Disgruntled movie critic Mr. Cranky says “ ... What if Microsoft Windows could grow legs and run around your house breaking stuff?”
First, Mr. Cranky obviously didn't read my previous post.
Second, that'd be kind of cool. Anybody working on such a project (without the breaking of stuff)?
On the first day of class, my 9th grade social studies teacher, Mr. Litivich, listed on the blackboard certain words we were not allowed to use. They mainly consisted of non-politically correct terms. A few, however, were words that he thought displayed laziness and lack of focus on the part of the speaker.
We were not allowed to use the words “stuff“, “thing“, or “um“.
“Stuff” and “thing” should always be substituted with the actual stuff or thing, he said. And while thinking of the appropriate words to use -- instead of using “stuff” or “thing” -- we better not delay with “um ... um ... um”. He'd prefer we remain completely silent.
To say the least, this on-going exercise definitely improved our speaking and thinking skills. How many good speakers do you know of who use “stuff”or “thing” or utter “um ... um ... um” while searching for the right words to use?
When I arrived at college, professor Samuel Pickering reiterated such sentiments in my Short Story class. This time the focus was on writing.
I've seen “stuff” and “thing” in enough articles to warrant this post. Not using these words is one of the easiest ways to improve the quality of your work, whether written or oral.
Raymond Chen says, “When writing documentation, one often has need to come up with a sample URL to illustrate some point or other. When you do, make sure the sample URL is under your control.”
Good advice to all writers, not just those who strictly document. Of course, as an editor I should also be on top of this before publication to make sure it is just an “innocent” mistake by the author.
Brian Livingston, in his article titled “Run, Don't Walk, from Internet Explorer”, opines:
“If the marketplace supported 10 browsers today, hackers would have much less incentive to generate remote threats, which would require the development of specialized code for each alternative.”
This seems like the classic case for more browser support in the market place, but even with 10 browsers, would it really provide much less incentive to write “specialized code for each alternative“?
Seems it would just take the determined attacker a bit longer. He still would only need to write the code once.
Thought I'd address a common (American English) pronoun misusage that I see often in articles.
When using a pronoun to refer back to a company, it is correct to use the singular “it” or “its“ instead of the plural “they”, “their” or “them”, especially if the singular form of a verb is used to describe the company's action.
Example:
CORRECT: Microsoft has trimmed its employee benefits.
INCORRECT: Microsoft has trimmed their employee benefits.
INCORRECT: Microsoft have trimmed their employee benefits. (Accepted UK English usage).
Tuesday I filled out an online form, requesting more information on residential solar power systems. I've filled out numerous Web forms in the past, but for the first time I left the e-mail field blank and filled in my home address and phone number.
In a million years I never thought I'd leave this field blank (and actually provide my phone number), but as I filled out the form it hit me. The onslaught of spam I've received to my personal e-mail account usually occurs a couple of days after I fill out an online form.
For the first time, I actually decided, rationally or irrationally, that I'd prefer literature in the mail or a phone call; the possibility of a company selling my phone number and mailing address; and a bite from a spider hiding in my mailbox than system infection through a virus hiding in an e-mail.
Boy, how times have changed.
Many have been blogging about the “release” of VS 2005 and the “free” Express line of developer tools.
However, there have been a couple of minor inaccuracies in some of the blog posts that should be corrected.
1) Some had written that VS 2005 beta 1 was released when it in fact had not. At the time of this writing, only an announcement of its availability has been made. Availability is soon.
2) Visual Web developer 2005 is not free. Its beta is, but the release version will cost in the “tens of dollars” range.
ClickZ has just published an article about Nike's new blog microsite on the Gawker blog in an effort to target a younger audience. The article also offers some statistics on blog readers.
According to the article:
“Web ad network Blogads recently surveyed over 17,000 blog readers on various social and financial indicators, online spending habits, and their involvement with Web logs. The study shows nearly 40 percent have an annual household income over $90,000, and 30 percent are 31-41 years old (only 10.3 percent are 19-24 years old).
When asked about their interaction with blogs, over 66 percent of blog readers say they've clicked on an advertisement that appeared within a blog. More than 39 percent donated money, and over 22 percent purchased a product or service after that click.
In addition, about 78 percent of readers say blogs give them a better perspective than other news and information source. Sixty-one percent say they believe blogs are more honest.”
Draw your own conclusions.
More and more bloggers are discovering that coming up with topics to write about on a consistent basis is as easy as learning a new technology without having anything to apply it to. They may resort to apologizing for not blogging or using the 'having nothing to write about' cliche as a topic itself (which may be as cheesy as a blog entry about how to choose a topic to write about).
On the same note, the first obstacle many would-be book and article authors face is finding a topic to write about (although we know that many writers can spew words for pages without saying really anything at all. We're above that though).
So, if you're one of these potential tech authors looking to break through that first obstacle, here are some ways to begin finding that elusive topic.
1) The best ideas draw upon experience. Use an application or system you have developed as a basis for an idea.
2) Take an existing application or technology and write an article on how to extend or improve it or build upon it.
3) Check the blogs and discussion lists to see what developers and/or customers are having trouble with or what seems to be a popular topic. What angle hasn't been covered yet? Are they missing the point about a particular technology? Does something seem confusing that needs clarification?
4) What have you read lately? Has a book or article (or anything) changed the way you approach or solve a computing problem? Talk about it with your real-world example. Can you present a better solution or approach than the book or article offers?
5) Take two completely different gadgets, systems, etc. and try connecting them (to create something useful).
6) The old standby. Take that hunch or premise burning in your head and try proving it.
These are just a few ideas off the top of my head. If writers out there have other methods for finding article topics, do share.
As an editor, I perform research locally and globally throughout the day and find many obstacles to the data I'm looking for. I thought I'd take some time to create a short list of those features a “semantic“ search engine should include:
1) Determine the word's part of speech (i.e. noun, verb, adjective, etc.) Oftentimes the same work can be used as a noun or verb (i.e. type, wind, singing, etc.)
2) Know the meaning of words that are spelled the exact same but mean two different things, even if they are the same part of speech (i.e. pool, mole, pry, yard)
3) Determine if the noun is the subject or object of the query
4) Not penalize the searcher for misspelled words. Based on the query, the search engine, for example, should know if I meant “aisle” instead of “isle” or “know“ instead of “no“.
5) Perform research - the other day (not at work) I wanted to know the number of Democrats versus the number of Republicans in U.S. Congress who have served in the U.S Military. I could not find this info already compiled. All I could find were each member's biography, which included military service and party affiliation. It'd be nice if a search feature could compile this info for me or at least organize the data so all I'd have to do is count. Basically, I'd like to create relationships through my search engine based on my queries, either locally or globally or both! Maybe I'd have political-party affiliation in a document on my local computer, but military service resided in various other places on the Web. The search engine could relate and organize data from everywhere into one result.
I know google does some stuff with misspellings, etc. but hopefully the others features (especially number 5) are not too far off.
If others would like to add to the Search Engine Wish List, either add to comments or post to your own blog and place link in comments.
Thanks!
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