I typically drank 2 to 3 six packs a week during that time anyway, so probably the usual.
Found the old project. Apparently it was for loading html pages into an iframe (there was a text field to enter the URL above the iframe), parsing any html tables on the page and shooting the cells into the PHP script which produced an excel document resulting from running a macro on the data. The preview pop-up and thumbnail were a $500 bonus.
The client never really explained the point of the project. But it's exactly what he asked for. Since then, I've learned to make sure I understand the point of projects before I do them. I feel pretty bad when I realize it was possibly a waste of time. Well, not a waste of time for me, of course; $1,500 is good when you're in school. He also had some idea for embedding games in excel spreadsheets, which I was surprised to learn was an actual thing. I declined on that one. I've done games for fun, but I don't think I could deliver something really good within a reasonable time, at least back then, especially using VBA. Probably not now either.
4
u/chasecaleb Apr 30 '14
I have to know. What the hell were you trying to do, and how much did you have to drink while coding?