THIS IS AN UNBELIEVABLE BLOG POST FROM FOUNDER OF PHP HIMSELF

reading this blog post I was totally shocked. How come Rasmus of php.net writes something like this to the public. If its for traffic generation then I am totally disappointed. read the post below

http://toys.lerdorf.com/archives/38-The-no-framework-PHP-MVC-framework.html

My comments about his post:

How can he prefer his own framework to other frameworks that make the work easy for us. Its like me telling him I will never use php because it wraps everything together in one language rather I will build my own server scripting engine that will let me support .net, java and php where necessary. HOW DUMB IS THAT ??.

These frameworks might be bad but the overall success is the fact that they are documented for teams to work together and also ask questions to community on one common platform. For instance the codeigniter framework has documentation and if I am building my application and somewhere I get called for something else, I can outsource it to any php developer and tell him my code base is on codeigniter.com. This way any developer can update my codes by learning codeigniter and then working from where I stopped given the specifications and UML diagrams. But using his so called no framework framework. How is he going to explain things to other developers when he gets stuck along the way. THIS ONLY SHOWS HE IS NOT A TEAM PLAYER OR HE HAS A LOT OF TIME TO TRAIN GUYS TO UNDERSTAND HIS NO FRAMEWORK FRAMEWORK AND WORK ON PROJECTS WITH HIM.

Men Frameworks like the .NET framework is what php has been lacking for years and no true programmer will lean more to procedural and individualistic ways of doing things than a team way of doing things.

I don't have the time to create my own framework, before building my application, then spend time writing documentation for my team members to learn and then start developing. I want to use a framework that has done a lot of stuff for me and can also help me outsource work to others and still be able to modify their codes even if they are thousands of miles away from me. I don't need to send them mails or get conference calls with them just to ask what they use to validate codes or connect to the google api. I will just follow the programming principles in the framework and understand their codes and they too will understand mine.

Men Rasmus, that your toy post was a total mess and please try to upgrade and follow the current trend of things

GMAIL NEEDS BETTER MULTITHREADING

Have you ever wondered what will happen if your mail client could send mails in the BACKGROUND ? if so then we are very much alike.

MAGIC: I wish that the gmail team reads this and adds this feature so it can help me read and respond to my business mails faster.

Now you might be wandering what I mean by "multithreading in gmail", well I simple wish to be able to send more than one mail at the same time with my gmail account.

The idea is simple:
1) I compose a mail,
2) add some attachments,
3) hit send button,
4) gmail sends the mail in a background thread and shows me the "notification status"
5) I go back to my inbox, (mail is been sent in background)
6) read another mail (mail is still being sent, or if done notice appears)
7) reply to another mail which also quees in a background thread.
8) I go back to inbox and the cycle continues

This way, while a mail is been sent, gmail informs me, "mails sending in process" or "mail has been sent" but the sending process doesnt stop me from searching, reading or doing other stuffs in gmail. Currently when you sending a mail it blocks you from doing any other thing, if you try to click on inbox while mail sending in process, it gives you a modal notice "your mail has not been sent... discard...". but they could just do a background thread and I go on while the machine works and informs me assynchronously.

Why on earth are the smartest web geeks(Phds) not able to do this simple computing stuff for me ??
AJAX is assynchronous javascript and XML. if i can remember my AJAX lessons, Assynchronous means it runs in the background, and gmail is one of the leading AJAX apps on earth. So guys please add me some "send mail in background" feature so i can reply to 20 mails in 3-- mins.

Trip to Cocoa Farms in Matoh-Kumba, Cameroon - 21 feb to 22 feb 2009

Recently, myself and a partner in Switzerland( Sebastian Schmid), decided to do some market research in the farming, processing and exporting of cocoa from Cameroon. This initiative came upon me while I was on my way back to Buea from the ICTAfrica2008 conference (here). I was sitting in the bus and wondering why I export software codes(programs) from AfroVisioN Group to Europe while my classmates, brothers and sisters in my village work in Cocoa farms and I could help them export their produce and help improve their living standards.

Question was : Churchill you are exporting software (outsourcing), why don't you also export agricultural produce just like you do with software ???

Well Sebi is a great Swiss social entrepreneur, a friend and a partner. When I told him my plans he was interested and we planned a trip to visit the farms in my village and see how we could be a part of their farming process.

