If you want to become a better developer, a great thing to do is to frequently set aside some 30 minutes per day to learn something new and tinker with that newly acquired knowledge. I call this satisfying the Daily Tinker Quota.

I have been doing this for a while now and I have been very productive. I learned new things I was able to integrate into my websites and apps. (Not that I don’t learn new things at work, this gives me the required space to allow for tinkering that isn’t always possible in a work environment.)

The year was 2018. I knew I was in trouble when I saw the reflection of my body in the window of the train, and I groaned. I really let myself go, I remember thinking to myself, in active disgust. I can’t deal with this.

A trip to the bathroom at the time revealed that I was close to weighing in at 90 kg, an incredibly unhealthy weight. This was, for me, a weight bordering on obesity. I was most certainly overweight. I realised that it was time for action.

It has been six months since a devastating breakup and I have been slowly clawing my way out of the horrible pit it felt like I ended up in.

It’s been a tough time for me, but I wanted to share some facts, techniques and lessons I’ve learned about during these trying times.

I’ve just released PHP Monitor 4.1 with various new features and bug fixes. Most notably, the domains screen has been added. This new release comes with various new features, most of which are detailed below.

My thanks goes out to the various beta testers who provided feedback and reported bugs for this release.