<P class=MsoNormal style="MARGIN: 0in 0in 0pt"><SPAN style="FONT-SIZE: 10pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial">Okay, don't get me wrong... I really like the guy, however lately he has turned into a few banned words, so I will refer to him as a total jerk...
A little background. About 4 weeks ago, my brother-in-law messaged me and asked if I would help him with a site that he was working on for a college. It was basically an information network, so I said, sure, I will help out. Mistake Number One - Never Ever Volunteer To Help, Always Be Busy
He came by, with his server, some layouts of how he wanted the site to look, and a brief overview of how he wanted the site to function. Basically, he described a typical phpnuke based site. He dumped the server here and basically told me to configure it. I am no linux guru by any means, and refused to even touch his server. I do not want to thrash his OS just because I tried to install Apache or MySQL. So I sat his server in the corner and set up a subdomain on a remote host to configure everything. I figured I could tell him what he needed to install and once that was done, I would move everything to his server.
I went ahead and downloaded PostNuke, and started configuring it, adding modules and the like, waiting for him to come by and help. Next thing I knew he decided to move half-way across the sate, so the whole site was dumped in my lap. I thought to blazes with it, I'll do him a favor. Well, no matter what was done to the site, he was not satisfied. It did not look like he had envisioned.
Well, last night, when I was adding another module, he decided to remotely tinker within the control panel and totally scrogged the MySQL database of which I did not yet have a backup, as I did not think I should worry about dumping it until I had all of the modules installed and working.
Needless to say, I got angry, because I had to start over yet again. He stated, "well just because the database is dead does not mean the source code is no good". Anyone who is familiar with the Nuke based portal systems, or any systems that use a database as a back-end know that they are almost entirely database dependant. I used the analogy of well, you just ripped your engine out of your car, does not mean the body is no good. Mistake Number Two - Never Let Anyone Who Is Inexperienced Into A Control Panel That Has Full Database Access
Well, I stewed all night, and this morning I decided, okay, there is still time to get something done, so I knocked out a quick site using includes that had the basic (and I do mean basic) functions that he wanted. He hopped online this evening and I showed him what I had been working on for him and he basically said it was not good enough for him. He said he could get an extension with the college and then I could set up and reconfigure the entire nuke site, at which point I basically told him where to shove the whole site. He seems to want a massive corporate level portal system for no money and with no development team.</SPAN>
Why is it that every time I try to help soneone out I get the short end of the stick? :|
I am still wondering if I should just finish the site the way he wants and be done with it, or wash my hands of the whole thing.
A little background. About 4 weeks ago, my brother-in-law messaged me and asked if I would help him with a site that he was working on for a college. It was basically an information network, so I said, sure, I will help out. Mistake Number One - Never Ever Volunteer To Help, Always Be Busy
He came by, with his server, some layouts of how he wanted the site to look, and a brief overview of how he wanted the site to function. Basically, he described a typical phpnuke based site. He dumped the server here and basically told me to configure it. I am no linux guru by any means, and refused to even touch his server. I do not want to thrash his OS just because I tried to install Apache or MySQL. So I sat his server in the corner and set up a subdomain on a remote host to configure everything. I figured I could tell him what he needed to install and once that was done, I would move everything to his server.
I went ahead and downloaded PostNuke, and started configuring it, adding modules and the like, waiting for him to come by and help. Next thing I knew he decided to move half-way across the sate, so the whole site was dumped in my lap. I thought to blazes with it, I'll do him a favor. Well, no matter what was done to the site, he was not satisfied. It did not look like he had envisioned.
Well, last night, when I was adding another module, he decided to remotely tinker within the control panel and totally scrogged the MySQL database of which I did not yet have a backup, as I did not think I should worry about dumping it until I had all of the modules installed and working.
Needless to say, I got angry, because I had to start over yet again. He stated, "well just because the database is dead does not mean the source code is no good". Anyone who is familiar with the Nuke based portal systems, or any systems that use a database as a back-end know that they are almost entirely database dependant. I used the analogy of well, you just ripped your engine out of your car, does not mean the body is no good. Mistake Number Two - Never Let Anyone Who Is Inexperienced Into A Control Panel That Has Full Database Access
Well, I stewed all night, and this morning I decided, okay, there is still time to get something done, so I knocked out a quick site using includes that had the basic (and I do mean basic) functions that he wanted. He hopped online this evening and I showed him what I had been working on for him and he basically said it was not good enough for him. He said he could get an extension with the college and then I could set up and reconfigure the entire nuke site, at which point I basically told him where to shove the whole site. He seems to want a massive corporate level portal system for no money and with no development team.</SPAN>
Why is it that every time I try to help soneone out I get the short end of the stick? :|
I am still wondering if I should just finish the site the way he wants and be done with it, or wash my hands of the whole thing.