This is all I bought in 2011 - not counting games… in case someone wants to ask

Webuilder - needed a web editor again for occasional use and my web designers had made me buy it for them (at a previous job) so went for this
JRiver Media Center (upgrade)
Paragon Rescue Kit (upgrade)
BitDefender
Goalscape
ECMerge
Ashampoo® Burning Studio 10
ConceptDraw OFFICE 2 (upgrade)
Postbox
Driver Cleaner.NET (for the purpose of installing an ATI driver on an older laptop using one of these laptop cards ATI refuses to install new drivers on)
Paragon Hard Disk Manager 11 Professional (upgrade)
Genie Timeline
O&O Defrag 14.5 Pro (upgrade)
Rainlendar2 Pro
SmartDraw 2012 (upgrade)
ACDSEE Pro 4 then 5 (upgrade)
Linkman Pro
DisplayFusion Pro
TwistedBrush Pro Studio / Curvy 3D / Genetica / Dj D Artagnan / Project Dogwaffle 4 / Archipelis Designer 2 / Texture anarchy / AnyFX / DAP (all DC’s fault)
PDF Annotator (update)
CrossOver Linux Professional (renewed)
Object Desktop Renewal (renewed, but might be the last time)
TaxCalc 2011
Recovered my license of Spherical Timesheet Tracker (never found suitable alternative!)
Wireless IRC (phone)
Gravity (phone)
Syncplicity (not renewed)
Expression Engine 2 (web)
Lifejournal

Paid Web Services/memberships:
Spideroak (renewed)
Fastmail (renewed)
Hiveminder (renewed)
FreeAgent
Newsblur

Finally gave in a built a new machine. My main desktop is having some hiccups and I am not throwing more money at a dead end (AGP! DDR1!) so it was time to throw more money and gut the old spare machine and make it new.

This is what we put in

Asrock Z68 Pro3
Intel Core i5 2500k
8GB Ram
Intel 420 80GB ssd drive SATA II
WD Caviar Black 2Tb SATA III
scythe shuriken low profile
PC Power and Cooling Silencer 750 (old)
HIS HD 6870 IceQ X Turbo

The fans are all Nexus. It is not silent, but it is a very quiet starting point.

yes, I have a thing for storage

People know I talk and rant a lot about the inefficiencies in large organisations - how disfunctional it seems to get, and fast, as soon as numbers go over… 2000? 10000?
It happens everywhere, even in good, successful companies employing good, well intentioned people. Amazingly, they manage to succeed in spite of it.

To put it simply, organizing to use “economies of scale” leads to silos. Silos almost inevitable lead to optimizing for the wrong stakeholders.

Silos used to be necessary as communication and interaction didn’t scale, in the old paper days, so chains of command and team protection were needed, lest people end up doing no work for all the memos.

It’s not the case anymore, it is possible for any of us in the trenches of any silo to interact with people in any of our unoffical dependents and stakeholders on a regular basis - in a self paced manner, without ridiculous overhead. Social tools, email, chat, wikis…. all work.

Yes, it cannot be controlled, but that is the value: things might get sorted out quickly without any escalation needed. Because that is what “control” is, in many ways: using an escalation path for nearly everything.

And nowhere would it make more noticeable a difference as in customer support. Yet how often have you encountered support people that are even able to go and get answers or feed back into the process? How much time does it waste as you, the customer, are tasked with decoding and following the chain of silos to ask for information that support cannot get you, or actions that support cannot offer?

It winds me up

...

For example, today it winds me up that HP cannot let me order an additional chip of RAM and a swiss keyboard plate for my new laptop. I have done it before for previous laptops. Go to the parts finder, look up the parts, order. Easy. Except when silos get in the way.

It pains me to whine about it, because on average my experience of HP has been good. Quick service, quick answers, helpful tools, fast delivery, great hardware.

Except for the SUSE license disaster on my mininote (linked to non unique serial numbers at HP - back then, again, the silos prevented them from solving it because it was in nobody’s remit) I have nothing but happy praise. I mean, the mininote works beautifully on Slackware and still attracts envy years since. The 3com network boxes never broke on me. The laserjet goes on and on.

