This past weekend, in addition to doing a bit of reorganization of my physical home, I took the time give my site a bit of a face lift and upgrade the content management system. Stop on by, check it out and let me know what you think. Read on if you care about the gritty details of this one.
Read more...I was highly intrigued by Andy Baio's write-up of The Whitburn Project, as well as the tidbits of knowledge he and others found. Such a vast amount of well organized data begs to be reviewed. As you might already know, I host copies of the Billboard Year-End Charts on my site, and have enjoyed looking through those and hearing from others who have done the same. Weekly data? Much more entertaining. Although there's a lot to see when looking through the charts, I thought some of the following bits were interesting.
Read more...I was talking with someone the other day about freelance web design/development. As we were talking, they said something along the lines of, “I can't help but notice you talk more about the code than you do about the design. I thought you were more interested in the design side.” (both true statements). “So, if you're so interested in the code, then why claim to enjoy the designing more?” Good question. It all comes down to math. I spend more time working on the code than I do on the design. It'd be great if we could all code faster. That would be fabulous, but that's just not how it works. It's not that I skip out on a decent design. I do my best, but the actual building of the site takes longer. Like a chef, creating a new dish. They're familiar with all their ingredients. They're familiar with the pieces and steps to making a good dish. They have an imagination and a goal, but once it comes time to perfect that new dish, they'll spend more time standing in the kitchen working on it, than they will sitting at their desk coming up with the idea.
You know what I'm talking about. You've had it happen to you. You're listening to some music, and it hits you. “That's it. Whatever that is, playing right now, I like it. I'm not sure who it is, or the name of the song. There's something to it I can't quite explain… and it's got something to it that I really like.” Stick with me on this one…
Read more...Steve at DeGraeve.com wins. It's not like there was a competition, just insane jealousy on my part. Sure, there are some options out there that let you upload a picture and it'll generate a decent palette for you. I didn't/don't want to be tied to somebody else's tool like that, and their generated palettes weren't as nice as Steve's. So, I looked around and tried out a couple pre-made options which I modified and hosted myself – but the colors generated by them just weren't right. (sorry, but I can't find all the links to the different things I tried)
Finally, I tried brewing my own, using a whole family of PHP functions with which I wasn't entirely familiar, and which didn't get me much further than the pre-made solutions. No matter what I did, though, I couldn't communicate in PHP what I wanted to do with the information I had. Unfortunately (or fortunately), since I work with databases all day, when I deal with arrays, they're just a bit sloppy, and don't behave how I think they should.
I knew it was going to be an uphill battle once I realized I was just trying to replicate somebody else's work. As we all know, a copy rarely turns out as good as the original. Why bother with this? I want(ed) to dynamically generate a color palette (which could be plugged into a CSS file through some magic) and have the accompanying photo show as well - to give the photos a better visual continuity. It's somewhat similar to what Dave Shea has going on, but a bit more dynamic. Who knows, maybe I'll still go through with it, but I don't see myself trying to do the full, on-the-fly palette generation. </geekiness>
lists work home food soap_box entertainment light_bulb computers blogging creative g2