Mark McAulay

"Big kids did it"

Mark McAulay considers himself a generalist after being called both a web developer and a web designer amongst other things. Mark lives and works in Aberdeen, Scotland.

He studied in Aberdeen before heading off to London to work in video, web design and multimedia. During this time he also developed an interest in server side languages and after years of working with PHP and CFML, much to his family's annoyance, he now spends far too much of his spare time fiddling with Python and Django.

God only knows what will interest him next...

You can find out more about Mark over on his personal website funcy.co.uk

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June 30, 2010

import a sql file on the MySQL command line

Because I had to figure this out the hard way, Here's a reminder for myself and others on the best way to accomplish this. I had a 21MB file.

Assuming you already have your dumped sql file.

remember where you saved the file
log into mysql command line client
run this: source /full/path/to/your/file.sql
bask in glory

Comments [1]

May 4, 2010

Ditched the cloud for a Linode

I've been using a server at the rackspace cloud for quite some time now to host my personal projects and for the most of it, i've been more than happy with it. Of course there was always the latency issue of using a US based server but that I could live with. The deal with cloud hosting is that you pay a minimal flat fee and then pay for bandwidth/storage/etc on top of that. The costs of these things have been pretty cool and I found I was saving myself a bit of cash in comparison to my previous host, the also awesome Slicehost. I must admit, I looked at the costs of the two and after a period of running both servers with a similar load for a while I made the call to go to the rackspace cloud as it was working out a fair bit cheaper. A couple of months recently however saw an increase in usage and the costs went up significantly and without warning. This pissed me off a bit if i'm honest. Had I been able to cap my usage to a certain budget, I'd still be with the rackspace cloud. It appears that this isn't possible (could be wrong?) and I'm only happy that the surge in popularity of the sites I hosted there wasn't greater or I'd be even more out of pocket.

So I ate humble pie and said hello to Linode. I'd been having an ongoing geek battle with @mikeduguid who to his credit, swore that Linode were the most sensible option for quite a long time. I of course argued that Slicehost and then Rackspace were better. Childish I know but hey, we like a good argument down the pub etc.

My new Linode server is UK based (London data center) and I have a fixed fee every month for a healthy service. To date I am delighted with it.

Several people have asked me why I moved...so there you have it.

Comments [0]

May 4, 2010

One Month On

'Tempus Fugit' as they say in Latin.

Just over one month ago I joined Fifth Ring as a Front End Developer. To say I hit the ground running is a bit light on impact to describe what has been one of my busiest months in years. I'm thoroughly enjoying my time here so far though and getting the opportunity to learn about project management on a larger scale while also learning about business strategy and a whole plethora of other things relating to how a large agency operates. I am soaking up a lot of knowledge here while mainly concerning myself with building websites which, is what I hoped would happen.

One of my main initial concerns when joining was how i'd readjust to working with a lot of people again. Since I left London in 2003 I have only worked in very small and focussed 2-5 man teams and to suddenly find myself in the midst of a global operation was a bit daunting if i'm being completely honest. Everyone I've met so far has been very friendly and welcoming so I suppose I really had nothing to worry about. I must admit that the fact I've been doing work for Fifth Ring as a supplier for the past 5 years helped a lot in making sure that not everyone I meet is a complete stranger.

All in all a good month and a great start to what I hope will be a long stay with my new employers.

Comments [0]

April 30, 2010

Aberdeen web types, let's go to the pub

It's been a long time since I did something about this. Far too long in fact. I've spoken about it but now is the time for action. A lot has happened, not just to me but to many people in the local scene. That got me thinking...damn, we have a lot to discuss...followed shortly after by damn, I could totally handle a beer with some geeky web chat.

Web designing and developing ladies and gents of Aberdeen, I call a web types meetup...in a pub! Am thinking that the Prince of Wales would be a good shout and I'm thinking that next Friday night(7th May) sounds particulary geeky but it's not all about me now is it, so who wants to stick their oar in?

Comments [3]

March 23, 2010

A new start

Today I made it official and joined up with my new employer. I am now to be known as a "front end developer" and can be found at Fifth Ring.

It promises to be a big challenge and will involve working on many high profile clients. I am super excited to join the Digital Media team at this stage and look forward to adding my experience and know-how to the already fantastic team that is being built there.

It's been a while since I worked in a large organisation and to have loads of different faces buzzing about is going to take a bit of getting used to again. Tomorrow will be my first official day, lets see what it brings.