Manifesto for text-communication growth

I need to commucate better through text. This is what I will work towards:

  • I will use inline-posting and/or bottom posting in emails.
  • I will write less text, be more concise.
  • If I can’t be brief, I will try and write summaries.
  • I will try and use bullets and make text more skimmable.
  • I will try and end emails and text-communications with next action points.

That ends todays manifesto for growth.

Okay I switched, are you happy now?

A couple of weeks ago, I backed up all my data to the cloud and then turned off my PC. One day I’ll turn it on again, but it will be to format it, reinstall it and give it to my mom. For you see, I have switched to The Mac, something readers of this blog — tech savvies you might call at least some of them — have been clamoring for for a decade.

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So yes. I switched to The Mac, and I’ve found a setup I’m happy with. Yes, I said it, I’m very happy with The Mac. Go on, have your moment. No, please, point at me and laugh because it took me so long to “see the light”. Remind me how long I criticized the OS, the ecosystem and the mere culture of The Mac. Get it out of your system.

But why did I switch? In short: the commandline. In my dayjob, I need to know Linux. Which is pretty much like Unix. Which is pretty much what’s at the core of OSX. Which means, if I’m on this ecosystem, there’s less to learn — and that which I do learn has broader applicability in what I do today. Because webdesigners should code.

Now then. Here’s what I had to do to tweak the system to be satisfying for an ex-Windows user:

  • Enable form element tabbing. System Preferences > Keyboard > Keyboard Shortcuts > “All controls”. I can’t believe this is not enabled by default.
  • Install Cinch. It’s on the Mac App Store, and it does what “Aero Snap” does on Windows 7. It’s the closest to fullscreen I can get.
  • Move the dock to the right side of the screen and make it auto-hide. It makes it less jumpy there as compared to the bottom, and whenever I need to drag a file into an app or the trash, the distance to drag is short.
  • Install ClipMenu. It does what CLCL does for Windows, i.e. it’s a clipboard manager. My clipboard history shortcut is ALT + V.
  • Install CloudApp. Windows users, see: FluffyApp.
  • Configure the screensaver to require a password, and create a shortcut to the screensaver in the dock so I can quickly lock the computer if I have to leave for a moment.
  • Learn the shortcots CMD + L for “locationbar” in browsers, ALT + Left for “move caret to previous word” and CMD + Left is the equivalent of “Home” (these shortcuts work in the other direction as well, ALT + Right and CMD + Right). Also CMD + H for “hide current window” — which is almost as useful as the “minimize” feature is useless.
  • Remove the CMD + ALT + Space and CMD + Space shortcuts for Spotlight, and remap Spotlight to CMD + $ (on a Danish keyboard, $ is the button right below escape). Yeah I’ve been recommended AlfredApp. I’ll get to it, but for now Spotlight is fine.
  • Configure the hot corners: bottom left is desktop, top right is Exposé.

Stuff that still bugs me to no end:

  • No fullscreen feature and a totally inconsistent stoplight behavior. Yep, Cinch in combination with CMD + H gives me the window management I need, but I really think it’s embarrassing for a modern operating system that all three core window management buttons are near useless.
  • The selection model is so broken, George W. Bush’s anthropomorphized foreign policy took a look at it and said DAAAYM!
  • I can only resize a window in the bottom right corner. Combine this with a dock that pops out when you don’t want it, and you’ve got a recipe for headaches. I hear this is fixed in the next OSX, but as they said when Krusty the Clown retired: “Why now? Why not ten years ago?”
  • The topmost filemenu feels so dated. Why not make it a context toolbar instead of a labyrinth of dropdown menus? When was the list time you clicked “Window > Minimize”? Be honest.

Yup. Have your say.

Going to SxSW!

Tomorrow, my time, will be spent travelling to the United States of America, specifically Austin Texas for South by Southwest. Incidentally, it’ll be my first time in the Americas, first time at SxSW and first time meeting most of my new colleagues at Automattic in person. In any case, there’s probably going to be WiFi, so I’ll be tweeting the adventure. Will I meet you there?

I’ve joined Automattic

Exciting news today! I’ve joined Automattic, the company that makes WordPress.com. I’ll be a full-time design wrangler.

I’ve done some consulting for Automattic in the previous months (most recently with regards to Stats), but the offer to join the company full-time came out of the blue. I wasn’t actually looking for fulltime employment, but the possibility of working with these supremely talented people on improving my favourite platform, while staying in Denmark which is near my favourite country (Sweden), was a combination offer that was simply too good to pass up.

I don’t have any more specifics at the moment, but feel free to question me up in the comments and I’ll try and answer if I can.

Throwing Darts

On my way home from work, a thing about design occurred to me. As a designer, you may find the perfect design in your first shot, just as you may hit the bullseye the first time you ever throw a dart. But to hit the bullseye (or even the board) consistently, only time and countless iterations will help.

Filed under “anecdotes”.

Twitter Keeps Resetting My Password

For the past two days, I’ve woken up to between 3 and 10 password-reset emails from Twitter, which indicate Twitters been involed in some kind of off-site phishing attempt. Are you getting these? My research has led me to sites that claim your password is too insecure (password is not a secure password) and other pages that claim you’re using a service not condoned by Twitter. I’m using Backupify, could that be it?

In hopes that this page will be Google-indexed as the go-to place for finding solutions to this, I encourage all of you to post your results in the comments. Thanks.