I always seem to have half-a-dozen ideas for articles floating around in my head. I usally leave them up there until one sparks, and I get a good idea of how to start the article.

The “spark” for my previous article, The Journey, actually came to me about 15 mintues after surgery: Wisdom tooth extraction. I had the dentist put me under, and afterwards — as my wife was driving me home, and while I was still extremely loopy — the spark came. I grabbed my iPhone and thumbed out the idea I had for a weblog article about the feel of an application which later turned into what you read last week.

For fun, I thought I would share verbatim the notes I thumbed out, typos included:

On feel. Its not just about the end result. Its also about the process and experience. Maybe an app does have a few less features than another but if my extra time spent to make up for those missing features is enjoyable then maybe its time well spent and mayebe the other app with with all those features is robbing me instead if helping me.

Nerds are suckers for information. And the really gargantuan nerds love to find out information about other nerd’s nerdery.

For example: One of my favorite set of posts on Glenn Wolsey’s site are his Famous Mac User Setups. Paul’s recent article on the behind the scenes info for PSTAM.com was a great read. Point being: I am a gargantuan nerd.

Therefore, for your own nerdery: Here are the ins and outs of how ShawnBlanc.net is maintained and published.

Mac Setup and Workspace

Having my home office and workspace set up in a way that helps me relax, think and work has taken a while to figure out. My office is my favorite room. It is so much more than just “where I work”. It’s my room. My wife gets the rest of the house – I get the office. And I am content with this arrangement.

Here is where I sit to code and publish ShawnBlanc.net –

My primary machine is a Mac Pro Quad-Core 3.0GHz with 4GB of RAM, 750GB of storage and a 23″ ACD. Since the above picture was taken I went sans-wireless with a thin Apple keyboard and my wired Mighty Mouse.

I never fully got on board with digital GTD apps. I use a Moleskine notebook for all my ToDo lists and notes. Basically I just want something I can write down a todo and the cross it off when it’s done.

The desk, lamp and wall shelves are from IKEA, and I think the desk and shelves totally make the room. I have that lamp on virtually all day long. Something about shining light onto my workspace helps me feel creative and motivated. And even though you don’t care: I just replaced the bulb today.

And yes, my desk is always that clean. When it’s not I have a hard time thinking.

When I’m not at home I have my 12″ G4 PowerBook with me. I plan to replace it with a 15″ MacBook Pro later this year. (Probably this spring when the new/refreshed MBPs announced next week at Macworld show up in Apple’s online refurbished store.)

(I wrote a full article on the elements of my office setup a while back.)

The Digital Skinny

WordPress

ShawnBlanc.net is powered by WordPress. I’ve never used another CMS, and I probably never will. I’m comfortable with WordPress, I’m familiar with how it’s built and I am extremely happy with how it performs.

As far as plugins go, I only have a few:

• Clutter-Free: I use this do hide a few un-wanted portions of the Dashboard.
• FeedBurner FeedSmith: I use this to redirect my site’s RSS feed (https://shawnblanc.net/feed) to a feedburner feed (http://feeds.feedburner.com/shawnblanc). I could easily just post all RSS links to the feedburner feed, but I like the clean look of the native feed link.
• FlickrRSS: Used to import my Flickr photo stream into my footer.
• Mobile Admin: For logging into wp-admin via my iPhone. I’ve only logged in on my iPhone a few times, as there’s not much you can conveniently do. But how am I not going to have an iPhone plugin installed?
• TwitterRSS: Used to import my Twitter status.
• Database Backup: Backing up your WordPress database is vital. You never know when your host could lose your data, or something else horrible could happen. I have a schedule set-up and get an email every day from my WP install with the latest backup as an attachment.
• WP-Mint: Automatically puts the Mint javascript into your WordPress header without the need to edit .htaccess or theme files.

(mt) Media Temple

My site is hosted on (mt) Media Temple’s (gs) Grid Server.

The (gs) Grid Server is the perfect solution for a website that gets a healthy amount of traffic with occasional heavy spikes. And the $20/month price of the (gs) is great for a guy like me who doesn’t make any revenue from his website. (I’ve thought about selling ad space in the sidebar, but haven’t pursued it at all.)

