Ben Stewart

Daley Hake

June 2nd, 2009 | 2 Comments

In case you need something to do on this summer afternoon, here is the website of an amazing photographer person* I had the privilege of meeting a while back while in California.

Please check him out because it will be worth your time: http://daleyhake.com/blog/

* This is not meant to say that he is not an amazing photographer. Rather it is meant to say that as amazing a photographer he is–as you can see by his website–he is an even more amazing human being.

Tags: links, photography | Posted in Uncategorized

Dock rock!

May 29th, 2009 | Comments Off

When I first started to jump into the world of standards-based web design one of the guys I followed online was The Man in Blue (Cameron Adams). Aside from being a Javascript ninja, apparently he’s also a music video master… geek style. Here is a recent post of his with a link to the geek-chic video he made of his dock:

Russ asked what my dock looked like, so I made a 55 second video. (Turn your sound on)

Tags: geek, links, Mac, video | Posted in Uncategorized

Must-have Wordpress plugins – part 2

May 27th, 2009 | Comments Off

Back in part 1 I listed five of the plugins I install every time I setup a Wordpress blog for a friend or client. Here are five more plugins for Wordpress that are sure help you get the most out of your blogging experience.

1. Cimy Swift SMTP. I often use a Gmail account as the primary e-mail account for a blog or website. However, what about emails that are sent automatically by Wordpress like user registrations, comment notifications, etc.? Many web hosts will automatically try to send those from their own mail servers instead of Gmail’s servers. With the Cimy Swift SMTP plugin all of your website’s emails will run through whatever servers you assign.
2. Dagon Design Form Mailer or CFormsII. These plugins are both excellent ways to setup a contact form (or any other type of form) on your website. I started off using the Dagon plugin but have recently moved over to CForms. I think it’s a bit easier to manage.
3. Lightbox 2 (2.8.2) and Add Lightbox. These plugins add the “lightbox” effect to any images you link to in your posts (like the Wordpress logo linked at the top of this post). The first plugin adds the necessary javascript to your theme and the second plugin automatically adds the necessary HTML to each linked image.
4. Events. Need a simple plugin that lists upcoming events in the sidebar and/or an Events page? This is one of the easiest I have found that still allows adequate control over the structure and style of the events listings.
5. Wordpress.com Stats, Google Analytics for Wordpress, µMint Plugin. None of these plugins actually track stats themselves, but all of them integrate whatever stat tracking service you prefer into your Wordpress site. Wordpress.com Stats even adds a nice graph and some fun info. about popular posts to your Wordpress dashboard. I generally install Wordpress.com Stats and another tracking system (either Google Analygics which is free or Mint Stats which is pretty) so I can compare results. Just like Askimet, Wordpress.com Stats requires you to sign up for a free Wordpress.com account. You don’t have to start a blog there, you just need an account. For real-time tracking of people viewing your site you can also check out Wassup.

That wraps up this round of excellent Wordpress plugins. Are there plugins you just can’t live without? Post a link in the comments and be sure to stick around for part 3.

Tags: free, links, tips, webdesign, wordpress | Posted in Uncategorized

Must-have Wordpress plugins – part 1

May 20th, 2009 | Comments Off

I really like Wordpress. If you are looking for a blog/news-based website then there is probably no better option than to use Wordpress. One of the things that puts Wordpress at the top of my list is the thriving community of developers that use it. If you need your new website to do something then there is a good chance that someone else has already developed a plugin to accomplish that task… and it’s probably free. The only problem with such a vast community is that there are so many plugins to search through that it is sometimes hard to find the best plugins to meet your needs. No fear, I have compiled a list of some of my favorite plugins for Wordpress to accomplish several common tasks in website development.

