Richard BF

I was doing some performance tuning the other day, for some fairly complex PHP code, and so finally had a chance to try out xdebug's profiling support. It's pretty cool, but unfortunately tool support for it is fairly limited.

xdebug spits out profiling data in a subset of the Callgrind Format, which is part of the Valgrind project. While the data is textual and human readable, the structure itself is a flat unrolled execution stack that's not entirely sequential for parsing, and so you need some kind of tool to interpret the data.

A number of shell tools will do the job, but won't be overly useful for really drilling into the data. The KDE based KCachegrind will read and display the data and everything else besides, but I haven't run KDE for about 8 years now, so it's not much use to me. Likewise the small but powerful WinCacheGrind does the job, but it's Windows, which for me means using my Windows box which is away from my main development set up. It also has a number of annoying little bugs, and while the source is available on sourceforge, it's not really being updated.

So, I spent a few days writing a Mac OS X profiling tool, MacCallGrind.

It's a bit rough and ready at the moment, and there's a number of problems with it, but it reads the xdebug output and displays it with at least a few useful metrics. There's more to come, because I need it for some other upcoming work, but I won't be getting back to that for a few weeks, so I figured it's best to just get it out there for other people use, even though it doesn't do very much.

Let me know what you think and what you'd like me to add.

Remember, I know it's only minimal, but what do you expect for two days' work?!

There must be something about impending fatherhood that mellows you out. It's not something I'm particularly used to, except when dealing with people in my work life, but for some reason I've started taking everything in my stride, whereas previously I'd probably either hide from the world.

At Ludic Creative we recently landed some conference work in Vietnam, which is timed about a month before my first baby is due. Working back from the conference date, our facilitators (including myself) needed to get our passports to the Vietnamese Embassy at least 10 working days before the trip, for Visa processing.

Unfortunately my passport had expired 14 months ago, which meant I needed to apply for a new one. You can simply renew it if it's up to 12 months, so I just missed the cut off. Fine, I was happy to re-apply.

Filling in the application involves having someone you're not related to, and not partnered to, signing the application and the back of a photograph of the applicant. So I arranged to have that done, and then took it to the GPO, figuring short of the actual Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, the GPO would be the next best thing.

So the GPO lady looked through the form and got the photo, and said that the back of the photo needed to be signed in black ink. I pointed out that nowhere did it say this, and she pointed to the text on the form that said "the form" must be completed in black ink. She failed to see the difference between the form and the photo, and said that the photo was part of the form, which it clearly wasn't as part of my filling it in, and anyway how was I to know. Anyway, I agreed to get another photo signed, but asked her to check the application to make sure nothing else was wrong. It wasn't.

So I spent the next 3 days hooking up with my photo signing person, and returned to the GPO, all the while wary of the clock rapidly approaching the Visa deadline.

Surprise, the address on my application form didn't match the address on the back of my license. I've just moved, and hadn't had the chance to do that. I had the lady check the rest of the form and she said it was fine. So I spent the next week applying for the address on my license to be changed and have it mailed to me. Eventually it arrived, so I headed back to the GPO.

Now on the back of the photo, the photo signing person is supposed to write "This is a true photo of Name Of Person" and then their signature. I now had it in black ink, but because my name is quite long, the letter were fairly close together, and the GPO lady said "It looks too much like RichardBF, not Richard BF. You're going to have to get it resigned." I would have punched her in the face then and there if it wasn't for the fact that she was pregnant.

A week later, I manage to get yet another photo signed, and as I was leaving he said "You better check with them soon though, because I'm flying to Europe tomorrow night." So I got to the GPO, everything was thankfully correct and I said back to wait for the application to be processed.

At this point there was about 3 weeks to go before I needed to get the Visa application in, and passports these days tend to take about 10 working days, so I was cutting it fine, but certainly doable.

Ten days passed, and I heard nothing. Eleven days, nothing. I called, "any ideas on how long it will take, because I need it for my Visa application", "let us take a look and get back to you, someone will call you.". OK.

Twelve days. "Any ideas where my passport is?" "We're not sure, someone will call you back."

