Category: Writings

Just some stuff I wrote

Tools

The best tools for the job

I am often asked by my Linux-using friends why I am using Windows, while my my Windows-centric friends wonder why I am using Linux or BSD and my Mac-user friends ask why I’m not using Mac at all. The answer to the last is easiest – I don’t have a Mac.

As to the other questions, it depends on what I am doing at the moment. I don’t think that Windows is inherently better or worse than Linux or BSD, nor do I think that all software that costs money is evil. I think it all comes down to asking the question: “What is the best tool for the job I am doing?”

With that in mind, here is the first installment in the list of my picks:

Web Development (HTML/PHP/JavaScript): Adobe HomeSite (previously Macromedia HomeSite, previously Allaire HomeSite). [Windows]

I have been using HomeSite for several years now, and despite the changes in company ownership, it continues to be the best tool available for general web development.

In the realm of rapid development, HomeSite has a built-in ftp client, and you can also set it to use a server running locally to see PHP pages and Perl CGI in action. For that I prefer Xampp from ApacheFriends, because of its ease of installation on Windows and the fact that it makes creating a local Apache/PHP/MySQL setup a snap.

The down side to HomeSite is that it doesn’t understand Python/PSP, and changing the tab settings to use spaces instead of tabs seems to be broken in the latest version. I thought it used to do that, but I may be mistaken.

The only tool that comes close is Bluefish [Linux] which seems to be improving in great strides. When I need to whack out a quick web document while in Linux that is the tool for which I reach.

Although Bluefish understands Python it still doesn’t quite work the way I would like it to when highlighting and parsing PSPs. Maybe, when I have the time I can write a plug-in for HomeSite to do just that.

Tomorrow: Music Editing/Creation Tools

Writings

I’m still here

Just to let the myriad of my readers know (all both of them!) that I am still here. I just decided to take a weekend.

I figured that since I had a three-day weekend I would avoid working on anything other than the house for a couple days. That was actually very nice.

Now, however, I find out that not checking my email accounts several times a day, in fact letting them go for more than two whole days, I am facing an incredible amount of catch-up I have to do. The old saw that “Hard work pays off later, procrastination pays off right now” comes with an unspoken caveat: while procrastination might pay off right now, the check still needs to be handled later!

Writings

Procrastination vs. Brain Breaks

Why is it that when things really get busy you find yourself thinking about everything but the task at hand? You have to wonder, are there still vestiges of teenage procrastination (the “I-can-get-it-done-any-time” syndrome) lingering about.

Perhaps the real reason is that after working long hours on a project, any project, the brain just needs to rest. Perhaps, just like those long sets at the gym that leave your muscles feeling bloodless and dead, long bouts of intellectual strain leave you brain-tired.

BREAK

I happen to think that may be closer to the truth. I have put in many long hours trying to get this site up and functional, and it has already been through several iterations, software-wise, to get to the point it is now (about 50%, functionally speaking.)

There are lots of other things I want to implement here, but am finding it hard at the moment to sit and concentrate on coding. So, I guess this is as good a time as any to throw some content up in the writings section, and to test the readmore functionality while I am at it.

Once I have this up and have taken a brain break, (I think a stupid movie may be in order), I will have to get back on what I am doing.