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Trim the fat, cut the crap
Mar. 25th, 2009 11:01 amYesterday's NSLS Leadership Training Day went well, even if I was having unexpected technical difficulties-- I learned from the Orientation what to plug in where and what to click, but when the audio mysteriously didn't work despite that, it took a good 15 minutes of button-pushing (randomly) to figure out THE EQUIPMENT RACK needed to be turned on in order for the stupid 3.5mm jack to be active! Dur-hur-hur. (I can be such a dummy with hardware, seriously.)
I also didn't finish my time planner for the video-- an hour-and-a-half long, LQ *.rm file (seriously!) that I had to squeeze into a 2-hour session (plus time for filling in worksheets and discussing the contents of those sheets with fellow NSLS members). Good thing the LTD is getting revised for next semester/year....
Also, I've been playing with my MacHeist bundle options, and so far:
* I LOVE EventBox. It's not that great for RSS feeds that are image-heavy-- that is, it sucks for LiveJournal, but it's great for Twitter updates, Facebook updates, and RSS feeds like Apple Hot News, Scholarship Points, and other simple text-only updates. Like Chris Pirillo said in yesterday's Reveal Screencast though, I do wish it did more. In the meantime, I'll keep NetNewsWire around for LiveJournal feed updates, even if I only check it once in a blue moon. Shame on me. :P I also wish you could have more than one Twitter account configured in it, but... meh!
ETA: There was a bug in the MH EventBox that caused Tweets and other updates to be dated incorrectly and then not update at all. It's been fixed on the EventBox Twitter, so heisters can download that, and I'm sure it'll eventually be up at the MacHeist site, too. But the catch is that for future updates, including all those great features like multiple account support (and maybe auto-fill? And confirmation of post? And deletion from the client?), you have to BUY the app. Well, I like it so far, so I might. But anyway, onward!
* I played one level in World of Goo and I think it's awesome. Great graphics, fun concept, interesting "puzzles." I'm looking forward to having the time (someday) to get to the other levels....
* I want to compare iSale to GarageSale, the two eBay auction-creating programs for the Mac. They're both PRETTY, but when it comes to which one produces genuinely eye-catching auctions that result in more bids? We'll see. I used GarageSale to make the auction for the ring Ryan,![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
fountain_the's brother, was trying to sell, and no luck, even though I shelled out $16 in fees to make the auction listing highlighted, featured, and everything. Of course, it could be the pricetag on the item itself, but we can only test that theory with further experimentation.
* Espresso (not Acorn; whoops-- Acorn is another photo editor, like Picturesque; why we have two of them in the bundle is beyond me... maybe it's because Acorn can work with other images too, but Picturesque focuses on... pictures/photos?) looks interesting, if only because it looks more intuitive than KompoZer, which is what I have to use for the RPGClassics Star Ocean: Till The End of Time shrine (ah, yet another project dangling). Finding a website creator (not necessarily a WYSIWYG one like Dreamweaver or FrontPage, though) that produces clean code is a pretty tall order, in fact, and it'll be good to know if Acorn can do that. It's especially awesome that it's got FTP built in, which is a MAJOR sell point for me.
* I want to start using LittleSnapper right away to either make tutorials for website navigation easy (see: myNorthridge portal, LiveJournal) or to simply do full-page screenshots of my old website layouts and gather them in a gallery.
Speaking of a gallery, I'm thinking of adding Coppermine Gallery to my eFiction installs (epiphany for my own stuff, and Dragonfayth for the Seto x Anzu stuff). This might prove to be a handy way of including fanart on the Seventh-Star.Net sites without worrying about theft or a lack of a crediting system. Still, some of the PHP scripts (eFiction and MediaWiki, to be precise) have been acting wonky on my server, so I don't know when this'll be feasible.
In school-related news, the Daily Sundial has started to go downhill-- a very steep hill, perhaps like the one Coit Tower sits on in San Francisco. Or Balboa Street between 22nd and 24th Avenues. I've thought so for a while, but seeing two measly eight-page issues two days in a row finally got to me. Also the quite repetitive indication that the copy editors there either have no idea what they're doing or they're high when they're doing it. Normally this kind of thing would make me want to charge in, guns blazing, and revamp the place, but I had a decent run with Sundial while it lasted-- and while it was good. If the Sundial wants to be seen seriously as a major campus newspaper as it once was, the whole staff, from publisher to cub reporters-- need to be in on it.