I won’t pretend that I have never had any hiccups with (mt) Media Temple’s service, but that is something you will get with any hosting provider. I feel confident that if a major traffic spike comes I won’t have any issues. In fact, my site’s performance often seems to improve when I’m linked to on TUAW or DF. Moreover, any time I’ve had to call (mt) to get some help with something they are fun, and treat me like their best friend.

Stats

I use Mint to keep track of all my site stats, and FeedBurner to publish my RSS feed and track subscription information.

I started publishing this blog on July 2nd, 2007. Currently, there are 193 posts and 0 comments. My site averages 500 unique visitors a day, 20,000 page views a month and has somewhere around 1,500 RSS subscribers.

Workflow and Publishing

When writing an article the first thing I do is get an outline for the post. My brain thinks best in 1, 2, 3…

Once I know the main points, and have an idea for the “feel” I want my article to have I start writing and try not to stop until I’m done. Then I edit a few times and publish.

Most writing used to be done with Ecto, but I have recently switched to MarsEdit.

I do all the coding for my site with Coda, and file uploads with Transmit. Additionally, all the graphics are created in Adobe Photoshop CS3.

Reading & Writing

For the most part, my online life consist of reading weblogs, publishing my ShawnBlanc.net and twittering.

I spend about 80% of my time reading, 20% of my time writing and 100% of my time twittering.

Right now I am subscribed to 70-ish websites, and that’s about my max. Most of them are weblogs with authors who produce great content and have great personalities.

I use NetNewsWire as my feed reader, but don’t read many articles in there. When I want to read someone’s article I’ll arrow-out to their website and read it there. Those words were written for their website, and there’s something about reading someone’s work in its native location.

(To see what blogs I’m reading, you can download my OPML file and import it into your feed reader.)

As you know, most of my articles are focused on design, Macintosh and the greatest invention of our time: the internet. When I am writing an article or an aside I aim to make it dynamic and narrative.

Before I left for Canada two weeks ago I began an article about my workspace. Literally entitled “The Elements of Style”. A book that has put me to sleep on more than one occasion. Probably because I read it when I’m tired – not because it’s borring. Interestingly enough I came back home to find two articles with the same title. I say this partly to qualify my title as original, and mostly to say that great minds think alike.

I have no intention to list the common elements in my design because, honestly, I don’t think I could list 5.

Instead I want to share how I’ve set up my home office.

Having my office setup in a way that helps me relax, think and work has taken a while to figure out. My home office is my favorite room. It is so much more than just “where I work”. It’s my room. My wife gets the rest of the house – I get the office. And I’m content with this arrangement.

I think that when people work at a desk in an office all day every day they become very acute to how others set up their desk and manage their workspace. Especially when those working are designers, writers and developers – who by nature of their chosen profession greatly appreciate detail and excellence.

For the first 21 years of my life I can count on one hand the times I had a clean room and a clean desk for longer than a week. My room was always dirty growing up and through college. Even when I finally would clean I wasn’t actually cleaning. I was more or less stuffing things into drawers and under the bed. (I know you know what I’m talking about.)

But over the years I’ve changed and now there are few things that delight me as much as a tidy room. So after several years of saving and thinking I finally transformed my home office into a place I look forward to spending time in. A new computer. New desk. New floors. New paint. And a great big new smile when I walk in the door.

And now to the point … there are three main elements that make up the personality of my office and the style of my workspace –

1. A Working Inbox/File System and a Place for Everything
2. A Clean Desk
3. A Good Computer

A Place For Everything

They say with a good filing system you should be able to find any piece of paper within 10 seconds. I doubt that. But I’m confident I can find something within 2 minutes.

It’s not just paper that needs a place to go – everything does. and that is surely the reason things pile up and don’t get dealt with. Back when I didn’t know where to put things they ended up just anywhere. I was too indecisive to just put a system in place. But no siree. Not anymore. A few years ago I realized it was time to just put things somewhere and keep to the pattern. It was easier than I thought and makes all the difference in the whole world to keeping a clean work space.

For me, finding a place for everything to be kept was basically a “I guess I’ll do it like this” decision. But then comes the follow through. It takes about an extra minute or two when I come home and an extra minute or two at the end of my day to make sure everything has been put away. That is very little effort I think for the huge benefit of having things out of the way and in a location that I can find them easily. And it sure beats the things-are-so-dirty-I’m-about-to-pull-my-hair-out-so-now-I’m-putting-everything-on-hold-until-I-clean-this-ginormous-mess approach.