Hence why I bought HP again. And I love the machine. Delivered overnight. Awesome screen. 4Gb RAM put in as a single chip. Thin power supply…

Silo 1: content.
Whoever is supposed to put the information in from engineering did not go back and put the information in the parts finder. So it is early draft, incomplete and incorrect information and there are no correct part numbers for the RAM or any keyboard (not even UK or US).

Silo 2: Parts store.
1. You’d think they would have the power to flag the incomplete information and either get it from engineering and put it in, or get engineering to put it in. The device is a year in existence at least, it is embarrassing for HP that the info is incorrect. And I am not the only one who bought it and might want to buy parts or upgrades, surely! How many just gave up but took HP 1 notch down for their next buying decision?
2. You’d think they would be able to go and get that information for me. No. They cannot take the responsibility, and told me to contact support as I would need an engineer to confirm the parts number for. They cant ask the engineers, I need to.
They were very nice and polite about it, and responded fast. At this stage I shake my head.

Silo 3: Phone support.
It quickly becomes apparent that the “consumer” support phone has pretty much only access to the same information I have, and cannot do any more for me than the parts store. I need to file a proper ticket.
Again, they cannot ask the engineers themselves, I need to go file a ticket.
I am a little frustrated at this stage, but not too much. It might make sense… if Silo2 doesnt have the information, the poor people at Silo3 probably dont either. It needs to be passed deeper, and tickets are the way. OK.

Silo 4: Support engineers
So I do file a ticket. I need to register, enter all sorts of information. I file my simple “i want to buy, need part numbers” ticket. Guess what?
These support engineers cannot answer me because I only have warranty, not a corporate support contract. I need to call the number (Silo 3) again.

Now I am starting to feel rather angry. I wanted to buy the RAM and keyboard plate at the time I bought the machine, but that was not possible at the time. I was assured it would be via parts. Except whoever’s job it was to put the information in hasn’t. I’m doing HP a favor - their systems missed the fact that the information is missing, but I am telling them. Engineers failed getting the information in the first place, and now engineers are telling me to buy a contract before they will tell me a part number they should have in their parts system in the first place…

Silos.

So I am back to square 1, contacting the parts store people and saying “can you flag the missing information internally so they get it fixed? can i help getting this to happen?”

And to be honest, compared to things I have experienced in the past years, HP is a monument of good functioning.

Still, can I get my RAM please? and a keyboard plate?

Update: after returning to the Parts Sales team, and talking to them about what we do next I encountered both Silo #5 and the silo-breaking options that HP have planned for.

Silo #5 - browser chat / automated support tool. Should work nicely and give me access to an engineer without a contract needed. Except it requires you to enter model and serial number, and it seems that the same episode of forgetfulness which led to the parts system not having the correct post product launch information, also led to this system not recognizing the Envy 14 as a valid product HP support. Oops.

Silo-loop-breaking: Obviously a company as large as HP would be aware that it will have silos and cases that fall in cracks in between the silos - typically when a normal step in their process has been missed (in my case: basic information about the machine not being put in HP systems). They have a “voice of the customer” group which then takes these and tries to resolve them. In my opinion it is not as good as empowering normal staff to do this, but it at least gives an exit out of the loop.

We’ll see

I have been a long time Unix / BSD / GNU/Linux user on the server side, but that every time I tried to use GNU/linux on the desktop, I ended up giving gave up quite quickly. That is in spite of having worked on Unix workstations during university and in my first job and really wanting to get that power back. I tried. I tried in 95, 96, 98, 99, 01, 03, and every year since….

In recent years reason to give up is always a mixture of time-needed-to-figure-things-out (sound system snafus, window manager/desktop configuration) and apps-i-cant-do-without (acdsee pro, for example). I’d install a distribution, crossover, start looking through file management tools, photo organiser/editors, music playing, drawing tools, clipboard managers and all the other little things I need, and realise the time needed to be invested would be quite large, when I already had invested that time and found a set of apps on windows that suit me fine. Especially when some of those have nothing even remotely equivalent to my windows tools, on first glance.

