Believe it or not, I'm a Web Developer
You know what they say: The children of the cobbler have no shoes.
So far this site is a repository for stuff - occasional weblog posts and images - that I want to make available to
people. You'll find some examples of my work, mostly older portfolio items at present, at my other site: Hipster Doofus Designs. I also collaborate with my wife at Bertellan.net. In time I'll impose some logic to all this. For now, have fun exploring my mess. Any deeper meaning is purely coincidental.
Monday, May 26, 2008
4:42 PM
Now that I've had a chance to better dig into how WordPress works, I'm very impressed by the versatility it provides out of the box to anyone who choses to use it. By contrast, Blogger is proving feature-deficient and if it wasn't for my long history using it, I would've pitched it by now for another system. It's reminiscent of how Moofie describes his relationship with the Star Wars series - dysfunctional in how it lures us back after a cooling off period, hoping that this time around, things will work out better.
Labels: "Web Development", Blogger, WordPress
4:33 PM
This past week I had an inspiring experience attending the WebVisions 2008 conference that was here in Portland. WebVisions has been around for eight years now and though I've attended before, this is the first time that I've felt it was directly applicable to my career. Though I've been working on web sites for several years this is the first time I've gone in thinking of myself as a web developer. As such, I felt an acute interest in understanding where the industry is going. Previous WebVisions have always conveyed a large amount of conceptual information about trends in web design and directions that it might be headed. Looking back at information I gleaned from previous conferences, I'm struck by how much of what was talked about years ago is now accepted practice. I'd like to do a more comprehensive review of my experience but for now a short summary will have to suffice. Below are the sessions I attended over the two days:
- Best Practices for Permission-Based Email Communication, Speaker: Mark Wyner - The seminar most applicable to my current projects at work. I learned afterwards that Mark is a former colleague of one of my other friends which is an interesting tidbit for future networking.
- The Experience Economy and Hybrid Desktop-Internet Applications, Speaker: Kevin Hoyt
- WORKSHOP: Type Class, Speaker: Roger Black - I had hoped for a more structured curriculum in this workshop and was disappointed that it didn't cover more general concepts of typography for either print or the web. I think I might've benefited with a broader knowledge-base going in as it didn't seem oriented to a novice.
- KEYNOTE: Is Print Dead? How Digital Media is Changing the Face of Publishing, Speaker: Lynne d Johnson (FastCompany.com) - Lynne was an engaging moderator for what turned into a facilitated discussion among the attendants but I was hoping for more of a considered presentation of her views of how digital media was changing publishing.
- Data Portability, Privacy and Identity: Welcome to the Open Web, Speaker: Scott Kveton
- PANEL: Open Source, Speakers: Deborah Bryant, Ward Cunningham, Brian Jamison, Josh Bancroft - This was way over my head. I cut out midway to catch the end of...
- The Language of Interaction, Speaker: Bill DeRouchey - I'd seen a similar presentation a few years previous and it's absolutely engaging.
- From Idea to Implementation and Beyond: Getting Started with Rails, Speaker: Jim Meyer
- Convergence 2.0: The Seamless User Experience, Speaker: Tjeerd Hoek
- KEYNOTE: Overcoming Chaos: Designing the Future Web, Speaker: Jeffrey Veen
Labels: "Web Development", WebVisions
Friday, January 05, 2007
12:34 PM
Interesting article about managing expectations when presenting in-progress development projects: Creating Passionate Users: Don't make the Demo look Done.
I've attended project demos where the feedback given was beyond the scope of what was being solicited and can accept the tenet that non-techies have a hard time looking beyond the cosmetic. I wonder if managing expectations like this is ultimately more or less work in the development process. [Link from: Digital Web Magazine - News - Planning the Fidelity of Your Prototype]
Related: GUUUI - Balancing fidelity in prototyping
Labels: "project managment", "Web Development"
