Once the tools are stablished, now we can begin to work. First, we should follow the Moodle Coding Guidelines and some rules for ourselves:

1. All functions that we program must begin with wiki_
2. PHPDoc to all function (all function must be well-documented, description, parameters, return...)
3. For all, functions we make, we should make a PHPUnit and test it. PHPUnit, in single words, are some test games to throw against the function you did to see if it works correctly or not. They all have a similar syntax. Moodle created their own method for testing PHPUnits instead of using a third-party software.
4. Not using $_POST[] and $_GET[] variables to get values arriving from an external resource. Instead, we have to use optional_param() function to retrieve the value, either GET or POST.
5. We have to keep in mind that we have to program HTML pieces of code in XHTML 1.0 Strict
6. All CSS that we could need to add must be added into styles.php file. Moodle fetchs this file for additional CSS parameters if they are included.
7. All permission which should be assigned must be located at mod/wiki/db/access.php file.

After that, we've discussed the database structure. This is the overall structure:

We must also document the application architecture. Too, we've mentioned some important files to consider:

• lib.php -> functions that Moodle calls automatically.
• locallib.php -> functions for internal use.
• version.php -> for allowing Moodle to notice a DB upgrade
• weblib.php -> to print screens
• languages files
• export folder -> for exporting methods
• db folder -> install.xml, upgrade.php...

After all this, I've been assigned to do the Database migration from ewiki and older nwiki version to the new wiki (Probably I have to program the upgrade.php file). Pigui told me that it could take me 2 months (omg!). Let's see the hardeness of my task... Time will tidy things...

Having DML and DDL Moodle libraries (a libraries used to update-query-manipulate moodle database) it shouldn't be too much difficult. Actually, it isn't. However I needed to use some special update SQL instruction with a WHERE clause, and I've not found any Moodle function to do such a thing, so I've done it with a function called execute_sql(SQL sentence), where you put as parameter an SQL query, and this query will be executed to the database.

What's the matter? All DBMS does not have the same SQL syntax. Functions provided by Moodle DML libraries solves this problem, but as I said before, I haven't found any upgrade function to use with a WHERE clause.

I hope Pigui will give me some assistance. But all my work will be thrown away with Nwiki refactoring, so Pigui will not spend too much time on this. And for me, I've seen I'm capable of doing it and repair bugs with work. I think I'm ready to do whatever task could be assigned to me.

This afternoon all scolarship holders will have a meeting to discuss the methodology we should follow for developing nwiki to fit with the new Moodle 2.0 architecture (probably available in early 2009). This afternoon I'm going to write a summary of the main clues of my meeting.

I post the code I made in order to repair the bug (it is incomplete and fails, but the main idea is clearly visible):

• This is the Main operation:

  

• XSLT transformation operation:

  

• Zip compression operation:

  

• getFileValue operation:

  

• The definition() operation in syllabi_import_form class:

  

My objective about this proposition is having a deeper knowledgement about Software Enginering and working methodology. In order to achieve that, I was preparing my PC to make nice class diagrams and sequence diagrams.

The "Free Software Market" about UML isn't too much good. I've tested some programs and very few ones completed my needs:

• ArgoUML: It lacks of a very intuitive interface and some basic functionalities that I find vital, and it doesn't allow me to do things in the way I want (bad class diagrams, bad sequence diagrams)
• Violet: It is not updated to UML2, so I couldn't do some stuff like fragments in sequence diagrams
• UMLet: It would be really good if it had a simple, but very necessary tool: a ZOOM!
• BoUML: You can't do constructors in sequence diagrams.

So, after some research, I found 2 programs which fit on my needs:

• SDedit: Probably the best sequence diagram editor I've ever seen. It is not a WYSIWYG editor like the others, you have to know some easy-to-use code (read the program's help) to make sequence diagrams. You type a simple code, and the diagram is drawn while you're doing that. Once you are used to it, the sequence diagram production speeds up in a considerable way, and the diagrams it makes are really nice.

  As it is not a WYSIWYG program, it introduces us to a new philosophy: Dragging&dropping, mouse moves... it's rather slower than simply typing some short lines with keyboard. I leant this concept and idea, and I find it well-builded in empirical demonstrations. I, for instance, I can make sequence diagrams fastly. With a "drawing" (WYSIWYG) editor I spend more time. I can assure you this.

• Dia: SDedit is a program that has sense: Sequence diagrams are just this, sequential. They can be builded and all drawn objects can have a fixed position in the diagram and it will be well shown; in class diagrams it's not possible to do that (or it is really harder), because you can position your items and classes in many ways and are all pretty or more understandable.

