Dave Burke : Freelance .NET Web Developer specializing in Online Communities

Geek Smatterings: A Blog Engine, ScottW Couldn't Wait, BodyNet, a Booklist, iTunesLib

I'm cleaning out a Firefox Bookmarks folder, so some of these smatterings will go back a ways...

BLOG ENGINE SOFTWARE AIN'T EASY.  Scott Mitchell is a .NET developer I admire a LOT.  This January post was interesting to me, because Scott puts together a basic Blogging Engine for demonstration purposes but never uses it.  He may never had intended to use it, but blogging engines are hard.  Sidebar: I've been using Scott's skmRSS package to display my Netflix queue, but with my CS 2.1 upgrade I'll be going with the .NET RSS Toolkit.

IF ONLY SCOTTW COULD HAVE WAITED FOR MICROSOFT.  This Thom Robbins post from February on Skinning and Themes in ASP.NET 2.0 is something I really, really wanted to investigate, but I knew the implementation in Community Server was different, so why bother?  And this was long before I knew I'd be working at Telligent.  This reminds me of the dissapointment I've read from developers with Community Server Master Pages having a different implementation than the ASP.NET 2.0 model (for ASP.NET 1.1 compatability.)  Yeah, if only Scott Watermasysk wasn't cranking this stuff out years before it became standard.  Seriously, I know the differences can be a little frustrating, but I decided years ago that I'd learn how ScottW does it and call it Suppertime.

I'M GETTING ANTSY FOR MY WEARABLE COMPUTING DEVICES.  This Zypad wrist computer is close (PDF), but let's go people.  It's cool to watch TV on an iPod, but we've got a ways to go, like the BodyNet concept Michael L. Dertouzos, head of the MIT Laboratory for Computer Science described in What Will Be.  (Search Inside at Amazon, page 65.)

THIS CODING HORROR BOOKLIST IS BETTER THAN AMAZON RECOMMENDATIONS.  I'm about due to buy a few new books for [NordicTrack] reading, and Amazon's recommendations have been leaving me flat lately.  I think I'll check out Jeff Atwood's list of books for developers when I feel the need for book spending speed.

BECAUSE ITUNES IS SUCKY AND I WANT TO FLIP THROUGH MY ALBUM COVERS.  I like iTunes, I really do, but it could be sooo much better.  I keep thinking about picking up on a .NET front end I started, yet never quite get around to it.  I want a screen full of my album jackets in a Windows Form app, able to flip through them and select an album I want to play.  And I want to select the order I want to play them in, not by play count or alphabetically.  Someone please finish writing this code for me, would you?  Just reference the iTunes Library in a Windows Forms app and see what happens.

[tags: Smatterings, Community Server, Wearable Computing, iTunes]

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Posted on 7/7/2006 9:40:00 PM by Dave Burke
Categories: Everyman Links
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7/8/2006 9:16:37 AM Permalink

Dave, I actually took the blog engine idea and turned it into a talk, which I then presented at the SoCal CodeCamp in San Diego two weeks ago.
http://scottonwriting.net/sowblog/posts/8624.aspx

Scott Mitchell |

7/9/2006 6:55:52 PM Permalink

Scott, thanks for the info.  I haven't looked at the engine myself, but I'm sure the talk was outstanding.  I know all of your other SKM tools (rss, menu, faq, all of which I HAVE used) are valuable learning tools as well as great tools.

daveburke |

7/14/2006 12:01:43 PM Permalink

If you haven't purchased your books yet I recommend nerdbooks.  I promise I don't work for them.  Smile

Erik Lane |

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