Thomas Penwell

Tom's Webdesign has a new logo! Check it out.
Honestly, I had no idea where to begin with a logo so I hired out to the folks at Phoenix Reaction (http://www.phoenixreaction.com/) to design a logo for me. This is what they come up with and I am quite pleased. Thank you Sam @ PhoenixReaction!

http://www.ThePenwells.com/ is now a much live website. Currently I have a family directory (which is only accessable to my family members who are registered on the site. I have also been able to link the directory login to an image gallery system called 4images.

I then spent countless hours trying to figure out how the 4images php scripts creates sessions and then try to duplicate that functionality with the help of a bridge script (a script to link the directory users with the gallery users.) I tried setting the cookies used by the gallery system and creating sessions in the sessions table of the gallery database. Had no luck.

So I had to cheat on this one to bridge the directory to the photo gallery. What I had to do is create a bridge script that duplicates the login form for the gallery system and automatically fill out and submit this login form to log the user in to the gallery system. The directory database has a table to hold the information (username and password) used by the bridge to make it look seemless to the end user. If a bridge has not yet been created, the user is prompted to "create the bridge". The bridge only needs to be created once. When the bridge is created, the bridge script goes to work and 1) creates a user in photo gallery system with a randomized password (this password is stored in the bridge table of the directory database otherwise the bridge script is unable to log the user into the photo gallery system.) 2) Adds appropriate photo albums (or categories) for the user. 3) Sets the user's permissions on those albums so they are able to upload to them. All links to the photo gallery system are then pointed to the bridge script. The bridge then "redirects" users to the actual gallery system and logs them into it.

While I was on my last vacation, I decided to put together a website for my family to use to keep in touch and post pictures. I bought the domain thepenwells.com to host this site.

You can view my work in progress on the test site at http://www.doomhead.net/penwells/prod/

I took a week and a half long vacation to see my brothers in Centralia, WA. That was the longest week and a half ever with kids running around wild and crazy like (Nanny 911 where are you???) My brother has 3 kids of his own. The oldest, Kevin, is a funny little man sometimes. First thing he says when I walk in the door is "Do you wanna play a game with me?" I reply, "I didn't come here to play games, I came to be with my family and relax." Too bad when someone tries to talk to him, 95% of the time goes in 1 ear and out the other (Nanny, we need your help.) The middle one is Alissa. She's kinda shy and always sick from whatever is floating around. Too bad she is the only one who does what she is told by both parents. The last one is Blake. His mind runs at 100 miles per hour (along with his body.) Can tell when he hasn't had his meds. There is hope for this one yet, he's a smart boy and soaks things up like a sponge. He even asked me to help him with his homework. I asked him to pick up the crayons afterwords and he did it.

On the other side, we did get to go out and do a few fun things. We went up to Mt. St. Helens (we couldn't see the mountain that day due to fog.) We went bowling (kept the kids occupied for about an hour.) We went Go Karting and of course I didn't win

The sister-in-law (Heidi) took me, dad, and brother out to a mom and pops place in Vader, WA for breakfast. They make some really good food. My bro and Heidi go to this place like every weekend for their breakfast date. This trip the wait staff there finally found out they drive all the way from Centraila to eat breakfast there

Me and Ross just moved into HIS (that's right Ross bought a house). I still feel the pains of moving all over my body We are scrambling to get everything moved into the house. We will prob officially be moved in sometime next century I keep reminding Ross that home ownership is quite possibally the best investment with your money you can do. Of course he doesn't believe me (the mortgage is about twice what we were renting a 2 bedroom apt for.)

On another note, since I operate my business from the new home, I decided to not publish my address on my website. I figure if anyone needs my address, they can call me and ask for it.