Well the pictures below will give you a glimpse of our trip:

Below is Sebi in a cocoa farm and my uncle in the background


Below am feeling like a great farmer


Below: At my uncle's place in Matoh - Kumba. preparing to visit the farms


Below: on the way from Kumba to Matoh (45mins drive ) - African car (a full blog post is required)


Below: on our way from Kumba to Matoh, we had to step down for car to climb

Below: on our way back from Kumba to Buea, I had "nose bleeding" too much noise I hit in Kumba at bus station


Below: Catholic Church Kosalla Kumba - while we were walking to get a taxi from the Theological Seminary

Below: Matoh is a realy nice village with students coming back from school ;)


Below: road to the farms - 20mins walk from the village

Below: At the Theological seminary where we lived with Christoph and his wife Cornelia(in pic below)


Below: buea before our departure

Below: At Christoph's place - Christoph hosted us in Kumba after we got back from Matoh. Realy cool guy and he is Pastor and lecturer at Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Kumba. He also gave me some paino lessons that night. He is a geek on the paino ;)


Below: Sebi sharing some drinks with my uncles at a village bar, while we were expecting a car to pick us back to Kumba from Matoh


Below: Sebi with my two uncles


Below: This is where I grew up and spent most of my early holidays


Below: this is my background and I miss this life


Below: on the road to the farms, Sebi was tired but he says I was tired not him


Below: trying to be happy with a cocoa pod


Below: This is the source of the chocolate you eat, so respect it


Below: Sebi what are you searching for ??

Random Events Dec 2008 - March 2009

Well my blog is missing me because of the tones of work we have at AfroVisioN Group but sure I will always post one or two stuffs because the blogger in me wont rest till I do some blogging ;).
Today I want to take this time off to write about some random events , not much but just a glimpse will be revealed.

Here we go:

ICTAFRICA 18-21 December 2008, Yaounde Cameroon.

In December 2008, there was a conference in Cameroon organized by some African professors in universities around the world (mostly USA). for information about the conference visit http://icitd.com/ictafrica2008/. They launched a call for papers and I submitted a research paper about IT4UMagazine I did with Phebe. I can say the paper was rich enough for the juries to accept it as a good topic for the conference.

Below is my PowerPoint presentation:



below is my video presentation:



below are some pictures




for more pictures and information please visit the following links

http://banyangigirl.blogspot.com/2009/02/ict-conference-2008-yde-camer.html

http://banyangigirl.blogspot.com/2009/02/conference-videos.html

AfroVisioN's Offline Gorilla Ad Campaign

We have started posting posters all over the south west Region of Cameroon and this is to inform the general public about our "ONE WEBSITE FOR EVERY CAMEROONIAN SCHEME". check out the picture below and what you see there is actually what you will see all over buea, mile 17, mile 16, Muea and Ekona. Next we move on to Limbe, Mutengene, Tiko, Kumba and Mamfe. The picture is from Billzimmerman, he saw the posters all over the place and took a picture which he posted on twitter find his tweet here - impressive.

140+ Wordpress Themes

Nowadays, its nearly impossible for me to come up with blog posts. Well I dont blame myself because I am chocked up with business, a lot of projects and programming to handle.
Today, I stumbled upon this article posted on twitter by White African and I decided to blog about it.
Some how with this post, whenever I need to see the article and the blog themes I will search my blog and find it(blog bookmarking :D ).
Well check out the link below, it contains 140+ wordpress blog themes and if you need inspiration for your next design or you simply want to run your own blog like Bill 27months.com , go there and download the one you like for free.
http://www.instantshift.com/2009/02/22/140-brilliant-free-wordpress-themes-around/

40+ Useful & Handy Web Designer’s Web Services & Tools

Today I stumbled upon this link from a Nigerian friend and Entrepreneur - Tim Akinbo. Its a blog post he found and shared with me on facebook. The blog post is an amazing list of web tools that will help me and my team (AfroVisioN) rapidly design websites at 50,000FCFA and also track our websites availability online. These tools will also help us come up with Rapid Web Applications for our clients world wide. AfroVisioN needs to research on many ways to improve productivity and tools like this will push our productivity to another level ;)
check the link out
http://www.noupe.com/tools/40-useful-handy-web-designers-web-services-tools.html

MY 2008 DIGESTED IN ONE BLOG POST

January 2008
I was solidifying partnership with this Indian Tech guy

Febuary 2008
Started work on theinvestor.in and studentnetworks.in, and launched www.bushfalling.com [AfroVisioN's community of cameroonians ], met Enstine of njangihost.com , FEE of kerawa.com and Nino of 20mai.net thats when the marvelous connection started


March 2008
Launched cameroonfootballers.com as AfroVioN's community of professional football players

April 2008
Had this great interview about me and AfroVisioN on 20mai.net, and started partnership talks with Sebastian schmid of Ecorp www.ecorp.ch

May 2008
Launched AfroVisioN's " one website for every cameroonian" project which entails a full professional site at 50,000FCFA per year

June 2008
We started work on www.afrikeo.com, www.seekvice.com and met Judith Modjock of www.weboptimal.net and signed a partnership deal with weboptimal.