The investment of time was just too big - every aspect that I use the computer for needs investigating and a suitable toolchain found - and in many cases the tools are not as slick out of the box - perhaps with time they can be tweaked to the right level.

But it would nag at me that I didnt do the effort - the main reason for the internal nagging being a mixture of
a)free software idealism and
b)knowledge that properly set up there could be worlds of efficiency and all that command line goodness - which I really miss when under windows (just like I miss some of my windows tools when under a GNU/linux system) and
c)i really want all my information and data and the work I put in it to be in open future proof formats, (not whatever my shareware is doing)

My attempt to resolve this was the acquisition of the HP mininote, with SUSE Entreprise. But alas Murphy’s law kicked in and thwarted my attempt due to a licensing snafu between HP and Novell (in short, the licensing uses the serial number but HP serial numbers are not unique and mine was already registered) which HP (the guilty party) was unwilling to even try to think about resolving (seems to me they could have given me another number to use for my SUSE license but they wouldnt). Novell support made some efforts but I was not really their customer and I didnt quite expect them to give me a license for free - my money had gone to HP after all, not them. So as a result I could not update SUSE to get up to date kernel and hardware support.

This was followed by a trip through many distributions, with most lasting about 5 minutes in the attempt before failing to function correctly either for the chrome graphics chip, sound, or the wireless.  opensuse, debian, ubuntu, mint, pclinuxos, vector, fedora, arch, puppy, sabayon, slitaz and quite a few others. Thank goodness for unetbootin!

Out of these, Mint and slitaz did best, although Mint was too heavy (and got broken when i tried to lighten it by using xfce and removing heavy packages), Slitaz stayed on for months, but it broke with slitaz 3. A shame, I’d learned to do recipes and flavors and had even installed in as alternate boot on my desktop.

In the end I put slackware on it - a distribution I have known a long time, use elsewhere - solid, stable, with a clean and straightforward structure, it doesnt break things by second guessing for the user, and fits my “systems should get out of the way” expectation. And if it breaks, I can fix it, because it is transparent and logically built… More worked out of the box on Slackware than had on Ubuntu, Fedora or Suse…

In the end I now have a mininote where almost everything works, with tools to do day to day work, and ready to try to explore for the big missing links (information management and photo processing). Even has some games!

All of this took way longer than it should have, really - 2 years.

I feel embarrassed that it took so long to get this device I bought to be fully operational for a long period of time, but on the other hand my life comes before such projects and I have learned to be OK with only scratching the surface of my tools (it is a fact of life that every device or gadget or software you get demands time investment, the greedy things!)

This is because although I am very technical, it is not the focus of my attention. I have limited time and patience to dig and there are too many components and options to dig through, too many decisions to make, and too many inconsistencies… And whereas it is totally natural for me to navigate around most linux distributions, compile, build packages, use the command line and text configs, it is not necessarily easy for me to get my head around the decisions (eg: all the sound subsystems) or to feel motivated enough to tackle a needlessly complex annoyance (such as the font size being all over the place, or broadcom wireless). In my day job i design large ambitious systems and build teams and people and businesses, and I am afraid I tackle rather poorly at times having to feel like a beginner in the face of X server idiosyncracies….

So what did I stumble on?

* the session manager / window manager / desktop environment / library combination - damn this is a quagmire! The feeling I got was that there were hidden tradeoffs to every choice, that would bite me later (especially the kde/gnome options). Also, the inconsistencies of who-does-what (every window manager has another answer it seems), the inconsistent experience (apps from different contexts look vastly different, font sizes all over the place…).

* audio - there are so many possible audio layers and not all apps work with all types, so one keeps having to add libraries and layers until one day they conflict…

* hardware - although 2 years on most of the problems, possibly all, are gone.

* specific apps - in my case ACDSee pro, and brainstorm/project tools, as well as viewing/using specific file formats properly.

