Tech Life

Ok, last post on the redesign and then I’ll start writing about the Zen of Terminal windows. Four categories of notes: Disasters, Tools, Hmmmm, and Shout Outs. Let’s start with: Disasters:

The new design is officially live and in the wild. Whew. Briefly, I had four design goals going into this redesign. First, I wanted to remove the sense of linear time from the site. While this is certainly a weblog, I want to give visitors every chance to find entries/essays which were published awhile ago,… more

First, the Flickr related tag browser. It’s a mouthful and also a potential holy shit. For my second trick, I will magically take away, at least, one hour of your life. Possibly more. Click at your own risk. [4/1/05 Update]: Details regarding the Mahna Mahna video. Obviously, this is a Muppet production, but a bit… more

I need a place to hold the various holy shits I stumble upon and this is that place. If you’ve had any recent holy shits, please feel free to add as comments. As the year comes to the end, I’ll likely reflect back on the year, tidy this list up, and figure out who actually… more

There’s a Screwed Scenario that I missed. Back in my Borland days, we were working hard on Paradox for Windows. I was a QA engineer testing the database creation and modification functionality. My counterpart in engineering, Jerry, was working hard, but getting absolutely nowhere. We were mid-to-late in a 1.0 product cycle and most of… more

There’s a new version of Rands in Repose in the works. I’ve got lots to say about the whole redesign process and how it sucks every single once of creativity out of your life, but right now, I’m thinking about buying a new camera. My eye is instantly drawn to textures. I was stumbling around… more

I’ve had a copy of Edward Tufte’s Visual Display of Quantative Information sitting on my desk for years. It’s one of those rare books you pick up every nine months and just wander about… pure visual eye candy. Tufte’s content strikes such a classic note with me, I remain convinced that’s he’s dead because it’s… more

Christmas Morning, 1978. The usual mad dash from the bedroom to the Christmas tree promptly followed by the frenzied assessment of who got what and how much. Careful attention is paid to the respective weight of each present because, while quantity does matter, a heavy gift has a higher likelihood of extreme coolness and subsequent… more

The only thing more interesting about the New York Times writing about NADD or “pseudo-A.D.D.” is the fact they published the article on my birthday. I smell conspiracy. Thanks to Joe Clark for the heads up.

T-minus one day until Vegas and I’ve got some great UI for you: First up, Baby NameVoyager. Yes, it’s a baby name site, but some has put serious effort into a stunningly useful application. Go ahead and fire it up and start typing names… slowly… watch what happens… yeah, real time graphical updates based on… more