1. Akismet. Use this! There is no better way to eliminate a large percentage of comment spam. While it isn’t a 100% solution, it makes a huge difference and it comes pre-packaged with Wordpress. All you have to do is activate the plugin and then sign up for a free Wordpress.com account–you don’t have to start a blog there, just an account. After signing up for your account just go to your new profile page and copy/paste the “API Key” that you will find at the top of the page into the Akismet settings page on your blog.
2. Viper’s Video Quicktags. This plugin adds a row of buttons on the Wordpress “write” screen so you can easily embed videos from many common video services like YouTube, Vimeo, Flickr, Google Video, etc. You can even choose which services to show or hide and set standard sizes for your embeded videos.
3. All in One SEO Pack. Every website is better with good search engine optimization (SEO). This plugin helps to automate that process by automatically changing your website’s title, description, keywords, and more to values that help search engines catalog your website accurately based on its content. This is a “set it and forget it” kind of plugin worth the download.
4. WP Super Cache. Wordpress, like most blogging engines and content management systems, generates dynamic pages. That means that every time someone goes to a page of your site, Wordpress finds the content for that page in its database and creates the right HTML page on the fly. It’s pretty much magic. But, it can also be slow if you get a lot of people viewing your site at the same time, if you are on a shared hosting package, or if your theme has a lot of extra database calls. Don’t fret, there are things you can do to help speed up your blog and one of those is caching. Basically, this plugin saves those HTML files and instead of asking Wordpress to generate new ones every time someone visits a page, it pulls out the already-generated file and displays it instead. This will not only make your visitors happy, but your web hosting service will thank you.
5. Feedburner Feedsmith or FD Feedburner Plugin. Either one is good, but the most important thing is to use Feedburner to manage your feeds! Why? First of all, if you change the location of your website or the platform you are using to run your website your original RSS feed address will more than likely change. This means that anyone who is subscribed to your feed using that address will now get nothing. The only solution at that point is to post a link to your new feed and hope that most of your readers will subscribe to your new feed. However, if you are using Feedburner then all of those readers are subscribed to a feed at Feedburner’s address which doesn’t change. All you have to do is tell Feedburner to start getting its contents from the new location and you don’t loose a single reader. As if that weren’t enough, Feedburner will also help clean up any improperly formed feeds which can be especially useful for podcasters.

That’s a pretty good first five to get you started. I’ve got Part 2 just around the corner so stay tuned. But until then, what plugins do you use that you want to tell the world about?

Tags: links, tips, webdesign, wordpress | Posted in Uncategorized

Must-have Mac apps pt. 2

May 6th, 2009 | Comments Off

I hope you are enjoying all of the apps that I listed back in part 1 because surely you’ve already read that post and downloaded those life-changing gems. This set of apps is a mixed bag of goodies that I think you will find useful. The theme today is free–something I don’t think anyone will complain about. So get your download button ready. Here we go…

6. Dropbox (free*)

Dropbox is a web service that integrates with your Mac seamlessly. It walks the line between being (1) file sync, (2) file sharing, and (3) cloud storage/backup. Basically, once you sign up for your free account you have 2 GB of space on Dropbox’s servers. Install the Dropbox app on your Mac and you will see a little icon in your menubar and a new folder called “Dropbox” in the sidebar of your Finder windows. All you have to do is drop a file into that Dropbox folder and it will immediately sync up with your online account. Why? Once that file is online you can access it from anywhere through the Dropbox website. Just login and you will see a copy of every file you put in that folder.

But it doesn’t stop there. Dropbox comes with a folder called Public. Just put a file in this Public folder, right-click on it, then choose “Dropbox -> Copy Public Link.” Now paste that link (URL) into an email or chat window and the person at the other end can download that file. This is the super-easy way to share that large Photoshop file, zipped folder of images, or whatever you need to send to someone else.

It also has a Photos folder allowing you to upload pictures that will automatically become a photo album.

If you have someone you always share files with, or if you have two machines (maybe a desktop and a notebook) you can create a shared folder with any other Dropbox user. Anything you put in the folder will automatically appear in their copy of that folder as well.

Dropbox’s web interface shows you every file you (or anyone you are sharing with) have added, deleted, etc. so you can easily keep up with what’s happening to your files. It also works great in Safari on the iPhone. Dropbox is free with 2 GB of storage (*or you can upgrade your account to 50 GB for just $9.99/month or $99/year). It works on Macs, Windows, and Linux.

7. Skype (free*)

We all know iChat has video capabilities. However, iChat is not always smart enough to get through pesky firewalls in places like hotels, schools, or conference centers. So how is a person expected to keep in touch with loved ones at home while out on the road? Why, Skype of course.

Skype is an online communication tool. It allows a user to easily video chat, audio chat, text chat, and even send files to any other Skype user for free. Any user can also purchase Skype Out credits allowing that user to place calls to regular land-line phones. You can even buy a Skype In number allowing other people to call your Skype account using a standard 10-digit phone number (and local phone rates no matter where you are in the world).

While no tool like this is perfect, Skype generally performs well and is most definitely worth setting up on your Mac. You can even communicate with your non-Mac friends via Skype and use it on your iPhone (via WiFi). Make sure to check out the security preferences after you install. Skype gives you control over how public or private your information is, it’s up to you to actually use that power.

