October 2005 Archives

I love obscure bits of information about words and names. Today I was looking over the About Feeds page at Six Apart and I noticed a little box that explains the corporation's name. The page on feeds is pretty comprehensive, if clearly focused on promoting the product's ability to create feeds (XML) as well as any other text format like HTML, or XHTML, if you are interested in learning more about this technology I recommend at least glancing at the article.

Why "Six Apart?" In honor of our two co-founders who were born exactly six days apart.

As a husband who is classically horrible about remembering dates, I hope for Ben's sake that his birthday is the one that falls six days before Mena's.

Earlier this month, I wrote an entry here about Kubuntu, a Linux based desktop operating environment. I think choice is good, but the fact is that I will have a Windows operating system on or near my desk for the immediately foreseeable future. Everyone else does, and they all call me for help, so I have to. Its the same reason I gave up Apple Macintosh after my first 1986 MacPlus. And now I have all three back in my office... but that's another story.

One reason I have always liked Linux is that I found the community more helpful. I thought that people in that community were more willing to share knowledge. I had the impression that people who had Microsoft skills were less willing to part with information without a consulting fee. Not that there's anything wrong with this.

It now appears I may have been mistaken and here are a few things I learned recently and some good places to look for Windows information which don't have any fee associated with them.

Weblog Usability: The Top Ten Design Mistakes (Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox)

I have been a fan of Nielsen's lists since I first saw them in the 90's. My own philosophy is similar to his, and I use his work to justify my own advice on a regular basis. I like the way he sums up a key benefit of weblogs:

One of a weblog's great benefits is that it essentially frees you from "Web design." You write a paragraph, click a button, and it's posted on the Internet. No need for visual design, page design, interaction design, information architecture, or any programming or server maintenance.

As I reviewed the list I found AdvisorBits to be in violation of a few rules. 1 and 2 (author bio and photo) can be remedied fairly easily. I am aware of rule 3 although not all my titles are as "correct" as this post's.

A lot of times in this space, you'll find me rambling on about Linux servers and other cool open source stuff that I use. I like typing commands and geeky stuff like that, but I know most people don't. This post is a pointer for the average user who interacts with a desktop computer and is more comfortable in a graphical (point and click) environment.

Ubuntu is free (available without cost also) distribution of GNU/Linux with the GNOME desktop environment tightly integrated. According to the project home page:

"Ubuntu" is an ancient African word, meaning "humanity to others". Ubuntu also means "I am what I am because of who we all are". The Ubuntu Linux distribution brings the spirit of Ubuntu to the software world.