Asymptomatic

There must be intelligent life down here

Meritocracy Versus Do-ocracy
March 21, 2009

At Drupalcon, there was a recurring theme of “do-ocracy”. Simply explained, a “Do-ocracy” is Drupal’s version of a meritocracy. Well, it’s not even so much Drupal’s version, as how people perceive the way that Drupal works, or how they choose to explain what a meritocracy is. Being involved with Habari and our own brand of meritocracy, I’m glad that they’ve come up with their own ridiculous term to explain how their project works.

As part of the definition of meritocracy on Wikipedia, you have this:

In a meritocracy, society rewards (by wealth, position, and social status) those who show talent and competence as demonstrated by past actions or by competition.

That’s the ideal scenario. But what the folks presenting do-ocracies at Drupalcon are advocating is something slightly different. They’re giving wealth, position, and social status (or whatever the open source equivalent is) to people who simply “do”, not by people who show talent and competence. That is, your work needs to be of no merit, you simply need to do it. That’s not right.

Web Design for Web Developers - A Book
March 15, 2009

I pitched a thought on Twitter about a book that I think should exist. The helpful folks on Twitter kindly responded with some candidates, but I should clarify what I’m looking for.

What I really want seems to change every time I say it, but fundamentally I’m a coder. It’s what I know how to do, and I’m pretty good at it. I realize that I just don’t have the design skills to be building designs every day like some of the more prolific designers that I work with. Especially not at their level of quality. But what I would like is some magic formula that gets me at least to the point that I can produce something that is not butt-ugly.

Let's Fix SEO
March 14, 2009

If you’re not a tool, you hate SEO as much as I do. If you hate SEO more than I do, you are possibly also a tool. What’s the deal?

It seems to me that people hate SEO because:

Hold
March 09, 2009

Riley turned four back in November. Shortly after that, he had his annual checkup at the doctor, and it was my task to take him over and have him looked over. We’d been prepping him for a week or two; talking about vaccinations, watching the relevant kids TV on the topic, reading the books on how your body works. He was both interested in and at ease with the idea, even though he thought he might be scared.

Finally the day arrived to visit the doctor. Riley and I both remained positive throughout the process. The doctor was friendly. She talked about the vaccinations that he was due for, and everyone was ok with that. She asked about some optional ones, since we were there and they were recommended. She asked about our recent trip out of the country and explained that Riley should have a TB shot, too. Riley was calm, only slightly apprehensive, and was happy to agree to getting the shots and being healthy.

How to Post Screenshots to Evernote 3 From SnagIt 9
February 26, 2009

I realize that Evernote has its own clipper tool, but I’ve been using SnagIt’s screen capture for a long time, and it has some features that Evernote doesn’t. With SnagIt, I can markup graphics before I save them, adding text or cropping or stamping them. It’s very handy at what it does well, just as Evernote is great for organizing captures and making them searchable.

So my goal was to make it so that I could capture things directly from SnagIt to Evernote in a “single step”. No cutting and pasting, in other words. Those who know me know that I do not accept cheese, and wouldn’t compromise with some kludgy hack. Here’s how I did it, and where I’d like to improve it.