Out with the Old
I’m preparing for what I hope will be a new phase in my life. And one of the things I need for this change is a revised online presence. I’ve experimented with various ideas and concepts. And I want to try and implement them in my life.
One of the first to feel the changes, will be my blogging. I deleted my old Blogspot blog. All the content exists on this website anyways. Also I’m planning to make this blog more into a portfolio, than just a blog straight up. The blog obviously will be accessible, just not on the front page. Also I’m thinking of doing some ExtJS magic and build a new AJAXy theme. So if the site breaks, you know what I’ve been up to.
On another note, I’m getting back to developing justCheckers into reality. And on the side playing around with the newly revived Pyzzle game engine.
Hmm… The Future Feels Clean
So do you like it? The theme on the website that is. I decided to go with a variant of light greys, royal blue-purple and amber highlights. It does have a spartan, minimalistic feel but I like it. I considered rebuilding the theme as an ExtJS or jQuery UI powered on. But honestly, this works and IMHO looks pretty good. For a theme that doesn’t use any images. I plan on tinkering with this theme as time goes on, but I think I like this theme as a base. As promised, I will go through this theme, clean things up and release it out in the open once I’m done.
Whats next on my list? Well a good chunk of work, and some partying this weekend to celebrate the coming of the end of the year. 
A Clean Future
The future is white?
Bob, the future has been white since the 60’s.
- Autotainment, Big Ideas
The future has been white for a long time, thanks to the likes of Stanley Kubrick and the folks at Apple. Thats why the theme I’m crafting for this website, is called “Clean Future”. I took the “Open Sourcerer” theme by Alan Lord, and modifying it until it suits my tastes. I’m still debating whether it will look like a glass UI or hand-drawn doodles. Maybe I’ll go all out and create a full AJAX powered UI. We’ll see. I’m sure it will remain white and light grey. And I’ll take it as far as I feel it makes sense to do so. So if anyone has any suggestions feel free to leave them in the comments below. I’ll make the modified theme available once I finish working on it.
Excuse the Dust
I apologize again for the silence earlier this week. I meant to post a few posts earlier on, but I did not get around to it.
Also you may have noticed that I’m updating this blog. In fact in general I am updating and cleaning up my “Web” presence in a big way. Hence I’m working on refreshing the look and feel of this blog. I’m plan on modifying the current theme into something I built myself. And I’ll building out my portfolio, something I should of done ages ago. Hence I’ll try to keep updating this blog frequently, but I might be a bit too busy for daily updates. Also the e-mail subscriptions ARE going way, please switch to using RSS feeds.
Of Journals and Juggling
I’ve found myself recently writing considerable amounts in my diary. I’ve had many a thought, that I felt compelled to write down. But such thoughts were fairly private in nature, so I will discuss or hint about them here. One of thought that I would like to share, is my temporary withdrawl from daily blogging. I’m trying to concentrate on writing my novel, A Collection of Shards. And I’m concentrating on reviving the comatose justCheckers project. Post daily updates to my blog just add more overhead to my day. And I’ve so precious little time and so many tasks to complete… So I’m going to take a break, and update this blog when I feel like it.
Tagged, Balanced and Categorized
I think I just hit a new milestone in my organizational efforts. I just finished tagging and categorizing the last of my blog posts. A long effort but finally done. I almost want to take a moment to step back and admire my handiwork. But unfortunately, today I’ll be heading off to party hosted by the Huddarts. So I don’t have time to stop and celebrate, at least not until tonight.
In addition I finished balancing my accounts and ledgers this morning. This could not of been possible, if I had not yesterday filed away most of my papers. The expanding file idea seems like a stroke of genius now. I can easily find everything, takes up less space and I feel organized. I managed to compress space and create time. And this all thanks to a bit of time, money and effort. My next goal will involve clearing out the junk and clutter I’ve collected over the years. With some effort, time and perhaps a bit of money I’ll finally be able to live neatly in the small room that I own.
Still this week my schedule suffered from my efforts. I have walked around sleep deprived. I put off tasks that need to finish. But at least I can safely say my long term goals and projects seem closer to realization.
OK, moment of reflection over. I need to plan for tonight. And I need to acquire breakfast. Also I need to get to those defered tasks. Maybe I can find time to move my projects forward too.
Upgraded to Wordpress 2.8
I am continually amazed by the ease of working with Wordpress. Not only do the themes and plugins just work, so does everything else. I upgraded my Wordpress install to the latest and greatest 2.8 . Simple, clean and issue-less upgrade. This is how technology should work. Get out of the way and perform the tasks the user needs to do. And perform the tasks quickly, efficiently and perfectly everytime all the time.
In addition to that, I can proudly say that less than 20% of the older blog entries remain “Uncategorized”. I plan on tagging, categorizing and editing the remaining entries. With any luck, I have this blog configured perfectly before my upcoming birthday. Hurrah!
Brief Hiatus
I’ll be taking a brief hiatus again from daily updates to this blog. I need to concentrate more of my time on writing my novel.
Looking Forward, Looking Back
I’ve blogging for a while now. This particular site and setup doesn’t suggest that I’ve been blogging since 2005. Of course nowadays, I blog more often than I did then. But the fact remains. I noticed this because when I imported my old Blogger blog to Wordpress, I did a messy job of importing my posts. Most of the tags and categories were messed up. So every so often I go into my mass of uncategorized posts, tagging, spellchecking and updating as I go along.
Looking back, I blogged about my life in the context of a university student. My struggles and triumphs as I dealt with university, computing, stress, writing, love and growing up. Some things changed since those times, some remained the same. I still enjoy blogging for all the same reasons as before. Back then I would post when inspired. Today I have to inspire and compell myself to keep posting daily entries, that are interesting, compelling, clear and worth reading. Still it has been a worthwhile journey, one that I plan to continue well into the foreseeable future.
Looking forward, I am trying to bring my blogging into the next level. Aestetically, I have set up the theme for the site in a manner that I like. To top of the site, I created and added a favicon yesterday. Also I continue with my re-organization of old posts. I have some 110 post to clean up. So about 65% of the posts are done. Just a few more to go.
Things That Work, Things That Don’t
As usual I like to experiment on various hacks to improve myself and enrich my life. Actually recently I have been actively trying to distract my mind from other issues. Along the way I like to record what worked and what didn’t.
Blogging on a touchscreen cellphone works as a compromise of convenience. Writing on a physical keyboard works better. I don’t end up pressing wrong letters and rewriting words. But carrying an IT strains my pocket more. And carrying a phone is far more useful. Besides the IT is still in an unusable state at the moment. Hmm… Another call looks like in order.
Microblogging works less well. It acts more like a distraction, than a useful form of communication such as an instant messenger or social network site. Besides just like Marika I prefer to blog in the long format.
Ok… I’m drawing a blank on what to write next. Oh right, keeping todos on my site works better than on the builtin PIM on the 5800. TaskFreak works really well. All I need is a syncing client for the todo list on my cell. Maybe I should write one as my first Qt project. Hmm…
Additionally, I am striving to incorporate regular exercise into my life. It helps to clear my mind and to keep me fit. In the winter, I used to play indoor volleyball. Nowadays I’ve switched over to taekwondo and soon, soccer. Exercise really does work, so long as it is packaged in the fun form of a sport.
