’ email API, which seemed to keep refusing specific types of emails when I tried to send them. I ended up filing a bug report on their GitHub, and after two days or so we found the problem: there are some very weird credentials processes that go on when you use the API and email systems together, that I fell foul of. Anyway, that’s now done, so activation emails and so on are working correctly, and I’ve noted the weirdness for next time in case I forget it.

Javascript refactoring

After refactoring all of the JS code to be in modules, I ended up having to change a lot of the php files as well; HTML elements that had onclick attributes directly in HTML didn’t work anymore, as since their onclick functions were now part of modules, they couldn’t be found. Instead I had to migrate all onclick attributes into the JS files, where the onclick listener is added for an element after the document loads.

Composer troubleshooting

It turned out I’d been structuring the project (a tiny bit) incorrectly all along: while I was testing some random code, I got errors that Composer’s autoload couldn’t find particular files in my source directories. Took a bit of time to figure out, but it was due to me not capitalising directory names - I thought they were case-insensitive, but they’re not., and they have to adhere exactly to the PHP package and class names to work properly.

Artwork submission fixes

I got around to fixing some of the bugs that were present in submitting artworks (namely, when editing an existing submission - the logic for switching images around, and for when images have been deleting and new ones inserted, gets a bit messy). Most scenarios I could think of are now working correctly, but it’ll need more extensive testing to be certain.

General improvements: code cleanup

Since Deserted Chateau is coming together, so to speak, I’ve started doing code cleanup on things as and when I see them, rather than leaving it for later. It has to be done anyway, so there’s no better time to start on it; all manner of bits and pieces, like database code that needs refactoring, variables that should be configuration items, and so on.

Display artwork page finished

As of now, the page that displays individual artworks is pretty much done. Layouts and so forth are all completed; the styling is done, there’s only separate elements to add in when they’re implemented like a bookmark button, and that’s that.