About Me

I'm a technical consultant living and working in Chicago. When I'm not at my full time job or seeking contract work on the side, I'm usually spending time local coffee shops, neighborhood bars, or traveling out to the burbs to visit friends and family.


Twitter Feed
    follow me on Twitter

    Thoughts

    Saturday
    Mar062010

    Kindle controls

    I've had my Kindle2 for a couple of months now, and I'm sad to say I haven't used it as much as I would have liked (insert lame excuse here). One of the things I did notice right away though was the page controls on the right and left side.

    On the right side, there is a page forward and home button, and on the left there is a page forward and page back. Both of these button sets are about halfway up the device, and are intended for use by the thumb of the hand that holds it.

    Now I am right handed so I started holding the device with my right hand. I soon began to notice that paging forward was fine, but I had to use my other hand to page back. I thought this was quite annoying and a pretty surprising omission on the part of amazon. Nonetheless, I still loved my Kindle and just decided to look past it.

    Then I made a forehead-smacking realization: the better controls are meant to be used by my left hand so my dominant hand can do other things! (D'Uh, I'm an idiot!)

    Basically I was at a coffee shop on a couch and I switched the Kindle to my left hand so I could get my coffee. In the process I accidentally used my left hand to page forward. So without thinking, I just hit the page back with my left thumb and resumed reading. Three pages passed with my coffee cup still in my right hand when I realized that this is how I'm supposed to hold it!

    So instead of me casting a 'FAIL' at amazon, i'm sending an 'RTFM' at myself.

    Friday
    Feb192010

    Auto-save dammit

    Alright, first gripe about the squarespace app: no auto-save. I was mid-post on the train when I got a phone call. After finishing the call and returning to the app, it was gone. I was a little peeved, but also realized I should be saving drafts regularly.

    So with this post, I started doing that. But much to my dismay, it's super cumbersome. It takes 3 taps to save the draft to my phone. Then it takes me back to the 'mange posts screen', which takes 10-15 seconds to load. Then I have to tap on the article I was just in and tap edit. Now that's a lot of work just to make sure my post doesn't get destroyed because of a phone call or randomly hitting the home button.

    I still think the app is great. It's free and it does make posting super easy, but the lack of auto save on a platform where random (uncontrollable) interruptions can blow away a bunch of work is a bit of a disconnect.

    Thursday
    Feb182010

    CTA-Trekker

    In an effort to stop neglecting my blog, I've decided to start blogging whenever I'm on any CTA (chicago transit authority) vehicle.  Since <a href="www.squarespace.com">SquareSpace</a> (my hosting platform) has a great, free <a href='http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/squarespace/id318590874?mt=8'>iPhone app</a>, I can post entries directly from my phone.  I've used it to post a couple of short entries with photos, and it works pretty well.  We'll see how well things go with longer entries.  But beyond making sure I get my money's worth on my monthly hosting bill, I really want it to be therapeutic.  Doing short to medium sized posts on a daily basis will help get my mind off work for a bit while making my rush hour commute a bit more tolerable.  It also allows me to carve out some 'me time' everyday, which is something that tends to wan as work gets busier.

     

    Thursday
    Feb182010

    Xmas gift

    This was my Xmas gift from my girlfriend. The hawks lost in a shootout, but we were super close and had a bunch of fun. Highly recommend seeing live hockey (especially that close).

    Wednesday
    Feb172010

    Bottle top art

    Found this in a wine shop in Lincoln Square. Pretty cool.