Flocking Extensions.

Every net addict has developed their own _view_ of the Internet. As we go on browsing, we customize the browser the way we want it. For the _can't-help_ conditions, we just settle down with an eye open for a silver lining. That's when the extensions start calling.

With extensions we can customize and _extend_ almost all of our browsing needs. In fact, extensions are a must for any serious browsing. Everybody kind of has this _must-have_ list of extensions, without which browsing becomes an ordeal.

Just like people wish to expresses themselves in their way of dressing, walking and styles, extensions have become an integral part of our net presence and outlook. Extensions speak loads about a person's online tastes, preferences, way of presenting and existing.

Now, coming straight to the point, I was annoyed and had even uninstalled Flock and sweared never to use this thing again till it fixes this. Well, I just couldn't install my favorite extensions, without which it's like I'm a handicap :-) As we can use most of firefox extensions in Flock, I tried installing all my favorites and it just kept complaining about the unsupported version. So thought good old firefox is _the best_ thing. But then, the silver line did appear :-) There is this link where u give the link to a firefox extension and it'll do the magic for you. It will edit the version info inside the extension, to silence it's false complaints. Flock did provide a link to a tool which has to be downloaded and will make all our downloaded extensions Flock compatible, but it's much more easier to just give a link to my extension and get back the modified one for download. This way, I'll only download the version I want.

Here's my list of _must-have_ extensions :

• Tab Mix Plus.
• Restart Flock.
• Download Statusbar.
• NoScript.
• FasterFox.
• FoxyTunes.
  
• StumbleUpon.
• All-In-One Sidebar.
• Bloglines Toolkit
• Gmail Manager.
• QuickNote.
• SmoothWheel.
• Resizeable Textarea. [especially when I'm frequently updating by blogger template code.]

Other useful extensions :

• ImageZoom. [ Just ossom.]
• WordIQ Toolbar. [ For dictionary/thesaurus.But online querying everytime is too slow.]
• easyGestures.
• MeasureIt.
• Clean cookies for this site.

technorati tags: flock, extensions, browser, firefox, browse

Nostalgia....

Here is our final year branch video. This is the video of IT 2K5 batch, NITK, Surathkal. Enjoyed every bit making it !! Really miss the great hostel life :-(

It's 3min approx and may take a while. I would suggest to pause the video until it's completely buffered and then play it, so that there won't be any hitches in between. You'll also need flash enabled for this.

Well, here it is, our moments of the four most wonderful years....

technorati tags: viblog, videoblog, nitk, surathkal, smriti, IT-2k5

TiddlyWiki - The Future?

Wiki came. Blogs came. Podcasts came. Vodcasts are almost here. Now this old Wiki thing is all set to become the next new thing.

TiddlyWiki is the Wiki flavor of the season. Why? 'cause it's got a funny name :-) Well, it's really fun using and building it too. It's built on a very powerful but simple concept. "Human minds are a lot better at taking information in little tiny chunks." They call a chunk of information a Tiddler :-)

Several Tiddlers make up for a topic. There are many other power packed features. The interface is great. The tags support is very much an integral part....This interface reminds me of moo.fx. We can selectively keep some Tiddlers on display, while closing the others. Which means, we only see as much as we want to see.

There is this another great story telling site built on TW. Gimcrack'd has got a small list of stories right now. The story proceeds in tiny tiny chunks and the interesting part is, it is revealed differently to different users, based on the order in which they open the Tiddlers. Everyone has their own tale to tell !!
Reminds me of those Hardy Boys and Nancy Drew combined mystery stories. Go to page xyz if you'd like Hardy Boys to solve the mystery or goto page abc if Nancy Drew has to solve it. We used to read both of them anyway ;-) But here, it's a truly different story, as we can track all the previous chunks read and decide on which chunk to serve next.

One thing that strikes me is, all these so called _powerful_ concepts are all so simple and makes me ask like, "This is so very simple. Wasn't this thought of before itself? basic common sense!!".

Here's my 2 cents on where this could lead to:

First, there is this inclination towards bringing programming language like fundas into our natural representation of ideas. Information is broken up into chunks and modularized. A small piece of information can be reused again and again. So, instead of links to external manuals for more information, we can get that information chunk into our document itself. Saves much efforts in redocumenting things as per the context.