The last one is not resolved for me - but it is not a problem for the mininote, it is only a problem if I wanted to convert my main machines.

I am quite pleased with the result - obviously since I am content to just scratch the surface this is not in any way tweaked polished or optimised the way many people do - but I will leave that part to others

The last time I wrote about tools I rely on and the likes it was 2008 - Software Jan 2008 - and alas fickle as I am much has changed, but not all that much…

The big changes? I use far less software, i have stopped bothering with many utilities and security tools. Webapps are appearing in my workflow - and I am still looking around for a better email client on the desktop/laptop, but that has been the case since 1998…

A reminder of my main biases: I like software that gets out of the way (as an example, skins and wizards get in the way, in my opinion), feels “clean” and gives lots of control. I tend to prefer more focused tools rather than does-it-all suites. I like a clean desktop and a clean interface and have no problem with the “old” look of some more classic apps… or the command line. I like my desktop empty, I prefer context menus and keyboard shortcuts to icons and toolbars, and I don’t like things that require lots of constant configuration. I spend far too much time managing my tools or data instead of doing what I have the tools and data for, and will always fall for something that promises to shrink that time.

My Classics

Total Commander - the tool i have owned the longest and still use. Looks dated, does everything well - just the correct order of priorities, imo
Opera - my browser of the decade. Just works very nicely out of the box, no need for a million add ons to make it useful - fast, quick, clean. And I love the notes - with the auto sync they are so useful as a cloud note taking, information gathering, scratchpad etc.
Local Website Archive - web page archive capture. I use it all the time, for recipes, articles, software finds, order receipts… it’s the only one that works with opera, firefox and about every browser i have used - as well as email and PDF. And it stores in an open format manner. I just wish it could capture selected snippets only, and multiple pages at once, as the workflow is a bit clunky for me so I often dont want to jump through the hoops. As a result, I have also started to use
Diigo - bookmarks, content saving and annotation. Very slick.
Fastmail - email provider and webmail. I do use clients such as Outlook, live mail, opera m2, claws, mutt etc. Postbox is promising.
ACDsee Pro - the best workflow I have found around photos. A HUGE obstacle whenever I consider switching to GNU/Linux or BSD
Flexible Renamer - the best renamer i have found, thanks to its preview function
Pagemanager 8, nitroPDF Pro and PDF annotator - for document management and workflow
Sumatrapdf - i just got fed up with the new acrobat reader constant nagging for document indexing, upgrades etc etc etc. this is a quick and light alternative. It was that or go back to acrobat 5!
Pidgin/miranda/skype - when I think to turn it on
Taxcalc - i’m always doing it at the last minute. this helps.
Super Flexible File Synchronizer - back up and synchronising between drives. I have storage bulimia and alas keeping things in sync is a major time sink
Spherical Working Time Tracker - automated tracking, amazingly useful

Office / Business
Libre Office - sure does the job better and better every time. I just havent “liked” an office suite since the good old lotus smartsuite but i dont need to like them, just use them.
Concept Draw - diagrams, mind maps and project planning
Goalscape - another thinking tool
MS Office + Outlook - yes, own these too
Onenote - another thinking/organising tool
hiveminder (web) - task management with the right features of GTD: easy to capture (email, im, bookmarklet, search box) and easy review.

Development

WeBuilder 2010 - replaced topstyle for me (Colin’s fault!)
Penguinet - great little tool for ssh, scp.
cream / vim - classic editor
Hostsman - a great way to change DNS on the fly, when testing websites etc. Absolutely a life saver.
Winmerge - file and directory comparison and sync, freeware
ECMerge Pro
ConTEXT / PSPad - my freeware editors when I need one