  I was looking for a program to design class diagrams as I design sequence diagrams in SDedit, by code; nevertheless, for the reasons explained above, I have not find any program such that (or I'm so stupid that I am not able to find it), so I had to give up and use a decent WYSIWYG editor. I found Dia for this, it's a great program, similar to Visio, it allows me to do very nice class diagrams in UML. It is far better than all described above, but by default it doesn't allow to create associative classes (it's not a huge problem but it could be good to have them), and last time I tried it, after forcing a bit the program capabilities, I recived a Segmentation Fault, loosing my time. It was not very happy, but I will give him a new try.

As a first requirement, I can make an abstraction:

1. First, I have to found, in the restoring process, where the new wiki ID is given and restored.
2. Then, after the piece of code I found before, I have to retrieve the new ID value.
3. Then, I have to locate the code where the link resources are restored.
4. Finally, I have to modify every link that will be restored in the previous founded code, retrieving the current link direction, and modifying the id parameter to the previous retrieved ID value from wiki.

I hope it won't be so hard to perform, however Marc's purposes for this piece of work are merely for my own learning and education.

Marc has explained to me that I will work on DFWiki code refactoring (lot of work is coming OMG), so as a training he demanded me to program a "foo" (example) Moodle format course, Moodle module and a Moodle block. This job has priority for me over the "ID" job explained previously.

In Moodle wiki I remember founding something related with that (some module/block/course format templates), so I'm going to take a look immediately.

Ok guys, let's work!

I never did any XSL transformation or programmed a XSL file, and I needed learning some advanced XSL features immediatelly not recommended for a newbie who wants to learn XSL as a hobby :). Also I had to adapt the xsl syntax to moodle, because Moodle needs "special" considerations:

1. Moodle xml files have very separated parts in the document. However, some parts have a very close relationship, and this relation can only be linked with an Identifier. But this identifier needs to be independent of the XML syllabi, so after some heavy research, the XSL function I needed for this was "generate-id" (this function generates a unique ID for a node, ideal for the lesson bucle).
2. I didn't know why Moodle, after the point 1 application, gave me errors didn't allow me to create a course. The explanation was that generate-id generates an id like "id7623472". Moodle only reads numbers, not strings!, so I have to discard the "id" string with "substring" xsl function.
3. In bucles, I needed incremental variables (aka i++ :)). Nevertheless, "variable" xsl element doesn't allow changing his first assigned value (OMG, problem!), because XSL is a declarative language, not a procedural one like C++ or PHP. The first and valid approach I found to solve this problem was the "number" xsl element. In a bucle, it makes something like a counter, from 1 to N being N the number of iterations. I found it a rustic and 'vaste' method, but valid for my purposes :)

After all these ones, and spending some time, finally I've finished the XSL file and it works perfectly. But this XSL file is built over a syllabi prototype, not over a final version, so I will have to modify it a lot when I recive it.

Now, I've finished all my work on OpenSyllabus integration prototype for Moodlemoot for now until "new external requirements" (probably they will arrive soon).

As you can see, in my blog entries I'm writing about XML files and other kind of resources, but I don't put any example to allow you understanding me clearly. Once I finish the project I will upload all those files and will modify all posts adding to them the mentioned ones (or until my teacher tells me that it could be good to upload them while they are in process).

1. I've no idea about PHP (I'm a pure Java developer, I've never touched PHP).
2. How can I add a new link (which points to the import form) in the Moodle admin block?
3. How can I create a form for allowing a user to upload a file compatible with Moodle?
4. How can I retrieve the file? And the name of the file?
5. How can I store a file into an specific folder in PHP?
6. How can I process a XML file with an XSL parser with my XSL file to transform it into another XML file in PHP?
7. How can I zip files in PHP?
8. How can I reuse the restore implementation?

Well, all these questions have their proper answer. But where can I find the answers and understand them? Afortunately I've already found them, however, it has not been easy:

• Or I'm stupid and I can't find it, or Moodle lacks of a good developer documentation (such as complete class diagrams, specifications, sequence diagrams, proper explanations...). It only has an API over hundreds of files composing Moodle (omg, finding something has been really hard).
• I'm tired of searching concrete functions among the API files. Is the Moodle API useful or useless? Can I do my job with brute programming? Or has someone implemented what I need yet?

After some days of desperate study:

1. PHP is an Object Oriented language, so a port from Java should not be too difficult. PHP is rather different than Java, however it has some similarities (like classes, attributes...), so with some practice, learning PHP should be easier (in fact, I believe I know now PHP and now I can program better than some time ago)

2. I've found the admin block is implemented in admin/settings. I've located my option link in courses.php file:

   $ADMIN->add('courses', new admin_externalpage('osylimp', get_string('osylimp', 'admin'), $CFG->wwwroot . '/course/osyl.php'));

3. Moodle has a superclass for forms, called moodleform (located at lib/formslib.php). Using a form example (edit_form.php located in course folder), I've created a new subclass, called syllabi_import_form.

