Colophon

Web publishing system

I use the ExpressionEngine web publishing system for ISV Survival. Whilst ExpressionEngine does not support "on the fly" theme changes like many content management and blogging systems, it does provide a solid and extensible platform to build dynamic websites.

ExpressionEngine is not an open source product and is not free to use for commercial projects like ISV Survival. Even so, I was happy to invest the modest amount for an ExpressionEngine license fee. In particular, I was impressed by the strength of the ExpressionEngine user and developer communities. Very recommended.

Hosting service

The ISV Survival blog is hosted in the USA on the EngineHosting web hosting infrastructure. To date the hosting service has been very reliable with consistent response times.

I have had a few interactions with EngineHosting's customer support team. In each case they have replied promptly and knowledgeably. On one question I even had an un-prompted follow-up email from their CTO to explain the background to an answer.

Version control

The ISV Survival website, ExpressionEngine source code (it is a PHP application with full source code provided) and all graphic and deployment files are maintained using the open-source Subversion version control system. Subversion's functionality is very impressive compared to the version control systems I have seen over the years being used by many ISVs and their development teams.

I access the (rapidly growing, now at revision 950 1896) Subversion repository using the excellent and recommended TortoiseSVN Subversion client. TortoiseSVN is an open-source Subversion client implemented as a Windows shell extension. It seamlessly integrates into Windows Explorer. If you are developing under Windows and using Subversion then I cannot recommend TortoiseSVN highly enough.

Development and testing

I develop and test ISV Survival locally using ExpressionEngine installed under the Ubuntu Linux-based operating system. I gained broad experience with various Unix operating systems in my developer days. Installing Ubuntu server and the LAMP stack was a pleasant reminder of command lines seen in the old days. When I needed support I was impressed by the depth and quality of the technical information available from the Ubuntu community.

I have installed Ubuntu on a virtual Intel server using the free VMware Server from VMware, Inc. I have created additional virtual machines to run a variety of browser and operating system combinations to (try to) ensure cross-platform portability.

When I first started using VMware I was pleasantly reminded of the IBM VM virtual machine operating system that I first used in 1982. That development project was a for a Life Assurance company in the UK and we used VM running on an IBM 4341 mainframe.