Of course, instead of using a Feedburner BuzzBoost mashup of Twitter, you could use Alex King’s WordPress plugin, Twitter Tools. (If I’m not mistaken, Alex King is one of those names you see in the default blogroll when you set up a new WordPress blog. He has a great WordPress Theme Browser that also lets you easily download themes you like.)

His Twitter Tools plugin only works on WP2.1 and up, but it takes recent Twitterings and collects them into a single blog post. This is apparently configurable, as he explains in his Proper behavior for a Twitter archiver WordPress plugin and Twitter tools roadmap posts. (You can see an example at Fun Anymore.)

Once he has all features in place, you be able to configure the plugin to create “daily digest” posts of your Twitterings, thus turning your microblogging back into a sort of regular blogging. One really interesting feature Alex is thinking of implementing is being able to Twitter directly from your blog’s sidebar.

Originally posted on March 30, 2007 @ 8:44 am

Despite the sensation that Twitter has become, who needs to actually Twitter when you can have more fun being a Twitter Watcher? So if you want to see what other people are Twittering without having to login into Twitter, why not display an HTML badge of sorts on your blog? I know that Twitter has its own badge for your own Twittering, but I don’t really like their Flash badge. They have something called a JavaScript Badge, but as far as I can tell, you’re limited to viewing your own Twittering.

What if you want to view the Twitter public timeline? Well, you can use Feedburner‘s services and tools to create a nice, clean display of recent Twitterings. All you do is take the public timeline’s RSS feed and “burn” it in Feedburner. Then you use Feedburner’s BuzzBoost service (under the Publicize tab, first item at the top of the left column menu) to produce your HTML badge. You can choose the number of items to display (1-15, all), the display format (plain text, full HTML), the date of an item, etc.

Once you’ve configured your BuzzBoost for the Twitter public timeline feed, Feedburner will show you a snippet of Javascript/HTML code that you can insert into the sidebar of your website. If you want to apply some style to it, the BuzzBoost content has HTML attributes that can be controlled with simple CSS code. For the purposes of illustration, I’ve used an HTML table below (shock! horror! blasphemy!). If I have some time later, I’ll post some CSS.

There are a lot of other things you can do with BuzzBoost, but I’ve not been able to successfully use the output of any Yahoo Pipes. Until Yahoo offers a way to output clean RSS feed views of complex information, you have to massage custom feed mashups before you “badge” them in BuzzBoost.

Warning: content in Twitter public timeline below may have NSFW text. Click link to see content.

[Read more…]

Originally posted on March 30, 2007 @ 8:00 am

The Semantic Web, which some call Web 3.0, refers to an Internet where content has structure and allows for meaningful (semantic) queries. So the Semantic Web gives structure for machines and meaning to human readers.

At present, web pages mostly have plain old text with very little structure. Queries in a regular search engine give us loads of results, but they are sometimes not what we want. With the Semantic Web, we could ask for, say, a list of holiday packages to a specific destination, within a certain time frame, leaving from airport X, for a price in the range of Y-Z, etc. Or, you might search for homes near a particular location, or within T miles of a public school. The choices are virtually endless.

So what do we need to support the Semantic Web? Structure. Web content would have to have some sort of structure, and would have to be XML compliant. By having structure, the Web’s content becomes like a database. And structure is what web 2.0 feed mashup applications like Yahoo Pipes and OpenKapow can offer. The Semantic Web isn’t quite here yet, but these apps are pushing us forwards.

What we still need is more powerful query widgets in web application builders like Teqlo. Then, anyone wanting to do a query that they’ll use at least a few times can just plug and play a few widgets, run the custom application, and view the results.

Of course, this opens up the possibility of mobile Semantic Web applications – maybe even voice-driven – via smart phones connected to the Internet. Such apps would be ideal for the tourist or occasional traveller trying to find markets or other places to visit. These sorts of applications will add tremendous value to online content. I don’t know about you, but I can’t wait for true Semantic Web apps.

Originally posted on March 26, 2007 @ 8:50 pm

Over the weekend I pondered the real world a lot. You know what I don’t like most people. Not just online but in the real world too. And you know what that is ok. I used to think you had to please everyone. But a business partner told me recently its ok to just please the 2%. The 2% that really care about your business and what you are doing.

If you spend 98% of your time trying to please everyone than you are wasting your time. But if you spend 100% of your time trying to please the 2% of people who are passionate about what you are doing you find success beyond your wildest dreams.

So who cares if you 98% of the universe and/or blogosphere doesn’t know you. That’s ok. But be passionate about the 2% that does. Or in the real numbers the .0002%. ( I have no factual data to backup my claims. )

Originally posted on March 26, 2007 @ 10:50 am

Sitting in front of the computer all day is hard work, at least for your eyes. Don’t save on your monitor, cut down on something else if you have too – after all, you’re staring at it all day right?

Widescreen monitors are very common these days, and decently priced as well. However, don’t be fooled by the size of the monitor.

Monitors are sold based on the distance from the top left corner of the monitor to the bottom right corner of the monitor. But, because of trigonometry, a 19 inch regular monitor will not have the same viewing area as a 19 inch widescreen monitor. A 19 inch 4:3 aspect ratio monitor is 15.2 inches wide by 11.4 inches wide giving you a viewing area of 173.3 inches. But, a 19 inch widescreen monitor is 16.1 inches wide by 10.1 inches wide producing a viewing area of 162.2 inches.

This according to a post over at Daily Cup of Tech, along with a graph and stuff.

I agree with the post. Buy one inch extra compared to a regular 4:3 monitor so that your actual space really increases. [Read more…]

Originally posted on March 21, 2007 @ 4:36 am