Utilities

ClipCache Pro / Clipboard Help and Spell - I cant live without a clipboard history tool
Direct folders - a launcher/quick folder thingie
Winpatrol - i have 3 pcs and couldnt just put regrun on all. so i found this. I then stopped using regrun and paid for this instead.
Peazip - nice clean compression tool
CloneCD + Any DVD - lets me get virtual CDs for many of my games so I dont need to juggle CDs/DVDs (or can use them on laptop without the energy drain of a drive). AnyDVD bypasses all the “sorry you cant play this CD on a pc” nonsense. I use these less and less as I get more and games via digital distribution
Crap Cleaner - freeware quick cleaner.
O&O Defrag - a good defrag tool, although for machines that are used less intensively I just use freeware tools
Stardock’s tools - mostly i at times use right click and keyboard launcher - and fences
UltraIso - another media tool to create/convert disk images. from a very helpful company
Bitdefender - dont care too much which one, as long as it has a small footprint. Using bitdefender still, as I was already in 2008 (it replaced AVG, which is good too)- good track record and good pricing.

Graphics & media:
(this is a category where I own a lot more than I use)
ScreenSteps - screenshots & documentation
Dr.Explain 4.0 - another interface annotation/documentation tool
Screenshot Captor - from donationcoder’s mouser. Very powerful
Xara - very nice illustration software. I also have inkscape
Fraps - now and then i record gaming footage
Jriver Media Center - I have been playing less music lately, as I left most of the stereo equipment in the second house.
Ashampoo Burning Studio - I like it as a quick and easy CD/DVD burning tool
Sagelight Editor - was for use on a key on the work laptop when travelling
NoteZilla 7.0 - sticky notes. I use them a lot less than i thought I would
RecenX - to speed file operations and history etc. so far not much more useful than what I had when I used object desktop and wirekeys
Aviary - nice to have access to all these media tools without install!

People who follow me on twitter or friendfeed cannot have missed the fact that I have been pondering buying a new phone for a few months now. Mostly the 2 things I wanted to add were GPS and Wifi (and some smartphone/3G functionality, I guess). Of course I am a slow and reasonable person when it comes to purchases over £100 (up to a year’s pondering, as it was with my camera) so I had to explore alternatives. I thought I would mostly play with some old gadgets as a way to learn a bit more about how I would use GPS (or not) to help me know what is worth it or not when buying my new device. But I shot myself in the foot because it works too well using 1 accessory and some java software… and it makes it harder to justify buying a new phone!

My current phone is the clamshell Sony Ericsson Z710i - hardly an up to date phone, I bought it in April 2007. It has served me well, apart from some well documented (i.e. not just me!) occasional problems with random shutdowns (quite annoying when they happen when you open the phone to answer it!).

I have been considering a new phone, something small and smart with wifi and GPS and all up-to-date features. Alas nobody does a clamshell with everything (why?) so I was considering the Nokia E51 / E52 / E55, but also being tempted by an Android phone. A new phone is not cheap though, especially for people like me who dont like contracts (and if I take a contract it’s 12 months, not more)

So what did I do? I geeked out and bought 2 devices! (Please indulge me a spot of linking to amazon affiliate - one shameless attempt to fund a few pennies towards my geeky addictions )

At first sight it seems an odd idea - but then I understood: this is squarely aimed at people who like to exercise and listen to music. You get the wired stereo handset/FM antenna, with the addition of a tiny box which is a GPS receiver which allows you to track your workouts (speed, mileage etc.).

It’s very easy to use, as when you first connect it the phone detects it and suggests downloading the software. That software is basic: a mileage/speed tracker, a gps tracks tracker, a demo of (very basic) mapping (there are better options imo), and the very useful “mark my spot so I can find my way back later” type app. If the apps suit your needs this is as easy as it gets, no configs, no hassle, all automated.

Other software can often work with it, but you have to configure “GPS receiver” as a serial device, comm=AT5 or something along those lines. Not all GPS applications offer this, many are bluetooth only, so it does limit the choice a bit. I did find at least 10 that did work, though, so it’s not as limiting as it might seem, and of course on newer phones there might be more.

