Dysmey Post Archive > Pages for 2003 > Start of the Iraq War Edition
It looks like Dubya gets his fondest wish: that Saddam will get his worthless bum kicked across Iraq.
Saddam has already proven that, while good at raping and murdering his own subjects, he is incompetent at waging war. He lost a war with Iran in the 1980's. He lost a war against the USA in 1991. He will most likely lose this time around. And when he does lose, let us hope that Dubya doesn't do what his father did and let the bastisch go.
Everyone will suffer for it, of course, but having to pay for gasoline at $2.50/gallon (it was $1.79/gallon in Muncie on Wednesday) is a lot less hard on me than on most people: I drive a compact car. :)
It's rainy but it's still warm, and the last piles of snow from our harsh winter have disappeared.
The warm weather is making Baby, the older of the three cats in my care, more frolicky. I have to be on my guard when I go into my car when she is outside: she likes car rides.
The warm weather has brought out the local alley cats, esp. that white cat with the gray patches. They run when they see me, and they run faster after tangling with Baby.
The weather is also warm enough to let out one of other cats, Isis, who really needs exercise after a winter inside the house. I didn't want to let her out in the cold because she doesn't have much fur on her tummy.
I'm still working away that those Lotus forms. Apart from the display aspects between Notes client and Web browser (which I touched on earlier), there is also the problem of making sure a user fills out certain fields. It's easy to make a Notes client user fill out a field with a line in Lotus formula language (as an example, txtName):
@If(txtName != "";@Success;@Failure("Please enter your name."));
which goes into txtName's Input Validation property. The user can't save the form unless they fill in the txtName field.
The trouble is that this does not work on a web browser. Lotus can translate a form into HTML, but can't translate the formula language. What I have found, though, is that Lotus can use Javascript in both Notes client and web browser to ensure a field is filled out. I just put this in txtName's onBlur property.
x = document.forms[0].txtName.value;
while (x == "") {
x = prompt("Please enter your name:", "");
}
document.forms[0].txtName.value = x;
When a mouse cursor is in a field, the field is said to have the focus. You can make something happen when a field gains focus (onFocus) or loses it (onBlur). In this case, the field is checked for text (any text) when the cursor moves out of the field.
I have gotten a lot of praise for my form work so far. It is rather flattering, but I am sure it will fade once the forms go out into the field.
The departments, whose forms I am building, want the forms because our field workers do not fill out right the paper forms on which mine are based. I am sure the new forms will really wiggle in the noses of the field folk: esp. when they have to fill out required fields they neglected before. And then there's their names prestamped on any form they bring up, whether visible or not. If they don't fill a form out right, they will get a call from the main office!
Life, truly, is hard.
Anyway, the appropriate departments are testing the forms (I hope). The forms are not in the field yet because the actual Domino database where they will go is beyond my reach. I will have to wait for my boss to return. He is doing his two-weeks-a-year in the Army reserves unrelated to the Iraq troubles.