Ammar Ibrahim's blog

Roba is lost and comes up with weird names of places. e.g. "Jordan Wild", "Cofffee news place". Roba once blogged about that place with the wrong name, and then Isam was also lost. 

I've had to argue with Roba last month for 3 hours to convincce her it's Wild Jordan. So please fix that in the meetup entry

Disclaimer:
"Couldn't resist posting this entry"

In 2 weeks I will be travelling to Syria to join the Regional Meeting on ICT4D that will take place in Damascus. Then I'm going to Aleppo to speak in the Open Source conference organized by AUF, University of Aleppo & NOSSTIA.

I'm really looking forward for both events

I wrote earlier about the weird day, I didn't have the time to finish the series. So the past week has been so weird.

Back to that day, it was around 2 am, waiting for my plane to go to frankfurt, connected flight, then to Oslo. While waiting there, two german friends were walking( Torben & Dennis ), and they were leaving on the same plane. Well, let's say it was a coincidence.

Then I got to Gaustablikk Resort and there a weirder coincidence happend. Last year I went to Karlsruhe and because I was frustrated that nobody seemed to speak english, I heard to fellows speaking english, one of them was a canadian nice dude called Zak Greant We chatted and exchanged some emails for a month or so. And there he was in the middle of nowhere! we were both shocked to see each other again. He didn't run away at least, hehe. Weird ha?

On my way back to Amman, on that same very plane, a cousin of mine with her two kids was there, and Dennis again! Now, this is conspiracy

I'm working on a website for some client, they have got the data in a MSSQL database for their desktop application. Now, the website will be running on LAMP, so I wrote a very specific MSSQL-to-MySQL migration script that reads tables schemas from an XML file.

I was surprised to see the data in MySQL as rubbish! after some some serious testing, playng with charsets, using iconv, ..etc I think the problem is in PHP-MSSQL extension, not sure though.

Ugly Fix: I used ODBC connectivity, and everything worked just fine. I hope this saves you sometime if you encounter the same problem.

Today marks the 10th anniversary of PHP. Just like today, 10 years ago rasmus announced PHP version 1.0

I owe alot to Rasmus, Ahmad Humeid & the PHP dudes, without PHP I wouldn't be where I'am now. My life is very related to PHP in lots of ways, I can't imagine my life without it.

It all started in Syntax Digital 5 years ago; I was an HTML monkey, then some site developed in PHP3 had some bugs, so Ahmad asked me if I could fix them, that was a big task( back then ) for an HTML monkey. I grabbed a PHP book and started to learn the language. Since that day I never looked back.

Mwah, I love PHP.

As promised earlier here are some photos of the crazy dive Probably it was 3 degrees or something like that, thank god i'm still alive after that. Will share the steam room pictures later haha not even in your dreams

Well I got back home today at 3 am. The trip back home was exhausting and boring. 2 Buses, 2 planes & a drive with my brother & mom, oh and waiting in the airport for 3 hours in Oslo, and 6 in frankfurt. 

I bought tons of chocolate, the security dudes think baharreb chocolate to Jordan . And surprise surprise, I bought a digital cam finally. I'm retarded, I bought it on my way back home.

The big surprise that a cousin of mine was on the plane, and a german friend! last week was so damn weird, that I expect anything to happen now. I met so many people by coincidence, freaky stuff.

This is an experience of a lifetime Today with the help of a really nice Danish guy called Ulrich, I jumped into a nearly frozen lake, something like 3 degrees. It was absolutely crazy, I feel like a Viking imagine swimming( for 10 seconds) and you can see snow all around you!

Then we ran back to the resort & went to steam room, hehe. It felt just great. I'll share some pictures later.

So I got everything done with the visa, now I went to do some work, afterwards I went home to change "Naturally" since I can't do much with those shorts & my messy hair. so I went home, and I had less than an hour before I had to go back to the embassy get back my passport.

Now let me gintroduce you to fu*king as*hole who deserves to be burnt hell, oh I'm in a good mood now, he deserves alot more actually, but one thing he doesn't deserve for sure; to live.

Prof. F( as in person X, but F has a purpose here) lectures a course that i'm taking. Now this course is really hard, like tha average would be 4/20. The first exam was like over 100 Pages, you need to study so hard for so long to get 5/20. In the first exam I got 12/20, which was lthe second highest mark over 80 students or even more probably.