July 2008
We had the first version of afrikeo and started work on our partnership with panther media and Ecorp. Our main partnership for Business Process Outsourcing of web applications from switzerland to Cameroon. Also met Joel Nlepe from Microsoft who is currently working with us on alot of projects including www.coolmboa.com and we also launched his ww.africa2point0.com blog.

August 2008
We successfully implemented the www.executiveasset.com project for our client in Douala. Real estate site where you can search for houses to rent or buy in Douala. And we started work on www.spdmania.com for cheap and auction sales listing in Douala.

September 2008
Redeveloped our AfroVisioN new corporate website, with an administrative backend, CRM module and scalable codes running on an MVC design patern with HTML views.

October 2008
We added computers to our training hall and launched marketing for our AfroVisioN Training programs in Buea and online

November 2008
We releaseed the www.spdmania.com for our partner Weptomial.
I came in contact with this Cameroonian Msc student in UK who intends to do her internship with AfroVisioN.
my research paper got accepted for IctAfrica 2008 Conference.
I came in contact with Billzimmerman and had this great email interview with him posted on his blog 27months.com

December 2008
Attended the ICTAfrica conference along Phebe Etchu business student from USA.
Started revising our business plan at AfroVisioN for the year 2009.
Also came in contact with Anabi Epizitone of BigPiktures Group www.bigpiktures.com

That is the brief run down of my professional life in 2008, and some projects are not included due one or two things.

AfroVisioN 50000FCFA per year website promo

These days we have been working on banners for our 50 thousand FCFA / year website offer to all cameroonians home and abroad. below are some of the banners we have produced to do the online marketing. You can help us by placing any of them on your blog or website or ?? and link to our site www.afrovisiongroup.com to help spread the word.

Random Posts About Me And AfroVisioN

Going over the African blogosphere I noticed some interesting articles:

Théophile KOUAMOUO an ivorian blogger talks about why people blog in Africa on his blog and references me on these links

http://kouamouo.ivoire-blog.com/archive/2008/12/05/pourquoi-bloguer-sur-l-afrique-revue-provisoire.html

http://www.rue89.com/ivoire-blog/2008/12/09/pourquoi-bloguer-sur-lafrique

Dibo a.k.a Nayigi's Daughter also loves what we are doing at AfroVisioN on this post 

http://dibobanja.blogspot.com/2008/12/and-i-keep-searching.html

there could be more some where somehow in some documents but these are the few I found around.

 Hey I still have to come up with why I blog about Africa, answer the tag from Bill and also answer Theo who started the whole viral effect ;)

My Presentation At The University of Buea For Brain Trust Competition

I was happy to be invited to talk about AfroVisioN Group to all the first class students at the University of Buea. They have to be inspired and motivated to start creating their own business' after school or while in school.
I told them who I was, my age and how I started AfroVisioN Group in 2006, and all our achievements (GCE results, Ubstudents.com, portfolio ) and how we have cut down cost of professional websites in Cameroon and put the most competitive price in the market. They were amazed when I told them we plan to build 1000 websites for NGOs, CIGs, SMEs and schools in Cameroon by the end of 2009.
check out the slideshow below and you might get a summary of how the presentation went through.

My Meeting With Dr. Mamouda Of The University Of Buea

On Tuesday I got a call from Billzimmerman(www.27months.com) telling me I will have to present the next day(yesterday-wednesday 19 Nov 2008) to students of the University of Buea for their Brain Trust inter university competition which is centered around business creation. So I went there and met other Young entrepreneurs here in Buea and we had to do fast preparation in just 24hrs ;) but the outcome was perfect( leaving that for another post with pictures).

