Posts filed under "internet"
To avoid any confusion and answer some questions that have been raised I’ve created this small FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) to dispell any rumours and set the record as straight as I possibly can. If you’ve got any questions put them underneath and I’ll update the post accordingly.
Why isn’t there a plugin to download?
When we first set out, I had tried to contact Matt regarding the idea, but he never got back to me. Uneffected I spread the word and with the inclusion of Michael to the team, Matt got back to us; originally he thought this was a fork, it wasn’t. After a bit of emailing we got Matt on board and he oversaw all the development that went into the mockups that you see. When it came down to how this design would be implemented there were several ideas thrown out into the ether, including creating a plugin.
However after much back and forth it was decided that this design would be better implemented as part of the core WP install. In many ways it was also impossible to implement this design in any way apart from altering the core code, so a plugin was not an option.
If Matt needs any help or wants some clarity on how certain parts of the design should work the Shuttle team is ready and waiting.
What if I can make this into a plugin?
If a whizz however feels that they can use the core WP admin files and implement the design, PLEASE contact me and I’ll be sure to give you EVERYTHING you need (spliced psds, colours, dimensions etc, hell I’ll even setup an SVN for you as well. However I feel that this won’t be possible and as such we’re all going to have to wait for Matt and his excellent team to get on with the task. Patience is a virtue.
So you’ve created the code and Matt’s going to drop it into the main code right?
Nope. We’ve not written any code. Actually that’s a lie. Joshua began coding a plugin when it seemed fuzzy as to what Matt was planning on doing with the design. However since we got a firm commitment to the implementation of the mockups as you see them that sort of stopped. The issue was always how we would implement these changes and keep up with the daily changes that happen to WordPress from the dev team.
So do you expect the final thing to look like the mockups?
I sure fucking hope so. The Shuttle team was fighting over pixel placements, colour hues and the list goes on. There will be certain areas that might not work out exactly, as the internal discussion between the hackers list continues (specifically about the dashboard), amongst other things. However when it comes to the aesthetics Matt will hopefully contact us regarding how to implement areas before making final decision on the outcome.
So what exactly did you launch?
The design. We set out to make the WordPress admin both more usable and more beautiful to look at. We feel that the mockups (if implemented as shown) will elevate WordPress high and above the rest of the blogging and CMS systems available on the net currently. This is a very important step. We’ve learnt a great deal in the process and it’s time we actually were more open about the results, after all it’s called Open Source.
The idea of redesigning the WordPress administration panel began believe it or not in December 2004. For over a year and a half myself, Michael Heilemann, Joen Asmussen, Chris J Davis, Joshua Sigar (later joined by Bryan Veloso) exchanged countless emails and mockups and links and ideas regarding what we thought the WordPress administration panel should be. The project was called the Shuttle Project. I now have the pleasure of presenting what we came up with and explaining the future of the project. The Shuttle project was without a doubt the single hardest thing I’ve ever been involved with. The only thing that made it easy for me was the fine and exceptional gentlemen on the Shuttle team itself. What made it so difficult is the fact that we were thinking of the thousands of WordPress users all over the world. We were thinking of usability, we were thinking of asthetics, we were thinking of the power user and the novice user. How do you get three headstrong (and passionate) designers to play nice with each other? I swear I have no idea but somehow it all actually worked out in the end. I owe Michael and Joen a great deal of thanks for helping me improve how I think about design.
However the greatest thing that I could have gotten from this project is the sense of collaboration that I felt throughout the project. We were all working towards making something we use on a daily basis that much better, it makes Open Source that much more enjoyable. Although it was tough going through this design process, I think we’ll all instantly forget everything once it’s part of the official install.
When’s it coming out?
Matt Mullenweg (lead developer of WordPress) will be incorporating these mockups into the official WordPress releases in due course. I don’t know when he’s going to be getting round to implementing the code for it all, so if you’re willing to help out to move the process along, by all means feel free to contact him and offer your assistance. This will not be a plugin.
I can’t wait for the Shuttle designs to be incorporated into the WordPress install, as I do believe that once it’s done there will be only one choice in which platform you should be using.
WordPress Identity | The Colour Blue
There are some serious changes to the architecture of the panel as we see it, and I (and the rest of the Shuttle team) will be going through the decisions we made and the reasons behind them in due course. The first element I think I’ll talk about is the choice of colours. When the project first began, the WordPress administration was a drab grey. It included a nice big gradient along the top of the navigation bar.
So the first major change we made was give WordPress a colour and it’s own distinct identity. We had to make sure that it didn’t mimic any of the other blogging tools out there, so we did a bit of research first. Textpattern has orange, Symphony is green, Moveable Type is grey/green, Expresion Engine is purple. We decided to go for blue. What does blue signify you ask? An easy link (and direct from Wikipedia) is that the colour blue:
…is considered a calming, soothing colour, perhaps related to its association with water and to the sky.
That was what I was hoping we’d get. The colour palette provides an atmosphere that is familiar and not harsh on the eyes. Seeing as a lot of people spend a great deal of time looking at the actual backend of WordPress a great deal throughout the day, it was very important to keep the visual impact of the administration panel to a minimum.
After a great deal of back and forth and loads of mockups and discussion the number of hues of blue was kept to a total of 3. These same blues would be used to distinguish links within the panel itself, as consistency is a major factor in keeping the user comfortable.
System Messages | The Importance of Colour
One idea that I really loved, however it didn’t really fit in with the overall design was the error and sucess system messages. The original intent was that an error or warning would be given a red colour while a successful message be given a green colour. This would provide a great visual aid, and users would instantly know if something was wrong or right. However we decided that the light blue and yellow coloured icons could provide the same level of visual information with the addition that they tie into the design itself which is what we were here for in the first place.
Join me next time as I talk a bit about usability (or at least try and talk about the subject).
