Monthly Archives: May 2008

FriendFeed Sync: Bits available

Download Now

What is it: FFSync “synchronizes” events and information from your Mac to FriendFeed. For example, when you are listening to iTunes, FFSync will update your FriendFeed with an item that lets subscribers know what your current song is.

History: Infobus, FriendFeed Sync, FriendFeed Sync, Part II

Note: This version only supports iTunes “Current Song” sync. I had some issues with the file upload for iPhoto, so I pulled that feature at the last minute.

Future Directions: One of the first things I want to do for the next version is look up songs on http://webservices.rhapsody.com and offer a link from FF to the actual song, so subscribers can listen. I love to get to a place where there could be a referral fee if a subscriber purchased the song.

Permanent Download Page: http://douglaspurdy.com/ffsync/

FriendFeed Sync, Part II

I have been getting ready for a BillG review over the past two weeks, so I have had zero time to work on my little sync project.

The BillG is tomorrow, the slides and code are in the can and I need something to take my mind off the review.

So I managed to get the little app to a better place (see shots below) and I am going to run a test overnight.

You can watch the results on my FriendFeed feed at http://friendfeed.com/douglasp.

If all goes well, I’ll post a DMG with a binary sometime this week.

“The biggest threat is internal.”

This is one of the great truths of the software industry from my perspective:

At a corporate level, history says that leaders in their markets are almost always knocked off their leadership position by their own actions and not by actions of others. If you look at the press coverage it’s all focused on external threats but the biggest threat is internal, and it’s not just true of Google, by the way.

 

http://money.cnn.com/2008/05/13/technology/lashinsky_schmidt.fortune/index.htm?section=money_latest

 

FriendFeed Sync

As I posted previously, I think FriendFeed is exactly the sort of “platform” that we need, but we need to find a way to marry this with data on the rich client (the Mac I am using) and the device (the iPhone 3G that I hope to get at the start of June).

To that end, this evening I wrote the below:

Which results in http://friendfeed.com/e/46d84bd8-9583-4ab3-ae29-e3a231562d31

It is a first cut, so there is good deal of work to finish.

Tomorrow, if I have anytime at all, I’ll add support for photos (posting thumbnails of the last import in iPhoto), clean up the UI and start adding even more data sources.

This is just the tip of the iceberg.

Also, if you have ever talked to me about my vision for the “web services” world, it will be clear that the fact that I am doing this in Objective-C and with FriendFeed is tragically ironic.

Bring the Noise

Scoble has a great post about swimming in the noise.

If I wanted to be pedantic, I may take some issue with his use of the term noise (see A Mathematical Theory of Communication), but I know what he means.

That said, his story of the party reminded me of how CDMA works in practice using Walsh codes.

They [noise junkies] are the types that head into a crowded party and listen to pitch after pitch (noise) and drunken story after drunken story (noise) to find something that their audiences will find interesting (news).  

I have several sources of “noise” that I love to surf (which people who are part of my Interesting Times Gang know), but my current favorite is not Twitter or FriendFeed (I love both, BTW), but Google Hot Trends feed.

There is a ton of noise there (and much of it could lend credence to some of the worst things being said about today’s society), but I find some interesting information encoded in there from time to time. 

What is a Workspace?

In addition to the language and text editor job openings, we have something a little different that we are working on that some folks may be interested in:

http://members.microsoft.com/careers/search/details.aspx?JobID=B672493E-78D8-406B-AF70-DA86901C0844

http://members.microsoft.com/careers/search/details.aspx?JobID=EED9B5B4-9608-4BEA-AC8C-6947E9B9F691

Tim Bray is on to something…

You should check out http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2008/05/05/Changing-Your-Address.

Tim is explaining in a real-world scenario the exact idea around the “Infobus“.

This is all about liberating your data.

Imagine if Amazon could access a feed (that you provided and gave them access to) containing the names of all your purchased books rather than storing all this information “for you”.

It is your data after all — why not liberate it — think OpenID writ large.

To WWDC or not to WWDC, that is the question

I am really considering going to WWDC this year.

I am such a huge fan of Cocoa and Objective-C (go Smalltalk).

I have been playing around with the iPhone SDK and I have to tell you that I am so impressed with what Apple is doing with Cocoa Touch.

When I think about the future client platform for the “Programmable Web”, I think a lot about the iPhone and iPod Touch.

If you have been to WWDC before, I would love to know if it is worth the money (comments, email or tweets welcomed).