   But the form example doesn't have a field for uploading files. How can I make one? After lot of websearching and coffees, I've found that I can add a line into the definition function of my new class:

   $mform->addElement('file','syllabi', 'XML course file','maxlength="150" size="20"');

   There were lots of similar lines in the document, however, replacing the first parameter with 'file' I've created a field for uploading files.

4. For retrieving the file value, exists a moodle function for forms: getElementValue. Passing as parameter the name of the file, it will retrieve the value entered by the user. Nevertheless, the value returned by getElementValue for the file field was an array. Arrays in PHP are rather different than Java:

   For expressing an array, in Java we use this expression: namevariable[integer]. In PHP, is something similar, but different. Arrays can be used in many ways, like hash tables, priority queues, stacks... so you can use also strings into the [], and mapping a key to a value in the array. See PHP documentation for further explanation.

   Finally, I could retrieve the name of the file :)

5. For retrieving the file and store it, Moodle forms have a method for storing into an specific path all files the user wants to upload: "save_files".

6. There are lots of XSL parser for PHP: the most interesting I found was Sablotron. However, I couldn't get it working, so I've used the built-in XSLT parser (libxslt library). In PHP documentation about XSL I've found some functions to get it working. This is the main procedure:

   $xp = new XSLTProcessor(); //First we create a XSLT process
$xsl = new DomDocument; //Then, we must load an XSL file
$xsl->load('../OsylCourse.xsl');

$xp->importStylesheet($xsl); //After that, we must import the XSL file
//to the XSLT process
$xml_doc = new DomDocument; //now we have to load the XML file
$xml_doc->load($CFG->dataroot.'/3/backupdata/'.$file['name']);
/*finally, we have to apply the transformation to the document and
save it to a file*/
if ($xml_out = $xp->transformToDOC($xml_doc)) {
$xml_out->save($CFG->dataroot.'/3/backupdata/moodle.xml');
} else {
trigger_error('XSL transformation failed.', E_USER_ERROR);
}

7. Zipping a file is quite easy:

   $zip = new ZipArchive(); //First we create an instance of a Zip file
/*Then, with open system call we create a zip file*/
if ($zip->open($CFG->dataroot.'/3/backupdata/course.zip', ZIPARCHIVE::CREATE)!==TRUE) {
exit("cannot open");
}
//Add as many files as you want (also directories)
$zip->addFile($CFG->dataroot.'/3/backupdata/moodle.xml', 'moodle.xml');
//Close the zip file
$zip->close();


   For further information see PHP Documentation for ZIP.

8. Reuse the restoration code is easy. Simply pass as a parameter the recently zipped file.

Well, that's all for now. However, there are plenty of bugs. For now, I'm only making a functional prototype for Moodlemoot... Doing things well requires time :)

For achieve that, I will do a simple task: adquire a complete XML file for testing purposes, and manually build a Moodle course with all information I can see in that XML file (wiki's, lessons, title, description...).

Tasks:

1. Obtain the DTD of Osyl XML syllabi.
2. Obtain a complete XML syllabi for testing.
3. Make manually a course with that XML.
4. Compare the XML backup of that course and the XML file and build a XSLT for transform the Osyl XML into a Moodle readable XML file.
5. Define the requirements which can be needed for the "import OpenSyllabus course" tool.

Realmente no estás exactamente igual, hay un pequeño detalle que ha cambiado. No se puede ver desde el exterior, pero sí desde el interior. La sombra de esa chica flota por encima de tu cabeza. Mientras estás sentado, la estás recordando. Notas como el tiempo ha avanzado, notas como el tiempo te ha hecho cambiar y estás distinto, notas que realmente estás vivo.

Y es que la memoria es la única manera que tenemos de poder percibir el cambio, la única manera que tenemos de poder evolucionar, de poder vivir como humanos, de poder aprender y crecer mentalmente.

Pero qué ocurriría si una enfermedad como el Alzheimer nos despojara de este don?

Así pues, cómo ser superfeliz según yo?

1. Trabajar en sitios donde cada día puedas hacer cosas diferentes e interesantes para ti, y que cada día aprendas más y cada día te sientas mejor, más a gusto con tu trabajo y más autorrealizado (Eric dice que esto es imposible).
2. Tener un horario que te permita compatibilizar ese trabajo con todo lo que quieres en esta vida (ya sean amigos, ya sea pareja).
3. Un sueldo que te permita vivir de forma holgada.

