Matthew Lang

The next must have for any bike.

via Fixed Gear Girl Taiwan

Love the look of this bike.

via Fixed Gear Girl Taiwan

I'm a huge fan of Markdown, yet it has been hard to show your preferred markup language or Markdown compatible services in a visual way other than a text link to something like John Gruber's Markdown page.

Hopefully now we'll start to see Dustin's proposed symbol for Markdown being used to indicate Markdown compatible services.

Adding Patrick's new book this to the list of book purchases for next month.

Looks great, but against the grey, rainy streets of Scotland, this will really stick out like a sore thumb. Great idea though!

via swiss-miss.com

So a few weeks ago I needed a quick way to write down an idea to my journal located on my Dropbox folder. I only had my phone with me at the time, so I emailed myself the note in the hope that I would remember to write it to my journal when I got home. I failed big time and remembered the idea 2 weeks later.

Determined to find a better solution to write to my journal, I built a web application that let's you write entries to a journal on your Dropbox account. It's called Journalong.

There's no need to have Dropbox installed on the computer or device you are writing the journal entry on. You just need to authorise Journalong to have access to a single folder on your Dropbox account. This is where your journal will reside.

Journalong will then handle the formatting of the entry, write it to your journal and even create a new journal file for each month when needed.

I've been journalling since the start of the year, and I find that it is a great dumping ground for thoughts, ideas and other stuff. Based on the feedback I get, I hope to that there will be enough initial interest to release it in the next few weeks.

This is a great habit to get into, even if you're job or career doesn't demand much writing.

Starting your day as a producer means that your information consumption has
meaning: the rest of the day means consuming information that is relevant to what it is that you're producing. Waking up as a producer frames the rest of your habits.

— 500 words before 8am by Information Diet

Glad to see there's still room in the world for quill stems.

via fixedgeargirltaiwan.blogspot.com

There are those who do grow up. Discussions about coffee machines, hotel allowances and bonuses recede. The 'country club' atmosphere which has grown unhealthily in abundant times can be dropped quickly and a focused 'war room' mentality swung into action.

— On Growing Up and Rites of Passage by Nicholase Bate

Another insightful snippet from the master of business, Nicholas Bate.

I know it's not always this clear-cut, but it's sad to see so many businesses taking the easy option out and cutting costs (usually at the bottom of the company ladder) rather than exploring new revenue ideas and possibilities.

Next time you make a goal or come up with a plan, think about this. Make note of your primary source of motivation to complete the goal/plan, and then assume that it is not going to take you through to the end. Supplement with alternative sources of motivation.

— A Shotgun Approach to Motivation by Buster Benson

I love my steel hardtail frames, but even I have to admit this 29er from Maxlight looks amazing.

via singletrackworld.com

So tonight, I deployed my first version of a plain text journalling product to Heroku. It's finally up and running! Those little hours here and there are finally paying off and now I have scratched the initial itch and provided a better way to write to my journal from anywhere.

After the excitement of deployment and seeing it work I was then tempted to power on through for another couple of hours and start the real work of implementing basic features, styling web pages and other things.

I'm going to hold back though and wait for another window of time to work on it. For the moment it's doing the most basic functional thing it needs to do, which is better than nothing. Yeah, it might be great sitting up for another couple of hours, but I'll only be robbing myself of energy from tomorrow. Also by the sounds of the weather on the window, I think it's going to be a hell of a cycle getting into work in the morning.

So until I can schedule more code time with my side-product, I'll hold back.

I'm 35 today!

It probably doesn't mean much to many people when they turn 35 or any other age really for that matter, but for me this year feels different and that's in a good way. Let's wind the clock back a few years first though.

When I turned 30 I was pondering on my career and what I wanted to achieve. I hadn't produced anything that I would call art (well in my case as a developer, a web application of some kind), and so I started thinking about what I wanted to achieve in my career in the next five years. I had thoughts and ideas, but no plan. Five years later I still haven't produced anything that I could put out there and say "Yip, I made that".

After a couple of years, I lost track of my ideas. I carried on with my job as a developer for a small consulting firm and tried to keep my development skills up to speed by playing with some programming languages in my spare time. I even produced a small mind mapping blog for a couple of years that let me practice some writing for a while.

