Tag Archive for 'rss'

Relient K and Shutdown Day? More like… Shutdown 1.5 Days

Published
by
jk
on March 24, 2007
in Site News
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Chicago. Ah.

Inadvertantly, I kinda celebrated Shutdown Day a half day early. Supposedly, today was supposed to be a day without using the computer, at all.

For me, this happened because I was without Internet. You see, without Internet, my computer ceases to be a computer in a lot of ways. I can’t check my email, talk online, check my feeds… I need my data!

I finally drove over to Panera near Woodfield for some lovely wireless bits.

Now I probably have like 300 stories I have to wade through (Google Reader, why don’t you tell me the exact number and NOT “100+”… what, is it that CPU intensive to give me the right number?) I have about 10 emails I have to reply to (lengthy… ahhhh!). Posts upon posts to write…

Here are some post ideas I have right now, sitting at Panera.

Mae at House of Blues

  • Relient K Concert (with Sherwood and Mae) at House of Blues
    • The Actual Event: Whoo hoo! First non-classical concert ever!
    • RIAA and Music: I thought this topic through while they were playing their new songs, the ones that I didn’t know.
    • City of Chicago: How INSANE it is to drive in the city
    • 14 Year Old Girls: DAH. “Sadie Hawkins Dance! Mood Rings!” still rings in my ear…
      • I always thought Relient K was more geared towards college kids… huh.
  • Founders at Work by Jessica Livingston
    • How incredibly awesome it is
    • How amazingly the author Jessica Livingston could have easily been Josh Kim
      • She writes… the Intro. The rest of the book is basically her asking questions at the founders of each respective company covered in the book. I could have asked those questions, and typed out 450 pages. Heck, I’d probably type that sucker faster…
      • Meh, maybe she asked the right questions… we’ll see as I keep on reading
    • How much I want to write a review PER CHAPTER
  • Consulting
    • How I keep mistyping “consulting” as “consluting”… ew…
    • Things I’ve learned with the clients I’ve had in the past
    • How I want to grow it: How to create an effective portfolio
  • Blog
    • Categorizing vs Tagging: I think I’m getting it…
    • Redesign process: How to effectively design a Wordpress Theme

Yeah, insanity.

I have a feeling, April is going to be insane.

Are you guys wondering “I mean… dang, Josh Kim… how much more insane can it get”?

You’ll see.

Lesson of the Day: Just DO IT.

Published
by
jk
on March 23, 2007
in Site News
. Comments

Not trying to sell shoes or anything, but seriously… if you’re in doubt, if you’re in pain, if you’re depressed, if you’re not wanting to, if you’re lazy, if you’re bored, if you’re sick and tired, if you’re actually “sick” sick, if you’re unable to…

Just do it. You’ll feel better. I know I’m feeling better.

My motivational speech to myself for the day. Huzzah.

And man… there goes the feed subscribers because of my mistake…

Couple More Things About Google Reader

Published
by
jk
on March 22, 2007
in User Interface & Design and Web Applications
. Comments

A few more things about Google Reader.

Shortcut Keys: Space and Shift+Space

I think the best way to use Google reader is to use space and shift+space to go through stories.

I thought that the space button went through one post each at the time, but I found out that it either does one post at a time OR if the post is longer than a screen’s height, then the behavior of the space key changes to a “page down”. It’s ingenious. I can go through all my feeds with one hand… kinda… which leads me to my next point.

Need a Shortcut Key for: Opening up Links

Currently, I’m having to command+click a title of a story to open up in a tab. There needs to be another key that opens up the story I’ve selected in a target=”_new” window.

I tried the enter key but all that the enter key does is open up the story in “list view”, and it does nothing in “expanded view”. Blah.

Another Feature Request: Sort Options

I like to read my posts backwards than how Google has set it up. I like to read the posts that were posted earlier than those posted later. I’d much rather go directly to the post: I don’t want to hear some garbage summary on the original post. (I love posts that add thoughtful and meaningful content to the original post… but that rarely happens in this digg world.)

So going back to the first point: I have to use shift+space rather than space to scroll through my stories… Kinda clunky, but it works.

