Adding tags

This post was written when this blog was based on Jekyll before I moved back to Wordpress. I have kept it as part of the history of this blog. It’s taken me a long time with lots of googling and trial & error, but I finally have tags working on this site. Out of the box Jekyll provides a tagging function. You can define tags at the start of blog posts along with the other data you wish to add, but annoyingly Jekyll doesn’t automatically provide archive pages.

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First steps playing with Figma today. We’ve been all in on XD for visual design but it seems to be dead and keeps breaking things.

1Password is going to support passkeys. This looks really interesting, might be time to do some passkey research.

Spent a bit more time working on my personal site. I’ve now revived the Jekyll powered blog and plan to keep playing with the site. Need to add a little personality to it but more of the bare bones are there now.

Hobbies, blogs, writing, iPads, and Macs

For the last few years 99% of my personal computing has been handled on the iPad Pro. For the most part it was ok. Sometimes I would need to jump through some hoops to do things and occasionally I would fall back on my work Mac. The only item that has suffered in that time has been my ability to work on my personal website. I tried several times to build workflows in shortcuts to enable me to do what I wanted, but most of the time they were buggy or didn’t quite work how I needed them too.

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Cameron Moll’s problem solving process is very similar to mine. Start with a basic understanding of the problem, and iterate on the problem and the solution.

I wish Sonos would make a proper Mac app.

Came across these rather beautiful pens this morning.

Since I cam across this post from Om Malik on whether the “stream” as a design paradigm is over it’s been noodling away at the back of my mind. I think, to some extent, I agree with it whilst at the same time disagreeing. Streams are good for one thing: communicating context via time.

I’ve recently discovered the blog of Manuel Moreale and I love the simplicity of the design.

In his post about Blogging, RSS, and Imposture Syndrome Brandon writes,

Then it clicked… the internet I miss didn’t include my mom. It was a bunch of nerds, creating stuff, showing it off, and most of the time doing it for free for others to enjoy.

And I couldn’t agree more. This is exactly the internet I miss as well. It’s what drew me to create my first blog in 2005 and what keep drawing me back now.

First steps of an updated personal site today. It will likely evolve a lot in the coming weeks especially while I work out how micro.blog, mastodon, and the site work together.

Keeping an eye on CodeEdit. Looks promising.

My code editor of choice (Atom) is no more. Anyone got any recommendations?

I miss blog rolls… the first time the personal web was in full swing everyone had blog rolls on their sites. Now very few people have this and it makes finding sites much harder.

Wandering around Oxford today after a few days in London. An end of January mini holiday is actually really nice and refreshing.

Blank page paralysis

I’ve been feeling the desire to create more since the start of the year. I’m not sure if it’s just because it’s a new year which often brings with it a fresh vigour or whether it’s seeing some people I know have their artwork displayed in a local gallery. It creates a spark in me. A desire to create things. I’m inspired. Except. When I sit down with my notebook and pencil or my iPad and Apple Pencil I don’t know what to draw.

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Blank page paralysis

I’ve been feeling the desire to create more since the start of the year. I’m not sure if it’s just because it’s a new year which often brings with it a fresh vigour or whether it’s seeing some people I know have their artwork displayed in a local gallery. It creates a spark in me. A desire to create things. I’m inspired. Except. When I sit down with my notebook and pencil or my iPad and Apple Pencil I don’t know what to draw.

Continue reading →

Not sure why but I now have a Mastodon account… I think intrigue more than anything is behind it.

Apple has released a new HomePod that looks like they haven’t learnt any lessons from the first one. It’s still $300 and still seems over engineered.