The real reason why I decided to reboot to something more simple this time round hopefully is becoming more obvious with the latest change in the background on the front page. As the section implies the background (which occupies the most real estate on the site) will be used to throw the spotlight on specific projects and completed artwork. Version 4 isn’t all that different (at least in structure) to what I have now, however it’s been adapted in such a way to allow me to play around more freely.
This week I’m throwing the spotlight on a little open source project I got involved with a couple of months ago. It’s an online feed aggregator and it’s allowed me to actually get up to speed and READ all the various sites that I’ve subscribed to. Traditionally most of my feeds were read from the Sage extension for Firefox, however I needed something a little bit more powerful FOFRedux provided me with what I was looking for.
The FOFR dev team is a great bunch of people. It’s a tight nit community of devs and users as the programme itself isn’t as widely used as it really deserves to be, however we’re hoping to change that with a number of great additions to the software. The major element being a complete overhaul of the UI admin section as you can see from the project page.
Anywho if you’re looking for an online open source aggregator that sits on your server, then you don’t have to look further. It’s still early days (version 0.3 was released a couple of weeks ago) but I have very high hopes for the software. Final word, I’m planning on spending a lot more time cleaning up my projects area over the coming weeks as I’ve got a great number of announcements to be making. Sometime over the weekend I should have some pretty exciting news about Shuttle to share with everyone and a page that mimics the FOFRedux page (it’s a lot bigger because I’ve got to upload over 29 images).
Might be old news (since I remember this being ‘released’ by google a couple of months ago), however I couldn’t find the free version of the software. I’ll give it a review once I’ve actually used it properly.
Looking at my archives April was the slowest month of blogging since I began over 2 years ago. 10 posts the entire month. Now I’m generally not for one regarding quantity as something I heed much as I blog whenever I feel like it. The curious thing about the whole situation is the fact that I didn’t feel like writing anything apart from those 10 times during the entire month.
Spring in England is the best time of the year. There’s that promise of good weather and a small cold bite in the air. The trees are changing and the flowers are blossoming, everywhere you look around you there’s a feeling of rebirth and restart. New Year’s day should most definitely NOT be held during the darkest, most depressing time of the year, it should be during the spring. The first days of spring signals new and fresh ideas and in many cases a much needed invigoration of everyone’s outlook on the year ahead.
Updates on the ‘Kode So the machine that is Broken Kode is slowly getting to where it’s meant to be. I’ve just put up the portfolio section along with cleaning up the shop area as well, both areas promise much more to come, but it’s just good to have these areas completed after a fashion. The mantra remains to keep things as simple and robust as possible that way all future changes will be done in a controlled manner than the usual ad hoc manner I’ve become accustomed to.
CSS Reboot Talking to Bryan yesterday, it’s amazing how this particular reboot is one of the best ones I can remember in a good long while. It’s a great time for feeding on the immense amount of creativity filling the internet landscape right now. Go and be inspired.
A small part of creating the BK Logo was to have something to put on my business cards. As you’d imagine these things are not going to be your run of the mill cards, as I wanted to have some fun with them. So the mammoth task came down on me to actually do a bit of research on the net to see what is available and if they’re worthy of being my designated printers. I’m only half joking about the last part, I want them a certain way and am probably willing to pay the price to get them that way, so I expect to get quality for my cash.
Bearing in mind that I’ll be starting off with business cards now, the list of printed items will be ever increasing for sure. So in order to aid everyone and let you all benefit from the research that I’ve conducted into the matter, here’s a quick rundown of the various online printing services that I’ve uncovered, and how I rate them. At the end I’ve attached a pdf that you can download for your own reference (this being the first that I publish on the Kode, but hopefully not the last.) If you know of a better service that I should really check out, then by all means send the link to me and I’ll add it to the list. I am trying to make this as a bit of a resource page for all those looking for something similar, you might as well let some other smuck (ie me) do the hard work for you.
- Print 100
So far I’m impressed by what Print 100 has offered. This firm is based in Hong Kong, so you have to go to the global site. What’s nice about this website is the information that they have on offer. That’s something I find pretty lacking in most places I’ve visited. It’s like most of these printers don’t really want to tell you the whole story, or they’re lazy and so try and get away with cheap things like ‘Contact us for a quote’. If you go over to the downloads section, there’s a massive collection of templates in Illustrator, Photoshop, CorelDraw and Freehand versions. Any printers that accepts Freehand files is OK by me. They’ve also included a really nice section that’s clear regarding how to format your files.
In terms of the kind of cards that they can produce, it seems the cards themselves have got a base rate, which is as far as I can tell the cheapest on the market, ($30 for 300 double sided, full colour cards), but they also provide additional enhancements such as die cutting, UV Spot coating, rounded corners and hot stamping. The cost for these enhancements does not provide any problems whatsoever regarding price either. So you won’t break the bank if you want UV spot coating (which I actually do).
My only complaint is that I think the final thickness of the card will be too thin. 230gsm or 250gsm doesn’t seem thick enough for me. I want at least 300 dammit :). They have a sample pack which came thorough before my cards came through. To be fair, at that price I was going to be doing ordering from them for sure. They arrived a couple of days ago and I’ve got to say that it’s just good to finally have them in my hands. When I contacted them regarding getting a different cardstock, this is what they replied with:
At the stage, we ONLY can provide 2 type of papers which is 230gsm stock paper with matt lamination OR 250gsm super white card. We cannot provide a thicker paper at this time. Sorry about that.