I was going to Oman, so I had a second exam during that time, so I went a week earlier told him very politely, sir I'm gonna be travelling & I'm going to speak in an international high profile conference, I apologize for not being able to come to the exam. F said it's your problem, you travel, I'll give you a zero, that's not an official excuse. I spent 5 minutes explaining how hard I'm trying to pass this subject, and told him how much I got in the first exam, still he insisted on what he said. I said, fuck it, I'm going anyhow.

When I got back I asked him for a mek up exam, he said, I'll see about that, I told him, ok I will do an extra ordinary presentation for a programming language( Which is what the course is about ) If I did good, then I deserve a make up, he said ok.

I spent one week working hard on it, really hard, I came up with a nearly 50 slide presentation for it. And it was about PHP( naturally) and it was no copy'n'paste, I really worked hard. Then for almost 5 consequent lectures I was asking him to do the presentation he wouldn't let me, and kept telling me next time!.

So back to my home on wednesday, I said i'm gonna go to his office, and tell him I came in to give you my presentation because I'm travelling tonight, thinking he's gonna appreciate how much sweat & blood I put into this, and that I'm serious about this course.

There I went he was sitting in his office sitting like a mafiosa godfather. I said( so polite that I hated myself, I was so polite and gay) sir, can I give my presentation now, sorry for disturbing you, it'll only take 10 minutes. He said I have a meeting in 15 minutes, I can't. I was like sir, why are you doing this to me, I'm travelling tonight, and I come and 3am bajahed for this. He said WHAT, you're travelling again???? what are you a traveller or a student, you're not an obeying student, I don't wanna listen to you, i'm gonna give you another Zero on your presentation, now go out of my office.

I swear, My hands shaked, if I stayed just another second there I would have been blogging from jail now, actually my hands are shaking now just remembering this incident. WHAT A FUCKER, YEL3aN SHARAFAK YA IBN IL 3ARS.

See our education? See how your professor help you improve? ya zalameh a7keelak K** Om** I'm So damn angry

To be continued ....

Ok so, as I promised earlier I'm gonna write about last wednesday, and what kind of day I had. As usual I went to bed quite late. At 11:15 I got a call, I picked up the phone, and the Norwegian embassy told me that I got my visa, and I should bring my passport, ticket & insurance to get my visa. The really shitty thing is that their working hours are from 10-12, lazy bastards. So I was like, ok anyway i'm leaving on the 2nd of june I thought, I told her I'm coming tom.

Then I called my friend who works for lufthansa coz she made the reservation and told her I need my ticket tom. Surprise, she cancelled my reservation, she thought I wasn't leaving anymore( Have no clue where she got that idea from). So she told me when are you leaving, and I told her the date, she was like, oh tonight then? And I said no tom, 2nd of june, she said, are you dumb, luftahnsa leaves at 3 am, so that would be tonight after midnight. Holy crap, it was 11:40, I've been awake for 20 minutes, I'm in my red sexy shorts, and formal socks, don't ask why. I have a mission impossible right now. I put on the first t-shirt i found & sneakers and got into the car. I had only 10 minutes to do everything. and the embassy is like 15 minutes away by car, that is if you're driving like crazy.

I called my friend Nayef, and told him please go to lufthansa and bring my ticket and follow me to the embassy in Abdoun. I got there at 12:05, the guard wouldn't allow me in, had to beg his stinky ass, then I got in. There was this really pissed off lady, and in a very unfriendly way, told me give me your stuff. I gave my passport & insurance, she told me where's the ticket, I said on the way here. hehe, the expression on her face was priceless, she nearly wanted to kill me, after 10 minutes my friend was there with the ticket. I gave her the stuff, so she told me to come back after 3 hours to get my visa.

To Be Continued ....

after travelling 18 hours or actually 19 if you include the way from home to airport I reached my destination; middle of no where, hehe. I'm currently in the breathtaking Gaustablikk Resort to attend EZ summer camp 2005. Had to take two buses from Oslo in a 4 hour trip to get to Rjukan. There the really nice CEO of ez was waiting, he drove me and 4 other participants to the resort. The country is so beautiful, so green, nature is amazing!

Yesterday was one of the weirdest/craziest days in my life, I need at least 2 hours to write about that, will do when I get some time