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This is going to be quite a busy month for me in terms of coursework and there's probably going to be a lot of coding involved. I have two main projects that I'm working on right now. One more than the other which is probably going to turn out to be a very bad thing by the end of next week.

The first thing that I'm working on is a website as part of my 3rd year group project. It's basically a site for a building society's customers to register and apply for mortgages. Exciting stuff... I think that our group was given one of the more boring options. I'd have much rather coded a system for a video rental store. At least then I'd understand how the system works. Mortgages are a bit beyond me right now. I guess I'm learning a little about them through this project but I'd rather just get on with the coding.

My part generally just consists of adding functionality to the web pages. It's just some php to transfer data and there will need to be some javascript for input validation, as well as some server side validation which I may or may not fall into my responsibility. Hopefully we get this project done with time to spare, but right now it feels as if it's going to be a bit of a mad rush at the last minute.

The second project that I'm working on is a Turing Machine simulator that I'm going to attempt to build using Java. It seems quite challenging and even the more advanced coders in the year seem to be having some problems getting the first part working. The first part probably does seem like the hardest part. We have to parse an input file which contains mathematical entities in a human-readable form and we then have to print them out in proper mathematical notation. There's similarities between coding this and coding the compiler that I attempted (and failed) last year. It's going to be tough.

There really isn't much going on for me this month out from the academic world. At least, nothing I'm aware of just yet. I've been thinking of renting out an unmanaged VPS (virtual private server) and acquiring a domain name. Mainly just so that I can get some experience using and running an unmanaged server and partly because I'm hoping to take up coding as more of a hobby. Right now it's strictly something that I do at uni and no more. If I can turn it into a hobby and get a job as a coder after I acquire my computer science degree, I'd essentially be getting paid to do a hobby, which seems like a good thing. Although then it may have the opposite effect and make coding in my spare time seem more like a continuation of work. Either way, starting to code as a hobby would develop my skills and that alone is worth it.

The only downside to this server idea of mine is that it would cost me most of my monthly income, which isn't much at all. Right now I have no job because I don't have the time for one. The only time I have to work would be the weekend, but the weekend is also my only real free time which I don't particularly want to sacrifice. I have no real living expenses right now, so money isn't something that I particularly need to live. It's currently just used to keep me amused. I have no intention of profiting from whatever projects I'd end up working on, so I'd be making no money from the server's content either.

I do quite like the idea of having my own server to tinker about with though. I also like the idea of building a better website than the one that I occasionally update just now. I'd like to build something from the ground up. My current blog type site uses WordPress, which I find boring but it makes adding new content easier than it was with my old site which I coded from scratch.

Will I end up renting some server space or wont I? What a tense conclusion to another exciting monthly update on the world of Dean.

I'll leave you with a picture. Toast-Tony was taking requests so I suggested "a cow with a green eyebrow, down by the bay". Be sure to check out his art.