SoylentFoo

Just a couple days ago Firebug 1.0 Beta was released, with loads and loads of new features. Roger Johansson calls it the web developer tool of the year:

With the recent release of Firebug 1.0 (beta – the old kind of beta, not a Web 2.0 eternal beta), this extension went from “great” to absolutely marvelous. A must have that no Web developer should do without. I’m serious – you need Firebug.

I absolutely agree. In the short time since it’s been released, I’ve used it to track down an obscure bug with Rails AJAX auto-completion helpers, debug the CSS on this blog, and inspect the AJAX behavior of Campfire to add new features to Marshmallow, the unofficial ruby Campfire API (look for a gem release soon!).

So, this morning, I did a short screencast demoing some of my favorite features of Firebug – some new in 1.0 Beta, and some there since the beginning. Here it is:

• Firebug 1.0 Beta Screencast

This is my first screencast, so go easy on me. :) Hope you enjoy!

I’m sick of expaining the difference between comments and trackbacks to people. For the last time:

Comments are comments are comments. Trackbacks are comments. Readers want to see what other people have to say about your post, they couldn’t care less if someone made the comment on your blog, blogged about it themselves, emailed it to you, or muttered it in their sleep.

In A Beginner’s Guide to TrackBack, Ben and Mena ramble for a bit and then get to the point and say:

“This is a form of remote comments.”

Separating comments to your posts in your blog’s UI into two lists, ‘Comments’ and ‘Trackbacks’ is confusing to the reader. In the pending redesign of this site, all comments will be displayed below their respective post in chronological order. No distinction will be made between the different types of comments, nor is such any distinction necessary. Let’s quit making blogging any more confusing than it should be.

Another boring Sunday Night, another look for my blog. I designed a theme for the blog to match my resume, which I designed a year or so ago.

I like this look quite a bit. I also like the idea of unifying the look of all parts of my domain.

Thoughts / comments? Don’t be shy.

To celebrate the Typo Theme Contest, I’ll be redesigning my blog numerous times this month. This edition will be called Simple, and will be tested here for a few days, submitted, and then be replaced by a new design.

Features of Simple:

• 100% less graphics
• Pleasant, green headers.
• Clean, easy to read fonts (Georgia for the headers, Verdana for the body text)
• Only the most recent post is displayed, with links to most of the older ones below. I’m still kind of iffy about this. I may change it up so that only posts from the last week are displayed, instead of just one. Maybe I’ll show snippets, ala Gmail. Who knows.
• A search in progress now displays text instead of that pesky blue spinner.

Anyway, if you have anything to say about this design, leave a comment! I’m open to suggestions.