Second, the DRM concerns have peaked up now. There are people ready to let go of the stringent copyrights and share their works under more relaxed Creative Commons licenses. Richard Stallman decries CC and tells GPL can be extended beyond software to cover _content_ also. I think, we can expect more and more publicly modifiable and reusable _content_. We'll soon see different flavors of a novel, all legally valid. ;-)
Or given a set of chunks, which can all fit into a particular part as alternatives, generate a random sequence of chunks and get a new novel generated !!

Or may be, feed and make the computers understand very small chunks of data, and slowly plug/load them with extra chunks to _teach_ them new things....

Before I start rumbling more crazy things, GOOD BYE.

technorati tags: TiddlyWiki, story-telling, story, wiki, Future-tech

50 Tools For Writing.

I Stumble!d upon lifehack.org today. Great tips on writing technique. Quoting some snippets.

Tool 1: Branch to the Right

Begin sentences with subjects and verbs, letting subordinate elements branch to the right. Even a long, long sentence can be clear and powerful when the subject and verb make meaning early. Now imagine this: A reporter writes a lead sentence with subject and verb at the beginning, followed by other subordinate elements, creating what scholars call a "right-branching sentence."

Here's a right-branching sentence, from a news story in The New York Times:

Rebels seized control of Cap Haitien, Haiti's second largest city, on Sunday, meeting little resistance as hundreds of residents cheered, burned the police station, plundered food from port warehouses and looted the airport, which was quickly closed. Police officers and armed supporters of President Jean-Bertrand Aristide fled.

That first sentence is 37 words long and rippling with action. The sentence is so full, in fact, that it threatens to fly apart like some overheated engine. But the writer keeps control by creating meaning in the first three words: "Rebels seized control..." Think of that main clause as the locomotive that pulls all the cars that follow.

Contrast this with the sentence below :

A bill that would exclude tax income from the assessed value of new homes from the state education funding formula could mean a loss of revenue for Chesapeake County schools.

Eighteen words separate the subject "bill" from its weak verb "could mean,". A fatal flaw that turns what could be an important civic story into gibberish.

If the writer wants to create suspense, or build tension, or make the reader wait and wonder, or join a journey of discovery, or hold on for dear life, she can save the verb until the end.

This is the only tip I looked into. Rest are marked for _future-leisure-reading_ :-)

Well, following this tip, I'll rephrase as below:

I looked only into this tip. Marking the rest for _future-leisure-reading_

I know, it doesn't make much sence for short sentences :-)

What do u think?

technorati tags: writing, lifehack, writing-tools, writing-tips

The First Trail

Flock has been around for some time now. A plethora of web browsers exist, each catering to almost all normal needs. Hence I didn't bother myself to try out this new browser. Firefox worked great. A host of extensions made browsing needs almost complete. It was like, there could be nothing better. Two days ago, after a lot of lazing around, I decided to try Flock.

Doesn't look much different from Firefox. Of course, it's a sister project. The important thing is about this social browsing concept being _in-built_ into the browser. Social browsing is becoming more of a normal affair. And extending browser through extensions doesn't somehow give that power and robustness. A more important point is, as the browsers evolve, Flock will naturally adapt to social browsing than would Firefox. As the global village emerges, social browsing becomes a _necessity_.

Some Features of Flock I Liked Most:

1. The sharing of favorites and synchronizing with my online profiles. So, I don't loose out on any of my bookmarked links. Adds the powerful tag based bookmarking.
2. Blogging tools like Shelf, Photo Uploader, My Blogs. These are indispensable tools for some serious blogging [ especially for some kinds of blogs as this one].
3. Tagging My blog posts.
4. Support for del.icio.us, Flickr, Shadows, Blogger, WordPress, TypePad.
5. Supports most of the _can't-live-without_ firefox extensions.
   

This doesn't mean that Flock is an absolute bliss. It's not even completely beta yet. It crashes nearly 4-5 times everyday [which means I loose my ongoing sessions ]. Very Very Annoying. Some extensions don't work well. No extra themes yet.... But they'll anyway get better.

This is not my first blog. Once in a full moon I did write something at my _very-scattered_ blogs and forums. Later, I got my domain. After another half year, I got a free web hosting provider with no-ads at 50webs. Sufficient for blogging activities.

Now as I browse, I can put my notes, interesting web snippets, links, etc., on to the shelf. Start posting my day's blog. Retrieve from shelf, things relevant for that post using simple drag-n-drop. Publish the post.

Now blogging no more becomes a separate _task_ but a _way_ of my online presence.

technorati tags: first, flock, social_browsing