This not according to me but moderate-liberal editorialist for the WaPo David Broder.

LINK

Seth

I do most of my blog reading using a web-based portal / feedreader called netvibes.

(For those of you who don’t know what a feedreader is, you’re truly missing out on one of the most helpful technologies out there. Simply put, RSS and feed readers allow you to read your favorite blogs and websites all in one application or web page. That way you don’t have to manually go to each site to read the most recent content. You just read it all in your feedreader. To find out more, read THIS article on RSS and THIS article on Aggregators (feed readers).)

Anyhoo, Netvibes allows me to export my list of RSS web feeds using a technology called OPML. I have done that and then re-imported the list right back into my Netvibe “Public” webpage, which you can view HERE.

My list is a good way of figuring out what interests me and who is influencing my thinking. You will, no doubt, notice that I am pretty influenced by many sources that are left of center, but you will see a few conservative influences as well. As you look at my list, let me say a few things about my TABS in netvibes.

First, I tend to read the tabs left to right. So the tabs to the left tend to be read more than the tabs on the right. The more time I have, the more likely that I will be reading the rightermost (is that a word) tabs. In fact, recently the tabs to the far right, God Blogs and Tech Stuff haven’t been read much at all.

Second, the Economics tab is very new, I just added a bunch of new sources today, mostly in deference to Steve and because I have a desire to know what the heck he is talking about.

BTW, one of the things I love about using netvibes is that they have one of the best iPhone implementations out there. Every night I lay in bed and read my feeds on my iPhone. Here are a couple of pics that shows the netvibes iPhone implementation.

So here are my questions:

• Do you have a feedreader? If so what do you use?
• Whats on your list?
• What do you wish I would add to my list?

Last year I read about an ultra-cool technology coming from Microsoft that would transform translucent tables into interactive computers that would detect PDAs and cameras and allow people to order tickets, drinks and meals. It is called Microsoft Surface computing. Check it out by clicking here. The downside of Surface computing is that it is VERY expensive.

So it was interesting to hear this week about similar technology coming out of Microsoft that was similar but VERY CHEAP. This technology will convert any flat surface into a multi-touch display. To read about it click here. Cool.

Seth

I have had several people ask how I created the video demo that was featured in my The Ultimate Budgeting Spreadsheet (free to the first 50 users) post that I did a few days ago.

I used Camtasia Studio which I purchased late last year but had not put to use yet until this week. It is an AMAZINGLY powerful tool. It does Capture (get the video), Editing (which I have not done yet but mean thing like cut crop highlight…), and production (which rolled up the whole thing into a slick flash file.)

It took MANY attempts to get the video to the last form (I wanted it to be less than 5 minutes but I could not include what I wanted in that time frame so I went with the 7 minute version). But once I got the capture that I wanted it took less than 15 minutes to produce and get it onto the website (production includes a sample web page with the proper embed codes for the video.)

Camtasia Studio is not cheap. But for people like me (planning to sell software online) it is well worth the price.

Seth

Why?…pray tell?…aren’t you using RSS to keep track of your favorite blogs. You should be. To learn about RSS and how it can save you time go to the official RSS Day website.

Seth

HT to the Desiring God blog.

For those of you that don’t know me personally…I write software applications for a living. An application I have written was briefly mentioned in a local newscast here in the upstate of SC. The article doesn’t quite get it right in terms of what the application does but it still is sorta cool to see some of your work get a fly-by mention.

Susan, interviewed for the newscast, particularly is a good friend of mine as well as a customer.

To watch the newscast click the URL mentioned below:

http://www.foxcarolina.com/video/15967368/index.html

To learn more about Loaves and Fishes Greenville click the URL below:

http://www.loavesandfishesgreenville.com/

Seth

Click here to see a list of the top 10 worst domain names posted on the blog site of Scott’s favorite hosting company.

HT to Coding Horror.

Seth

My interest in a story like this one lies in the fact that I am a software developer so I have a small understanding of the technical complexities of delivering software.

People would be shocked if they knew how many large software projects go down in flames. Delivering working software/hardware is much more difficult than you might think for a variety of reasons. It is much more difficult than building a skyscraper, for example. (This assertion is based on my belief that most skyscraper projects succeed…I might be wrong…but I have never seen/heard of a half-built skyscraper that stayed that way.)

To read a related post from my favorite technical blogger click below:

Denver/London Airports.

Seth

I am not writing this post from a browser window. No…I am using Cool Tool #2. Blog Desk is a very lightweight windows utility for posting blogs.

It loads fast and for a quick post it might be preferred to firing up your browser…going to you web site…logging in…going to the write page.

It is not perfect…for example…it doesn’t show sub-categories…so even for this post I am going to have to go in and edit the categories. And for posting with images (although I think it can be setup to do it) I think I would prefer the Wordpress Write page. (Another reason I will be editing this post after posting.) But, those conditions notwithstanding, it is a good tool for short, quick posting of ideas that pop into you head…I have enjoyed using it.

To download it click here.

Click the image below to see a screen shot:

Seth

UPDATE - Today’s competition was the regional one and below I have marked how they did.
They were competing at the 7th - 8th grade level.
Hint - Every website won!!

