It’s that time of week again, when I get to share my activities from the previous week with you. This week had me looking at something I have never looked at previously as a new venture fixed itself in my head that I couldn’t ignore. That set me off in a direction totally new and I’ll share that. Come on in and share my week, you need a break.
New Things
This week I was involved in a lot of new things, some expected and others not at all. I had cool gadgets occupying a fair bit of my time along with some nice software, too. I’m still impressed with the usefulness of the Sony VAIO P notebook. It amazes me just how small and light this baby is and yet how easy it is to use. The Sony keyboard is much nicer than I thought it would be after a few days and I don’t really have any complaints with it (other than the small right Shift key). The super high-res screen is still hard to get used to, though, and I don’t think I could use this for much of the day on a regular basis. It’s just too small and things are so tiny on the screen after a while. The VAIO P is going back to Dynamism shortly and I’ll certainly miss having it to carry around.
I must admit, I’m far more impressed with the Intel Classmate PC than I thought I’d be. I have always felt that it’s a gimmicky netbook, but that’s changed with a little hands-on time. What has surprised me is how good a job Intel has done on the inking capability of the Classmate. The resistive digitizer screen is as light to the touch as any I’ve used on a tablet device yet the palm rejection technology is superb. I don’t believe I’ve caused a single inadvertent mouse event while inking on the Classmate, a testament to how good a job they’ve done with it. That’s important, as the intended audience is kids who are not going to understand what’s happening if merely touching the screen causes unwanted things to happen. Very well done, Intel.
The Classmate is good to use as a laptop, too. The keyboard is small yet very well laid out and it provides good tactile feedback while typing. The system is very responsive doing normal things and it’s a solid netbook. I don’t know if these will ever be sold to the public, but it would be a shame if they weren’t. I’d have no problem recommending one of these for kids; heck, even adults could use one of these fine. I am also impressed with how well the inking utility handles text input via the stylus. It’s not a “real” Tablet PC, but it’s very close.
I’ve been testing a lot of new software this week, more than usual. My favorite new program I’ve adopted is Nambu for the Mac. This is a Twitter desktop client app and I’ve adopted it full-time. Nambu grabs all my Twitter friend’s tweets like all the rest but I also have multiple panes going. I have a pane with just replies to my own tweets and I fire up search panes for different things. I find the visual appeal to be high and I really like the low footprint it seems to require. It has replaced Tweetdeck totally for me, something I didn’t think would happen.
I installed the newly released BumpTop and it’s as cool as I thought it would be. BumpTop is basically a 3D interface for working with the Windows desktop — and it’s very cool the way you interact with it. I installed the free version, which is a limited version but it’s almost as full an implementation as the one that costs $30. I installed it on Windows Vista on the MacBook, which runs in a virtual machine under Parallels Desktop. It installed and runs fine, although Aero glass doesn’t work under Parallels. BumpTop runs fine and displays well in this configuration and I admit I wasted far too much time playing with it this week.
While BumpTop is good at what it does and is fun to use, I’m not convinced that it adds anything to my Windows usage. It makes some things easier to do and is a cool way to display a lot of junk on the desktop, but I don’t keep a busy desktop so my benefit from using it isn’t all that great. I’ll wait for further evolution of BumpTop before I adopt it full-time, if at all.
Tell You a Story?
I discovered an entire new genre of software that sent me off on an unexpected software adventure that is still ongoing. I have been wanting to write short stories for a good while and that urge reached epic proportions this week. I reached a point where I could no longer ignore that urge, so I started seriously thinking about writing the stories that are bouncing around in my head. My stories are — surprise– fiction stories with a tech bent.
The more I realized I needed to start writing, the more I started wondering if there was a program that makes such ventures easier to do. What I had in mind was a good word processing program that other writers are using, so I went off on a hunt for such a beast. I was amazed to discover not just a single program but a whole raft of them that writers are using on the Mac for writing projects. I ended up spending a lot of time trying several of the most highly recommended programs for myself, an evaluation that is still in progress.