The only other qualm is effectively with the website which has some stupid popup system going on if you want to enter your account area, rather than keeping it within the site itself, which I found slightly odd and dated. Additionally even though they have a referer’s program, the fact that it isn’t as simple as putting in a link on my site that is distinctly my link (like say for Dreamhost) it becomes fiddly and I doubt I’ll be gaining much benefit from it, so they should really sort that out. But in the meantime if I’ve introduced you to this website, do a brother a favour and put me as your referrer (brokenkode is the username). - Face Media Group I actually was going to go with this company before I had the bright idea to actually do a little bit of research and see what the alternatives on offer where. I am very glad I didn’t jump into these things without looking around first. Face Media Group is a company is based in the UK which has a direct impact on it’s associated costs. The website is very slick and easy to navigate. It’s neither ugly or overbearing and does actually scream of a subdued quality. I’ve already received the sample pack and I can vouch for the quality, however the price point for this company is not exactly inviting. The price page is very simple to understand, £125 will get you 250 300gsm cards with UV spot coating. One additional disappointment is the fact that they don’t seem to offer die-cutting or foil stamping.
- Ezdzns I’m pointing this website out because of the fact that they offer design services as well. They seem a tab bit pricey however if you’re not all that great at doing your own designs (then your first contact should be me), failing that then give them a shot, although I’m not sure what the design entails, and how many iterations/changes you’re allowed.
- Pecal Media These guys do a range of stuff, including plastic cards, posters, flyers. They also provide design services and you can get a sample pack sent to you as well. It’s a pretty rounded website, relatively intuative.
- Graphic Disorder I thought these guys were interesting since they offer 1000 cards for $99 (you can keep the dollar). Included in the price is the design, the cards with spot UV and shipping to the continental US. That’s not a bad deal. Not as great as Print100 but it’s closer than the rest of the printers on this list.
- Overnight Prints The only way I can describe this is the Kinko of online printers. Ironic since Kinko is a printer but what I’m trying to say here is that they’re the sort of store that would look like Kinko if they opened in a store down the road. It SCREAMS generic but at least they seem to be fast and affordable.
- Advansys These guys seem slightly corporate and generic as well, but if you’re looking for that style and don’t want the extra bells and whistles that are included in the rest of the packages, just something white with the information and a logo then these guys might be what you’re looking for. Clean site, information is all there for you to get on with it.
Again, this isn’t the list to end all lists, this is just what I found on my search. I’d be seriously interested in knowning about different online printers that provide for business cards, postcards, flyers and just about any other printed media. So if you’ve got a good one up your sleeve, share and I’ll be sure to include it into the pdf. Which reminds me. This is a first pass at the pdf. I will be editing it, just slapped this together quickly because it’s a good tool I think to have the comparisons in front of you. Even though you don’t need to buy 1000 cards as a minimum, I’ve done that it’s possible to compare the prices correctly. A few of these places offer 1000 as a minimum.
I’m giving a presentation on what everyone is missing out on the web to my group at work on Wednesday. 90% of the people that are going to be there have never heard of Firefox, don’t know what Gmail is and certainly don’t know what RSS is. I’ve got a load of topics I will be talking about in detail, however I’d like to ask everyone reading this what they believe are the most important contributions, sites, applications, technologies that have been released on or related to the the internet in the past 5 years.
Currently I’ve got the following headings I’m playing around with:
- Brief History of the Internet - It’s only a little over 10 years old, where was it and how has it matured?
- The Open Source Movement - Brief explanation and introduction to the plethora of programmes out there ripe for use and contribution towards.
- Firefox - The only browser you should be using.
- Google - What it can do for you that you didn’t know
- The Wireless Office - “Web 2.0” applications, Writely, 37Signals, etc.
- Emerging Technologies - RSS, Tagging.
What do you think I’m missing, bearing in mind I’ve got only 50 minutes to play around with and I’ve got to condense everything in roughly 40minutes with 10 minutes for questions.
Some of the statements made in the descriptions often come across as pretty damn glossed over (also laughable in a few occasions), especially when tackling a subject such as this, but check out the Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries.
HUMAN EVENTS asked a panel of 15 conservative scholars and public policy leaders to help us compile a list of the Ten Most Harmful Books of the 19th and 20th Centuries. Each panelist nominated a number of titles and then voted on a ballot including all books nominated.
(via pixelsurgeon)
If you’re interested in these things and would like to see what goes into making the administration panel of a programme, then I present the Feed on Feeds Redux Redesign mini-site. It’s just a quick install of the excellent Zenphoto which I’ll be skinning heavily in the coming days. I’ve got such a massive burst of creative energy right now. This project is very different to the Shuttle project because there are no expectations on us. This is trying to promote an open source application which is why I’m being so open about it. I hope that this will help build some form of awareness to the project and get some interested programmers on board.
Expect lots of changes and loads of images to be uploaded there until I’m completely done.
Honestly this sort of thing doesn’t happen to me very often. I subscribed to the FOFRedux mailing list and started talking interface design. Shortly after joining the list Joe Shaw gave this scathing review of the application:
I didn’t even try this. It has the scariest user-interface I’ve ever seen in a feed reader. I’m a hacker, but these days I just don’t want to deal with complicated software anymore.
See the problem with Joe is that he lacks vision ;) . I know a diamond in the rough when I see one. After all if I was quick to judge then I wouldn’t be using WordPress. However he is right in some ways. Traditionally open source applications are seriously FUGLY. It’s mainly due to the fact that coders don’t really care for what something looks like. So long as it works. Here is a screenshot of the current application in use:
Today I decided to sit down and have a crack at redesigning the interface. Now based on previous experience, this sort of thing takes months. I’ve been dealing with Shuttle for over a year and a half. Even though we’re getting closer it’s been very tough to keep the motivation of everyone in the group up. I’m going to see it through no matter what. I decided to play around with FOFRedux because I really want a good RSS aggregator that sits on my server and because I needed a bit of a break from Shuttle.