 The picture above is Bill's shot while we were at linkUp  (www.linkupdevgroup.org)  training room talking about what the presentation will look like and the guides in producing our power point slide shows ;). Dr Mamouda of the University of Buea was one of the organisers of the event and we had a long talk about what we have to do at the event and other events we will have to attend. I am happy to meet this guy and amazed how I never knew he was around, he has this experience studying and working in Europe and USA and I bet you he will be a great tutor to me. He is a very open person and I will call on him whenever I have difficulties in any business operation ;). 

"Hey Thank you Bill for introducing me to this guy and all the opportunities and VC stuffs your bringing to the Buea area - God Bless You"

 I was there with a 19yr old business man who runs his own cyber cafe and an operation manager of a group that supplies computers to about 20 schools in the south west (bridging the digital divide). 

 I will post information about the presentation after I get the pictues ready. 

Fuh Bright Afangwei: hopes for a bright future, not insight?

My eyes are filled with tears as I cry for this little boy and his parents, I guess its realy hard for them to take it. He is a four year old little boy from Bafut currently in Yaounde because he cant see with his right eye because due to an infection called "Right Orbital Tumor". This picture is what I saw on his article on www.crtv.cm and I have never seen something like this before, so we are all called to see how we can help this little boy either by posting his story around or by just donating some funds so that this Cameroonian can live to be our next President, Doctor or Lawyer. Please read the extract below or follow the link to learn more about his case. See for your self:

"The story of Fuh Bright Afangwei can hardly be told without holding back tears.

Born of 23-year, Fuh Godwill and 21-year Ambesso Gladys, the story of this 4-year little boy started in 2006 when the child complained of right eye pain. 

The parents whose monthly income can be estimated at 25000 FRS CFA ($50) instantly took their first son in quest of a  proper diagnosis.

After criss-crossing a numbers of health centres in the small locality of Bafut where they lived, the boy was later referred to Acha Annex in Bafoussam, a Hospital reputed for treating relatively complicated eye problems..."

 For more information please click here 

Mambe Nanje Churchill On The Spotlight

Well I cant believe Bill Zimmerman (An Ex Microsofter) just posted an interview about me and AfroVisioN Group. Well I think AfroVisioN Group is getting alot of attention these days. If you want to read the post follow the link below.

http://www.27months.com/2008/11/focus-on-cameroon-ict-entrepreneurs-part-2/

What I think So Far About Information Technology in Buea - Cameroon

Buea is fast becoming a hub for information and communicatin technology (computers, software,internet) in Cameroon. This is due to an increase in the number of small business startups dealing in Information Technology, which leads to an increase in the number of software solutions at lower costs than Douala and Yaounde (alot of competition just like MTN, Orange and Camtel).
AfroVisioN Group (www.afrovisiongroup.com ) being a leader in this sector has decided to train more young, dynamic and talented Cameroonians to join in serving these rising number of clients. I see this as an opportunity for Cameroonians to get trained and get certified and finaly work for AfroVisioN Group which has a rich client base and an increasing number of clients in Cameroon, and alot of offshoring projects from partners in France and Swiss. I think Cameroonians abroad who understand the importance of Information Technology skills like Java, C#, PHP, MySql, Oracle and DHTML should advice their brothers back home to come learn how to build solutions like www.executiveasset.com www.openuandi.com and help us improve the services on www.ubstudents.com. At the same time also improve their standard of living while attending university or better yet have a steady source of income. Some how this might help us against the "Brain Drain" dilema.
I am in the process of doing my part please help me spread the word, for more information click here
or visit www.afrovisiongroup.com/training

Updates on AfroVisioN Group's One Website for Every Cameroonian

Its been about three months since we launched the "one website for every cameroonian scheme" where we offer full sites like www.inacod.org as low as 50,000FCFA (110usd) per year to cameroonian firms or business men.
We have added a couple of businesses to the scheme but this one caught my attention, its a site we built for a business consultancy agency here in buea - U and I business consultancy hosted and www.openuandi.com .
The client is happy to have had his business represented on the web and the pricing is comfortable. We are looking forward to more businesses signing up to this our on going scheme with about 18+ websites since launch.

Screen shot

The pic below is a screenshot of the home page of U AND I CONSULTANCY'S WEBSITE. click on it to view the site and remember its under the " one website for every cameroonian SME and citizen scheme

My Meeting With Ongola Boy a.k.a Willy Manga

A few days back, I met with Willy Manga and we had a nice meeting talking about Information Technology in Cameroon.
Willy Manga is the Computer Lab Admin at "College Liberman - Douala"- I wonder if thats the right spelling ;) .

