3 July 2009
An if-substring-in-string Django Template Construction
Here's a quick tip for Django template hackers. It's a known fact of Django templates that the syntax is purposefully limited. I've been living with the need for an if-substring-in-string construction. Of course, I could write a custom template tag, but work is quite busy. So on a whim and a 10 minute break I tried this yesterday, and it worked well for me. Take a look and let me know what you think.
Read the rest of this post | 3 comments
2 July 2009
YouTube - What's new in Firefox 3.5?
A nice video tour of Firefox 3.5 for everyday users.
Firefox 3.5 for developers - MDC
What's new in Firefox 3.5? This Mozilla developer site page has the complete list. Note, this is more for developers than end users, and seems exhaustive. I'm glad to see Firefox work on JavaScript speed and adopt the process-per-tab model of Google's Chrome browser.
30 June 2009
EveryBlock source code released / The EveryBlock Blog
The title says it all. EveryBlock is now open source. And GPLv3 at that, which was at the request of the Knight Foundation. I've yet to look through the code, but I'm sure this will be useful for developers of all kinds, news, micro-local, or otherwise.
26 June 2009
When JavaScript Attacks, errrr, Hacks
I've been doing a lot of JavaScript coding in my recent work on Launchpad. I mean, a lot! We're pushing to get every aspect of a bug page editable within the page itself, hopefully making it easier to manage bugs without being directed to another web page. Everyone on the Launchpad bugs team is working on some part of this. I haven't previously done any JavaScript coding like this, and now I'm sitting with a 1400 line JavaScript file that has grown unwieldy and needs to be tamed. I'm starting on that refactor this morning and thinking on the things I've learned as this file has grown seemingly with a mind of its own.
Read the rest of this post | Add a comment
25 June 2009
YUI 3.x :: YUI Library
A comprehensive list of what has changed in YUI3 as it goes to beta. The end result for me is that I have code that will break. :( But the nice thing is that the API, especially around Node is getting saner. NodeList no longer behaves like Node, for starters, but this means you have to be mindful of if you're dealing with a list or a Node, which before you didn't have to worry about. So no size() call on Node to determine this; an empty NodeList is [] rather than null; and so on.
YUI 3.0.0 beta 1 Available for Download » Yahoo! User Interface Blog
YUI 3 moves out of preview and into beta releases. With this move, the API is nearly final, and there are some performance improvements. We've been using YUI3 on Launchpad. All of the AJAX work on Launchpad has been YUI3 driven and is running on launchpad.net now. I've been pretty happy with YUI3 personally, but I realize JavaScript libraries bring out the best and worst in developer opinions. At any rate, it's nice to see YUI3 getting closer to final release.
Introducing Web Therapy Season 2 « Hulu Blog
This Lisa Kudrow web series comes to Hulu. I've heard this is great, but honestly, I haven't watched it yet. It's interesting to me that bigger names are getting in to web series. (Via NewTeeVee.)
My graphic novel for Android and iPhone - Boing Boing
Comics adapting several Cory Doctorow short stories come to Android phones and iPhone. I'm always looking for new comics for my mobile, but I also like that these are Android first class citizens. Note, too, that iPhone didn't allow one comic because of objectionable material, which is sad and makes me really worry about this new form of approval-based censorship for content.
24 June 2009
The Early Morning Internets
Most everyone I work with knows this, but friends and family may not -- so just in case you haven't heard -- my work schedule (which means the time I am available online) has changed since I joined Canonical. I am now up very early to better match European time zones, where the other members of the Launchpad bugs team are located. How early, you ask?
Read the rest of this post | Add a comment
Let's make the web faster - Google Code
Google Code has put together a central resource for thinking about web page optimization. There is an FAQ, articles, and some downloads, including links to downloads from other sites. Most of this is to do with front-end optimization, but there is some info on compression, PHP, and caching headers.
Buffy vs Edward (Twilight Remixed)
A terrific and funny remix where Buffy meets Edward. Edward gets what's coming to him, yes indeed. Edward seems creepy to me in the film and book, but set against Buffy here he is even creepier. And funnier, too. (Via Whump.)
23 June 2009
Multi-process Firefox, coming to an Internets near you < Chris Pitchin’ Hey
Firefox gets multi-process support, a la Chromium. This is a nice demo, and I can't wait to see this released. I also like the support of video and other HTML5 tags. Be sure to view this post in a version of Firefox 3.5 to see the embedded video.
Chromium Blog: Danger: Mac and Linux builds available
Chromium, the open source version of Google Chrome, comes to Mac and Linux, though in very early stages. For those using Ubuntu, there is a Chromium daily build PPA, which is nice. I've been using it for awhile, and it's both useful and fun to see the daily improvements in the browser.