For filing incoming papers and mail and receipts I have three inboxes above my desk. The top one is for urgent paperwork – such as bills, letters to read, and the like. Second is an inbox for not-so-urgent paperwork, and the third is a temporary storage space for current design projects I’m working on.

(See crummy picture below.)

A Clean Desk

This is the desk I had pictured in my mind all along but never knew existed. I seriously (though not literally) stumbled into it at IKEA when I was visiting Minneapolis one weekend.

What I absolutely love about this desk is the way it’s laid out. With the corner spot to hold my monitor and keyboard there is a nice empty work space on the left for me to read, write or use my PowerBook. With my old desk I had to move the keyboard and mouse over and out of the way to have space to work on anything else. Now I just swivel to the left.

Keeping my desk clean and free from clutter is a must. I have an extremely difficult time concentrating when there is unnecessary paperwork sitting around. And by keeping a clean desk it’s always ready for big projects that need to be spread out.

A Good Computer

Buying the Mac Pro as my primary work machine was a fantastic decision. Not only does this machine blow every computer I’ve ever used right out of the water, but it makes my time on the clock so much more productive. I spend about one third the time waiting on the beach ball as I used to.

And the 23″ Apple Cinema Display is awesome. In a cluttered office I could have gotten by with a cheaper, less beautiful monitor because it would have blended right in with the other random items. But on a clean desk the ACD looks amazing. Worth every penny. And we all know that a larger monitor means better productivity…

[I wrote a much more comprehensive write-up on the Mac Pro back in July when I first got it.]

Miscellaneous

• The Walls: This was my biggest decorating challenge. To each his own – and for me, finding the balance of artwork, shelving, and empty space was a massive task. Some people thought my wife did all the decorating, but no. It was me.

  I think it came out pretty well. When first painting I was weary of the color. But my sister made a good point. She said a new color of paint is like a new haircut. You’ve got to look at it for a few days before you know if you like it or not. So I went ahead and painted and the color came out great. Warm enough to make the room feel comfortable. Light enough to make the room feel bigger. And neutral enough to not interfere with my design-work.

  Something else I love are the dual wall-mounted shelves above my desk. I made sure to bolt them in there real good to avoid any renegade shelfs trying to body slam my monitor.

  The only thing I would do differently is lower that top shelf by about 3 inches. I’m only 5’8″ and it’s a bit too high of a reach for me to comfortably get things from up there.

• Lighting: A room with good lighting is a good room.I have a window. A ceiling fan and a desk lamp. One of my favorite times to work in my office is at night with nothing but the desk lamp on. It’s naturally inspiring for reading and writing.
• Comic Book Collection: I was a pretty avid collector growing up. And I still keep them available in a wooden crate.

My wife and I have been in Canada for the past week. We are with a group of 16 from the International House of Prayer doing the final regional conferences for 2007.

We were all in Winnipeg last weekend and we are now in Calgary.

Internet has been very limited and my iPhone has gotten the week off. AT&T international service prices are a joke. All my friends on Verizon paid about $9 and got their national plan turned into an international plan for the month. I would have had to pay $4 to get a slight discount on the per-minute charge. So instead, I just turned it to airplane mode and have greatly enjoyed being disconnected.

Something I have always teased my Canadian friends about is the “eh”s. But being here for the past week I’ve actually come accustomed to the phrase. It’s a freindly conversational word that invites feedback when talking.

We watched the Calgary Flames lose to the Red Wings last night at my first live NHL game. Quite a different experience from the Broncos games I grew up going to. NHL hosts a quiet and relatively un-enthusiastic crowd.

Something else that has been great about this trip is spending Canadian money. Everyone here will be happy to tell you that the Canadian dollar is now worth more than the American dollar. But spending Canadian cash feels like I’m not really spending money. It has this you’ll actually take this and give me something in return? feel.

And of course I have to mention Tim Hortons. Timmys. Timmy Hos…. A Double Double on the double please.

Usually when Christmas is over, there is always that one gift that was the highlight. Last year, for me that gift was The 17th edition of Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations.