4 hours is all it took to come up with a design that I’m pretty happy with. That’s it. Sure there are several elements that could use some work but this is my first stab at it. I’ve never used the famfamfam icons in any of my projects so that scratches an itch I’ve had for a while. Here’s a screen shot of version 0.3 of the redesign:
You can see a larger version of that image right here.
So if you think you can or want to help out, do join the mailing list as this is going to be something you will be using in the near future.
Go get yourself and account at coComment. Not sure how they’re going to make money off this, but track all the comments you leave on different websites all over the blogosphere. You can even have an rss feed and you can get them integrated into your actual blog. The design and implementation of the service looks fantastic. I generally hate to host things off my server, however until now I never had the chance to track my comments. Which is probably why I don’t comment as much on websites as I would like to. Expect to see my ugly mug appear on a few more websites.
Warren writes about some bollocks (didn’t even bother to read his actual post). Go straight to comments section where there’s a seriously funny exchange between him and Joss Whedon.
Definitely one to put into your RSS aggregator. UX magazine seems to be a pretty quality type of website. Slick design and seems to have a decent amount of good content in there as well. Not sure why it’s in beta, it’s not like it’s an application or anything. Must be a web 2.0 thing..ugg.
Who amongst us doesn’t like a good bit of soap opera? Ok, what about a bit of soap opera revolving around the world that you spend a couple of hours a day on? Yeah I’m talking about the shit storm that’s blown up with 9rules announcing that it would be removing a few blogs from the network. I actually heard about it from Bryan, who was calling out the Blog Network Watch and the snitch that broke the information to them.
All I’m just going to say that Blog Network Watch knew about this before I did and all this happened in the span of me going to bed. Hell I only slept 6 hours!!! Meanwhile everyone’s going, is it going to be me? Is it going to be him? I never liked her!
We then got the official word from the 9rules boys. Then Tyme goes and gives the explanation about the whys of this current situation. Seems it’s not Scrivs just thinking to be contraversial, very much the opposite. While I don’t want to take away ANYTHING of what Tyme says the real fun is found in the comments.
I couldn’t stop laughing when I was reading the comment banter between Mike Rundle and Chris P. The culmination was when Mike says:
Regardless of these inconsequential details, it was said and it cannot be taken back. You’ve got mail.
To which Chris comes back and clarifies what was actually in that email (yeah I know the tension the drama):
So we’re all on the same page, “you’ve got mail” was a tidy reference to an email that I just received about being dismissed from the network.
Call me a caty bitch. Call me a flaming gossip but that was really fun reading. I’ve not read a good flame thread in a while. It’s not really a flame thread as the guys kiss and make up and agree to meet each other in SXSW (a blogging conference or something like that).
Yeah like that was the end of that, seems like the Deuce over at JOAB has written something on this and the Cowboy has written a little something as well.
I’m just enjoying this. I think the snitch is an asshole and should just leave the network of his/her own accord. I think Scrivs and Tyme had to make some tough decisions, and it seems everyone and their pony knows best. Me? I’ve always followed a simple mantra:
Opinions are like assholes, everyone’s got one.
And for the first time I actually know how it feels to be Rich Johnston over at Lying in the Gutter (he writes a weekly column about the gossip of the comic book industry). I read the column religiously every week, which begs the question, who’s going to step up to the plate and start writing a gossip column/blog on bloggers and blogging, I know I’d subscribe to that feed…but like we established earlier I love the gossip.
I was recently reading Stathi’s latest post and I could help but smile at just what a completely unique method of blogging he actually has. You see he doesn’t ever write full posts, he only uploads his poems. To be completely honest I actually didn’t think he was going to keep it going for longer than a couple of weeks, however he’s proved me wrong and has been going strong since August.
In this particular post I actually understood exactly where he was coming from without him having to explain it to me. This poem came about from one of the Thursday basketball practices where he had stuff stolen from his jeans in the locker room. Credit cards, cash and his memory stick with several poems he was meaning to get onto the site.
See if I had my wallet stolen the post you’d be reading would go something like this:
MotherF$%er, wan$ing piece of sh*t that can’t do anything but pry on other people, the parasitic a$$hole seriously needs to be taken out and f%£ed up the nose….I got my wallet stolen today….
Or something along those line. However this is how Stathi decided to talk about this subject:
Would it be six thirty? Would it be the five o’ ones? Would it make a difference? Faded they were, worn out and dirty With six years of history
I left a piece of myself in them though In the frequent adolescent sweat rooms Where boys still burdened with abstract realizations Of welfare and the boogie man Have all become first class limping gangsters
Not their fault though Accidentally took a piece of mine From my overdrawn hole-full-hope-full pockets Left me change for a bitter ride home
Not too long ago I wrote a review about Feedlounge. Kyle came back and voiced his opinion about the price of the service, which to be fair was the only downside I could actually think of for the actual application myself.
I remember feeling the same way when the Mint price package was first released. At first I thought that $30 was far too pricey for what I was getting. It only took me a couple of weeks before I caved in and bought the package and do actually really like it. It provides me with all the information I need and much more in a fashion and designed in a way that I really like as well. So for me paying $30 for a set of code that I can sit on my site doesn’t feel like a cheat. Shaun’s provided me with both a service and a product, that in some ways is tangible in this crazy virtual world. It’s the same sort of precieved value one gets from fonts. If you’ve never paid for a font then you probably don’t understand where I’m coming with this.
Anyway, I’ve decided not to go for Feedlounge. The value I am getting from that programme doesn’t really inspire me to pay for it. See had the guys gone the Shaun route and actually let me host Feedlounge on my server, with the whole login system right there, for $35 I’d have not even thought twice about buying it. Something like that makes perfect sense to me. Hell I’d have gone and paid $50 for it.
Update: Yeah, when registering, don’t untick the emails at the bottom, it doesn’t like that, which is utter rubbish, why have them there in the first place???