Now that I've become a Twitter addict (my username is the_sweet on there too; come follow me!), I think it's stupid that the Sundial DOESN'T have one. It'd be so easy to set up, and it was actually Ezra's Twitter for SCENE magazine that got me thinking I should get one (and Fred's nagging that I should update it more often). Why can't different members of the Journalism department learn from one another?
Actually, what had me writing this post in the first place was the fact that A.S. (Associated Students, a.k.a our student government here at Cal State Northridge) has flubbed up elections again. The Sundial says this is the fourth year in a row, and I believe them. There have been problems with elections EVERY SINGLE YEAR I have been here. Another example of an organization not learning. This year the problem was that a person running for a particular slate for my own college, the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media, and Communication, got left out of the ballot, even though he registered on time and was campaigning and everything. That means that regardless of who I voted for today, my vote for the seats for my college (which is a BIG college, needless to say) is nullified. That sucks in and of itself, but it also sucks that the guy's name was left out of the ballot. Honestly, the only ways students hear about who is running for what is the booklet (an honest improvement from past years' elections, I must say; we never had that kind of resource in the past) and the names on the ballot. The campaigning signs that are plastered all over campus aren't allowed within a certain distance of the polling stations (as it should be), so unless someone bothered to read those signs, take note of the names (or memorize them, which is hard enough with so many seats open and people running), and bring their notes with them to the polling station, people aren't going to vote for someone who's write-in or left off the ballot.
I liked the online elections a LOT better, but they crashed the server and I guess that was a sobering enough of an experience for them to never want to try again. Why can't they hire someone to be a full-time manager for the AS site whose big project of the year would be the elections? And make sure they have a robust server that can handle a ton of bandwidth overload? Or heck, they could pay $19.95 a month to get a premium SurveyMonkey site and just outsource it to them!
Side Note: WireTap Studio just got unlocked for MacHeisters! Whether you already bought your bundle or are just thinking about it, grab it now! Extra apps for helping charities!
Anyway, it's just about time for my biology class, so TTFN!
I also didn't finish my time planner for the video-- an hour-and-a-half long, LQ *.rm file (seriously!) that I had to squeeze into a 2-hour session (plus time for filling in worksheets and discussing the contents of those sheets with fellow NSLS members). Good thing the LTD is getting revised for next semester/year....
Also, I've been playing with my MacHeist bundle options, and so far:
* I LOVE EventBox. It's not that great for RSS feeds that are image-heavy-- that is, it sucks for LiveJournal, but it's great for Twitter updates, Facebook updates, and RSS feeds like Apple Hot News, Scholarship Points, and other simple text-only updates. Like Chris Pirillo said in yesterday's Reveal Screencast though, I do wish it did more. In the meantime, I'll keep NetNewsWire around for LiveJournal feed updates, even if I only check it once in a blue moon. Shame on me. :P I also wish you could have more than one Twitter account configured in it, but... meh!
ETA: There was a bug in the MH EventBox that caused Tweets and other updates to be dated incorrectly and then not update at all. It's been fixed on the EventBox Twitter, so heisters can download that, and I'm sure it'll eventually be up at the MacHeist site, too. But the catch is that for future updates, including all those great features like multiple account support (and maybe auto-fill? And confirmation of post? And deletion from the client?), you have to BUY the app. Well, I like it so far, so I might. But anyway, onward!
* I played one level in World of Goo and I think it's awesome. Great graphics, fun concept, interesting "puzzles." I'm looking forward to having the time (someday) to get to the other levels....