Fast forward to today and I still haven't produced anything career wise that I would call mine, but it's not something that I am going to lose any sleep over.

Which brings me back to today. So why do I feel like everything is in the right place?

Well at the start of the year, my wife and I found out that we were going to be parents again. We already have a five year old son, so it's great news that he will have a younger brother or sister in August when the baby is due.

At home, we're also kicking off a project to convert our garage into a multi-purpose room. Mainly it will be sitting room, but I'm also claiming a section of the room as a more practical place to do more sideline work. I don't have what you would call a great area for working when I am at home, so it's good to know that in the future there will be a better place for turning some ideas into reality.

My career is in a good place at the moment. I'm using my preferred tools and languages on a daily basis and I'm also gaining more experience in working in agile software development teams. It's not long term though, no job ever is, but it's good being in place where I am learning new things everyday.

So what's different from today than the same day five years ago?

Well I'm more grounded in plans and expectations for the future. I know that I can't do it all, but instead I'm focusing on things that are close to my heart and really interest me.

I'm also a bit more realistic about my strengths and weaknesses. I know I've got skills in programming and I enjoy writing. Okay my strength in writing might be me being biased, but I do enjoy it and that's what counts. On the weakness side, I do find it difficult to maintain my focus on one thing. I've not seen my projects through from start to completion but I'm hoping to change that this year.

So what does the next five years hold?

Who knows. I certainly know that on the home front, I'm as content as a I'll ever be. I can't wait for the new addition to our family to arrive in August. Our son will be so pleased to have a younger brother or sister who could share in his love of golf!

On the career front though that's a different thing. I've started work on a small micro-product that I am hoping to launch in the spring. It's a helper for those who like keeping a plain text journal. The idea for the journalling product came after I wanted to continue writing everyday but on a smaller volume than doing my three pages of writing every day. Also I wanted a plain text archive that was in the easiest format to slice and dice as I needed. I've tried many note-taking applications in the past, but none offered the simplicity of plain text. More on that later though.

After that I have my eyes set on a second product that I hope will help people make with their decision making. These might never take off, who knows.

At least I know that I will have tried.

The world is full of ideas that can be executed with 10 to 20 hours per week, let alone 40

— All or Something by 37 Signals

Not big words, but it's sort of the same thing I've been telling myself for the last couple of weeks. Even if I only get a 5 hours a week to work on something, it's 5 hours towards the end goal.

Once my son is in bed and my stuff is organised for the next day, once all the little chores are done, once my world is in order again, I open my laptop and put in an hour or two.

It might seem that I am not making much progress, but those hours are adding up and my micro-product is taking shape. I've still got loads to do, but I know that with every hour I'm making a step towards getting this idea executed and launched.

And yes we do need another word for startups.

29er singlespeeds just look the part, and this Tomac is no exception.

via singletrackworld.com

I wish I'd had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.

I wish I hadn't worked so hard.

I wish I'd had the courage to express my feelings.

I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.

I wish that I had let myself be happier.

— Five Regrets of the Dying With Tangents by Buster Benson

Wouldn't it be nice if you could live your life with no regrets? I already have a couple of regrets at the moment on this list, but I'm still young enough to turn these around.

via blog.chasejarvis.com

via Smashing Magazine

I wonder if Nicholas Bate know's about this? It would tie in nicely with his Be Bold 101 book.

Productive Brainstorming Requires that you Separate Creative Thinking from Critical Thinking

via thestartupdaily.com

I had first hand experience of this productive brainstorming at the weekend when I was collecting some ideas for a journalling application. The problem was that each idea I had was quickly followed through by my more critical side asking "How would that work?". As soon as I had an idea I would quickly invalidate it by thinking that it would be too difficult to implement. You're not going to get any ideas by doing this.

Looking back I should have simply put my ideas down first without giving them a second thought about how they would be implemented and then let them incubate.I do this quite a lot with a blog on mind mapping, but it's something that I had forgotten about at the weekend when I was trying to be creative and generate some ideas.Let your ideas grow in your mind for a while before applying the critical thinking to them.

