After not posting for the past several months, Jon-Michael is back and shares his new vision for writing with this article here.
There are too many good lines to quote. You ought to just read the article yourself and hopefully glean something from JM’s own resolve. It’s guys like this that make the web a better place. And you might as well add his feed to your list. You’ll be glad you did.
“In Mac OS X, you vote with your dock.” – Michael Lopp
Who doesn’t love great software? I wanted to write these reviews for two reasons: (a) I love to brag on the things I use and enjoy, and (b) perhaps you’ll find something you can spend your lunch money on.
The apps I’ll be reviewing are:
The first five are related to this site, and I thought it would make sense to “start here” and work my way “out”. The sixth app, SuperDuper!, is sort-of in a class of it’s own within the list, so I thought I’d put it in the middle.
The final three are free apps (heck, one isn’t even an application at all), but since I use them constantly I thought I would share a bit of how I use them.
(I wanted to link to Brett’s article yesterday when I read it but I couldn’t think of a reason why and I didn’t want to just quote something. But when I read Cameron’s reason for linking I realized that’s exactly why I wanted to link to it. So, with out further adieu…)
Brett’s Article is here: The Early Adopter Paradox
And Cameron Hunt said: “Good article by Brett Peters about non-techies as the best iPhone salespeople. It’s really amazing, and I’ve seen it happen as well.”
Michael Mistretta’s Review of MarsEdit on MacApper –
…MarsEdit still beats all of the online blogging solutions hands-down. With it’s strong feature-set, ability to manage multiple blogs from one dedicated app, and offline freedom, MarsEdit is an app that is completely worth it’s $29.95 pricetag, and will make any blogger more productive, more creative, and more involved with their blog.
Great minds think must think alike as I too am writing a review on MarsEdit.
I don’t know about you but I change my desktop about once a week. If I find a really good wallpaper then I might keep it for a month. Not that I have a rule about changing my wallpaper, I just like to.
To put my Cinema Display in the Christmas Spirit I’ve had 1920×1200 pixels of Kevin Cornell’s Christmas-style Desktops up all month. And speaking of which, he just put up a new one, and wow. Kevin is talented.
All this to say that thanks to Bill, I just came across these I Love Typography Desktop Wallpapers, and a few of them will be making their way into the rotation.
Give the Gift of (mt) Web Hosting.
$95 for a year of hosting on their (gs) Grid Service Lite. These guys are awesome, and this is a really good deal.
I’ve always been a John Mayer fan, and Slow Dancing in a Burning Room, from his Continuum, has been at the top of my playlist for a while.
Tom Yager on How Leopard Time Machine Works, and How it Doesn’t –
As Apple presents the Time Machine filesystem view, you can see your system approximately:
As it was at the top of each hour today.
As it was each day for the past 30 days, starting yesterday.
As it was each week, starting 31 days ago, going back as far as disk space permits.A distraught user might only be interested in the amount of data he may have lost: If you accidentally deleted a file today, you lose up to an hour’s work If you deleted it between yesterday and 30 days ago, you lose up to a day’s work If you deleted it more than 30 days ago, you can lose up to one week’s work, or all of it.
I never gave too much thought to Time Machine (I guess that’s the point?), but I assumed that when it folded the daily archives into the weekly archives it would keep all the files from the daily archives and turn them into one weekly archive.
For example: I don’t keep files on my desktop longer than a few hours usually. So say each day a file gets kept in Time Machine’s backup of my desktop folder. Then when it folds those seven days into the one weekly backup, I assumed that all seven files would be grouped together as what my desktop looked like that week. Apparently, that’s not the case.
I installed a 2nd internal HDD on my Mac Pro to act as my Time Machine backup, but other than surfing around in Time Machine I haven’t actually needed to use it.
I’m really not too concerned though. I still have my old backup strategy in place with one change: I only backup to my external FireWire drive once a week now, instead of every night.
Google Launched its iPhone Web App Today –
Today, Google announced the release of a new iPhone application that integrates its multiple services into a single interface, making it easy for iPhone users to find, use and switch between Google search, Gmail, Calendar, Reader, and more. To use the application, iPhone users simply point their web browser to http://www.google.com.
If I used Google applications more often this would be fantastic. At first glance Gmail, Reader and Calendar all have a very slick and iPhone optimized layout.
This December the ministry I work for is hosting our annual young-adult conference. Last year we had 15,000 show up to our “living room”. This year we’re expecting 20,000, and it’s an all-hands-on-deck event to say the least. Every department is working at 110% to get their end of things ready.
For the past few years I have been the stage manager. Which means I make sure weird people don’t go on stage in their underwear with “I Heart God” written on their chest. It’s times like those that having a black belt comes in handy – which is why I was chosen for the job to begin with.
But this year stage managing isn’t my only job. Since I now work for the marketing department as a print designer I have an additional role this year. I’ve dubbed it “Official Creator of All Advertisements For the Conference Magazine”. Whereby “Conference Magazine” I’m talking about a 76 page booklet called the “Communicator”. It has all the information that could possibly be interesting to any one of the 20,000 college age folks attending our 4 day conference. Things like schedules, interviews, frequently asked questions, products for sale and how to grow a chia pet.
Needless to say, the past few weeks have been busy for all of us in the marketing department as we pull together information and feedback from all the departments and try to sort it into an intelligent, cohesive product.
But it has also been challenging to me in a unique way. The 16ish pages I’m in charge of consist of the advertisements for various departments around the ministry. For instance the high school ministry is hosting a conference next summer, so they need an ad. There is a new book out that the bookstore wants to sell. A new CD. A new teaching series. Etc… Each of these products and events need special treatment and some TLC while staying within the design style guidelines. My strong distaste for the “that’ll do” status-quo has forced me to think outside the box. And I have to admit that I don’t feel I have designed at a level I feel proud of.
Having to work on several simultaneous projects all with a short deadline and strict guidelines brought me to a new realization of my poverty in creativity and imagination. Programs do not a designer make.
The creative arts are a beautiful thing. With them we can share our own emotion and draw out the emotion of others. We can impart messages of hope, love, sorrow, joy and sobriety. There is much more to design than white space, the two-thirds rule, and font selection. Those tricks and elements surely help when we’re stuck, but I know for certain that they are not what real creative design is all about. I look at the elements and standards of good design as the launching pad to what creative design is really about: Creating.