These programs are designed to handle all aspects of larger writing projects for writers. While they are really aimed at those writing large works, like novels, most of them can aid smaller efforts like the short stories I want to do. The breadth of these tools is nothing short of amazing, given the things they can do for the writer. Most of these tools handle everything from the actual text writing to the basic organization of the work. They allow the planning of chapters, characters, scenes and even laying out the timelines of the stories. I had no idea such tools existed and I have settled on two of them to evaluate.
The first is Scrivener, the more basic of the two. This program is still very full-featured and while it provides a distraction-free environment to write, it also makes it easy to outline the project. There is a very cool “corkboard” for posting story notes on the fly for easy retrieval during the writing. I’m using the 30-day free trial to see if this works well for my writing.
The other program I’m evaluating is Storymill, the more complete tool of the two. Storymill looks like it would be better for large novel projects and as such, may be overkill for the stories I want to write. It, too, has a lot of organization and layout features and will even let you move events around on the timeline, as well as to have the program automatically move the text in the story around to fit the new timeline. It’s almost scary what you can do with Storymill. There’s a free trial for it, too, and that’s what I’m using.
I’m currently writing two short stories so I’m doing one in each program to see which one works better. Trying to use these unfamiliar tools no doubt is making this effort harder than it needs to be, but I’m hoping in the long run I’ll settle on a good tool and good habits to make lots of writing easier. That’s the plan, anyway.
Observations
I noticed some things this week that got me to thinking, which is always dangerous. :) The first was a survey I saw that was like many others I’ve seen on the web. The survey I saw somewhere (I don’t remember where) found that men would rather play video games than have sex. You’ve seen these types of surveys too I’ll bet and each one reaches a silly conclusion like this one. I remember seeing one that said men would rather be on the Internet than have sex.
These are bunk. The fact is we men are cads and the truth is we want to do X (like play video games) and have sex. We’re guys and that’s the way our little brains operate. If we play video games until 3 in the morning we still want sex when we come to bed. We wouldn’t rather be on the Internet until all hours instead of having sex, we want to be on the Internet (in this example) and have sex. Like I said, we’re guys and that’s that way our minds operate. So please stop the goofy surveys already. Hell, at least I’m honest.
The other observation this week that’s had me thinking was the app store explosion we’re seeing in the smartphone arena. This week saw all Verizon phones get an app store, following in the path of the iPhone, Android, Windows Mobile, BlackBerry, etc. Enough already I say. One app store is innovative and a great idea. Many app stores just confuses the whole issue and it’s plain silly for all of these companies to think that their app store will be as successful as the ones that came before them. There are too many issues and most of these stores will not go anywhere.
Old Things
One of the advantages of working at home is being able to play music while I work. I can play any music I want and as loud as I want and not have anyone complain about it. I find I work better to music and I get to listen to all types of music as the mood strikes me.
This week I listened to my collection of Dan Fogelberg music and man did that make me nostalgic. It’s almost magic when I do something like this and get taken away to a time long past that makes me feel all good inside. Fogelberg’s music always does that to me and it was a great experience. We all need to get nostalgic from time to time and this is my way to do that.
E-books of the Week
My favorite read of the week was the latest collection of short stories by prolific terror-meister Stephen King. Just After Sunset is a great collection of stories written as only King can write them and I thoroughly enjoyed all of the stories. If you want to blame something for my current urge to write my own stories then blame King as this collection really got my writing juices going. Yeah, blame him.
I also read Season of the Machete by James Patterson and liked it a lot too. It is typical Patterson and it proved that sometimes your standard machete murders are not what they seem.
I’ve done all my e-book reading on the Kindle 1 and Kindle for iPhone and enjoy it. The rumors this week that Barnes & Noble is working with Sprint to produce a Kindle competitor revs my motor big-time. The B&N purchase of Fictionwise/ eReader really makes sense now, doesn’t it? I can’t wait for an electronic eReader that works with my 300+ e-book library on eReader. :)
Until Next Week
That’s my week, I hope you enjoyed sharing it with me. This was a bit more long-winded than I intended but it is what it is. Have a great holiday weekend and see you next week.
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