Monkinetic Weblog

Major Kudos go out to Seth Dillingham and Macrobyte Resources, makers of fine content management systems and groupware for the web gourmet.

DW, re: Manila: "We use the tools, we're sick of how awful we are, but we also know that they're the best that are available anywhere. What a conundrum."

On Being A Geek

Per Rob O.'s recomendation, I ordered Jon Katz' book "Geeks" (From Barnes and Noble) and started reading it tonight. My wife just finished "Microserfs" , by Douglas Coupland, and loved it. She's already started again. Why mention Microserfs? Because like "Geeks", "Microserfs" deals with what makes me tick.

I loved "Microserfs". Douglas Coupland's writing is personal, funny, ironic, and touching, all without going completely overboard. As a longtime nerd many things in Coupland's book touched a nerve in me.

Katz' "Geeks" is turning out to be a whole different experience. "Geeks" takes the clean-LEGO world of "Microserfs" and rubs off the shine, exposing the pain and isolation of not fitting in, as well as the triumph of being indispensible to a new world of communication. Coupland's "Microserfs" is a novel, "Geeks" is simultaneously an expose and a manifesto, part reality-based television and part Declaration of Independence.

I've only gotten through the first two chapters in "Geeks". I think I'll have more to say later, but for now,

Ciao

--Steve

image for site

My name is Steve Ivy, and I run redmonk.net. I'm a web developer by trade, formerly of U-Haul, Compass Technology Management, CBN, and ArtLab Europe. My unofficial title could be web architect, designer, and Conversant/XML/R.E.M. evangelist.

is coming along well. Conversant's style sheet editor is great. The form interface takes a lot ofthe guesswork out of "what do I put where?"

I've spread the template around the site a bit... Now I'm squashing GUI bugs and finding the remnants of old tempalte lying around.

Doc Searls has an article on Jabber, an XML-based chat client and server, in the Sept. Linux Journal. Looks like good, technical reading.

This is a test page. This is test content.

MacFixit, resource extraordinaire for Mac in trouble, has started a Mac OSX page. Here's to all you black belts out there: Welcome to the future, and don't give up!

Anyone doing Java development and need a good resource on OO design? Try this PDF. Trust me.

I love seeing what others are doing on the web. At the main Free-Conversant site, MacroByte has a list of other sites that are using Conversant. Check 'em out! You may learn something too!

Resetting Templates.

This is great. I want a copy of that chart.

sorry about the mess. i was editting temapltes when i broke them. still trying to fix it.

This is a Lego Mac Plus I created some months back. It's been a fixture on my NT machine ever since. I got my first Legos at age 4, and was an avid builder until my late-teens. Even now when I get a chance I pull out the small box of several hundred Legos (those that survived my childhood and that of my two brothers) and have some fun.

I know the look and feel on this site isn't as... "interesting" as the one on my usual site, http://redmonk.editthispage.com, but give it time. I'll be redoing this site shortly, and I may even move redmonk.net here. Who knows?

Well, I made it through the night without another dose of Vicodin... I guess there are advantages to not having a nerve. <grin>

"Nate" and I spent 5 hours one night building this... LEGO rocks.