secretGeek.net

Standarditis

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I have a sickness....

Why do I enjoy reading standards documents so much?

I was just reading the rss 2.0 specification and I loved this bit so much I had to read it out loud:

 It specifies a web service that supports the rssCloud interface which can be implemented in HTTP-POST, XML-RPC or SOAP 1.1. 

It's better than poetry. Shoot me now.

Sidenote: I think the reason why there as so many arguments around RSS standards is precisely because RSS relates to 'social' software. There's some kind of governing principle that you can't create social software without opening the flood gates to anti-social behaviour (e.g. spam, comment-spam, standards arguments). 'More communication' also means 'more bad communication'. The most eloquent expression of this effect comes from Douglas Adams (in Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy), writing about the invention of the Babel-Fish:

 Meanwhile, the poor Babel fish, by effectively removing all barriers to communication between different races and cultures, has caused more and bloodier wars than anything else in the history of creation.  

R.I.P, Doug :-(
 

A short note about Albert Einstein

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Final thought for the day, taken from the book "Creative Intelligence"

"Einstein went so far as to use one type of soap for everything so that he could focus his energies on more important matters."

Umm? Way to go, Einstein.

Yes. Must remember this piece of trivia for my planned encyclopaedic tome, "Bathing Habits of the Great Thinkers."
 

All the software's a stage

color, food, it industry,

Good showmanship is one part of profitable software. As Shakespeare first said:

All the software's a stage

Taking the metaphor further, here's how the roles are mapped between theatre and software.

Theatre = Software
Actors and Play = Software and System
Audience = User
Script writer = Coder
Director ="Architect"
Lighting, Costume, Make up artists = Graphic and Interface designers
Producer = Employer or Manager
Promoter = Salesperson
Rotten tomatoes = Abusive email
Clapping, cheering, flowers = Silence.

To stretch the metaphor a little further...

  • A coder who doesn't 'dogfood' their own software is like a scriptwriter who doesn't watch the rehearsals.

  • A software-salesguy who misunderstands the software is like a promoter who bills a romantic comedy as an action adventure, or who says that a big budget sci-fi thriller will be a funny and rewarding musical drama.

     

    • Company-Wide Memo

    coffee, it industry,

    There will be some changes over the coming weeks.

    According to a business consultant, this company lacks vision.

    Hence, starting now we'll be topping up the coffee pot with liquid LSD.

    The new corporate vision should be a strong one.
     

    A favelet, an email, a web service

    australia, html, it industry, tools,

    Coolest thing I've seen all week

    A DHTML 'favelet' that lets you float over a webpage and find out what html is behind each screen element.

    http://slayeroffice.com/?c=/content/tools/suite.html

    Funniest corporate email I've seen today

    A friend forwarded me this gem from his workplace (name withheld)

        From: (Name Withheld)
        To: (the entire company)
        Subject: One of our our core values, namely MUTUAL RESPECT could be demonstrated by not cancelling other peoples print jobs part way through! Thank you!

    Afternoon of fun with web services!

    I'm digging the australian business number web services. Useful for validating ABN's. Info available at their web site
     

    The 3rd of the month -- Hey! it's backup day!

    blog,

    Did you backup your home computer today? Did you?

    Probably not. And I hope you wake up tomorrow to find that:

    1. Your hard drive is dead
    2. You've accidentally wiped important documents
    3. A virus has damaged your operating system
    4. Your computer has been stolen
    5. Your house has burnt down
      6. AND
    6. A lightning-strike has destroyed your hard drive

    Regarding the lightning-strike possibility: don't snigger. It happened to my parents about two years ago, along with several other houses around them. Computers, microwaves, televisions: all sorts of things were destroyed. Naturally there were no backups.

    If you're the geek in your family (and I know that you are) then you have an obligation to use your geekery for good instead of evil.

    The third of the month is the day when you back up your home PC -- and you insist that your family and friends back up their's as well.

    backups backups backups

    So how do you actually do one of these?

    I think there are two types. Type one is a 'complete' backup, an image of your hard drive. This is impractical and unneccessary for most home users, so I'll ignore it. Type two, which is relevant here, is to backup your most valuable information. A stepped list is provided below.

    1. Work out what to backup
    2. Schedule it! (once a month is good!)
    3. So back it up already
    4. Mark your back ups
    5. Take it off site!
    6. Automate what you can

    On the 3rd of October I might solicit more details about how to achieve each of these steps. People who read this blog are cluey enough to perform a backup and take it off-site.

    Don't overcomplicate it. Just get on with it.

    Best of Luck!
     

    What is a geek?

    amazon, commandline,
       A geek, of course, is a man who lies in a cage on a bed of filthy straw in a carnival freak-show and bites the heads off live chickens and makes subhuman noises, and is billed as having been raised by wild animals in the jungles of Borneo. He has sunk as low as a human being can sink...   

    from "JailBird" by Kurt Vonnegut.

    Vonnegut is great, but he's a bit hit and miss. This book, JailBird, is one of the good ones.

    Slaughterhouse Five, his book about time travel and what happened to him during the bombing of Dresden, is possibly the best novel yet written.
     

    Looking for a gmail invite?

    blog, google,

    This guy might be nice enough to give you one. And Rory was all over the situation earlier today.

    I gave away what I had, but may get more later. If you leave your name and email address (in some spam-proof form) in the comments here I'll invite you if I get the chance.
     

    So you've got GMail

    apple, blog, google, hanselman, toolbar, tools, UX,
    Things you need to do:
    • Try out the features
      • "new mail" is achieved via "Compose" in the top left of the screen.
      • "Address book" is available via "Contacts" in the top right of the screen.

    Hungry for more utilities? Look at:

    Mac OSX user?

    "gCount is a menu bar and/or Dock item that displays the unread status of the inbox ..."