Overall: Satisfied

It’s quick. It’s painless, to a certain extent. It’s not as clunky as Vienna…

Plus, it’s a web application. Half-minus, it’s Google. (Google is neither on my list of companies I love nor on my list of companies I hate…)

Wow… WoW?

I swear. Sometimes, writing on this blog turns out to be something like leveling in World of Warcraft: I can’t stop it. I gotta level up just once more or turn in one more quest.

Time to Change the RSS Reader: Google Reader

Published
by
jk
on March 18, 2007
in Project Ideas and Web Applications
. Comments

I’ve decided to ditch Vienna for my RSS feeds. It’s been getting on my nerves with a lot of little bugs (double downloading, “recent post” count problems), and I decided it’s time I should make the web app jump for this type of application.

I’ve written before on how a problem encourages me to move and try something new. Here’s what’s relevant from that post.

Feeds

  • I dislike most online feed readers. I love Vienna, because it’s free and open source and fast and responsive and does EXACTLY what I need.
  • I can go through feeds in very quickly, by being able to delete articles that are completely worthless (about 90% of which are Digg crap stories that link to the blogs I’m already subscribed to…)
  • I still want to be able to set it up so that OPML file is still saved somewhere…

Looks like I’m going to be going against my own words. I still don’t like online apps for certain things, but for feeds, google reader is quickly becoming something that… just works.

Short-cut keys for Google Reader

Only a subset of the advertised short-cut keys work for me, since I turned on “start searching when I type” feature in Firefox (BonEcho for the mac users). But these seem to work:

  • s: Star an item
  • n: Navigate to next item without opening it
  • p: Navigate to previous item without opening it
  • j: Open next item
  • k: Open previous item
    • Oh sweet vi keys…
  • o: Open / Close item (In list view, doesn’t do anything in expanded view)
  • r: Refresh
  • t: Tag it

I think there might be more, but this is more than enough, I think.

What would be really nice is if I had the ability to scroll down an article using a shortcut key also. For example, if the post I’m reading is longer in height than the window it’s in, I want to be able to scroll down on just that story. I’d much rather have j and k be the “scroll key” and have l and ; be the “next/previous post”… thereby solidifying Google’s love for vi. I’m probably asking too much.

A VERY long day

Published
by
jk
on February 21, 2007
in Personal
. Comments

After going to sleep at around 3 AM (not sure… I just kept reading the Bible), I woke up again before the alarm at 7:30, only to be so tired that I decided to cut down on RSS time and get like 15 minutes more sleep.

Missed the bus that would have taken me to work by 9, but instead took the next one to make it by 9:30. Worked like a crazy person until 2 PM, with no discernible break in between… and I’m still not done. Lots to do tomorrow… but I wonder if I can get out of going in. Trackball’s supposed to come by mail, and I wonder if someone’s going to be here to accept the package.

I decided to stick around campus and finish up what little lunch I packed. Read through the Bible… I feel more and more confident and able to point out where things are in the Old Testament each day… I feel like it’s fast becoming my textbook on life.

Took the bus back, then without warning, I fell into a deep sleep. Then woke up and started going through my feeds, yet again… to find out that a friend needed a ride to a meeting, and she was already late. Taking this as a sign, I packed myself a very VERY light dinner (comprising of grapes and yogurt… wow, I’m such a girl…) and got ready to head for WIMPE.

But you see, my day should have ended with me, coming back home, making dinner, and going to bed. NOPE. I went to ISR, to meet the likes of Colin, Christine, Andrew, Ken, Jon Chu; and the list goes on and on…

And I feel like this all-nighter was only possible because of those people. Well, yeah, they did take up my time and forced me into this position… but what I’m saying is that the energy that these guys spewed forth into me… something about being near students again makes me feel alive.

Oh, a sidepoint: For the first time since… that one really messed up night during college… I had a nosebleed. This happened while I was helping Christine with her ECE 205. I have a theory: My brain freaked out when it started getting bombarded with resistors and diodes. I can’t believe I still remember some of this stuff.

Just goes to show you: God’ll redeem everything. Even elementary circuit analysis.

Now, to the code and to the writing of worthwhile posts.