I talked about Feedlounge a while ago. It was announced earlier this week that the application would be moving away from it’s Beta stage into a public release sometime next week. So I thought it’s might prudent that I give everyone a bit of a proper review for this little online application. As you might or might not know Feedlounge is an application that allows you to read your RSS feeds. What’s an RSS feed you ask? In short it’s a link from a website. You download that specific link and paste it into your Feed reader. There are many feed readers all over the place. From desktop applications, to ones that intergrate with your browser, to ones that live online. These applications check the RSS feed, and if the website has been updated it actually returns all sorts of information (depending on how the owner of the website has decided to format his RSS feed).
So without ever having to visit a website you can keep up to date and maximise your reading experience.
I’ve been using Sage exclusively for about a year and a half or whatever. It’s been a great little addition to Firefox and has served me well. However the experience has been less than fun lately. Using Feedlounge I see that I’ve actually been missing out a great deal.
The Good
Interface One of the nicest thing about the application is the interface. The gradients used are subtle. The text is nice and clear. Everything is well laid out, but the guys have anticipated the fact that people have different reading habits and so they’ve included 3 different layouts.
Features There have been a couple of new features since I last checked up on it. I’m not sure if they’ve been added since I first looked at it, or rather I just didn’t notice it the first time round.
Unread Items. Grouping the unread feeds is very cool (remember I’ve been using Sage).
Tags addition. All applications that store elements in anyway, SHOULD HAVE TAGS. They’re words you associate with a specific post of feed item. The tags can span different websites/blogs.
Flagging. I’ve actually wanted to be able to highlight things that I’ve enjoyed reading or provides some sort of link or whatever for a while now, so the fact that you can flag an item is something very very useful indeed.
History. That’s also a nice element that I’ve not been able to use due to using Sage. Scrolling through the last week’s worth of feeds, highlighting when I’ve read them is a great little addition to my reading experience.
The overlay menus. I actually like these because they don’t hinder your experience. There’s no clicking between pages as you do in most web-centered applications. Everything goes cloudy and the main element is brought to the forefront. I live that idea mainly because it doesn’t disrupt my experience which is what these guys are effectively selling…which nicely brings me to the bad.
The Bad
No Manual Refreshing This one is a bit annoying but I guess that’s part of the way things go. I’m used to actually deciding when to refresh and see if there’s any new stuff. Unfortunately it’s done automatically which is not the end of the world, but it’s just annoying for me.
The Price Everything has a price. Feedlounge is not free, which is a shame really because I would have liked to pay for it, however $5 a month seems a bit much for what I’m getting. If they’d come back and said to me it costs $3 a month (maximum I’d effectively pay for a service like this), I’d have signed up in an instant, now I’ve got to actually think about it.
I’ve got to think about it because it’s a really well put together program. The thing is though it’s not something that is helping me produce anything. It’s not something that is helping me collaborate on anything, store something. It’s effectively a program that helps me read stuff in a nicer way. I dunno part of me feels that my $5 a month should be spent on something else. I’ve honestly got to think about this further.
Recap
All in all Feedlounge is a great little application with more going for it that against it. I’m going to have to really think about whether or not I buy into it, but like I said that’s a tribute to Alex and Scott for their hard work. They’ve built something they could be proud of.
In a way it’s really important for me right now at this particular time in my life to seriously take a step back, reflect and look at what’s gone before. It’s posts like this that actually make my blog an extremely important part of my life. The sheer amount of information and experience one goes through in a year is amazing. Since I generally can’t remember what I ate yesterday it’s even more important for people like me.
I’m going to warn you however that this is the single longest post I’ve ever done in 2 YEARS of blogging now. I’m generally a verbose person anyway. You’ve been warned.
Broken Kode and Design
In June I completed 1 year of my blog under the Broken Kode name. However the site was still gaining momentum in early 2004 from the release of Manji.
Manji and Rin Manji was released at the tail end of 2004, for Rin was released in March. I do want to thank two great personalities on the Broken Kode forums. James and Steph you guys are absolute gems and I thank you for all the help you’ve given to people throughout the year.
Alex King Theme Design Competition Coming second place in the Alex King WordPress Theme design competition was a great little boost for my thirst for creating better designed websites. I’ve still got a great deal to learn, however I’m a lot more confident than I was a whole year ago before the Manji and Rin. I’m only happy when I’m constantly learning and fighting to understand things, and these two themes gave me the necessary building foundations for the future.
Broken Kode Designs Which kind of leads to the fact that I designed this site 3 times this year. To me that implies that I seriously didn’t have much of a clue as to what I wanted, which isn’t completely true. It’s been a bit of a rollercoaster ride for this site as my needs and the reader’s needs has shifted. I had the idea for version 4 that I really wanted to implement. It’s been a very successful design and one that I’m very proud of and very humbled by all the nice comments people say about it.
Human? Based on a review of a book I did, I was invited to contribute to the book, which should get published sometime next year. I’ve included a double page spread and one of the playing cards. However due to my hard-drive crash, I actually lost that information, so I’ll get it like everyone else on the DVD that’s included with the book.
CoCo I introduced CoCo, which is actually not the first mascott I’ve ever created but definitely my favourite. All future BK designs will have the little guy in one form or another.
Emmortel I launched another website, Emmortel to coincide with May1st Reboot. I enjoyed doing it and I’m generally happy with the design, unfortunately I didn’t update it are regularly as I wanted to. This was also because I realised that I really should be putting all my efforts into Broken Kode, and that my portfolio section could be included into this site. That aspect of the site is still giving me some serious grief but it’s good that it’s on the main site as it motivates me even more to do something about it.
Broken Kode Originals A couple of weeks ago I introduced my first Broken Kode Original. One of many to come in the near future. I’ve got around 5 on my plate at the moment. I’d like to get to the stage where I’m commissioned for at least one of these a month. I think I could probably increase it to two a month but no more than that to be honest.
