One of the features on the main page of DEFORGE is a calendar I've cobbled together out of Javascript. I say "cobbled together" because I haven't had any real formal Java or Javascript education, so I've learned mostly by looking at other people's scripts and figuring out how they did things. On top of that, the web development software I'm using now has some great Javascript help and debugging support, which has sped up the process somewhat. This particular script is pretty ugly, and if I ever get around to getting better at this sort of thing, I'll go back and make it look sleeker and run more efficiently. This will probably lead to this script eventually lying broken for extended periods of time, but at least for now, it seems to be working.

The idea for the calendar came from a desire to have "time-released" content on DEFORGE. If you've been here before, you'll notice that I post new content in waves- I'll post tons of stuff in a matter of weeks followed by months where website creation takes a backseat to the other things I've had going on, especially since I've sunk a lot of free time into graduate school the past few years. So, in an attempt to smooth out the peaks and valleys, I wanted to create something that would be a little different everyday, so that even when I'm not posting a lot of content, people would still have a reason to stop by the webpage.

I stumbled across a freeware "quote of the day" javascript by a programmer named Peg Duggan and thought that having a daily quote would be a great thing to have. At first I was going to use some famous people quotes I had lying around, but I felt that was probably done better elsewhere. Then I thought I would compile 366 of my favorite song lyrics, but after putting together a short list, it didn't seem so interesting, especially since the lyrics got stripped of their original context. (I wasn't going to post whole songs, but the snippets I did pick seemed lacking). So I was going to have a "Dave Quote of the Day", which would be entertaining and unique (not the idea, the quotes), but I quickly paled at coming up with 366 snappy-cutesy things to say. I barely made it out of January before giving up on that idea.

Eventually, I distilled the quote idea down to just the fact I'd have a calendar, and if it was some sort of important day like a holiday or something, I would have an acknowledgement of that day plus a little graphic or some other time-released item. It wasn't rocket science, but it could be fun and also not amazingly ambitious- it might be something I could actually put together before hell freezes over. So I clumsily rewrote that script I found to display the date, a little graphic, and sometimes some sort of little note about the day.

After the script was done, most of the rest of the work was coming up with the little calendar graphics. Although I have some small skill, I'm not creative enough to come up with a ton of little graphics from scratch, so I went onto Font Freak and pulled back some freeware dingbat-style fonts that I could modify/color. Those became the basis for the calendar graphics that flank the date on the main page. In case you're curious, here are all of the calendar graphics currently in rotation:

These graphics are my generic graphics for Spring. Since I don't have 366 graphics built (yet), I wanted a set of graphics that I could use over and over for days which nothing of note occurs, so each season has a set of four generics that I cycle to. The 2 flower graphics were some of the first ones that I made. They are okay for now, but I hope to revisit and make better ones someday. The other two are a Spring shower and some nice clouds. Some kids wanted to be doctors, others wanted to be firemen. I wanted to be a meterologist. Lots of graphics used for the calendar are weather-themed. Anyway, three of the pictures used came from either wingdings or webdings, while the nice clouds came from a dingbat font by Jeff Levine.

These graphics are for some of the holidays during the early part of the year. For the most part, the calendar is using holidays that would be on a calendar in New England, but I'll add more as I add graphics. The heart is for Valentine's Day. I like the way this one came out. The clover is for St. Patrick's Day. It's allright- it looks a tad overexposed. I may come back to it at some point. The leaping guy is for February 29th (Leap Day). He reminds me of an old Olympics symbol. He comes from a font called "Swifty". The next one is for April Fool's Day, and may need a little explanation. In French, "April Fool" is "Possion D'Avril" or literally "April Fish". Obviously, when I pull out the French, it's because I'm having trouble coming up with a decent idea. Having said that, the fish turned out to be one of my best looking ones I've made (and a favorite, too). Finally, I have an Easter Bunny, who looks overexposed. Sort of more like an Easter Bunny Spirit, materializing on our plane to bring warm holiday wishes and chocolate likenesses. I can probably do better.

This group contains my generic Summer graphics. They are pretty self-explanatory, except the green and orange blob is supposed to be a guy windsurfing. The other three aren't too adventurous. The thermometer was a nice original thought, but it's rather plain. The noontime sun lights up the sky only slightly more than the midnight moon, and may need to be revisited. The moon is probably the one I like the most out of this bunch, although it's not strictly "summery".

Here are the generic Fall graphics, and for the most part these are the weakest ones so far. Actually, I think I had great ideas for them, but the execution just ain't there. The oak leaf is the coolest one out of the bunch- I like its eerie "I'm about to ignite!" look. The orange blob is supposed to be a pumpkin, but the detail gets lost at 30 pixels by 30 pixels. Same with the stack of hay. I'm sure nobody had a clue what that was supposed to be. The red thingie is a football player. He's another one where the size is too small for what I was trying to show, although I do like the blurry hash mark. Gives the illusion of motion. Gee, I'm so pretentious. Allow me to balance this out with some withering self-analysis: I'm not very good at making graphics, even though I cheat.

These are some special graphics for events in the Fall. The list is too short. I will have to beef this area up. Anyway, the gargoyle is for the site anniversary of DEFORGE, which I celebrate on September 4th. The ghost is for Halloween, and the turkey in the dark room is for Thanksgiving. It appears that the table the turkey is on is made out of thin sheet metal. I like the ghost, though- he's one of the better ones.

Over here, we have the generic Winter graphics. The snowflakes were the first two that I made. They look much better than many of the subsequent graphics I came up with. The hockey-playing guy appears to be somehow playing on the Artic Ocean in think fog, but I think he came out well. If you look very closely, the snowman has an orange nose.

This set contains the Winter holiday graphics. So far, I have a wreath for Christmas Eve, a tree for Christmas, an impossibly large martini for New Year's Eve, and the world's least cluttered calendar for New Year's Day. The wreath is rather dark, but I think the tree is particularly nice. This is also a too-short list of holidays, so I'll have to come back to it, soon.

Finally, we have a set of generic special graphics for use throughout the year. The American flag is for U.S. holidays, and I think it's the best graphic of the bunch so far. I'll probably not be able to make one as good-looking as that from here on out. The rose is for Amelia's birthday, while the birthday cake is for everybody else's birthday. I hope everybody likes half-orange, half-lemon frosting. It's either that or I have to explain why there is a brighter lightsource than the candles shining on the cake at such an odd angle.