Basejumper.com - archive

I've been working on this software for a few weeks, and it's ready to be tested. I'm throwing it up online, not fully finished, to get some opinions/views before I finish it. It is not entirely functional (you can fully add gear, add objects, and jumps, but not edit, it's currently disabled.). This is basically a front end for an SQL database. It is multi-user, and can provide quick stats from your jumping data (as summarized on the main page).

http://andrewkarnowski.com/nathan/www/CrystalX/logbook.cgi
username: test
password: test

Feel free to add/delete anything, and play around with it. Thanks!

edited to add: best viewed in firefox!

I think it has a great look and feel and some very useful features. I also like the fact that you can track the no of jumps on each pilot chute.

HOWEVER and its a big one, the fundemental concept of having my logbook online scares me. It could fall into the wrong hands much easier than having a paper logbook at home or on your home computer.

That being said, if it was possible to package this up to run on your computer with some sort of encryption on the database files then I think it would be great.

I'm not fully aware of the techniques used in this particular application but if it is based on standard relational database (MySQL, MS SQL Server, etc) and web user interface made with any standard web technique (PHP, ASP, etc) it is pretty easy to make it run as standalone application on local computer. First, install the DBMS (for example MySQL) to the local computer and create all tables and schemas needed. Second, install a web server (apache, MS IIS) to the same local computer and configure all needed connections to DBMS and possible plugins for the web interface. And thirdly, set up a local website to your local computer under your localhost where you store the web interface and voila, you have your own private web enviroment for your logbook apllication in you local computer.

I agree that the design has a nice feel!
The functionality to store photos of objects
along with data & notes is quite cool.

My Only gripe is that the site crashes
like a drunk teenager when viewed with
Macintosh's browser: Safari.

whenever you add any type of gear, you set the starting number of jumps it has. then each time you do a jump on it, it shows the total number of jumps when you view the gear.

This is true. I personally don't like the idea of a paper logbook. Yeah, it's quick and simple, but over time I've found myself to almost completely stop logging (I started out writing every detail down when I started.. now if I log it's just the number and the object just to keep track). I'm a computer nerd, and like the idea of being able to have all of my information in a database.


Yeah, that's how I've been writing it. To run it locally you would need to setup a web server (i use apache), then install Activestate's Perl (the language interpretor), and Mysql. If people are interested I could make a very simple "howto" on setting it up locally.

The original idea was to just write it for myself, but then some friends said they would like to use it as well. Encryption can be easily added too.

the only issues should be the HTML layout. the database interfacing should be fine. i might download a couple different browsers later and mess with the HTML some.

nobody cares about macs... don't even try :-P

the only mac's i'm interested in are the ones that spit out money

being able to add pictures of the gear, and even pics or video of each jump would be sweet too!

As far as security goes, you could make it secure enough (with turing numbers, encryption, etc) to keep unauthorized people from accessing it.

However, if you were to put one of these online where lots of people could go and sign up and create their own logbooks and everything, how much would it suck if the authorities managed to get a warrant to sieze the database?

securing it online would be quite simple.
you'd have it so its all encrypted in the db etc and the only thing that can decrypt it is the key the user knows.
even if the authorities can see the code to view the encryption algorithm it'll be pointless to them if its strong enough encryption
and besides don't make yours accessible to anyone make the site invite only and make the your log only viewable by ya friends.

Neat. It would be cool to have the source to install it locally (and a dump of the mysql schema to create the necessary database).

Nice work and congratulations!

-=Raistlin

As soon as it's finished anyone can have it. Since a lot people would like to use it locally, I'll release it with instructions. I wasn't really looking into making a signup and blah blah blah. More or less for specific people to use. I'll probably host mine online, that way it's accessible anywhere (as you see with the links, it's eventually going to be an entire site - blog, adventures, jumps, pics, etc) - but a personal site .. an organized (through databases) area for myself, accessible anywhere.

I use Google Spreadsheets, it's not quite as flash as a dedicated application but it's a spreadsheet so you can get it to count things.

Gus