Less is more
Hopefully you read my previous post about Sass and CSS preprocessors and felt my angst toward learning a new syntax. I've been using LessCSS for about a week and I'm really impressed. For starters, no new syntax to learn. This is simply an augmentation of existing CSS syntax. You get mixins, nested rules, and most importantly, variables. You also get operations but I've yet to find them that useful. Here's my critique
2009 December 01
Sass isn't for me
I've been window shopping the CSS preprocessor world the last week or so. Sass seems to be everyone's new bicycle. It hasn't won me over and here's why...
2009 November 30
Curiosity rewarded the cat
Good user experience is often found in the most unassuming places. We have a new restaurant opening in my neighborhood this week and I've been anticipating their arrival for a few weeks now. They officially open today but two days ago revealed a very important lesson in user experience.
2009 November 20
Interface harmony
Interface consistency is one of those things that, if done correctly, should go unnoticed. I've slowly been working on a new interface for a side project and thought it'd be a treat to share my approach.
2009 October 25
Working with Python and RabbitMQ
I recently installed RabbitMQ to handle some message queuing needs at Readernaut and thought I'd share how everything came together. If you'd like to learn more about RabbitMQ please read the excellent Rabbits and Warrens.
2009 May 20
Capturing content in Django templates
As a template designer there are times when you have structural code surrounding a block which is waiting on content from a child template.
2009 February 28
What's next
Does it make sense to reinvent the wheel every time we sit down to a new project? No. My work echoes my past and I stand by it. Some say, "that looks like Readernaut" or "that looks like Playground Blues" and I say yes, they are me.
2008 December 13
Save RAM with mobile middleware
A while back I wrote an article on how to set up a mobile site with Django. Currently I have a Slicehost account which includes 256MB of RAM. My resources are tight and I really dislike having another set of unnecessary Apache processes for a mobile site that, aside from different templates, is using the same code base. The solution is quite simple, write a middleware.
2008 October 07
Message Queuing imports
Last week I ran into some problems dealing with large book imports on [Readernaut](http://readernaut.com). I tested the system for around 50-100 books but had no idea people would upload lists of 900+ books. This begged the question, how do you handle importing very large sets of data before the browser times out?
2008 September 05
Creating a basic API with Django
Creating a simple public API for you site is a lot easier than you may think with Django. You're basically just creating another view and serving it as XML or JSON instead of HTML.
2008 August 11
Gadget fast
My iPhone and laptop will be unplugged starting Friday evening for two days. I've let the fog of distractions generated by these two devices grow too thick so for the next few days (much like China) they'll be turned off.
2008 April 18
Capistrano rules
I've grown tired of committing changes to my subversion repository, logging into my server, updating my live checkout, and restarting python processes. I finally decided to implement Capistrano and eliminate this repetition.
2008 March 17
Aspen Simulator
As much as I'd like to blog about my trip to Austin and SXSW last week I'm just too excited over the iPhone SDK goodies that dropped last Thursday.
2008 March 13
Ah-ha Event Delegation
Wrapping my head around things like OOP took months. It's not because I'm an idiot (I don't think) - it's just because I needed all the explanations to marinate before having an ah-ha! moment.
2008 March 05
Going mobile
Over the weekend, I decided to whip up a mobile version of Playground Blues. I walked into Broadway Cafe around 3pm on Saturday, and by 5:30, I had m.playgroundblues.com. Here's how it went down.
2008 February 18
iPhone bookmark iconage
If you're wondering how to control the icon that gets generated for your webpage with the new 1.1.3 iPhone release, look no further than Apple's iPhone Dev Center.
2008 January 15
Flash, meet H.264
Adobe just released Update 3 of Flash Player 9. This is HUGE. Streaming video is no longer a laughing matter. Streaming High Definition video will become common place and it starts today.
2007 December 04
Django Basic Apps
I've been working on abstracting some Django applications from past projects so they can effortlessly be plugged into future projects.
2007 December 02
Django Sprint
Armed with high levels of legally addictive stimulants, silver laptops, and brilliant minds Django will get even closer to 1.0 today.
2007 December 01
Juggling Django settings modules
If you find yourself juggling multiple Django projects and constantly changing the settings module variable, try this simple shortcut.
2007 November 06