For those unfamiliar with John Bartlett, he was a bookseller from Cambrige and in 1855 he self-published A Book of Familiar Quotations.

I use this thick, coffee-table-worthy book all the time. Most often for perusing through it and spouting our random quotes to entertain when company is visiting. But it is also quite handy for writing speeches, lectures and blog posts.

Some of my favorites to quote include Ernest Hemingway, Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Licoln and Robert Louis Stevenson.

I could not tell you what my favorite quotes are because they always seems to change based upon my mood. However, I will share with you two quotes from Benjamin Franklin. I am using these in my notes for the seminar I am teaching later on today about life vision, focus and work-ethic.

Human felicity is produced not so much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen, as by little advantages that occur every day.

and

When men are employed, they are best contented; for on the days they worked they were good-natured and cheerful, and, with the consciousness of having done a good day’s work, they spent the evening jollily; but on our idle days the were mutinous and quarrelsome.

Today I realized that to publish this website the way I want to requires much more time behind the scenes than I originally thought.

This is not because I underestimated the sleep I would lose while spending my time writing, but because I didn’t discover the kind of writing that makes me want to do more of it. The kind of writing that, in a way, actually makes me feel alive.

So I suppose this post ought to have the word “my” in the title. Put it up there in place of “the”. I used “the” to add shock value and to avoid broadcasting that this is post is really just one of those “So I had a revelation, blah blah blah” posts that I always read. What’s funny though, is that I like reading those kinds of posts. I like hearing about your growth, but in the back of my mind I feel a bit embarassed for you. As if some other guy is reading your website too and he thinks your a dork. Well, my friend, I’m fine being a dork.

Now – back to the reinvention.

I wish I had started blogging before it was popular and before you could make money doing it. I also wish that for the first six months of writing my first blog I hadn’t read anyone else’s site, so I could have discovered my own voice, my own rhythm and my own niche.

Instead I read every how to out there, and studied all the popular blogs. They all told me to publish easily scannable posts. To use the right keywords and create outstanding post titles. That may be fine for them, but to me that’s not writing. And I want to write.

Enjoyable Literature

When I write something for shawnblanc.net and hit publish, I want to then open up my homepage and read my own article. And I want to really, really enjoy it.

To accomplish this two things are required.

1. Forget all those hints, tricks and 17 bulletproof ways to build a better blog that I’ve ever read.I’ve decided to ignore all the advice about writing for my up-to-their-neck-in-RSS-feeds readers. Although I am extremely grateful for every single reader who takes the time to see what I have to say, I have no intention of catering to any sort of article length / layout / topic etiquette.

   I am writing so that one day, when you Google for something, and you stumble onto this website and you land on an old article you’ll find an old post and actually enjoy reading it.

2. Throw that posting rhythm out the window.If I don’t have anything to say then I won’t say it. When I do have something to say I’m OK with not posting for a few days so I can instead publish something worth reading.

I think we all need to re-discover the nobility and power of hitting that publish button.

It’s okay to have a Link List

Link posts are a part of the internet now. I’ve heard the gurus say we have to find the cool original content and be the first to link to it if we want readers.

Well why can’t overlapping link listing draw people into a tighter community instead making everyone’s blog into a who beats who contest?

If you link to something that I link to that was already on Digg … well?

How about if instead of trying to be one of a kind we tried to be ourselves. If something caught your attention then share it. It’s your website isn’t it?

(Truth be told there’s many times I come accross something interesting but don’t link to it because I figure it’s just redundant.)

Oh, and one more thing.

Staying up until 1:30 in the morning to write an article on writing better has got to be a tremendously horrible idea. Put it up there next to the ‘peanut butter, jelly and croutons all together in a squeeze bottle’ idea.

Like most of you, I spend the majority of my day on my laptop or in my office. I thought I would catalog a few random moments from my day using screenshots. Enjoy.
Continue reading “Random Screenshots From My Day” →

Anna and I recently painted our house. I spent 65 hours on an extension ladder operating a power washer and paint sprayer – though not at the same time. It was a lot of work, and cost a very pretty penny. But we’re done now and it looks much better than before.

A guy down the street recently painted his house also. He probably spent 150 hours on an extension ladder though because he scraped and rolled. Yet the color he chose someone else is going to have to paint over as soon as they move in: Neon Lime Green.