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Archive for 2005

What is RSS and What is it for?

Lifted from a post that I wrote over at One-Change.

So you’ve seen the little orange link on all of these sites around the internet. What does it mean? What does it do? It’s a link for an RSS feed.

What’s that you might ask. Well the long and the short of it is that it’s a technology that you can use to subscribe to regularly published content. You can read news stories, blog posts, movie reviews, etc. from all of your favorite websites in one central location.

That central location is called your RSS Reader. There’s a wide variety of RSS Readers to choose from: NewsGator, Bloglines, and even the free, open-source email client Mozilla Thunderbird has RSS support. Each one of these readers have their own specific set up directions which you can find on their respective sites. Many of these will be easier than setting up a new email account.

Using RSS feeds will probably change the way you use the internet. I know that it’s changed the way that I use it. It makes getting content from a lot of different sources really easy and centrally located. And that is really helpful for me.

So without further ado, click here or copy this link and paste it into the RSS reader that you’ve selected. Also, if you’d like to read more about RSS, here’s a good primer. If you have any questions let us know and we’ll try and help.

Meet Me at the Fairmont

Apparently there has been a rise in setting up meetings in hotel lobbies, because there is comfy furniture and free Wi-fi. Makes a lot of sense.

Here’s a caveat. I’ve only hung out in the lobby of a hotel (of which I was not a guest) twice. Once, in Pittsburgh (the Onmi William Penn) to take a break and relax in the midst of a 5-day conference. And the other (The Drake in Chicago) an interview for a business school (which went well, I just decided to not pursue it).

The article mentions that this has become really popular since hotels have introduced free Wi-Fi in their lobbies. It makes a ton of sense. It’s a open, safe place for associates to gather and conduct business. It’s informal but at the same time better than meeting at a loud coffee shop. It’s upscale enough to feel like a business meeting rather than a meet-up with some friends. The article also quotes various hotel sources that say that actually encourage this traffic, and that it’s boosting revenues by providing more foot traffic to bars, and restuarants on-site. Again, makes a lot of sense. Kudos to those hotel managers who are embracing this practice. I could definitely see that a short-sighted managers would discourage this activity because the amenities are for guests of the hotel. So, I think, there is a lot of goodwill in providing these services for people who aren’t current guests, but who are definitely potential guests.

Carson Workshops: Eric Meyer Professional CSS XHTML Techniques

A long, long time ago…
I can still remember
How that music used to make me smile.

Back on November 3, I was fortunate enough to go to the Carson Workshops Eric Meyer Professional CSS XHTML Techniques. We all arrived, bleary eyed and ready to dig in to hear from the CSS Guru. He didn’t disappoint. Eric’s presentation was polished and it was also flexible enough for people to ask questions about a wide range of topics. I really liked his style of presentation.

We broke for lunch and I was fortunate enough to meet Miguel and John. We talked about ourselves and found out a little about where each other was from and what they were up to. That’s actually when John said that hooking up a feed with Feedburner was really simple. And it was. I actually encountered some problems reading the feed with Thunderbird, but i’ve since gotten that ironed out.

Then we headed back into the classroom to plow through the afternoon session. I have to admit, there was a lot of information and I reached my daily capacity at around 3:30. I tried to hold on and pay attention for the rest of the day… but it was a struggle. At around 5pm someone from the school barged in and basically told us to get out. Ryan and Gill handled it really well. Apparently there was going to be a class in that same room that evening and we had to get out.

So, we packed up and headed over to a bar to wind down and get to know each other better. So we all slipped into something more comfortable. Well… not really. But we had some drinks. I was able to talk to Ryan and John about the “state of the web”. It was really great to talk to interesting and thoughtful people about the web industry. Where we’re headed. And bounce ideas off of each other. I work with some really bright people, but due to the fast-pace of the office we rarely get the opportunity to sit and wax philosophical about the web and where it’s headed, so that was really fun.

Overall the event was a huge success in my mind. I was not only able to learn about CSS, but I also meet like-minded people who share my passions. So thanks to everyone I met and definitely thanks to Ryan and Gill for putting on a super event. I’d highly recommend going to any Carson Workshop you can.

Reactive Flash

Over at www.izpitera.ru, there is some wicked cool Flash going on.

Now, i’ll give you that this isn’t the best use of Flash, but it may very well be the most fun. And it’s certainly great for taking out a little agression.

AJAX cleans up

There is quite a buzz about the new(ish) technology AJAX. With AJAX there are a lot of applications that will be simplified. There are a bunch of frameworks and libraries coming out that sport AJAX. A couple of them are http://script.aculo.us/ and http://openrico.org/home.page. I haven’t messed with AJAX but it looks like it can really be used to created really effective interfaces.

37Signals has used it in their Backpack application. Seems like the possibilities are endless.

I’ll keep you updated when I mess with it.

Google [owns the] Earth

Google has done it again. With the release of their Earth product, Google has wowed me again. Google News, GMail, personalized homepage, Google Maps, and the list can go on and on.

This is amazing stuff. My hat goes off to the folks out at Google. Great work. Inspiring. Keep up the good work.