Pros:

- if you run, walk, cycle listening to music on one of those Sony music phones, this adds GPS with almost no additional weight or clutter
- powered by the phone
- super easy to use, and good reception as far as I could tell
- easily lasts 6 hours (i tested!) and probably a whole day
- quite a few apps can be made to work with it (it’s a “serial device” comm=AT5)

Cons:

- powered by the phone, so both it and the phone need charging every day (if you listen to music and keep the GPS on)
- only works on 1 company’s phones, and not all
- not all GPS apps can be made to work with it

This is a small thin box about the shape of my phone but 1/2 the tickness (perhaps less) - it pairs via bluetooth on the phone and works with many applications automatically. I suspect if you have a Nokia phone there might be apps you can get via your phone direct, but for my phone I had to go browse around to find them. But find them I did, and every app that ran on my phone found it and worked with it (you would hope so, though, it is the point of bluetooth!)

Pro:
- longer battery life than the previous solution
- excellent reception (based on other people’s tests, i have no idea how to test)
-works with more apps
- bluetooth, so can work with all brands

Con:
- heavier
- additional gizmo to carry (and lose!), and additional charger (unless you have a Nokia phone using the same charger)

(in the US? try: Nokia LD-3W Wireless GPS Module but it is a silly price!)

I tried a few apps but ended up with 2 that seem to do what I wanted at the time (tracking where I am). I have not yet tested any of the “directions to goal” or “voice directions” apps because usually I dont need that.

The two applications I found best (out of a totally random, short and biased “if you dont make sense within 1 minute you’re off my phone” test)

http://www.gpsj.eu/

reconfigurable GPS information screen with direction pointer, compass, heading, distance to the waypoint and many more,
compass with waypoint pointer,
track map with panning, zooming and pointing,
location of 20000 town&cities in Europe,
the rest of the world downloadable,
detailed POI databases for bigger countries (eg. about 100000 POIs in Germany; maps of other countries generated on request),
track export to the following formats: GPX, Google and CSV.

GPSJ can import and export tracks. It costs 7 euros per phone. The security around the installation caused me some grief (o2 connection dropped partway through and I couldnt redownload, so had to wait for support to email me the file)

2. Track My Journey

http://www.trackmyjourney.co.uk/

TrackMyJourney is a website set up to manage, view and share tracks recorded from GPS devices. TMJ-Mobile is a Java mobile phone application that uses GPS data to provide a number of functions, including navigation, location tracking, map display and route plotting. It receives its location coordinates by communicating via Bluetooth with a separate GPS receiver, or via the phones internal GPS if supported. The phones built-in GPRS/3G/GSM data connection is then used to send its location over the internet to the TrackMyJourney website where you can then share your location and recorded tracks with your friends.

TrackMyJourney requires you to register on the website, then you can get the software via your mobile. It is probably seamless on a smartphone but it was a bit annoying with my old phone, i dont have email set up so had to type it all in etc. The software is extremely full featured, works with maps from OpenStreetMap, and I was impressed enought to donate 10 euros already. Although I now see the software comes in a lite and a pay-for version, so I am going to go and haggle with the developer!

Now that I know all this, which would I buy?

I’m not much of a jogger/cyclist, so the cool features of the Sony headset are a bit lost on me - although it was quite nice while travelling on the train listening to podcasts and watching my progress. Since I am not sure I would stick to the Sony brand for my next phone, the bluetooth option seems smarter.

Although since I have both, I can see plenty of times where I would still pack the Sony instead of carrying an extra device, especially since my 2 programs of choice happily work with both devices.

Note: There is a new version of the Nokia bluetooth GPS (LD-4W see left), it is smaller, has a better chip, but less battery life. It’s a tough call which of the two is the best buy, I’d probably go for the older model (the one I have) and the battery life.

Note: this is a talk-out-loud piece written wearing the hat of an average user - it is not written wearing the hat of the web and software professional - that’s why it is in my personal blog and is written in light conversational style.

In the past I have often said that as cool as I thought many rich-online-applications that seek to replace desktop apps, I hadnt really started using any of them. But recently a shift has started to happen, and it hit me in recent conversations about some images and patterns I used on my site - all of them had been whipped up playing with online applications.

