async/await explained as simply as I humanly possibly can

Put async in front of a function.

eg. async function test() {} or const test = async () => {}

Now you can use await inside that function to pause and wait for values that take their time getting back to us.

Here’s an async function:

// Define our async function and let it use await
async function test() {
  const response = await fetch("https://api.github.com/"); // Wait for the Promise
  const json = await response.json(); // Wait to resolve the Promise
  console.log(json); // Log the response
}

test(); // Run the function

Okay that’s it! Get it now?

If not, go here for a better explanation. Or leave a comment and I’ll try to help out.

Updates for 2019 etc.

Me again. We’ve had a baby. Things have been hectic, but good.

I’m still software developing over at ABC News.

I’ve written a few beginner coding articles over at DEV.to. I thought I might repost them here too, over the next few days.

If you haven’t already, please check out Quoke and give it a star on GitHub.

Thanks a bunch, and see you soon.

Josh

Pushing your charting library to its limit (literally)

I did another chart.

How to host a Ghost 2.0 blog for free on Glitch

Ghost 2.0 is here!

I’ve always liked Ghost as a blogging platform. It’s open source. It runs on Node.js. I even momentarily moved this blog over to Ghost for a little while back in the day.

The only problem is it’s relatively hard to set up hosting for it. You could always just pay the monthly fee, but it’s pretty expensive (as far as blog hosting goes).

But there is a way to set up a Ghost blog on Glitch. Here’s how you do it:

• Go to glitch.com and click New Project -> hello-sqlite. This will start a new Glitch project
• Click the package.json file on the left and then Add Package and search for “ghost” then click it to install
• Create a New File on the left and call it config.development.json with the following in it:

{
  "database": {
      "client": "sqlite3",
      "connection": {
          "filename": "./.data/sqlite.db"
      },
      "debug": true
    },
    "paths": {
      "contentPath": "content/"
    },
    "server": {
      "host": "127.0.0.1",
      "port": 3000
    },
    "url": "https://ghost2.glitch.me"
}

• Replace the ghost2 part in url with the subdomain of your Glitch project (it will be something like lime-hen and you can change it)
• Now we need to make a content folder. The easist way to do this is to click New File and type content/temp.txt then press enter
• Finally, we need to replace the contents of server.js with the following:

const ghost = require('ghost');

ghost()
    .then(function (ghostServer) {
        return ghostServer.start();
    });

And that’s it! You should have a working Ghost blog. If you click on Show up at the top left you should see your new blog.

You can delete all the extra files in public/ etc too.

Also, don’t forget to go to <your-blog>.glitch.me/ghost and set up an admin password etc and write your first post.

Have fun Ghosting!

PS. Here’s one I prepared ealier so you can see the code for yourself (or simply remix it and it should work right out of the box hopefully).

Strange days indeed for The Strange Attractors

The other day my mate James asked me why it was (strangely) impossible to find my old band The Strange Attractors anywhere on the Internet. Especially for someone as extremely online™ as I was.

Good question Jimmy!

There was no Spotify back then. My old band sort of just slipped out of existence, except in memory.

So I’ve uploaded the album to YouTube for everyone. Enjoy!

On this record is me, Jeremy Sega Dreamboat Neale, Lauren Jenkins, Michael Fletcher, James Boyd, Neal Apel, and Jo-Jo P James.

Ahhhhh the memories!

Remember to subscribe to my YouTube channel :)