Sí, un trabajo perfecto debe cumplir esos 3 perfiles. Pero... EXISTE??????

Eric dice que no, todos los trabajos acaban siendo monótonos, sea el que sea. Yo digo que sí; aunque sólo conozco 1 trabajo que pueda ser así: Profesor de universidad (que a su vez, sea investigador).

Ser profe de universidad es la reostia en bicicleta (almenos profe de la FIB, y para ello me voy a basar en el profesor Marc Alier). Parece que él es totalmente feliz: Cada día se pasa viajando arriba y abajo -gastos pagados- (que si Alemania, que si Burkina Faso, que si Las Vegas...) y se lleva a su mujer, con lo cual se lo debe pasar bomba viajando. Luego, dando clase, las da de una forma que no sólo se lo pasa bien él, sino que además se lo pasan bien los alumnos. Y luego, dirige una serie de proyectos que no solo generan conocimiento y ayudan a expandir el conocimiento (Moodle, DFWikiLabs...), sino que además siempre está dando conferencias y asistiendo a ellas y aprendiendo cada día más y más sobre este mundo que cambia tan rápidamente, y conociendo a gente importante del mundo de los sistemas de información, comilonas, etc. Vamos, todo un lujo y todo un estilo de vida que, almenos a mi y visto así, me resulta envidiable (por dios, que alguien me corrija si me equivoco).

Almenos esa es mi "excepción" con la que pretendo decir que el trabajo puede realizar SIEMPRE. Por supuesto, estas cosas así son poco comunes. Normalmente todos los trabajos son los típicos de pasarte 8 horas dando el callo como un cabrón, aprendes lo que sea y luego ahí te quedas para mantener a tu família, y luego los horarios no coinciden con los de tus hijos cuando terminan el colegio / con el trabajo de tu esposa.

Es chungo buscarse una vida así, pero para ello, hay que sacrificarse un tiempo y... estudiar?

For playing on this server, you need a chess client. Lots of interfaces/clients are avaible for all platforms (the most used is Jin, an interface you can you on the web or in your PC, written in Java and is compatible with all platforms). However, as a Linux user, I use eboard.

Regardless the interface you choose, you have to create a FICS account to play on the server in the main website. (It's quite easy and it's free), or playing as guest.

Once you connect to FICS, you will be ready to play chess with other people. Interfaces often has a “seek graph” where you can see all people that want a match. If you want to play with someone, write the command “seek 2 12” (for example, for a 2 minutes and 12 increment game). Read the help for more help (or ask me).

If you want to talk on a chat channel or to an user, use the command “tell user/channel text to say”.

Ahhh, also, write the following command to add me to friends: “+notify davigetto”. I will be notified if you add me to friends and if you wish, we can play some matches :)

The following game is Battle for Wesnoth. The main website is http://www.wesnoth.org. Again, this game can be played in all platforms. It's a turn-based strategy game with a fantasy theme (with orcs, elves, dwarfs...) where the main objective is “destroy the opponent”. It's quite easy to play this game, and when you catch “the feeling of the game” you can be attracted strongly, so be careful :)

Once again, if you want to play with me at this game, send me an email or a comment to this post. However, in this game, opposite to Warcraft III, matches often are very long, so often I prefer playing the campaign mode.

Also, if you wish, I can play with you to the mythical Warcraft III... for remembering oldies purposes :)

Yesterday I invested the whole afternoon in install on my PC Mahara (I followed the guide in the oficial webpage, but it was quite difficult) and make working OpenSyllabus into Eclipse (omg, 3 hours for making it working good!). Regardless, now I have a full working mahara and OpenSyllabus on my PC and I can take a look to code when I want.

After that, I could explore what is Mahara, and what is Portfolio. And O-M-G! It seems to be a nice CMS and Portfolio a nice tool! (I say seems because I have only tested it one day, however I can see interesting uses for myself :D). You know what is a portfolio, right? The typical folder where you store your drafts, currículums, learning resources... Well, Mahara implements something similar:

• First, it has a complete and interesting user profile (where you can put your personal information, like other CMS systems). Nevertheless, it's different in Mahara. In your profile you can define your own Curriculum Vitae (Certifications, books and publications, education history, employment history), your academic/career goals, and what are your skills. Moodle doesn't have an user profile as great as Mahara.
• Portfolio allow users to upload files (their notes, pdfs, even source code) in a structured way (in folders). Also it allows creating view pages for every user (blogs, etc...). However, it's bugged for now.

