Thursday, May 29, 2003

The personal voice #

Dale Pike: The answer, I believe, is in balance. A weblog does not have to include a first person voice, but I think that it becomes much less when it does not. I believe that a weblog is a concept that has become much more than simply the tools used to post chronologically-ordered HTML entries. A weblog is a manifestation of an individual voice. There will always be a place for sterile, scholarly dissertations, but I guarantee I won't look forward to reading them on my lunch break. If I can listen to you, however, talk about something you're doing...something that is going on in your life, chances are I can learn from you. And that IS something I'll look forward to reading at lunch... Indeed.  Though we shouldn't miss the rejoinder to David Carter-Tod's comments.  I guess it doesn't have to be either/or  The best blogs in my estimation mix the personal and the "informational" in really compelling ways.  For example, I appreciate David Carter-Tod's blog so much more because I know a bit about who he is and his particular context and his occasional mention of personal happenings.  In my own blogging, as I make this site more "professional", I certainly don't plan to squeeze out the "personal voice".  [via SiT]   Posted by Raymond Yee on 5/29/03; 11:27:51 PM from the Web Technology dept. Discuss

I got my hosting service lined up -- now what blogging tools? #

Hosting After doing some shopping around, I settled on having Cornerhost the web hosting facility for my personal domain raymondyee.net.  It's not the cheapest place -- but largely on the ringing endorsement of Mark Pilgrim, I went with paying more for having my domain hosted by a individual identifiable, responsive man, Michal Wallace.  My own experience is that Michal has answered my emails with 24 hours -- both before the sale and now after the sale.  (Before I made my final decision, I looked a range of options including colocation, informatively described by Joel Spolsky, and virtual servers  A slashdot thread helped me to see the range of growth options I have.  I also located a promising Zope hosting facility in case I ever get anywhere.)  Bottom line:  if Cornerhost can facilitate the awesome web work of someone like Mark Pilgrim, then I'm confident that it won't the limiting factor for something like my own modest personal blog! So, now you should be able to go to http://raymondyee.net and see -- well, the sad disclaimer that my site is under construction. Blogging tools Now comes the fun part -- what tool should I use to manage my personal website?  Let me share what little I've figured out so far and follow up when I make a decision. I've been itching to try Movable Type (MT) for a long time, largely because of my dissatisfaction with Manila.  Not that there isn't much to like about Manila -- I'm still largely pleased to keep pushing on with Manila for my blog and the dozens/hundreds of sites the IU hosts.  But the community of users and developers is pretty small in number -- and consequently, Manila does not feel at the cutting edge of blogging tools any more.  There's still some awesome things in Manila, largely unexploited IMHO.  For example, the XML-RPC interface to Manila has so much potential and is something that I've wanted to squeeze more mileage out of for a long time.  With it, I can still datamine my blog, programatically create complex structures in Manila, push up outlines, slide shows, etc. -- but I don't see many others doing that work.  (I use the manila python library that Mark Pilgrim wrote to access Manila....are there many others doing the same?) MT seems to be the tool of choice for many technically savvy bloggers (including the ever-mentioned Mr. Pilgrim)  But I've been benefitting tremendously from the reviews that Ray Davis has been doing on various tools.  Alas his comparisons are available on a blog open  to Berkeley folks only... (is that right, Ray?).  For instance, Ray recently pointed out Drupal and pMachine as intriguing possibilities.  So I'm a bit confused.  But I've pulled together a number of resources that should help me decide (I don't want to wait too long to decide since I'm anxious to start to blogging personally and not just blog about blogging personally.): Google's directory of blogging tools A chart comparing tools another blogging tool compendium Slashdemocracy's page on blogging tool references a discussion of MT vs Radio I'm also considering blosxom (because of its tiny size and extensibility), though I suspect that there are small numbers of users for blosxom.  I will follow rantelope, being built by Cornerhost's very own Michal Wallace.  Big possible plus for rantelope:  its use of Python. What will be really useful, however, is for me to articulate exactly the requirements and desired features for my blog.  Also, I need to remember that I can use more than one tool!  That's what I have to figure out next.   Posted by Raymond Yee on 5/29/03; 10:50:10 PM from the Web Technology dept. Discuss (1 response)

Why it pays to have thoughtful friends with blogs #

While eating lunch and perusing the latest issue of the East Bay Express, I came across the following paragraph: Learning curve: It was with a certain glee that we read in the Chronicle last week that Oakland schools superintendent Dennis Chaconas -- the same Chaconas who presided over an $82 million budget deficit, provoked the largest bailout of any district in California history, and effectively ended democracy in the Oakland schools -- is now teaching a Mills College education department course on fiscal and business services. I thought, "yeah, that doesn't seem to make any sense for Chaconas to be teaching such a class."  Later in the day, I came across Laura's post on the same topic which quotes the course description [I've kept Laura's italicization]: This course challenges the view that the primary role of business managers should be as guardians of budget limits. Instead it explores the use of business services as a primary instrument for achieving school and district educational goals. Students will learn to assess the cost-effectiveness and cost-benefits of programs, and to coordinate, leverage, and converge resources toward creating optimum conditions for teaching and learning. So -- is there a place I can read Chaconas' take on the current situation at OUSD?  (I'm sure there is but just haven't gone looking for it.)  What struck me today is how reading a blog helped me to contextualize something I read quickly (and largely accepted with little challenge).   Posted by Raymond Yee on 5/29/03; 10:31:58 PM from the Personal Notes dept. Discuss