Avast, ’tis that glorious time o’ year again me hearties – Talk Like A Pirate Day. So put down yer coffee ‘n raise th’ bottle o’ rum as ye find some ships t’ raid ‘n villages t’ plunder, damn yer cursed eyes!
Archives for September 2007
Links from Ma.gnolia for Sep 13 to Sep 16
Some new widgets for the WordPress MyDashboard plugin.
Tags: wordpress, plugin, mydashboard, widgets
The Elements of JavaScript Style
“I have been at Yahoo for two years. One of the first things I did when I got there was to do a View Source of the front page. That gave me a lot of visibility into how things were done. I also saw some things to improve. That inspired me to write the first two chapters of The Elements of JavaScript Style.”
Tags: web development, javascript
Matchbook Museum
“I’ve selected the best for their graphic design, historical value, or the sad tale you can infer by holding them between thumb and finger and listening closely.”
Tags: design inspiration, design, inspiration, show sarah
Vinyl junkies, show us your records!
A wonderful photo pool on Flickr.
Tags: covers, record covers, lp, ep, vinyl, disc, design, show sarah
A Reminder – QuickSilver Style
So, I ran across a little QuickSilver tip which may be old news for the QS power users, but was new to me: QuickSilver is a a great timer for reminders. So, say you need to call someone in 30 minutes, but you don’t want to have to keep monitoring the clock as you are working on a project, writing e-mails etc. You could use a dashboard widget, or a kitchen timer, but why not use QuickSilver? It’s pretty damned easy:
- Open QuickSilver (cmd-space) and type a period (.) to open the QS text box
- Type your message (Call the restaurant to confirm tonight’s reservation) and hit the tab key to move to the commands pane
- The first option is to display as large text, make sure its highlighted and hit ctrl-enterto save that command to be used in conjunction with the next command:
- Choose ‘Run after Delay’ or ‘Run at Time’
- To have your message appear on screen in half an hour, type ’30m’ (30 minutes) in the box and hit enter.
It take about five seconds to do, and in half an hour, you’ll see a large box reminding you to “Call the restaurant to confirm tonight’s reservation”. Give it a shot, it’s a very useful feature! You can of course use other time options, seconds, hours etc.
Thanks to David Hayes for publishing the tip on his site, where I stumbled across it.
Links from Ma.gnolia for Sep 10 to Sep 13
“Acorn is a new image editor built with one goal in mind – simplicity. Fast, easy, and fluid, Acorn provides the options you’ll need without any overhead. Acorn feels right, and won’t drain your bank account.”
Tags: web design, design, os x, aplication
Comparison of web application frameworks
A large table comparing the features in different Web app frameworks.
Tags: web development, php, ruby on rails, ror, java, python, django, cake
Photoshop Secret Shortcuts
“30 secret Photoshop shortcuts that I’ve learned from years of experience. Well, what I mean by “secret” is that these shortcuts are not documented in the menus.”
Tags: photoshop, design, web design, show sarah
bubbl.us
“Bubbl.us is a simple and free web application that lets you brainstorm online.”
Tags: web application, brainstorming, mind mapping, outlining, share
Processing
“Processing is an open source programming language and environment for people who want to program images, animation, and interactions. It is used by students, artists, designers, researchers, and hobbyists for learning, prototyping, and production. It is created to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context and to serve as a software sketchbook and professional production tool. Processing is developed by artists and designers as an alternative to proprietary software tools in the same domain.”
Tags: programming, design
Styling File Inputs with CSS and the DOM
“File inputs () are the bane of beautiful form design. No rendering engine provides the granular control over their presentation designers desire. This simple, three-part progressive enhancement provides the markup, CSS, and JavaScript to address the long-standing irritation.”
Tags: web design, forms, html, javascript, css
Technorati Topics: Politics
Technorati’s constantly updating stream of political stories from the blogosphere.
Tags: politics, presedential politics, elections, united states, u.s., government
Beef Satay with Spicy Peanut Dipping Sauce
“Food on a stick = happiness.”
Tags: recipes, cooking, food and wine, beef
Green Chili with Pork (Chili Verde)
“My version started out as a stew/soup, which was great, but when simmered slowly for a few more hours it became an outrageously good burrito filling or topping for a burrito, or whatever else you want it to be. Perhaps a filling for enchiladas?”
Tags: recipes, cooking, food and wine, pork
Grilled Basil Shrimp with Raspberry-Chipotle Dipping Sauce
“Sweet at first, but then a substantial kick on the back of the tongue makes it quite addicting.”
Tags: recipe, barbecue and grilling, grilling, food and drink, shrimp
Basil Garlic fries
A tasty looking recipe for garlic parmesan fries.
Tags: recipes, cooking, food and wine, potatoes
Meatspace: Formally Yours
This is the third entry in this series, in addition to the overview, I’ve written an entry on informal meetings, covering the more relaxed gatherings that can, and should happen amongst your members between the formal meetings.
One of the most important ways to maintain and expand your group is to set and stick to consistent meeting times and locations. Regular meetings ensure that everyone has a chance to plan ahead. A regular meeting time and place makes it easier for your members to arrange for babysitters, avoid making conflicting plans, and in general remember the event. It also makes life much easier for the planners, as there is time to choose a topic, presenter(s) and verify the location reservation.
Anticipation = Participation
By planning ahead you can broadcast future topics and play up the presentations and discussions, generating excitement within your group, and hopefully driving your members to spread the word to their friends and colleagues who may not be aware of the group.
Location Location Location
There are several important factors that come into play when choosing a venue for your gatherings. Here are some things you should keep in mind when looking for a venue:
- The size of the group that will attend, which impacts the amount of:
- Seating – remember to calculate for people bringing computers!
- Parking
- A central location, that is easy for the majority of users to reach via the major modes of transportation in your city (highways, subways, canals etc.)
- The facilities:
- A WiFi connection
- A projector and screen
- Ample seating, with table space for laptops
- A room quiet enough for the presenter to be heard, and separate from the rest of the location’s clientèle
Home is Where You Hang Your Hat
The ideal location is one that you can use for sevaral meetings in a row. In this case laziness is a good thing. By not moving it every month or two, everyone knows where you’ll be come meeting day, so they don’t have to scramble at the last minute, looking for an old e-mail , or even worse, start on their way, realize they don’t know where the meeting is and opt to go home. It happens. It happens far too easily.
A Little Planning Goes a Long Way
While that’s a bit trite, the saying rings oh so true when you are building and planning for a group. Take a bit of time up front, and you’ll find that your group will grow much more quickly, and predictably. Keep an eye out for what works and doesn’t. If you move to a new location and see a major drop in attendance for two or three meetings in a row, step back and think about what changed, and whether you should rethink your location choice.
And remember, the group should be fun for you and your members. You will have to do some work, but it pays big dividends. As always, if you have questions, suggestions or critiques, just let me know in the comments or the contact form!
Links from Ma.gnolia for Sep 07 to Sep 10
“The name Anivers –as you might have guessed– is derived from the word anniversary. Anivers celebrates the anniversary of Smashing Magazine.” An interesting free font
Tags: fonts, design, web design
Offsprung: Your life didn’t end when you became a parent.
“A humor magazine! And community! About parenting! On the Internet! Offsprung is all these things, and so many more. “
Amazon’s Redesign
Amazon provides some details on their new design, which has a substantially different navigation structure; gone are the top tabs.
Tags: web design, amazon.com