For years I've been talking about a rewrite. Then I started learning Java and thought in a few months I'd jump right into it. I've been reading about enterprise architecture, middleware products, Service Oriented Architecture, portal servers, single signon and identity management, web service sercurity, etc etc... and keep putting off the site because I know that today I don't have the skills to do it the way I think is right, until I finish reading my mountain of books. If I just slap something together, then I won't be happy with it and will re-write it again later.

So here is some of my plan. I'm trained and experienced in EJB2 but I want to use EJB3 now. Tonight I'll crack open my 700 page book on EJB3 and get started. While I'm reading that book (a couple months) I'll likely get into Phase 2 and 3 of a java project I'm doing at work which will involve more sophisticated uses of web services, and improving the overall design of the system to fit in an SOA. I also want to poke around with Sun Portal server and JSR-168 portlets. Once I feel comfortable with EJB3, JSR-168 portlets, Sun Portal server, and SOA design, I will then be ready to get started :) Actually, I forgot to mention Sun Creator Studio 2, the IDE for developing JSF web tier components, portlets, and applications. A year ago I read a book on JSF but never used it. This will be a bit of a learning curve as well.

Hopefully you can now see why I haven't started the new site. I'm not lazy -- I read a thick programming book almost nightly. There is just so much to learn, Java is not PHP. Also I have to fight the programmer in me that wants to make a generic content management system instead of programming a specific website for myself. I've got my ideas written down about the content and sections of the site. My realistic guess on when the new ryandelaplante.com will be available is sometime around Christmas 2006 or sooner.