Gnomebox

I’ve been working on an update of the Writing Projects Plugin. It is long overdue but the upgrade to Wordpress 2.5 has encouraged me to fix some of the problems and implement new features. I’ve been working on a new interface for listing the projects.

The list is easy to filter by type, genre or status simply by clicking the hyperlinks. There is also a “browse by month” feature to display projects started within a given month. I’d like to add the ability to do combined filters later, such as all “horror short stories being revised.” That will probably wait for a future update. The new list functionality is working in my current development version.

The next release marks some additional database changes. I’m dropping the “milestone” fields. I’ve added the status field so that projects can be tagged “Idea, Planning, Writing, etc.”

I also want to create the ability to display progress bar widgets in the sidebar. I’m still figuring out the details of the widgets. It’d be nice to improve the progress bars as well.

There are also some bugs that need to be fixed and other details. I don’t have a date yet for when the new version will be online. I may do some minor releases just to address key issues like the current list view issues.

Tags: Features, Fixes, Updates

I’m changing my plans for 2008. Pretty much I’m just going to skip the aReader at this point. I like the idea of a social ebook reader that makes it easy for people to exchange ‘booktalks’ about books they’ve read but I’m too busy to spend much time on it. Instead I’m going to focus my efforts on improving the Wordpress plugins that I use daily. Then, if there’s time, I want to create Gnomebox, the writing program I’ve imagined for a long time.

Tags: Plans

I enjoy programming but it doesn’t pay the bills or help me become more healthy. Even so there are a few things I’d like to see before the end of the year. These are very speculative resolutions because I may not have much time but this is what I’d like to do.

1. Update the writing plugins. I’d like to get a new version of the projects plugin done especially. I’d also like to see some more widgets added to the writing plugins.
2. Create the aReader social e-book reader.
3. Create Gnomebox - the writing program I’ve wanted.

So we’ll see if any of that happens.

Tags: New Year's Resolutions

I’ve uploaded an update of the Daily Word Count Plugin. This version adds some simple tags to display word count calendars in posts or pages. The calendars can be styled by editing the theme’s style.css file. There are two tags in this update.

[post_calendar] - displays a monthly calendar using the post’s date

[monthly_cal]Dec 2007[/monthly_cal] - displays a monthly calendar using the date between the tags.

Different months can be included on the same post/page by using the [monthly_cal].

This update also includes the first widget in the plugin, a simple sidebar stat which shows how many days straight you’ve written. It doesn’t have any options at this point to configure what is shown. Later on I plan to add additional widgets such as a generic stats widget which would let you customize what is shown. Usually updates happen as I find time and want a particular feature so it may be awhile before everything is in place.

Tags: Calendars, Updates, Widgets

I’m working on several different projects right now. I hope to find time to get everything done. I want to update the writing plugins for Wordpress, develop my fiction-writing software (Gnomebox) and work on some other ideas. It’s just a matter of finding the time.

Here’s a quick list of possible features in Gnomebox, the writing program I want to develop:
Full-screen
∘ Ability to change settings
• Live text statistics
∘ words, pages, characters, partial
• Programmable page count formula
• Customizable look and paragraph format
• Timer
∘ When time is up it tells you how many words
• Stopwatch
∘ When stopped tracks words
• Spell checker
• Notes
∘ ..starts a note.
• Target count
∘ National Novel Writing month, etc. % complete
• Partial counts
∘ Chapters, paragraphs, session, etc.
• Auto-corrections and quick text
• Standard text format
• Typing sound effects
• Small, fast, stable
• Python
• Auto-saving
• Free, GPL
• Function Keys for files
• Copy/paste/cut
• Tagging instead of naming
• Expandable/collapsible notes/paragraphs/links
• Filters

Plenty of things to work on. RubyRoom is interesting and works for now but I’d like to get started on Gnomebox as soon as I can find some time.

Tags: Editor, Features, Gnomebox, Ideas, Writing

Hard to believe it’s been so long since I’ve done any work on the Daily Word Count Plugin or any of the other plugins. I guess I’ve just been using them without really considering changes. I spent time today updating all of my blogs to the latest version of Wordpress and along with the theme changes I decided to create a widget feature in the plugin to display my writing stats. It’s pretty easy. I’ll be adding additional widgets to the plugin to display progress bars and allow for the customization of the stats.

At the moment it just displays how many continuous days and word counts but I’ll add features to allow different stats to be displayed.

Tags: Development, Features, Plugins, Stats, Widgets, Writing

When we call software “free,” we mean that it respects the users’ essential freedoms: the freedom to run it, to study and change it, and to redistribute copies with or without changes. This is a matter of freedom, not price, so think of “free speech,” not “free beer.”

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An excellent essay at the Free Software Foundation. Take a look. Fight for your freedom.

I recently saw a photo over on flickr of the XO laptop keyboard which shows a dollar bill covering the entire keyboard. I can fit my fingers into the space of a dollar bill and could probably even touch type but I don’t think I’d be happy. As amazing as the machine is maybe it won’t work for me.

That’s okay. I’m not the intended audience. I think the XO laptop is an amazing achievement but maybe I’ll hold off until there is something else available. In the meantime my Alphasmart Dana works great.

I’ve been following the XO Laptop project since it was first announced. I think it’s a great idea to put these machines in the hands of children around the world. Aside from that, though, I’ve always thought that it looked like a nearly perfect laptop for my needs. I have used a variety of Palm OS devices primarily for my writing and ebooks. From my first Handspring Visor with a GoType keyboard to my current Alphasmart Dana these devices have proved to be a better option than a full-fledged laptop. Now the XO Laptop looks even better.
Particular features I like:

• Rugged design with a sealed keyboard.
• Small size and weight.
• Long battery life and flexible charging options.
• Screen designed for reading ebooks in a variety of lighting conditions. Switch to tablet view.
• Wi-fi.
• USB (x3) & SD card slot.
• Gnu/Linux device so I can finally be using an open source machine and the same file formats that I use on the desktop.
• Integrated pointing/writing panel.
• Python-friendly environment.

Okay, there are even more features but that’s enough. I was excited to read about the new Laptop Giving plan. Essentially “for $399, you will be purchasing two XO laptops—one that will be sent to empower a child to learn in a developing nation.” The other is sent to you. The program starts November 12th and only runs for two weeks. It’ll be interesting to see how it goes.