Matthew Lang

Got the iOS 16 install going for my iPhone. I’m not as enthusiastic as I was in the past about these big iOS releases, but it helps to stay up to date.

Essential viewing.

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I won’t lie, I’ve been watching a lot of the television coverage following the death of Queen Elizabeth II.

Tonight, I watched some of the events from today including the service at Westminster and the Scottish Parliament’s motion of condolence at Holyrood. I also watched the Vigil of the Princes where members of the royal family stand guard during a lying in state of relation. This tradition started with the death of King George V in 1936 and was continued in 2002 for the death of Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother. It was a lovely moment to see the Queen’s children together standing guard.

I love Rian Johnson’s Knives Out. Such a quirky film and Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc character is great to watch. Looking forward to the sequel, Glass Onion.

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Up early, well for a Saturday at least, for a little code and coffee combo. Fixed a couple of wee bugs on my blog and now spending some time on a re-write of a previous project.

My oldest son Ethan turns 16 today.

It still only feels like yesterday when we first brought him home from the hospital. A few highlights over those 16 years include his first nativity at nursery, his first day at school, becoming a big brother, his first holy communion, and his first junior club championship win, and many more great stories that we’ve captured. Now, he’s the tallest in the house and definitely the biggest hitter in the family when it comes to golf.

It will definitely be interesting to see what the next 16 years bring.

Happy birthday pal!

I’m posting a short post tonight as I’ve been spending the evening setting up a Hatchbox account and migrating the first of a handful of Rails applications to it. The setup was straightforward, and after 45 minutes of tinkering, I got my Writeabout app running on it. I’ll try to move a couple more applications over tomorrow.

After reading Nicholas Bate’s latest powerful productivity post, I thought I would share a few of the people and apps that have influenced me.

• Patrick Rhone - Patrick’s dash/plus system has been part of my own processes since I read about it.
• Nicholas Bate - I’ve been reading Nicholas Bate’s blog for over 15 years. I’ve been using his master list idea for some time.
• Ryder Caroll - Creator of bullet journaling, the only productive process that I have stuck with recently. It also works for me because of it plays nice with Patrick’s dash/plus system and Nicholas Bate’s master list. The fact that it’s also analog is a huge benefit to me. I spend enough times on screens. The last thing I need is another app just to stay organised.
• 37 Signals - Over the years I’ve long been a fan of the way the 37 Signals company work. All of their books are recommended, but the real changers for me were Rework and Remote are great books that really do make you question the traditional methods of working. Short, sharp and straight to the point.
• Trello - Although I use pen and paper most days, there is times when you need a digital tool to manage a project. I’ve flip-flopped between Things, Todoist and Trello over the years. While freelancing I used Trello for managing client projects, but when I returned to full-time employment I started using Todoist and Things to manage projects. I’m back to using Trello now. It’s the visual aspect of the app that really helps me.

I could have probably added another dozen or so people and apps that have influenced how I work over the years, but these five are the ones the I keep going back to.

Who influences your productivity?

Over the last few weeks, I’ve been re-writing a small product that I spent sometime building before lockdown.

The product has been gathering dust since the start of lockdown. It does have a handful of customers and generally good feedback from those customers, but I wasn’t happy with my first pass at it. There were so many things that I would do differently if I could start it over again. So I decided to have another go at it.

I’ve made pretty good progress so far and will be able to launch it again in a few months.

This weekend I’m hoping to move all my Bear notes into Ulysses. My Bear renewal for the Pro subscription is at the end of September and while I find the app useful, I’m finding that I don’t use it as much as I used to. I’m also starting to consolidate some other files that I have into Ulysses. It’s becoming my go-to app for writing and note taking.

Most of the notes I have already moved across, but there’s a few that I need to do some more work on to tidy up the formatting that was lost in the migration. Hopefully by the end of the weekend, most of this migration will be complete.

I’m going to try and kick-start the blogging process once again. I’ve lost count of the number of times I have tried to do this over the last few years. This time though, I’m trying something different.

Instead of trying to aim for longer pieces on a daily basis, I’m going to initially just keep it short. Around the 100 words mark.

So, expect some short ramblings over the next few weeks. Some thoughts, views, ideas and anything that I think is worth putting on the blog. I’m hoping this will lead to a steady stream of posts over the next weeks and hopefully a more active blog.