Of my kids. No. Not my real kids. Although I am very proud of all five of them because they are, without exception, AWESOME KIDS.

But in this case I am talking about the kids I have been working with at the local middle school wherein I have been volunteering to teach web design for the last few years.

Tomorrow they will be going to their regional technology competition, where the will be competing in web design, robotics, programming, and General Applications. Here are some links. One of the requirements I made for the kids is that the look, feel and formatting for their sites use something called CSS (Cascading Style Sheets). Thats a lot harder than the older kind of web pages. All of them met my requirement. Plus they wrote the content and used other applications and tools such as The GIMP, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Flash.

Today I did a final review of their work and all I have to say is . . .
WOW!! Check out the links below and tell me they won’t win.

HONORABLE MENTION — FOOD - This is a team site using almost all AJAX. In other words, very sophisticated using the cutting edge technology used by Google, Yahoo and other big web companies to make fast and interactive web pages for building web-based applications. It has a random fact generator (Did You Know?) As well as an quizlet tool. The hard-core technical stuff here was all done by a 14 year old.

HONORABLE MENTION — ALTERNATIVE ENERGY - This is a team site that makes extensive use of another technology called Flash. Its only the most commonly used 3rd party add-on for websites to make them interactive and, well, “flashy”. For example, every time you watch a video on YouTube, you are using Flash. This site also has great content and is Standards Compliant. Impressive!

FIRST PLACE — HUMAN TRAFFICKING - This is a team site. Standards Compliant (Click on the two W3C images at the bottom of the home page).Great use of Flash (The Header. Plus see what happens when you click on the “Where is it Link”). Random Fact box. Great Content. WOW!

FIRST PLACE — DANCE - This is an individual site on Dance. Simple but very nicely done. With good use of CSS.

THIRD PLACE — ANCIENT EGYPT - This is an individual site that makes good use of CSS. and has a nice layout.

I will update this post when we have the results of their competetion.

Scott

I loved this post from one my all-time-favorite technical writers:

Martian Headsets

Very interesting read.

Seth

I have been trying to think up topics that I can do (mostly) quick and dirty posts on and yet still be useful. In that spirit I will be doing a Cool Tools series.

Cool Tools are tools that I use everyday (and that I would hate to do without). Mostly they are small utility software packages but I plan to include one hardware tool and a couple of larger softwares in the series..

COOL TOOL # 1 - Notepad++
If you are like me you use a text editor like Notepad (NP) (ships with Windows) all the time.

In fact, I would say my usage of a text editor is all day every day:

• Need to jot a quick note - fire up NP.
• Need a place to paste that text that you might need in a few minutes - fire up NP.
• Need to take notes on your work day - record your work details - fire up NP.
• Need to copy that code snippet from the web for later use - fire up NP.
• Need a place that will strip out all of the formatting from that web page or word document that’s on your clipboard - NP.
• Need a place to copy your difficult to guess password until you are sure it is safely stored in Roboform (a future cool tool) - NP.

For me, a text editor is an essential tool for my daily workflow.

But notepad (the text editor that ships with windows) is completely lame-o-stupid-oplis. In fact, the only good thing about it is that it is light-weight and fast.

ENTER Notepad++. Notepad++, too, is fast and lightweight but is loaded with tons of other useful features that are lacking in the windows version like:

• Tabbed documents. Not only can you open as many text windows as you like, but they will automatically reload whenever you restart Notepad++
• Automatic line-numbers
• Line Markers (Bookmarks) that you can mark for easy finding later.
• Excellent search and replace
• Language selection with automatic formatting. This feature allows you to tell Notepad++ what kind of text document you are currently using and it will format the text for easier reading.
• Excellent search and replace.
• A whole lot more - there are a lot of powerful features that I don’t even use.

So just run on over to Notepad-Replacements-R-Us and get yourself one of them FREE powerful text editors.

Oh yeah…did I mention it’s free.

Below is a screen shot…click on it to see more.

Seth

In a (not-so) secret laboratory in his basement, Thiago Olson has created a small nuclear fusion reactor,. Nuclear Fusion is the kind of energy technology that powers the sun and many people have high hopes that if fusion energy can be harnessed on a large scale that it could provide abundant and clean energy for the world and end our dependence on fossil fuels.

Also in the news today: France has won a bid to build the first large-scale experimental fusion reactor in the world. It is expected to cost more than $15 billion.

Photo Copyright © 2006 Detroit Free Press Inc.

PC World has collected a bunch of old vidoes off of YouTube and compiled them together into a history of PCs, as seen through commercials. It is really fascinating and you at least have to check out the 1984 Apple commercial. I remember seeing that the first time the ad ran during the superbowl.

CHECK IT OUT

Scott

*******UPDATED*******

Yahoo is launching a new video service that will compete with YouTube (with an emphasis an higher-quality video).

Here is a video made by Bono on his U2 bandmate, The Edge.

A Day in the life of the Edge, by Bono - Part 1

A Day in the life of the Edge, by Bono - Part 2

A Day in the life of the Edge, by Bono - Part 3