I’m at a pub listening to The Unmade Podcast, playing chess online against my brother, and solving a New York Times crossword. I’m a total rager.
Speeding up Google Calendar .ics Subscription Refreshes
My project of the moment preventing me from going to bed: configuring a Google Calendar script to work, such that it will force GCal to refresh its .ics subscriptions from Fastmail every 15 minutes, rather than the default 12-24 hours. All so then SkedPal can read GCal and have accurate and timely data from which to build my daily task schedule. Why can’t SkedPal simply support standard CalDAV?
Only Hemispheric Views offers One Prime Plus
I see that Macstories is introducing new levels of membership:
TL;DR: Today, we’re announcing the all-new Club MacStories featuring two additional tiers: Club MacStories+ and Club Premier.
That’s all well and good, but always remember that only Hemispheric Views offers One Prime Plus membership. Get yours today!
I’m two episodes into Mr. Corman on AppleTV+ and already it’s one of the most impactful, enjoyable shows I’ve seen.
It’s been an expensive weekend. I bought a new TV - LG OLED C1 - then discovered my current Yamaha 375 receiver was too old to drive it, so had to upgrade to a new Denon AVR-X550BT receiver. Fortunately, I’d been saving money for a long time in a YNAB category!
Camera Comparison
Today I pulled my old cameras out from storage.
This was prompted by my trial of Glass, and the reminder that my Flickr account still exists.
I haven’t had much time to do anything with them, except charge the battery and try to reset them back to a state where they were taking jpegs and letting the camera intelligence do the work.
In a sign of how long they’ve been sitting around for, every camera needed its clock reset. I also seem to have lost some SD cards - does anybody know where I put them?
I took two photos with each camera from roughly the same position. It wasn’t too scientific, so don’t necessarily read too much into the results, but it’s kind of interesting.
My cameras are (with links to relevant pages at DPReview:
Shot 1: Sound Panels
LX3
GX7
D7000
XR
Shot 2: Tchotchkes
LX3
GX7
D7000
XR
Findings
Each progressive generation gets better at capturing light, leading to brighter images. The iPhone and its computational photography has to be the greatest revolution in photography since the digital camera was born. Keep in mind that I’m using an iPhone several generations old, and that some of the greatest advancements since this model have been low light capture.
It was nice to pull out the old cameras though, and I think the D7000 and GX7 in particular still offer some value in terms of a change-up from typical iPhone shots.
At this point, the LX3 probably needs to be consigned to use only for outdoor shots with reasonable light.
I am proud to announce that NBL Pocket Podcast finally has its own home on the web. 🎙 🌏 🏀
I’ve pulled out my old cameras to have a play. Going to pare things right back: shoot jpg not RAW, use P mode instead of A/S, and see how things turn out. Back to basics. 📷
My wife will be jumping off a building in November!
The WA Minister for Mines & Petroleum; Energy; Corrective Services was kind enough to draw attention to this fact in Parliament today:
It’s all for a good cause though. Hannah is participating in the Central Park Plunge 2021 in support of Guide Dogs WA.
If you’d like to support the effort, this is Hannah’s fundraising page.
Exploring Glass encouraged me to revisit Flickr. The latter is technically better (despite the bugs and UC mishmash) but people are active on Glass. If I could have only one, it would still be Flickr. Why can’t that site be more successful? 📷
I finished watching Physical on AppleTV+. The first half of the series had me engaged and interested, the second half left me feeling undernourished and somewhat confused.
Tot, redux: iOS Edition
By way of follow-up to yesterday’s review of Tot, I can confirm I’ve bought the iOS version.
With thanks to @keithpound I’m in at Glass. My username is canion over there, too.
Tot
Update: The day after writing this, I bought the iOS version of Tot.
My friend and Hemispheric Views podcast co-host Martin Feld is Mr. Default. He likes Reminders. He like Mail.app. He likes Calendar. Not for him the world of OmniFocus, MailMate or Fantastical. No sirree. Keep it simple, keep it made by Apple. Except… he uses Tot. I’m sure he uses Notes as well, but Tot. Not Drafts.
I installed Tot on my Mac when it was released, because as with anything made by The Iconfactory, it’s worth a look. I didn’t get it. It offers a 7 note maximum. It has limited Markdown support. Mostly, though, while the macOS app is free as in beer, the iOS version of the same app is AU$30.99. For a tiny notes app? So my exploration of Tot ended, and I went back to Drafts, and DEVONthink, and iA Writer, and Craft, and the list goes on.
Recently, I raised again my frustration with my note and file management “system”. Martin reminded me of Tot. So I’ve been giving it another try. This time, my verdict feels quite different.
The limitations seem useful. The restrictions seem like helpful guiderails rather than annoyances. This all comes at a time when I’ve cancelled my automatic renewal of Drafts - an app I appreciate for its power, but hate because of its interface.
I’ve been using Tot on macOS only over the past few days. At this stage I can’t comment on how it works on iOS because I haven’t spend the money. I think I will, though.
I’ve written this short article in Tot (yellow page). It’s delightful. And, icing on the cake, this is a Mac-Assed Mac app which has full support for all the niceties of macOS, including Services. I love using Brett Terpstra’s SearchLink service. Tot loves using it too. After a week of reading about 1Password ditching native code in favour of Electron, the joy of using a native app is sweeter than usual.
So Tot. Write in it. Put ephemera in it. Switch between plain text with markdown and rich text. Share it somewhere else. You’ve got 7 notes. Use them wisely.
This Twitter thread (which should be a blog, but anyway) from Rich Siegel regarding Electron on macOS should be required reading for anybody who takes even a vague interest in this stuff.
The situation in Afghanistan is deeply saddening. I think of all the women and children, in particular, who are now going to face extremely difficult lives, with no genuine prospect of relief. 😔
My sketchnote selfie done after watching the great Sketchnoting session at Micro Camp. @ChrisJWilson @cm