So, Mahara Portfolio is a good tool to allow students having their own Curriculums and notes in a structured and organized way.

Now, How can we integrate Mahara and OpenSyllabus into Moodle once we know what are their advantatges and disadvantatges? I've got some ideas. I write one of them:

• Modify the Moodle user profile to make it equal to Mahara user profile and Portfolio. With a good user profile, users and students would be engaged in organizing their notes and their curriculums, sharing them among other students. This will improve their learning experience and their learning performance.
• Add/embed OpenSyllabus to Moodle for creating easy and uniform syllabi, and allow teachers to create courses in a very easy way. This would improve the organization of courses and their upgrading.

Well, in 21th I'm talking with Marc and Pigui about all of these.

Hey, I'm really enjoying this project! :D

PD: I attach two screens about Mahara profile and portfolio.

I've recived a good amount of information in my mail/MSN conversations. Jacques sent me Powerpoints and PDFs explaining what is OpenSyllabus, its objectives and its technology. Nevertheless I want to extract some points which try to refer as little as possible to technological part:

• The syllabi around all universities have a common structure. However, information in a Syllabi can be redundant. What solution can we use? Osyl uses XML files for achieve that, XML files that have a structure that Sakai can represent. I wonder if a database could be used in the same way XML is used...

  So, XML exchange is used to represent data. Does it mean that in the local machine, a little copy of Sakai is stored to get asynchrony?

• I got an account for testing the OpenSyllabus they have implemented into Sakai. QUÉ GUAY! (Parezco un anuncio de juguetes...). Also I got the source code of Sakai (omg, 400MB file!!!!)

• The architecture is something like this:

  

• In Moodle, when you build a course, you have manually to add all resources that can be needed (wikis, blogs, exercises...). In OpenSyllabus, through the Syllabi defined from one subject (for example, ES2), meanwhile the course is advancing in date, wikis, exercises, lessons and all required data is automatically published (well, it's what I understand). I believe that Sakai does that in that XML file and with a good code.

Maybe there are more points that I've eluded, I will think of them if I have the chance.

Also I am now trying to get running OpenSyllabus in my machine through Eclipse. However I have some problems with GWT Libraries. I sent Claude Coulombe, one of the Sakai 'masters', a mail asking for some help (yes, I know what you think, but after talking, you must know that I have tried to do all I was in my hands and I can't make it working).

When I began, teacher spoke to us about unknown words: class??? method??? (I understood the word method like 'methodology', not 'function'!), and bad explanations about that... I was really disappointed and I lose my heart.

• If you really like programming, and you want to do great things, be patient, keep going, the world was not made in seven days!
• If you are a really beginner, please, don't start with a full oriented programming language like Java. Begin with something simpler, like C or PHP, where you don't need to apply the object oriented concepts (reserve memory space with news, pointers, class, attributes... more complex concepts for a beginner).
• Read! Read! Read! Be used to read! For your mother, read! For you, read lots of manuals and tutorials until you understand the concepts! You can find them around de WWW!

All programming languages have little examples for testing. The most popular and simplest example in all programming languages is "Hello World" (or "Goodbye, cruel World" xD). This example will give you a simple and basic concept about how the language works.

• Practice, practice a lot, it's the most effective way to learn a programming language!

Doing this, you will get some notions about language syntax, but it's pretty harder to be a good programmer. Making programs requires lot of logic, a heavy and solid mental structure (where I must put a while? Where I must put a condition?). For me, acquiring this mentality required more than 1 year (omg! you could say). Well, be a good programmer requires a lot of time, a lot of reading and a lot of acknowledge (practice, too) for acquire this mentality. But there are strategies to accomplish this.

Programs can be crazy for you: you open a program, and usually, you will ask yourself: How has this program been made? You must divide the problem in more little parts: Which operations are hidden? Which data must be shown? Which parts is this part of the program composed? Here we enter in a basic and, maybe, the most important word in programming world:

ABSTRACTION

Abstraction, in simple words, means "Divide a problem in less difficult problems that you can solve easily".

EDIT 20:34

Read tutorials and manuals about how to be a great programmer (It's easy, the only requirement is motivation).

My counsels:

1. Begin programming with a language like PHP or C (in his single form, without touching OO).
2. After that, try to do any interesting program, or be practiced.
3. After that, try an object orientate language, like C++ or Java. Learn the meaning of inheritance, polymorph, software changeability... You can find lots of manuals about these languages, but if you want to understand the benefits from Object Oriented languages (I can't live without them) read Software Engineering books, and understand the design patterns.

In the future, I will enter harder with this theme through my project (probably), but I love Software Engineering and sure I will write lots of articles about this world.