For no other Reason

Some forewarning: this post is going to be somewhat awkward. Okay, more awkward than normal. I’m not really announcing anything (it’s been around a week since I could’ve announced anything) and nothing is coming up (at least, nothing planned). However, it’s been 2 weeks since I’ve written anything, so I figured I should post something.

First, a note about my latest project: Notesoble! Or something else. I haven’t exactly nailed down a name, since I lifted Notesoble from a similar project that just didn’t work out around a year ago, and it doesn’t quite reflect the character any more. So what’s it do, you ask? Well, it’s a documentation system meant to ease comprehension by harnessing the power of the computer. I think it makes much more sense when one looks at the motivation: currently, ebooks don’t use the malleability of computing power: sure, maybe they offer search, or easy dictionary look ups, or a fancy little applet with which to investigate Newtonian forces, but those are peanuts compared to the meat of the text, which is mostly unchanged from the normal prose filled tree-books of yore.

For instance, why doesn’t anyone highlight things listed in a line of prose? The content is obviously not important enough to break out into a list, but we can draw the eye immediately to the discrete elements of the list with a subtle impression. Likewise, why do we all read the same prose? On a second reading, one either wants less detail, or more. Heck, on a first reading people read for different levels of detail: why do we insist on bringing them the same level of detail?

Of course, the obvious answer is that that’s what good readers do; they don’t need these silly aids with which to read at whatever level they wish. However, I am arguing that it’s not about what one eventually figures out, but how fast one can learn it. If the structure of the page aids comprehension such that people do not have to think as much to learn the same amount… well, that’s my goal.

Such is the state of Notesoble after working on it for a weekend and then letting it ferment. I’ll get back to you guys once there are more better baked ideas, better propaganda, and better prototypes.

Jeez, has it really been a week since Devfest ended? Looking at my wrist, I discover that yes indeed, it has been a week since the end of Devfest (I’ll have to do a post-mortem post on Devfest 2011 sometime). And yet, my life is still hectic and fluffy, fluffy as expanding foam that fills every crack of the world with suffocating lemon smells. Some of it is due to the fact that I’m trying to catch up with reading that I neglected during Devfest, but I have a sneaking suspicion that much of it is due to the fact that yes, school is just this time consuming, especially since I’m not in classes where I already know everything.

I know I said I would, but I haven’t gotten my hands on a book on Bayesian Data Analysis: instead, I put out a warrant for a book on Visualizing Data. Hopefully, it provides some counterpoint to Tufte; ever since I read a stinging indictment on his work, I haven’t trusted my opinion on data visualizations. Since I don’t have a dead-tree book at the moment, I’m reading Pro Git in my spare time.

In random news, I found one of my really, really early attempts at creating a web site on Google Sites. It was pretty pathetic, and I had to euthanize it. Rest in bits, work of my past self. Hopefully, my future work won’t deprecate as quickly. Or maybe I should be hoping it will. Hmm.

And when the hell does Github turn over it’s commit counter for the week? This week of commits on Notesoble is making the rest of my projects look bad.