I just upgraded my work computer to Photoshop CS4 Standard. I am not a power user of Photoshop. Actually, I am just a hack, but I get alot done with it. Sort of like my jQuery skills. Before going in to the upgrade, I want to declare my pre-conceived notions. I had already assumed that…
Wow, that title was a mouthful. Ok, bottom line: It sucks. There is a term: convergence. It basically means that I could get video on my computer and watch it on my TV or mobile device. Specifically, it means giving my television (or connected devices) codecs and access to the internet. First is DirecTV. There…
There is no such thing as SaaS management software. There are bug trackers like Jira and Bugzilla. There is Agile project management software like TargetProcess or FogBugz. There is Microsoft Project. But there isn’t something I look at and say, “That would work to manage the never-ending work a SaaS startup goes through.” At least,…
Without any doubt in my mind, this is the holy grail of web development. A superDiv. I spoke with Brad Neuberg about this at AjaxExperience. He was working on possibly using the <canvas> tag to do interesting things like this. Corner.js does this pretty well for <img> tags, but not for generic divs. This is…
They all suck. How hard is this? The rules are simple. The business model is simple. People register and join a ladder. It costs a minimal amount per player, like 25 cents a month per player. Ladders have rankings for each player in the ladder. 1-n. Each player has a history of matches that can…
Also known as Baby Sandwich. This was my favorite slide from my presentation. There are ideas that become wrong over time and you have to willing to get rid of it. It could be your own code, your own ideas or positions you had previously taken. It doesn’t matter whose idea it was, if it…
At AjaxExperience, we stayed at the Boston Renaissance Hotel. It was mostly 95% pleasant, but the 5% really annoyed me. Is this nitpicking or human behavior? I definetely feel like it’s the little things that matter. Although if you screw up the big things that is bad too. In general, I had a good time and…
Remember Browser Possession? It was at the end of last years AjaxExperience. I had figured that it was a dead issue, but apparently it has come up again a few times in this years conference. I asked the Adobe guys about it and got a surprising answer. They are talking about doing it with the…
I think it went well. I had nice reviews from people afterward. So far, the conference has been fun and informative. I have met lots of new and exciting people. I love being around such brain power. It’s inspiring and exhausting. Somehow though, I feel like last years was more edgy and exciting. Some passion…
NOTE: I am not an engineer. I am very good with HTML/CSS and I love jQuery. The following is from that point of view. I was wondering what the state of RIA Frameworks were these days. Have more competitors popped up? How easy are they? As a non-engineer, I wondered if any were easy for…
I don’t think this applies to everyone, but it applies to me many times over. When I feel like I can not make “progress” I get very stressed. My mind doesn’t think as well, my body feels ill. I generally have a short temper when I am in this state. Progress is my minds digestion…
Sometimes I feel like GMail is trying to make a bad experience on purpose. Google has a counter at the bottom of the screen that tracks how much space you are using. Since I use Picasa and have thousands of photos, I purchased the annual storage upgrade. They give me about 7 or gigs of…
I have not had alot of time to think lately. Most of my “ideas” are focused on Marketo. However, my AjaxExperience presentation is due and I have not “nailed it”. I went to sleep worrying about it. I work up at 4am this morning. Mostly asleep, but this idea kept nagging me. With this idea,…
Powerpoint is a great tool for communicating, if you use it right. Most people don’t do it right. Here are a few (but not all) guidelines: Do not make people READ. It is very hard to read and listen at the same time. Do this excercise: Read and article from a magazine about a subject,…