So I guess it is time to reverse the pattern of posts saying “web app x, tested, stopped using” to spread some love to the ones I do end up using.

1. Aviary (& donationcoder)

When I first heard of aviary, I really wanted an account. I registered my interest but alas never made the cut. Luckily for me some of the delighful people on the Donation Coder site had some invitations to share, and I got to get my hands on one. I am amazed as to what can be done with image manipulation online nowadays. I guess I shouldn’t be, having been in the web development field for long enough, but it’s actually different seeing first hand what can be done, and how smooth it works.

Screenshot: Vector editor in opera

Even though I only just dabbled with the tools, I ended up paying for aviary, in part to support them and get them to implement all the promised apps, and in part because the ability to have access to tools such as these from any computer or any OS really will make my life easier when travelling. I can access them on a friend’s computer, I can use an older laptop, or a netbook, because I only need the RAM and CPU to run the application and view the result, not to process the image. And of course I can boot on FreeBSD or opensolaris or anything with a modern browser available, and aviary should work. No more “crap, I wanted to quickly whip something up on this photo but the machine is booted to BSD and running something and I dont want to switch” (of course I might get the whole virtualisation thing finalised and wont have that problem at all anymore, who knows? But that is another story)

As I said, I mostly just dabbled with the apps - especially peacock, which is just like pipes but for images generation.

Screenshot: Peacock with my little triangle experiment

I was playing with triangles, which are my favorite shape (as much as one can have a favorite shape). At the time I was trying to create a set of nice sharp triangles as a basis for a website design - another idea which didnt really make it through. But the background based on triangles I created in peacock was used on this site for a while, and is still my background on my computers. It doesnt look quite that great on white, but it is a transparent png and creates a fascinating depth effect on a dark background (don’t take my word for it, look!)

See this on aviary

Out of the full applications they are planning to do, I am most interested in the font creator and probably the “real medium” painting simulator. And I am a bit disappointed they seem to have cancelled any idea of web design tools. It will be interesting to have access to things like sound editing without having to install any application, since I need it maybe 2-3 times a year (at the moment I just use wavosaur when it happens, since it is a no-install app). We’ll see!

Edited: one thing I forgot to mention about aviary is how people often share their creations, complete with all the actions used in their creation. This makes it a great learning feature, because not only can I admire what people created with the tools, I can also see how they did it.

PS: Donation Coder is a great community, by the way. I joined it a while back because I wanted to donate something back for some apps I was using, and as an addict to independent software this was a great place - full of addicts like me, and developers. It is also a very supportive learning community. I should write a bit about them, but just go check the site, the software offered on it, and the discussion in the forums.

2. Colourlovers

I have been working on a slight update of the colors used on different sections of the site (not that you could tell, like half of what I ever do it hasn’t made it onto anything visible). Now I am a)lazy b)not a designer so I thought it would be fun to use a webapp to play with color schemes. So I found Colour Lovers a few months back and played with it a bit. Created several palettes at random, some of which became the currently half-finished themes on the site.
I also played at creating patterns from those palettes and others, and in spite of the rather limited set of available patterns (especially ones that use the full set of 5 colors), I had a bit of fun. Since I was just messing about I cannot comment for the app’s suitability for production work, at first glance I would say it is not sufficient. But it might be a good one to get a bit of inspiration in a way that does not kill concentration, prior to going to work in the professional tools.

Screenshot: Colourlovers

I particularly enjoyed the option to submit an image and have the system offer colors from that - although I mostly found that some of my favorite photos of my own turned out to make rather lousy color palettes. What works in a photo does not work in a flat color setting.

In the end though, Colourlovers, like other very narrow fun-social websites before them (eg: wordie) is something I can see myself using in short bursts followed by months of forgetting about them, especially since for the pure work of palettes and texture, aviary mentioned just above has some pretty nifty tools.

See the patterns on colourlovers

both files are to be considered released on CC license, attribution required (a link to this post would be enough)

I think there have been less changes in the last year in spite of finding and testing dozens of tasty things thanks to donationcoder.com.

So what’s changed?

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