* I want to compare iSale to GarageSale, the two eBay auction-creating programs for the Mac. They're both PRETTY, but when it comes to which one produces genuinely eye-catching auctions that result in more bids? We'll see. I used GarageSale to make the auction for the ring Ryan,
fountain_the's brother, was trying to sell, and no luck, even though I shelled out $16 in fees to make the auction listing highlighted, featured, and everything. Of course, it could be the pricetag on the item itself, but we can only test that theory with further experimentation.* Espresso (not Acorn; whoops-- Acorn is another photo editor, like Picturesque; why we have two of them in the bundle is beyond me... maybe it's because Acorn can work with other images too, but Picturesque focuses on... pictures/photos?) looks interesting, if only because it looks more intuitive than KompoZer, which is what I have to use for the RPGClassics Star Ocean: Till The End of Time shrine (ah, yet another project dangling). Finding a website creator (not necessarily a WYSIWYG one like Dreamweaver or FrontPage, though) that produces clean code is a pretty tall order, in fact, and it'll be good to know if Acorn can do that. It's especially awesome that it's got FTP built in, which is a MAJOR sell point for me.
* I want to start using LittleSnapper right away to either make tutorials for website navigation easy (see: myNorthridge portal, LiveJournal) or to simply do full-page screenshots of my old website layouts and gather them in a gallery.
Speaking of a gallery, I'm thinking of adding Coppermine Gallery to my eFiction installs (epiphany for my own stuff, and Dragonfayth for the Seto x Anzu stuff). This might prove to be a handy way of including fanart on the Seventh-Star.Net sites without worrying about theft or a lack of a crediting system. Still, some of the PHP scripts (eFiction and MediaWiki, to be precise) have been acting wonky on my server, so I don't know when this'll be feasible.
In school-related news, the Daily Sundial has started to go downhill-- a very steep hill, perhaps like the one Coit Tower sits on in San Francisco. Or Balboa Street between 22nd and 24th Avenues. I've thought so for a while, but seeing two measly eight-page issues two days in a row finally got to me. Also the quite repetitive indication that the copy editors there either have no idea what they're doing or they're high when they're doing it. Normally this kind of thing would make me want to charge in, guns blazing, and revamp the place, but I had a decent run with Sundial while it lasted-- and while it was good. If the Sundial wants to be seen seriously as a major campus newspaper as it once was, the whole staff, from publisher to cub reporters-- need to be in on it.
Now that I've become a Twitter addict (my username is the_sweet on there too; come follow me!), I think it's stupid that the Sundial DOESN'T have one. It'd be so easy to set up, and it was actually Ezra's Twitter for SCENE magazine that got me thinking I should get one (and Fred's nagging that I should update it more often). Why can't different members of the Journalism department learn from one another?
Actually, what had me writing this post in the first place was the fact that A.S. (Associated Students, a.k.a our student government here at Cal State Northridge) has flubbed up elections again. The Sundial says this is the fourth year in a row, and I believe them. There have been problems with elections EVERY SINGLE YEAR I have been here. Another example of an organization not learning. This year the problem was that a person running for a particular slate for my own college, the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media, and Communication, got left out of the ballot, even though he registered on time and was campaigning and everything. That means that regardless of who I voted for today, my vote for the seats for my college (which is a BIG college, needless to say) is nullified. That sucks in and of itself, but it also sucks that the guy's name was left out of the ballot. Honestly, the only ways students hear about who is running for what is the booklet (an honest improvement from past years' elections, I must say; we never had that kind of resource in the past) and the names on the ballot. The campaigning signs that are plastered all over campus aren't allowed within a certain distance of the polling stations (as it should be), so unless someone bothered to read those signs, take note of the names (or memorize them, which is hard enough with so many seats open and people running), and bring their notes with them to the polling station, people aren't going to vote for someone who's write-in or left off the ballot.
I liked the online elections a LOT better, but they crashed the server and I guess that was a sobering enough of an experience for them to never want to try again. Why can't they hire someone to be a full-time manager for the AS site whose big project of the year would be the elections? And make sure they have a robust server that can handle a ton of bandwidth overload? Or heck, they could pay $19.95 a month to get a premium SurveyMonkey site and just outsource it to them!
Side Note: WireTap Studio just got unlocked for MacHeisters! Whether you already bought your bundle or are just thinking about it, grab it now! Extra apps for helping charities!
Anyway, it's just about time for my biology class, so TTFN!
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