Broken Kode Shop This was something fun to do. I got a massive buzz getting those prints printed off. I didn’t do it for the money because if I did then I was going about it the wrong way that’s for sure. I’m just immensely grateful to all those people who have supported me in this whimsical idea of mine.
The second item to be offered from the shop is nearly completed and that’s my first blook. I’ve got some serious work to do before the 15th of January, however I’m excited about this package as it’ll be the first book I put on my shelf that has my name on the spine which alone gives me Goosebumps just thinking about it.
Introduction of Splash Panel I’m actually appalled at myself for taking this long to actually get this particular show on the road. I guess I was scared of the amount of time and dedication a site such as this would take. My ambitions for this site are very big. The plan is for Splash Panel to be the first destination people go to for news and reviews and information about the latest graphic novels. Fortunately for me (unfortunate for the industry) most comic book types are still in the dark ages with respect to the internet, as they honestly don’t know how to design a website or present the information for their sites. That’s an article I’ll be writing at some point to flesh things out more.
I believe the site will get a huge amount of momentum once I’ve done the design for it and had a couple of interviews under my belt.
Internet Projects
Work Progressed on Shuttle We progressed this a great deal in the past year. We’ve all decided to get on with it in the month of January and complete it all. The entire Shuttle team is completely dedicated to this date and it will mark one year of working on it (not continuously, just in bursts). I’ve learnt a great deal from Michael, Joen and Bryan. I’m hoping to pick up some stuff from Joshua and Chris. This project has definitely made me into a better designer, since now I question EVERYTHING I do. If I didn’t then I’d get hammered from the guys. This project has helped build and nurture my friendship with these guys, whom I hold in the highest regard.
Codename: Borg Borg has moved forward than just an idea and will hopefully be something I can be proud of in the near future. I don’t want to talk much about it just yet as we’ve still got a long road before we’re in Beta, but it’s going to be a really fun road I can tell you that much. Snook is a code-master. The guy’s sooo blasé about coding it’s unreal. Stuff that would make my head hurt he just shrugs it off and calls it easy, that bastard, lol.
9rules Network In July I was accepted into the 9rules network. While the added exposure has been great, honestly that’s the least important perk of being in the network. For me having gained several friends is worth more than 2 million hits a day. That’s what makes the network special, the people.
Inksmith In May I started thinking aloud. Seems I wasn’t alone in my line of thought. Others felt the same way. The project and idea lay dormant until I could actually give it the proper time it required and so Inksmith was born. The team behind the idea is top notch and is always and constantly expanding. We should be announcing something in the not to distant future regarding this little idea. I find it amazing how just the idea has sparked off loads of conversations but that’s a good sign as people have opinions, and once we’ve actually gotten the framework sorted out, people will appreciate what we’re doing that much more.
Internet Friendships One aspect of this year that I only really was able to put my finger on as I thought about this list more was the number of internet friendships I was able to build and nourish over the past year. It’s gotten to the stage where I don’t think too much about these things anymore but thinking back a year ago this wasn’t the case. I consider Phu Ly, Michael Heilemann, Joen Asmussen, Jon Snook, Bryan Veloso, Chris J Davis , Podz, Matt Mullenweg, Erik Sagen and all those crazy cats over at inksmith and 9rules as friends.
December also brought about the very first London WordPress meetup. I hope to repeat this in the near future as there are a couple of people that live in London that I would like to meet (yeah I’m looking at you Phu).
Life
Lebanon Problems in my country flared up again after 10 years or relative peace. This event is still being talked about and was fueled even more last night was an unbelievable interview with an ex-Syrian politician. The future of the country looks to be very electric over the next couple of months.
However this event spurred me into going back to Lebanon after 2 years. I was able to vote for the first time in my life. It was a bit of an anti-climax, although it was extremely important that I do that.
Basketball With the exception of the Corporate Games in Manchester, my basketball life this year was pretty weak. To substitute for my lack of basketball action I did take up running which I’ve been pretty lax on in recent months, however that’s more to do with work than anything else. The funny thing is I got a couple of nasty emails due to those posts.
London Attacks Went through a pretty tough time for the city of London during the month of July. Stathis of course went through worse, however I’m glad those around me got through this unscathed.
Reviews
Concerts I didn’t go to that many concerts this year, however those that I did I can say were extremely memorable. Here’s a couple of reviews:
Top Movies I actually watched loads of movies, however I didn’t review half as many as I would have liked to. I might make a more concerted effort next year.
- 25th Hour
- Kiki’s Delivery Service
- Batman Begins
- Leon: Special Edition
- Howl’s Moving Castle
- Serenity
- Sky Blue
Top Books I didn’t read as many books as I would have liked to, but the few that I did I must say I enjoyed greatly.
Top Graphic Novels To be honest I’ve written a massive post about this over at Splash Panel where this sort of thing is meant to be.
Because it was too big for one post, here’s the continuation of my best of the net round-up.
Flock Love it or hate it this little application has definitely caused a bit of noise on the internet. Some say it was all hype and no substance. Some say that there’s no need for it. Some say the developers behind the browser are only interested in the money that is generated from the use of a the little google search at the top right hand corner. And still others don’t really give a shit because they’re still using IE and don’t know that there are alternatives out there.
I just like the fact that there’s development going on and competition in this field because it will help make browsing a better experience for everyone. Which is the direct opposite to what was one of the major points of this year…
Adobe buys Macromedia I felt really sad when Macromedia was bought buy Adobe, hell I didn’t even know that Macromedia was for sale in the first place. For me the biggest thing is the fact that I’ll be loosing Freehand, which is one of my favorite light-weight vector illustrator tools out there. I’ve written about this. As most websites are created using Macromedia products this is a major issue. The lack of competition in this field will be very much missed. This is one of the reasons I’ve been turning to Open Source software more and more. The people might change but the software will always be available for the next person to take it on and go off with it.
