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2012

  • 1 min read

Amazing article about what’s going on in Syria

MarieColvin

In the Sunday Times (of London, I gather, but they don't feel the need to include that in their name) I saw this outstanding article about what's going on in Syria. (No I don't regularly read the Sunday Times, I got this through a link.

Here's a little from the article by Marie Colvin:

"Our house was hit by a rocket so 17 of us were staying in one room,” she recalls as Mimi, her three-year-old daughter, and Mohamed, her five-year-old son, cling to her abaya.

“We had had nothing but sugar and water for two days and my husband went to try to find food.” It was the last time she saw Maziad, 30, who had worked in a mobile phone repair shop. “He was torn to pieces by a mortar shell.”

For Noor, it was a double tragedy. Adnan, her 27-year-old brother, was killed at Maziad’s side. "(from The Sunday Times)

The sad postscript is that this article was Marie Colvin's last, as she was herself killed soon after in a bombing.

  • 1 min read

8 Hour Sleep is for the birds?

Do you believe that you require 8 hours of sleep to be rested and effective. Well, in this really interesting article in the BBC News it seems like that pattern might not really be the most natural. Some experiments conducted came up with some interesting findings:

In the early 1990s, psychiatrist Thomas Wehr conducted an experiment in which a group of people were plunged into darkness for 14 hours every day for a month.

"It took some time for their sleep to regulate but by the fourth week the subjects settled into a very distinct sleeping pattern. They slept first for four hours, then woke for one or two hours before falling into a second four-hour sleep.

Though sleep scientists were impressed by the study, among the general public the idea that we must sleep for eight consecutive hours persists. More recently, the theory that humans slept in two distinct chunks has resurfaced, but in the rather less likely field of history." (from The Myth of 8 hour sleep)

If you are intrigued, here's the whole article.

Though sleep scientists were impressed by the study, among the general public the idea that we must sleep for eight consecutive hours persists.

More recently, the theory that humans slept in two distinct chunks has resurfaced, but in the rather less likely field of history.

  • 1 min read

What is Pinterest good for?

Funny thing, I like many people are trying to figure out what Pinterest is good for. Well I found a use.

From yesterday's post, you saw that I am searching for a new application icon for BlogBridge. In fact I listed a series of out/crowdsource design options. What I need to do now is to provide them with design guidance, a design brief.

So as you may imagine, I've been looking around the web for icons and logos which I like because one of the best ways to tell a designer what you are looking for is to show them the stuff you like.

See where this is going?

Voila, what better use for Pinterest can you think of?

Here's my Pinterest "BlogBridge Icon Inspiration" Board

I will try to set it up so you can add an idea or two if you have any contribution. Whoops, that might be dangerous. Shall we try?

  • 1 min read

Crowdsourcing a new BlogBridge icon

Well, it's been about 5 years with the same (lovely) BlogBridge application icon and as we are redesigning the web site and releasing a major new release of the product, we thought, hey, it's time to update the icon to something, ahem, a little more modern.

In case you forgot (or never knew),here's what the BlogBridge app icon looks like today:

Blogbridge

I guess, nice, but boring, yes?

So what I am looking for is a beautiful new, 3D rendered, and meaningful application icon. Something that will look really cool in my dock (but equally on a Windows or Linux desktop.)

So far I've considered using:

So far I am liking 99designs.com the best. But if you have suggestions, please send them to me!

  • 1 min read

Lake Wobegon and Politics

Have you ever heard a politician or pundit say, with self-assurance, America is a Right of Center country. Think Newt Gingrich.

Right of Center. How do we determine the center?

Isn't this a lot like Lake Wobegon, "Where all our children are above average "?

I'm just sayin'…

  • 1 min read

RSS feed for for twitter

A simple question that for some reason does not have a simple answer:

"I want to follow someone's twitter feed using an RSS reader, where is it?"

Well it seems that for some reason Twitter has quite hidden it but as a public service I will share the results of my research with you.

You will find it at:

https://api.twitter.com/1/statuses/user_timeline.rss?screen_name=username

So, for my twitter feed it is:

<https://api.twitter.com/1/statuses/user_timeline.rss?screen_name=pitosalas>[  
](<https://api.twitter.com/1/statuses/user_timeline.rss?screen_name=pitosalas>)

Of course, users of BlogBridge have a much easier time and have many more options. With BlogBridge you can subscribe to a person, to a list, or even to a general Twitter query, like "Object Oriented Marketing".

Watch this brief video to see how you would do it in BlogBridge:

[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSo5sC3kN3Q]

  • 1 min read

MapReduce Patterns and Examples

Great review article:

"In this article I digested a number of MapReduce patterns and algorithms to give a systematic view of the different techniques that can be found in the web or scientific articles. Several practical case studies are also provided. All descriptions and code snippets use the standard Hadoop’s MapReduce model with Mappers, Reduces, Combiners, Partitioners, and sorting. This framework is depicted in the figure below." (from Highly Scalable)

Worth reading if you are interested in how Hadoop and friends might apply to the problems that you are trying to solve: "MapReduce Patterns, Algorithms, and Use Cases"

  • 1 min read

What I want to see in Spotify

As you know, I am a big big fan of Spotify. Lately I've been playing with the Last.FM integration. It's a handy way for me to see what new music or artists I might like to listen to. I've discovered plenty of new music that way, it's great.

What I would like is to be able to ask Spotify (or Last.FM) for a 'radio' station which plays music that I might like to hear. This feature exists but it doesn't suit me because it would jump from a raucous rock piece to a quiet jazz piece to a strange folk piece. Generally I play music based on a general mood I am in or want. Quiet Jazz in the morning and upbeat stuff (load) when I am washing dishes. You get the idea.

If you work for Spotify, what do you think?