Here is the design I made for the database:

2 tables only. Nothing fancy :-)
One for the images “TBLIMAGE”, and the other for the subjects “TBLSUBJECT”.

Image table has the columns below:

• imageID: unique id
• fileName: name of the file that we will show
• subjectID (key for getting the subject name from the subjects table)
• filePreTxt: Some text to display just before the image
• filePostTxt: Some text to display just after the image
• strImageQueue: Within the subject every image has a queue which shows their priority to be shown

TBLIMAGE

Subject table has the columns below:

• parentSubjectID
• subjectText: The title of the cartoon will use what ever text is in here
• strSubjectDate: We will order the cartoon files first according to their subject dates

TBLSUBJECT

And here are some parts of the PHP codes, that you may find useful:

Setting up the configuration file by assigning the dbname, username, password values to their variables respectively:

$dbhost = 'localhost';
$dbuser = 'yourdbusername';
$dbpass = 'yourdbpassword';
$dbname = 'yourdbname';


Opening the database connection to work with:

$conn = mysql_connect($dbhost, $dbuser, $dbpass) or die ('Error connecting to mysql');
mysql_select_db($dbname);


And finally, defining and running my query:

$query = "SELECT filepretxt, fileposttxt, filename, subjecttext, strimagequeue FROM tblimage, tblsubject  WHERE subjectid = parentsubjectid order by strsubjectdate asc, strimagequeue asc";
$result = mysql_query($query) or die('Error, query failed');


Well, I didn’t forget to close the database connection of course.

mysql_close($conn);


So, here is my question:
Now that we have a chance to use a powerful and easy to integrate web application like Wordpress, would you rather use it, or make your own PHP Website for displaying your works/cartoons/etc.?
Or lets put it this way:
Which one is better?
Whibdatt [WordPress] or Whibdatt [HomeMade]?

Special thanks to W3Schools for their nice and explanatory web development tutorials ^^

I had owned the whibdatt.com for a year, and it expired due to my carelessness. So, I thought of getting something more familiar to the eye this time.. Something with two most commonly used words in the bloggers’world: “Blog” and “Geek”..

A bit sneaky, but I checked JustDropped.com and bought a domain which was just expired: “BloggingGeek.com“.

I got it via HostMonster.com after checking some reviews on hosting-review.com. It was a bit painful the first day to actually get the domain activated, I had to chat with the support guys a few times, and send in the scan of my id etc.. But compared to my old host Yahoo, I found HostMonster more advanced and user friendly. After the confirmation of identities and payment, everything went smoother.

When you get a remote host, you do not only decrease the possibility of the loss of your data but also benefit from the tools your host provides, like:

• Phpbb, for easily creating and managing a forum,

• Wordpress, for the creation and maintenance of your web pages,

• and the widgets and plugins provided by Wordpress of course!

They are the best tools to integrate your web page with the other applications you are using online.

For instance I used on my blog:

• twitter for wordpress widget, which shows my twitter entries right away on my blog, so you can actually track me on the go

• Events Calender plug-in, after installing and placing it on your blog, your site’s visitors can see your posted days on this calender and click on that date to view your post, or just hover over the date to see the header of your post

• Mobile Press, for the sake of easy reading of the posts on your mobile phones

• RSS widgets for googleReader etc., for your visitors to subscribe to your blog and get your posts in their reader boxes

Other integrations possible with Facebook, LinkedIn, GoogleMaps, almost any application you can think of.

Back to the HostMonster,
The control panel is quite user friendly; everything is under one control panel page as an icon and a short description under each icon. The ftp connection to your host through tools like Filezilla or the configuration of you mails to your Outlook Express etc. are all managed by a few registry scripts HostMonster creates for you. You have your environment ready in seconds, the only thing you need is to start thinking of what to do with what you have.

My domain BloggingGeek.com is still under construction, while there are a few subdomains I created for different purposes.

For instance, whibdatt.BloggingGeek.com for the exhibition of my home made cartoon series ‘whibdatt’.

There is also the forum.BloggingGeek.com which I created while playing around with the tools in the control panel, and actually people started logging in and posting.Well most of them are my real life friends, but this is a start, no?

As someone said before: “It can only get better.” ^^