Thirteen days. "Any ideas where my passport is, because I need it in the next 5 days or I'm not going to Vietnam?" "We're not sure, someone will call you back." "Can you mention that while I'm going away on 8th July, I actually need it earlier for the Visa?", "You have enough time sir, someone will call you."

Thus I came to Friday afternoon. The following week I would be out of town in Canberra on work, and I needed my passport by that Friday in order to get the Visa. I was starting to panic. I was driving to my weekly radio show, where we had planned to do a world wide live link up of my photo signing person for the show, not related to the photo signing of course, and I had stopped to pick up my P.O. box mail when I got a call from the passport office. "We're sorry, but your passport application never actually arrived. We have no record of it. It's most likely still at the GPO. I see you're going in 3 weeks, just put in a new application and you'll be fine."

Once I'd explained the real deadline, we came up with a plan, I would resubmit my application to DFAT in Canberra, Monday lunchtime, which was the soonest possible because I was supposed to be running a training course. They would electronically transfer it to Sydney, process it, and have it ready for my girlfriend to pick up on Tuesday afternoon, so we could then rush it to the Visa people. I was already going insane.

I hung up the phone, realising that the next few weeks were going to be a rollercoaster, but at least I had a fun live radio show to do, which I suddenly realised was in 5 minutes. I jumped out of the car to go grab the mail, and... I'd locked my keys in the car...

Suffice to say, this was a week ago, we did cancel the radio show, but I also did get my passport, and the Visa application did go in on time. I've been pretty relaxed, when in the past I'd normally be close to a break down. I've been flat out working non-stop for the last month, and Vietnam is going to be the last big thing to do before the baby drops, if only I can get to mid-July.

Louise and I have been counting the days to the birth of our baby. Due on 8th August, or 8/8/8, the same day as the 2008 Olympics, the number 8 is of course good luck in Chinese, and media are nicely telling us over and over how many days to go, which is nice of them to care about us and little bubby.

In What a crazy year, part 1, I was in Canberra, and had just managed to get my passport and Visa application in on time. Jump to lunchtime Thursday at the end of that week, I'm still in Canberra, and I get a call from Louise "Look, there's nothing to worry about, but I've just xxxxxx, and I called the hospital just to check, and they suggested I come in so they can just do a routine check, so I'm going to head over there after lunch"

So I was just a little on edge that afternoon, with a few critical meetings that I had to do before taking the four hour drive back to Sydney. Then around 5pm, as I'm packing my car to leave, I get another call "I'm just sitting here, they ran some tests, but no real news, I'm hoping they'll let me go soon, but I'm not sure. I have some urgent work to do at home so..."

10 minutes later I get the call that they want her in over night just to monitor her. Fine, let's do that, better safe than sorry. I started driving. I'm half way back and the phone calls from Louise are getting more panicy. Louise has never been in hospital before as a patient, and has rarely visited one to see someone else, so the whole experience was fairly confronting.

I arrived around 8:30pm, and then we heard the word we didn't want to hear, Pre-eclampsia.

It's now Saturday, and for friends and family reading this, this is what's happening. Both baby and Louise are great, no problems. Louise has fairly high blood pressure at the moment, so they're monitoring that to see how it goes. Over the next day or so they will then make a call on whether the baby should be delivered (we're five weeks from the due date) or not, just to be safe. Apart from that, we know little else.

We've both had to shed as many appointments and deadlines as possible, amongst mine being two big shows that I was supposed to Stage Manage and tech, and of course the inevitably jinxed Vietnam trip, so much for that.

But yeah, we're all doing fine, we just really don't know what's going to happen from hour to hour.

Special thanks to Cale, Lyn, John, Peter and Cindy for allowing me to cancel a bunch of stuff at the last minute. I'll make it up to you. Right, back to the hospital...

Louise's blood pressure dropped over night, and is now the best it's been since going in. She has a heart monitor on the baby, and is otherwise doing very well. They're going to give us a tour of the neonatal unit later today, just in case we need it at some point.