Best Websites This is just a list of websites that stuck out as being above exceptional for me at least and ones that I would make a concerted effort in reading everything they wrote. In no particular order.
- Solution Watch Brian’s a machine. He constantly and consistently churns out fantastic article after fantastic article. What amazes me the most about the guy is the speed and depth with which he’ll tackle every single article he writes. Big fan of the man’s site and one that I always check with enthusiasm.
- Whitespace I like Paul’s voice on this website. He writes a lot of stuff all over the place, but I read his words here and they sometimes make me smile sometimes make me roll my eyes, but generally speaking they nearly always make me think.
- Avalonstar Bryan’s a buddy, and I can say that with conviction. It’s actually crazy but our humours are very much alike, at least I’d like to think that way because when I read the man’s stuff I generally can see where he’s coming from and usually see the same funny side of things. There was a time when he was pumping out a lot of MASSIVE articles, one after the other. I like his enthusiasm and it’s brilliant we’re working on a couple of projects (3 of them to be exact which is the most from anyone person I believe) together.
- Noscope I’m a huge fan of Noscope. Joen shares his knowledge, both by actually answering my questions and providing quality content. Then once a month he inspires and depresses me at the same time. What’s not to like?
- Binary Bonsai I hate this Bonsai guy. He knows too much and must be stopped. Therefore I’ll be heading a new project next year called Stop Bonsai. Go over there and register.
- Weblog Tools Collection As a WordPress user can you imagine a day without a post from Weblog Tools Collection? Yeah neither can I. The man is a machine.
Web 2.0 I really hate the fucking term. It’s just annoying, however sometimes when we’re trying to explain an online application we fall down to it for lack of better term. I for one have tried several applications which I’ve honestly thought very highly of. A few worth mentioning are
- Writely - Which I used with Erik in our collabration for James, and one I’m using with Bryan for Sharq.
- Backpack and Whiteboard - Seems like it was years ago that 37signals introduced these little web application to the world. They’ve been a success for them and their other suite of applications. They have made us think about the internet in another way and as such it’s been good fun watching what this company has in store for the future.
I’ve got my year in review post (which I’m still writing) however I can concentrate on the best of the ‘net 2005. It’s been a busy little year for cyber-space with a lot of crazy ideas. Seeing what sticks has been the name of the game. I’ve split it into a couple of posts because it was getting too big to digest.
Google vs Yahoo! Finally there seems to be a competitor to Google’s onslaught on world domination. Yahoo! used to be a big player back in the day, so it’s nice to see that they’re giving Google something to think about. While everyone is pitting Google against Microsoft, we’re slowly seeing another player that seems to be coming to focus as well. Yahoo! have sorted out their email app, and have added a few services to their roster that makes it slightly more interesting to watch than Google. Even though Google upped their storage indefinitely, introduced Gtalk and added things like rss feeds to their email accounts (Yahoo! came first with this), Yahoo!’s actions seemed more calculated. Although I don’t use Flickr or Delicious, but I know a lot of people do. It’s good for the netscape, so I want to see how Google counter attacks (and I don’t mean them buying something) but releasing something new.
Mint
This was an interesting thing to watch. I’ve honestly not seen many applications that can match this sort of success, it’s nice for Shaun and it just proves that if you’ve got a good idea and you make it both functional as well as pretty to look at then you’re onto something. I personally believe that he could have made more money if he’d brought the entry price down slightly as it’s just a stats program, it’s still interesting to watch it’s popularity grow. Should be interesting to see if this will continue or not.
Blogging Networks Blogging networks were on EVERYONE’S keyboards (or lips whatever you want). Broken Kode joined 9rules, and something like 5 million blogging networks popped up around the place. The main reason is making some money from ads such as Google’s adsense or Yahoo’s equivalent. The big news was Weblogs Inc being sold to AOL for whatever number it actually was (what is it this week, $20 million?).
To be completely honest I actually shy away from networks except the 9rules because the actual model is very very different. It takes a specific voice for me to actually give it a go and something like Jack of All Blogs. The Cowboy has got some serious bile festering in his stomach and it’s seriously great to watch him unload it onto people. Notice the trend, I follow the person, not the blog. Which is why I don’t read Engadget anymore, but we’ll talk about the best websites of 2005 in part 2.
Treehouse
Treehouse was released from the boys over at Particle Tree and I finally got an internet magazine that I could seriously get into the articles. It’s great looking package and well worth the price of admission. The topics range and you’re always going to gain a lot more knowledge than the price of an individual copy. Here’s hoping 2006 actually produces a print version of this excellent publication.
I was planning on keeping this quiet until I’d actually done the design for it and had a few posts under my belt, but alas it’s a good way to keep the interest in the project going, but SplashPanel marks my second blog. The content is VERY specific. It’s going to be about Graphic Novels and every once in a while I might talk about other comic book specific things. I’ve been thinking about this for a while so it’s nice to get going on it. Hopefully I’ll have a design for it in the not too distant future. I know what it needs, it’s just that it will take a good long while to get EVERYTHING on there. Definitely a work in progress but I’ve got very high hopes for it. So if sequential storytelling strikes your fancy mosey on down there.
If I didn’t read Business Logs I’d have completely missed this story. Just haven’t really noticed anyone I read actually talk about it. It would seem that the story of the week is the launch some blogging/advertising/network company called Open Source Media, no scratch that, it’s actually called Pajamas Media. Whatever not terribly interested in shoddy businesses, however what made me stop and truely think was the difference between my online collaborative efforts and that of Dennis.