19 June 2009
YUI 3: Lighter, Faster, Easier to Use [JavaScript & Ajax Tutorials]
Ara Pehlivanian gives a tour of what's new in YUI3, like Node and chaining. We're using YUI3 on Launchpad, and I think reactions are mixed among devs. Everyone has a strong opinion about js libs. :) But I like YUI3 and this article outlines some of the improvements made over YUI2, which I also had experience with at the Washington Post and Greenspun.
16 June 2009
Opera Unite
The tag line for Opera Unite is a little misleading, I think -- "a Web server on the Web browser." Maybe that's what Unite is technically, but it's use case is really social features like sharing files or services from your browser. Still it's nice and interesting. And it's good to see browsers ramping up feature sets again these days.
15 June 2009
12 June 2009
Moserware: The First Few Milliseconds of an HTTPS Connection
A long read, but an interesting look into what the browser does when doing SSL connections. A nice dive into encryption is also included.
Why I don't love JavaScript's Module Pattern
Came across this a few weeks ago, and though I thought Snook's points were valid, I dismissed this post as wishful thinking -- wishful thinking in that avoiding the module pattern is virtually impossible in JavaScript, especially if you use a library like YUI, which he cites in the post. Really, it's XHR that makes the use of enclosures a near must. Having said that, I just put some code through review on Launchpad that I felt was unnecessarily complex because of the use of enclosures, the "module pattern" as he calls it. I will be refactoring the code in a later branch and will definitely try to limit enclosure use to simplify the code, but still, I'm skeptical I'll get the code as nice as I would like. There's just something about asynchronous code in JavaScript that gets complex quickly, especially when dealing with many XHRs or multiple levels of XHRs.
3 June 2009
Cory Doctorow: Search is too important to leave to one company – even Google
I find myself agreeing with Cory Doctorow on this, even as much as I like and respect Google, that the power Google wields in determining importance and even access on the web should be examined critically. I've heard these types of questions about Google's power to promote or effectively ban a web site raised before, and Google's response has historically been something akin to "people are not involved, it's an algorithm." As our world gets more and more mediated through the eyes of technology, we need to be mindful of the effect of algorithms, too. It may sound like the stuff of science-fiction, but a computer's choice should be just as suspect as a human's, where that choice has so much of an influence over our lives.
2 June 2009
johnaugust.com » How much does a short story earn in a magazine?
Apparently, self-published short fiction is as good or better than being in print. John August releases numbers from his sales of a short story through Kindle and his personal site and compares to going rates for short fiction at popular print publications for fiction these days.
Google Plans to Enter the E-book Business - PC World
So Google is entering the e-book business, huh? Interesting. The Kindle money looks good from a distance it seems. However, the most telling line in the article writes that this technology from Google is "to allow its partner publishers to make their books available for purchase from any web-enabled device." In other words, a web browser. So Google will offer browser-based e-books, which again is interesting, but may miss the mark. It seems that what Google is forgetting is what Cory Doctorow best summarized when he wrote that readers are "pervy for paper." The Kindle tries to be e-books for paper pervs, while this just seems like Project Gutenberg on steroids. But clearly, this is the year (season?) of the e-book.
Bleeding Cool » Do Anything 001 by Warren Ellis
Warren Ellis has a column at Bleeding Cool now. The opening one has some nice lines on the power of comics, most of them straight from the head of Jack Kirby. The best to me is -- "That's the wonderful thing about comics: It puts the idea of published storytelling in the hands of the ordinary guy."
28 May 2009
Does community development violate the GPL? - While the coffee is hot
My friend who got me into Samba work (and yes, brother-in-law) jerry has started blogging. Here's a nice post asking some interesting questions about community and open source, which I think most of us don't think enough about honestly.
27 May 2009
not enough minerals » Blog Archive » Looking for a Talented Engineer
Charlie Cheever, formerly of Facebook and leader of Platform development there, has a new startup that is hiring. Just passing along in case someone who looks here might be interested. This is Python work and could be a nice opportunity for the right person.
24 May 2009
Book review: Saturday
Ian McEwan never disappoints, and this novel is no exception. [...]
Read the rest of this post | Add a comment
johnaugust.com » The Variant, a new short story
Screenwriter John August tries out selling a short story for $.99 via Amazon and PDFs available from his site. I will be interested to see if he reports back on the success or failure of this model for him. When I'm back in the States and my Kindle's network activity resumes, I will probably get the Kindle version to support an artist I like and see how it feels to read a short story on Kindle.
19 May 2009
Working from Barcelona!
I've just finished my first night in Barcelona, Spain. This was a fun night, a good night for catching up with people in person whom I normally only see online. And, of course, Canonical is steadily growing, so there are many people still to meet or get to know. This should be a nice couple weeks.
Read the rest of this post | Add a comment