Another day of not much happening. The renal specialist came past this morning and just reiterated pretty much what we already knew, they're still monitoring the fluids and blood pressure. This evening Louise got down to 110/80, but as normal for her, she's gone up at night to around 140/90 as at 8pm, which is much better than last night.

At this stage, no news is good news. We're waiting to see how things pan out, and we'll hopefully have some idea of where we are by Monday. Yes, she'll be in until then. Baby is doing excellently and cooking well at 34 weeks and 2 days and counting. At this point every single day inside counts.

I fought the parking man, and the parking man won. On Thursday night, I left the hospital late, around 11pm or so, and the boom gate of the car park was up, so I just drove out. $30 saved. When I say car park, it's more just a few empty blocks of gravel and dirt, but it's the only car park near the hospital, so it will do.

Louise's car had also parked there since Thursday, and was amassing quite a large fee. But I didn't care, because I figured I'd just drive them both out late on successive nights, and voila, free parking.

So last night, Friday, I'd been parked there all day. I left the hospital at around 10pm, and walked to the car park. It was a cold night. The guy was still there, boom gate up, but waiting to take my money, so I walked around for a while, freezing, figuring 10:30pm would do it. Nope, still there. So I called my sister, spoke to her for a while, and walked back around 11pm.

By this time I was cold and frustrated, wondering why I didn't just pay the parking fee. But the guy was packing up his stuff and about to leave, so it seemed like it was worth the wait. I walked close by to check it out, careful not to give away my intention. He watched me walk by, it was like a mexican stand off, him wanting to leave, but not wanting to miss out on the $30. So I went around a corner and waited 10 minutes before returning.

Finally, he'd gone. I checked the gate... it was locked. Check the other gate, also locked. I walked right around the entire station, there was no way out. I'd had a chance a leave, but I wrecked it, so here I was, with both of our cars locked inside a parking station that I couldn't get them out of. I ended up having to walk home, and walk back to the hospital in the morning. This morning.

Late this afternoon I finally left the car park, asking the guy if I could go out and come back later in the day and continue the ongoing fee, but no, he said I'd have to pay the full day rate every time I left and returned in the same day. What an arse.

As it is, I now park out in the street, and I'll get Louise's car out (with a $100+ fee) sometime tomorrow.

What an arse.

Got a little more news. As at around 8:30pm tonight, Louise's blood pressure has stablised a little. The little man with the little hammer came in and hammered her legs again, which she finds particularly amusing since she's never had her legs hammered before in her life. They'll watch her overnight, and hopefully she'll come back to normal by the morning.

Around midnight the doctors marched back in, because Louise was at 135/100 again. Now they're mixing two different drugs in different quantities and at different times, trying to get the right balance for going forward. Not sure whether this means they'll let her come if they figure it out, or not.

They took us on a tour of the neonatal unit yesterday afternoon (click on the fundraising link to see the photo), in order to prepare us just in case we needed to deliver baby early. Talk about emotional, Louise and I both had tears in our eyes at various times through the tour.

The unit is both sad and comforting at the same time. Really tiny babies lay in their humidicribs, where they try to reproduce the conditions in the womb as much as possible. It's layed out like a regular ward, but smaller, and with most of the lights out, so it's dark, except for the multitude of lights and monitoring displays. In some way's it's like a secret hydroponics lab, not that I'd know what one of those looks like. ;-)

Babies are continually monitored with those little clip on heart rate monitors attached to their feet, and they are fed by either a canular into the arm, or via a really tiny tube into the mouth and stomach, which is removed after each feeding. Babies are positioned so that they can move and exercise their arms and legs, which helps develop their little muscles.

Yesterday they started giving Louise steroid injections which will help to fast develop baby's lungs, in case we need to bring it into the world. If we delivered now, baby would go into the neonatal unit for about 5-6 weeks. Luckily at this point we'd be going into the regular section of neonatal, and not the ICU (Intensive Care Unit), because we're at 34 weeks. Some of the babies in the ICU were around 24 weeks and under 1 Kg in weight, and were smaller than a kitten, yet as cute as punch. Our baby is 2.389 Kg.