I guess I’ve been truely fortunate in the online collaborations and the quality of people I’ve chosen to jump with head first into these collaborations. While people still fear anyone on the internet, blogging has effectively given people a new medium to both collaborate and help each other, while at the same time truely shaft each other in a spectacular fashion.
I think the only reason I’m enjoying using the internet as much as I am right now can be attributed to the collaborations on projects with various people from around the world. The internet has put me in touch with people that share the same passions and ideas that I would otherwise have not had the chance to experience and by extension been that much poorer.
Would things not go as smoothly if money was involved? I’d really like to think that would not be the case. However I’ve been burnt several times in the past to shoddy characters (wish I did blog back in University because that would have made a terribly interesting read right about now) that I can justify people/myself for being jadded about the whole thing; and yet I’m ALWAYS looking for the next collaboration.
- Rin and Manji were both collaborative efforts and have both done me proud.
- Inksmith was announced last week, and things are going at a completely unexpected pace.
- WordPress Version 2.0 Beta was released with many elements from the work we did in the Shuttle collaboration. More news on this will come I promise.
- Codename: Sharq with Bryan isn’t flowing as we’d both like it to, but we’ll be giving it a great deal of thought in the months to come.
- Codename: BORG with Jonathan Snook is another fantastic example of two people clicking and getting on with things. Much more to come on this in the coming months.
I couldn’t have done any of these projects on my own and neither would I ever want to. I evolved greatly as a designer/coder with each project and more importantly I gained several friends along the way.
I’m not sure if this is just me, but I’ve been getting more and more frustrated with people in the real world not getting it! In this particular case it, being blogging and the internet community/world that has been building and growing for the last good few years. It’s like the general public around me is completely ignorant of everything and anything online. Still reserved to thinking that if you do anything internet related you’re considered a techy geek. Fuck that shit!
It’s a preconception based on ignorance. I know it’s harsh to use such words but it’s true. I still find it amazing when I mention the word blog and the person looks at me and doesn’t have a clue about what I’m talking about. It’s not like I’m asking them to tell me the difference between PHP and HTML or anything ‘technical’ like that. If I dare mention the internet in any capacity apart from amazon, google and hotmail I’m looked upon as I’m a dredge of society while Gmail and Firefox are effectively words I just made up.
Seriously, it’s the same shitty ignorant and stupid look I get when I mention that I read and love comics but that’s another post for another time. I guess part of the problem is that I’m in a completely different industry to the web development one and therefore we can consider these people as the general public. The thing is it’s not like I’m talking to my grandmother here who’s still in awe about the concept of the telephone, these are computer literate people, who get their news from the net, who buy stuff online, who surf and search the web EVERY single day.
It’s not all doom and gloom however, every once in a while I’ll meet someone who’s actually read the site and tell me they like it, or topics I’ve talked about here get further airtime in some conversations I have with a couple of friends. It’s a slow processes getting people to understand what the internet has to offer them apart from spam, buying shit and downloading porn.
The title of the post says it all, lots of little things I’ve got on mind I’d like to get out.
» We’ve upped the InkSmith founding contributors to a total of 10. The latest additions are the impeccable Jennifer and the sublime Becca. You all know who I’m talking about.
» Thank god this week is over. Just handed in a scheme report design for an Embassy building. I’s been a mad rush to get it sorted, what should ideally take us roughly 5 weeks or so was condensed to around 1 week. So, long hours in the office have been the order of the day. Mental note, I will only accept to do projects if I like the mechanical engineer. If they’re a dick streer the fuck away from it. Luckily I’ve been very lucky in this regard generally. The reason is simple, on long office nights that’s who you’ll be spending the most time with.
» I did one of those cool 5 Question interviews for Dave Kellam. I really love what he’s done hacking the site to fit in. Very cool stuff, going that extra step. Also pretty cool being the first of the “blue and orange” interviews.
»I’ve started wearing my scarf, just in case people where wondering when I’d give the OK to accessorize properly. Now is the time people.
I don’t want to say much about what we have planned because (to be honest) it’s still in the planning stages (so that answers everyone’s first question), however due to some confusion around the place, I think it’s prudent to address a couple of points and issues regarding InkSmith. Some common rumors making the mill.
- First of all we’re not an blogging network. Most of the people on that list are already part of a very good network already so that’s not what this site is about.
- No we’re not a boy band (although Erik looks like he belongs in one).
- Can’t be called the Sinister Six, as we’ve already added Erik Sagen and Shawn Grimes to the InkSmith team.
- Inksmith will not be a Web 2.0 company offering some really cool service with random javascript actions. It’s what you make of it.
Just so that we’re clear. It’s going to be a site focused on the blogger. It’s that simple a concept. This effectively explains why we’ve put our faces on there. What’s important here is not the site or the program running the site. It’s the person behind it. It’s the online blogging community. The plan is to take this virtual playground that we’re all in and making it slightly less electronic. Instill a bit of personality into it. I’m not interested in speaking with SpankMonkey and his ilk. Give me your name dammit, otherwise I’m not really interested in hearing what you have to say. It’s about making the blogging community less hostile to people.
Blogging has introduced me to a slew of people from around the globe, all with similar interests to me, all completely different to each other. People I would never have had a chance to talk to, I now consider my friends. There’s a barrier out there that many people don’t see. Inksmith hopefully will be a step to overcoming that barrier. Will it work? I’m trying very hard not to hype this thing up because it seems net users revel in failure, but I’m optimistic, then again I’m a natural optimist so maybe that’s just something I would say.
Just so as to discard another pre-conception, this isn’t an exclusive club. It’s got a small group of people that are going to build the framework that will hopefully benefit people but make no mistake, the true stars of the site will be the blogging community, both by being a part of the site and providing content for the site itself. So go over to the site and sign up for the newsletter.
Remember that you are an InkSmith.