Game changer. The bookmark you take notes on.

I’ve been curious about the PHP framework Laravel over the last few weeks. I’ve just been reading the docs and watching a few screencasts. Just dipping my toe in at the moment.

For the last ten years that we’ve been visiting my in-laws in Canada, they’ve lived in the township of Oakville just outside of Toronto. When they first moved there, we were impressed by the small suburban areas, quaint feel in the centre of town, and the beautiful properties along the lakeshore. Everything just seems to fit together nicely.

Not having been here now for the last four years, we’ve seen a dramatic change in the town. Instead of the flat skyline we were used to, it’s now starting to fill with taller condo buildings.

An increasing number of properties along the lakeshore have eschewed traditional homes in favour of a more modernist look. Gone are the homes that tried to keep in with the style of other homes in the area. There are now several homes that can only be described as boxes comprising of glass and wood. Finally, the centre of town has lost its charm. I’ve noticed some of the smaller independent stores have gone. Instead, there are more retail outlets from more extensive franchises there.

In a way, I suppose, it’s been the victim of its own success. As more and more people are looking to move to the Greater Toronto Area, they look towards places outside of the city that isn’t too far away. Mississauga, located just outside the city, could be considered a city in its own right. The skyline is a sea of high-rise buildings that now dwarf what would have been the tallest buildings there twenty years ago. Oakville is the next town along the shores of Lake Ontario. With condo buildings now featuring prominently here, I think it’s safe to say it will follow the same route as Mississauga.

Just up the road from Oakville is the small town of Waterdown. I was stunned to see how much this small town has expanded over the last few years. What was once a quaint town centre is now dwarfed along the road by multi-story buildings for commerce and residential use.

One could argue that this is simply a sign of the times. I could partly agree with anyone who presented this argument. Everything changes over time, but it’s a shame to see the old, small towns along Lake Ontario gradually morphing into a single sprawling urban area.

A final trip to Rockchapel today for nine holes before our flight back to the UK tomorrow. Papa making up the fourball for today.

My youngest son, Drew, turned 10 years old today and boy did he have a great day.

A few rounds of laser tag ensured that he and his brother reminded us that the Fortnite skills on the PlayStation are transferrable to other areas in life. I wasn’t expecting to run around that match, but it was great fun.

After that it was back to his aunt’s house for cake and big birthday spread with a few presents to open.

It as great seeing the kids together once again and it’s been so long since they’ve all been together. A good chance then to re-create one of our favourite pictures of the kids all together on the front step.

That rounded off a truly great day for Drew. Happy birthday pal!

An unexpected perk of this trip to Canada was being able to play Glen Abbey golf course, which has been a host of the RBC Canadian Open for a number of years. We’ve always visited this course as spectators to the tournament, but being able to play it was an opportunity me and Ethan couldn’t pass up.

A strange course, as it features a handful of holes that are located down a ravine which made for a very different experience to other golf course we’ve played.

A fantastic day with Ethan and we both played pretty well considering it was out first time on the course.

All of us headed down to Niagara Falls for the day to enjoy some of the sights down there. The first thing we all did was the boat trip to see the falls up close. We haven’t done this since Drew was born so it was nice for him to experience this with all of us. After a wander round Clifton Hill, we grabbed some pizza and did the Sky Wheel to take in some great views of the falls.

Me and Ethan played Hidden Lake again today. We stuck with what we liked and played the new course. We also got paired with a couple of locals who kept us right and gave us a few pointers to deals on local courses. Nice to see that the food is still great at Hidden Lake as well. Highly recommend the smash burgers!

First visit to our favourite nine hole course in the Oakville area, and that’s the Rockchapel course just past Waterdown. Nice being able to play in the sunshine with a good short course for Drew.

A great afternoon range session for the boys before the rain started rolling in.

My in-laws have a new home in Canada, so a few changes to the sleeping arrangements. They still have a great spot outside for a quiet coffee though.

I like the idea of Shawn Blanc’s “Stop Doing” list.

Another productivity essential from Nicholas Bate.

The latest release from Field Notes looks great. Although I’m not a North American resident in the area of the great lakes, I’ve spent a number of summers at my in-laws home off Lake Ontario to appreciate them.