I would recommend at least a few hours or even a couple of days between creative thinking and critical thinking.The time when your ideas are in an incubation period can give you a chance to reflect on your ideas. This isn't time when you should be thinking about the critical aspect of your ideas, instead it's just a time for the ideas you have, to sit and do nothing.While they're doing nothing you might trigger a thought to a more refined idea. Then again you might not.

You don't lose anything here but it does mean that when it comes to the critical evaluation of your ideas, you'll be familiar with each of the ideas you originally had and you'll be ready to apply some critical thinking to them.

Another great find from Swiss Miss.

via swiss-miss.com

Last year I did a favourite four of 2010. I listed my favourite blog, book, tweeter and podcast. This year I am trimming it down to just my favourite blog and book.

The reason I am skipping the favourite tweeter is that I am no longer gaining much value from Twitter like I did the last year. I'm starting to see that some people are posting stuff more to do with their personal life than what they're up to with work and projects. Yeah it's nice to hear that someone has just met the love of their life, or seen their kid take their first steps, or something else along those lines, but in 2010, I was spoiled with people who were tweeting some really good stuff. In 2011 this didn't happen so much. I'm as just as guilty as the next person of this.

The flip side of this is that I have started to see more of a benefit in reading blogs again. There was a lot of talk of social networks becoming the blogs of this decade but I don't see it happening. While I'm still subscribed to just over 200 blogs and feeds, I'm managing it easily on a day to day basis.

I used to listen to podcasts alot. However since moving to a new job, I haven't much time to tune into the podcasts that I used to listen to. Maybe this year I'll get back into catching my favourite podcasts again.

Favourite blog

Nicholas Bate has done it again. Last year his blog was my daily recommended reading. This year, I stand by his blog again as being recommended daily reading. His
Instant MBA book and series was a great read and his current series on strategies for success is brilliant.

I'm looking forward to seeing what Nicholas will produce this year. His blog just keeps getting better and better.

Favourite book

Patrick Rhone's book, "Keeping It Straight" was my favourite book of the year. It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but the different sections of the book and the way in which it was written was brilliant. I found it to be quite similar to Stephen King's book "On Writing".

You can find a more detailed review of it here.

There we go, my favourite blog and book from 2011. What's yours?

Declare war on passivity.  Hush the inner voice that insists you’re over the hill, past your prime, unworthy of attaining those dreams.  Disbelief is now the enemy, as is the notion of settling.  Get hungry — hyena hungry.  Get fired up.  Find your backbone, and your wings.
Flap ‘em.  It’s the only way you’ll be able to fly.

— Declare War on Passivity by David Kanigan

I believe there is a place for this is the world of technology. I think there is a need for a Software Tailor. For instance, you have a text editor that works well but could use just a few changes to make it work perfectly for you. You take it to the Software Tailor and they do that for you. Or perhaps you go to one to build the perfect task management app to fit your specific working style. In my mind, many who program are crafts people and I think there is a growing opportunity and need for such a service by people with these skills.

— Bespoke by Patrick Rhone

Patrick Rhone's latest post on software tailoring got me thinking. Software is used by millions across the world, yet I wonder how many people are aware that some of the software they use can be tailored to their specific needs?Yes there are freelance developers out there who specialise in building plugins, extensions or custom versions of software applications, but that's the problem. These developers specialise in one application or product. They won't even think about touching anything else.Sounds to me there might be room for a number of developers who are jack of all trade developers who are prepared to dig into just about any code that is given to them and make the necessary changes.

Just a thought, that's all.

Those things we build for ourselves are guided by our own philosophy. Those things built by others are guided by theirs and through our use we accept and adopt these.

— Buying Philosophy by Patrick Rhone

At the end of the day, plan tomorrow.

Travel light. Regularly empty out the bags and wallet of the accumulated debris.

Write down their names. Nobody minds at all.

Look for the best.

Plan 'down' time as specifically as 'work'

via blog.strategicedge.co.uk

There are hundreds of books on self-help, productivity and organisation. You could spend a fortune on these or just use this list. Click through for the rest of Nicholas Bate's fantastic list for an easier life.