2006-11-24
Basic Notation
I'm designing a notation that represents structured content in a text-based format. Kind of like a lightweight alternative for XML. The reason I designed this, is because I feel that XML has some problems that a standard format should not have. I started a discussion on Channel 9, asking if it was too late for a new format to replace XML. I realize my notation will not be used as much as XML, but I just want to see if I can create something that is technologically better than XML.
I've just finished writing a first version of the specification. You can download it in XPS format (195 KB), or PDF format (164 KB).
Because the specification is still in development, you can still provide feedback that can influence the design. To provide feedback, you can post in this thread on Channel 9, or just post a comment on this blog post.
2006-11-18
The pleasure of peeling peanuts
Yesterday, I rediscovered the pleasure of peeling fresh peanuts. It's much easier to just buy peanuts that are already peeled, but they're not as fresh, and they're usually salted. Peeling fresh peanuts requires patience, and you usually spend more time peeling, than eating. But the gratification is so much greater, because you have to work to get the peanut. In our society of laziness, symbolized by prepackaged peanuts, I think it's important to sometimes take time to peel peanuts yourself, to realize the value of peanuts.
2006-11-06
New interw3b idea: cross-site bridges
Today, I got an idea for a new feature that allows sharing posts between sites. I got the idea from this post I made on Channel 9 about Opera's new developer site. On the Opera dev forum, I also made a post, in which I posted a link to the C9 thread.
Then I started thinking: what if, instead of just linking between threads on separate sites, we could build a bridge that would connect the threads, and automatically synchronize posts between the 2 sites, each using their own software.
I think this could be easy to implement, via RSS (maybe with some extensions). The bridge could be uni-directional or bi-directional. A uni-directional bridge would be a bridge from a thread on site A to a thread on site B, where A initiates the bridge, and automatically adds the posts of the thread on site B to its own thread, without site B having to know this. A bi-directional bridge would be a bridge between a thread on site A and a thread on site B, where both sites use the bridge-system.
When I use the terms site and thread, I don't want to narrow it down to forums only, but also blogs and actually every site that has a concept of logical threads.
This means that members of 2 communities could be connected, each community using its own software, its own community site, but where the posts are shared. And if you create some kind of standard for user profiles, the sites could even create hyperlinks to user profiles on the other site.
EDIT 7 Nov 2006: I also started a thread on Channel 9 about cross-site bridges. Some niners have already made good remarks. Imagine there was a bridge between this blog post and the C9 thread, instead of just a hyperlink...