I told him about some projects AfroVisioN Group is going to release into the Cameroonian market in the sector of Information Technology Education and Awareness, especially amongst the youths and he was very much interested. Some of the projects are the ones I posted(http://mambenanje.blogspot.com/2008/07/my-meeting-in-douala-with-etum-africa-2.html when I had a meeting with Etum of africa2point0.com .
I was amazed when Willy Manga told me about his projects with Cops fm or so, and what he is doing with secondary school students in his lab on linux platform. anyway check out our pictures below.

In the pictures we were in a taxi in buea heading to Mid Way restaurant

some random pictures

I have had a couple of events at the offfice, around buea, in douala and all and I was to blog about them but I didnt have time because there are alot of projects AfroVisioN Group is working on and I have to see that all the clients are satisfied. So I have decided to post the pictures and just comment about them.
check out the pictures below and you might know what has been happening with me:

Below: Ghislain Kamgang(Cameroonian in Paris, France) paid us a visit at AfroVisioN Group while we were working on our new corporate website so we had to take a look at it together


Below: Ghislain and the brother Sorel (Cameroonian in Germany) were with us yesterday and we had to analyse AfroVisioN Group's new website.


Below: Ghislain while he was explaining some software development concepts to AfroVisioN Group developers during his visit


Below: I was walking the streets of Buea with a laptop behind me, and I decided to get the look and feel of the whole scenario


Below: Enstine (www.enstine.net) came to AfroVisioN Office and he was asking Valery (Software developer - AfroVisioN Group) some questions about an enterprise software we were building in C#


Below: I had a meeting with Enstine and it was fun. Its always fun when I meet with software developers or geeks


Below: I paid a visit to douala along with Wenie (my gf) and we were with FEE and Enstine.

let the downloading begin - Google Chrome

Google or "Big G" has finally decided to own the internet by releasing the linux of browsers. Microsoft has not finished fighting linux now they have to fight Chrome. Google used the power of linux, put thousands of computers together and built what Microsoft could never be able to kick off and in other words, build what will be the internet monopoly. I don't blame them because its always said "only a Ninja can stop a Ninja", and in this case "only Monopoly could stop Monopoly". Chrome sounds very interesting for a software developer like me - multi threading with processes, garbage collection, memory reuse, many nice geeky words, and I like the fact that it has the power java had when it came in with garbage collection and memory reuse. I am very excited to learn this will be out today for download and we have to watch the number of download against that of IE8 and Firefox 3.
I cant wait to download and test chrome for the mean time I like the look from the pictures

for more pictures visit http://blogoscoped.com/archive/2008-09-02-n72.html

Active Records VS Traditional SQL For Fast Web Development

Active records is a new way of querying a relational database without hand coding or thinking about the sql yourself.

Now let me explain with an example:

if I want to get everything in a table of users I will code it like this with php and normal sql:

//construct the sql
$sql="select * from users order by dateregistered desc";
//execute the query ingnoring the errors
$result=@mysql_query($sql);
/// now fetch
while($record=mysql_fetch_assoc($result)){
echo "username: ".$record['name']."
";
}

Thats realy boring imagine handling all the errors everytime you perform a query. I can't remember the last time I wrote codes like that. Imagine coding a solution as big as twitter and u have to write such codes.

Now lets do it with active records

//instantiate the active records database class
$db=new activeRecordsDB(array('host'=>'localhost','username'=>'root','password=>'passwod'));
//order the query by date registered
$db->orderby('dateregistered','desc');
//execute the query
$records=$db->get('users');
//loop through the records
foreach($records->result() as $user){
echo "name: ". $user->name;
}

This is how you add WHERE, LIKE condition statements using active records

/instantiate the active records database class
$db=new activeRecordsDB(array('host'=>'localhost','username'=>'root','password=>'passwod'));

//add a where clause
$db->where('name','%churchill%');
//or add a like clause
$db->like('website','%afrovisiongroup.com%');

//order the query by date registered
$db->orderby('dateregistered','desc');
//execute the query
$records=$db->get('users');
//loop through the records
foreach($records->result() as $user){
echo "name: ". $user->name;
}

With active records we have more readable codes and easy to understand and work on with other developers in a team. Nowadays I work with projects with guys in different geographical locations, with active records our codes are easy to comprehend.
There are more advanced implementations of active records in Java, .NET, PHP , ruby on rails , etc. but what i wrote here is just an understanding of how active records makes web development very very fast and smooth.
Active records information can be read from wikipedia following this link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Active_record