Skype is free for computer to computer calls (*Skype Out and Skype In are resonably priced if you need them) and is availabel for Mac, Windows, Linux, iPhone, and a handful of other devices.

8.Handbrake (free)

Ever want to rip a copy of that non-commercial DVD you just picked up onto your Mac so you can watch it without having to keep up with the bulky DVD case or risk scratching the disk? That’s exactly what Handbrake was designed to do. Handbrake allows a user to insert a DVD and rip it to the hard disk in a variety of formats and quality levels. It even includes several presets that keep you from having to know the right settings to get that perfect rip for your iPhone, AppleTV, or HDTV.

In the most recent version Handbrake has been expanded to allow conversion of video files. So, if your cousin sends you a video file in some crazy Windows video format you can just load it into Handbrake and make iTunes happy by converting it to the right Quicktime format. (For another video conversion option–it never hurts to have options–try Video Monkey for free.)

Handbrake is free but remember you should only use it for legal purposes. With great power comes great responsibility.

9. The Unarchiver (free)

The Unarchiver is one of those utilities that everyone should have in their arsenal but most people will never even know it’s there. It makes unarchiving any compressed file you find yourself downloading from the internet an automatic process. I like utilities that keep me from having to think and that’s exactly what this is. Trust me, you should download it and forget it. But trust that it’s there making your life a little less stressful.

10. iStat Menus and iStat Nano (both free)

If you like to keep an eye on how your Mac is performing you need an iStat product (or two). I always keep my memory and CPU usage in my menubar with iStat Menus. If I feel my Mac getting a little sluggish I can just glance up at my menubar and see exactly what’s going on. It even provides easy access to Activity Monitor so I can keep an eye on any applications that are hogging more memory or CPU cycles than they should.

But iStat Menus doesn’t stop there. If you want more Date & Time information than Apple allows in the Date & Time Preferences you can have iStat Menus show you that as well. You can set your own date/time format and even show multiple time zones. You can actually see just about any information possible about the state of your Mac such as temperature, fan speed, drives, network traffic, etc.

If you’re not sure you want all of that information taking up precious space in your menubar, then maybe the iStat Nano dashboard widget is for you. In a small footprint on your dashboard, this widget be default shows a brief overview of your system with things like CPU usage, memory usage, hard drive space, temperature, fan speed(s), network traffic, and uptime (time since last restart). However, just hover over the widget and a smorgasboard of information is immediately at your fingertip. You can get detailed information about anything listed above as well as things like battery life and current running processes.

Even if these aren’t things that you want to see now, consider that one day your machine might be running a little slow and you may want to try to figure out why. At any rate, both iStat Menus and iStat Nano are free, functional, and pretty.

Conclusion

Well, that’s it for another round of great, must-have Mac applications. I hope you enjoy each of these as much as I do. If you’ve got other apps that you just can’t live without I would love to hear about them in the comments.

Tags: apps, links, Mac, productivity | Posted in Uncategorized

My favorite Twitter clients for Mac

April 29th, 2009 | 1 Comment

It seems today that Twitter has hit the mainstream. This means that there will be a lot more businesses using Twitter as a means to pimp themselves and there will be many more annoying people using Twitter to post every meal they eat and every thought they think.

However, this also means that the Twitter application market is much more attractive to developers. If more people are using the service then more people are interested in using applications to make their Twitter experience better. Let’s face it, Twitter’s web interface isn’t amazing. I’ve taken a few Twitter clients for Mac (and a couple for iPhone) for a spin and here are my favorites.

1. Tweetie – Free with ads or $15-20 (also for iPhone)
   
2. Twhirl – Free (requires Adobe AIR)
   
3. Nambu – Free (also for iPhone)
   
4. TweetDeck – Free (required Adobe AIR)
   
5. Twitterific – Free with ads or $15 (also for iPhone)
   
6. EventBox – $15-20
   

Things I look for:

• Small footprint with a lot of power
• Menubar icon or simple show/hide functionality
• Keep feed window on last read tweet when new tweets arrive
• Free option
• iPhone version
• Choices for URL shortening services and picture attachments
• Be beautiful and functional

What’s your favorite Twitter client?

Tags: apps, iphone, links, Mac, twitter | Posted in Uncategorized

Cover Tune Grab Bag

July 10th, 2008 | Comments Off

This is funny. You should check it out.

Tags: funny, links, videos | Posted in Uncategorized