The staff seemed fantastic, and each baby had a dedicated nurse, all of whom seemed really nice when we spoke to them. If you're considering which charity to give to this year, then I'd seriously recommend RPAH, and in particular their neonatal unit. They do an awesome job, but it costs a LOT of money, and we all know how stuffed up our health system is at the moment. Help keep more babies alive and allow them to have future rich and happy lives.

Finally we have some good news. Louise is going to be allowed home for a few hours today on day release. They're now starting to openly talk about the three options we knew we'd be up for: inducing now; sending her home; and keeping her in hospital. From the information we're getting, we're guessing that most likely baby will stay in for another week, and then most likely they'll consider inducing. We'll wait and see...

So they let Louise out for a 3 hour day release, which is great, although that seems to suggest that she's not coming permanently home any time soon. Last we heard we'll most likely hit the 35 weeks, which is this coming Friday by their figures, this Thursday by the official method, and we reckon personally about Tuesday, so in theory, Thursday will be 35 and a half weeks. Baby is pretty big, so this also backs this up.

We left the hospital and walked to Louise's car, which has been locked in the car park since Thursday. I was relaxed about handing over a quite substantial amount of money, even though I still had issues about car park man. So we got in and drove to the boom gate. He gave us a bit of a discount, which was nice, and so unlike him considering I felt like I knew him so well, but it was still expensive. As we drove out, the gravel and dirt turned to concrete, and I felt the car leaning slightly to the right, and then I heard the car parking man yelling at us. What an arse. It was then I realised... we had a flat tyre...

My life is a bit like that, when I have disasters, they tend all come at once. And the last thing I needed right now was the car parking man yelling at me for blocking his exit lane. He came running up and... asked if we needed help, if he could change the tyre for us, or if he could call the NRMA. It turns out, the car parking man aint such an arse after all. Well, maybe just on weeknights...

Louise is still at home, but we'll be heading back to the hospital in about an hour. We have clothes, washing, cleaning and other bits and pieces, so we don't need any help at this stage, but we have dozens of offers of help, so the minute we need it, you'll all be getting a call. Thanks for all your concern.

At 5pm, Louise was 114/78, which is awesome, best she's been since being in hospital, and at 8pm, she's 124/82, which is still pretty good. Looks like they're getting close to stablising everything.

Louise had a nice day today, 3 hours at home playing with Phoebe and finalising a little bit of work stuff she was in the middle of on Thursday when she first went to hospital, and then back to hospital at 5pm for dinner. After a few work phone calls Monday morning, she should be completely free to concentrate on her health.

The doctor came in this morning for a few short minutes, and gave the impression that she'll probably be in until Thursday at least, at which point they'll think about what to do next. So the waiting game continues, and probably not much news for the next few days at least.

Today is probably going to be a boring day. Louise's blood pressure throughout the night was 130/85, 140/90, 135/85 and 120/70 at midnight, 6am, 7:30am and 8am respectively, which are all pretty good readings. She's also given a few more blood and other samples for a few research projects into hypertensive pregnancy disorders at the hospital, which is nice.

She's already cleared the decks of her work going forward, which means she's now free to relax all day. We'll catch up later this afternoon, after I've finished off my month and year end. We're now just waiting to get to the end of the week.

So much for a boring day. The renal specialist visited again today, and while they now seem to have most of the symptoms in order, Louise's liver is now starting to show signs of pre-eclampsia. It's like squeezing a balloon, the more you treat in one area, the more it shows up in others. Anyway, now they're talking about maybe tomorrow or the next day for a cesar, but we've yet to speak to our obstetrician, so we don't know for sure. Baby continues to do well. Louise is getting a little tense that we're getting closer and closer to the birth. Tense and excited, it's a mix of emotions I think.

I'm busy finishing up my end of year, and then I have a jam tonight for Backstreet Stories that I would be in a bit of trouble if I missed, so I'm going to drop in on Louise this afternoon, and then maybe again after the jam depending if anything happens.