ode - a simple personal publishing platform for the web http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/community/ Ode is simple! (Simple means that you know how it works.) en http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss your_account@your_domain (Your name) your_account@your_domain (Your name) Do the simplest thing that could possibly work http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/about_ode/why/do-the-simplest-thing-that-works This post was inspired by a comment on the forum. I'll quote the short bit of that comment that's relevant to this post. As I have a tendency to do, I've sort of gone off track a little bit.

I am visually oriented ... having everything out were I can touch it feels better. (as opposed to it disappearing into a database)

I think there are a lot of us like this and for good reason too. We (i.e. people) are tuned to be 'visual thinkers'. Why fight it?

That question is not entirely rhetorical. There are lots of good uses for what we think of as databases BUT I would argue that there are fewer good ones than would be suggested by the number of databases in use.

Databases are like taking all of your stuff and putting it in a separate room. Next you hire a person to stand at the door and, when requested, go get stuff for you and put it back.

All of your stuff is available to you, but not directly. It saves you from having to arrange all of your things, because the person at the door handles that, but is that nec a good thing? After all, you don't get to arrange and interact with all of your stuff.

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]]> Fri, 27 Jan 2012 21:36:10 EST http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2012/01/27/21/36/10/do-the-simplest-thing-that-works Best wishes for the new year http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/about_ode/noteworthy_dates/new-years-post2012 Here's hoping for a great new year for this project and its participants.

There will be a new release this year, and hopefully lots of other activity too. Of course that's going to depend on all of us. So we'll see how it goes. (I'm as curious as you are.)

For my part, I'm going to spend as much time on Ode as I can, making improvements and expanding what it can do. As I've said before, we're only just scratching the surface.

Thanks to everyone who supports this project. I can't tell you how import you are to Ode. After all, that is what's beautiful about a small project like this, that each person involved can make a meaningful contribution. I believe that this ideal that is at the heart of the Wide Web, and it's the reason why Ode exists in the first place.

So thanks for all of your help to this point, and let's all do better in 2012. That's the promise of a new year - to improve what we are already doing well, and to fix what we've done wrong. A new year is the next best chance to get it right, and that time is now. 

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]]> Sat, 31 Dec 2011 21:42:53 EST http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/12/31/21/42/53/new-years-post2012 YA 'logic' based theme: Introducing 'logic_leftsidebar' http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/ode_themes/logic/logic_mascot_leftsidebar_introduced Like the '_fox_news' variant introduced a few days ago, this certainly isn't an entirely new theme.

In this case all I've done is move the sidebar to the left of the main content area. (That also required updating shifting some paddings and margins to agree with the new placement of the sidebar.)

That's it.

I'm absolutely sure this is something you could have done on your own. And that's exactly the point I'm trying to make with the logic theme. As I've said before, I always intended to provide a few different layouts, both so that people new to Ode have a few different layouts to choose from, and more importantly, to demonstrate just how malleable a simple theme like this can be.

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]]> Mon, 05 Dec 2011 16:52:02 EST http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/12/05/16/52/02/logic_mascot_leftsidebar_introduced A new theme: Introducing 'logic_fox_news' http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/ode_themes/logic/logic-mascot-foxnews-201-introduced Well, calling it a new theme is probably taking it too far. logic_fox_news is a 3 column variant of Ode's default logic theme. (Based on the newest 2.0.1 version of logic.)

Download the logic_fox_news theme.

This is something I've wanted to do for a while. With logic I've tried to create a theme which is both easy to understand (i.e. simple) and easy to modify. To that end, I decided it would make sense to create a couple of alternative versions of the theme with slightly different layouts. The idea is that users can pick the layout the works best for them as a starting point.

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]]> Thu, 01 Dec 2011 16:01:17 EST http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/12/01/16/01/17/logic-mascot-foxnews-201-introduced New version of 'logic' (Ode's default theme) available. http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/ode_themes/logic/logic-mascot-201-available After working through a series of posts about themes, I quickly revisited the default theme (again). This isn't something I'll continue to do forever, but I don't think I've gotten it quite right up to this point. Who knows, maybe this time is it.

Download the new version of the theme.

There are a couple of good signs:

  1. Each time I go through it I'm tempted to change less.

  2. When I compare the new revision to the previous one, it's not always clear to me what was so wrong with the earlier version that I felt I had to change anything at all.

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]]> Sat, 26 Nov 2011 21:36:43 EST http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/11/26/21/36/43/logic-mascot-201-available I recommend that you do not use Ode (this project) http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/about_ode/dont-useOde What does that mean? It means exactly what it says. My official recommendation as that you find something else better suited to whatever it is that you want to do. Find something easier. Maybe something with a nice big button for you to click. Look for something that doesn't require anything of you except a profile, and permission to share that profile, along with your relationships, content, and interactions with present and future 'partners'. There are quite a few services that allow you to authenticate using your Facebook account. That sounds great. Or you could drop the middleman and just use Facebook. Really what do you need to do that you can't do on Facebook anyway? Maybe you should stop being such a pain in the ass and just get onboard.

Let's be honest, if you're like most people you don't know much of anything about the technology you use every day, and you don't see that as a problem. Find something that doesn't ask you to learn anything. Learning is hard. It makes you confront the fact that you don't know everything. Why would anyone want that? It may even give you a headache.

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]]> Tue, 15 Nov 2011 16:41:28 EST http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/11/15/16/41/28/dont-useOde A population is not a community : How to help with Ode http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/community/how-to-help-with-ode People sometimes ask me if they can contribute to the project, And if so, what's the best way to do that.

I want to take a moment to tackle that two part question.

The first part is easy. Of course you can contribute! I'd like nothing more. If you've read through the blog or the forum you may be aware that I consider community to be an essential part of what Ode is all about. And when it comes to this or any other community I believe that quality is so much more important than quantity.

You might find yourself standing in the middle of New York City, a city of well over 8 million people and feel totally isolated and alone. Add just one more person to the mix, someone you know, a friend or someone else who cares about you, and suddenly it feels like a community. It works the same way with the web, and with open source projects. The populations we're dealing with might be large, much larger in fact than the population of NYC (there are something like 2 billion+ internet users), but it just takes a few for a community. Population is all about quantity, but community is a measure of quality.

What's my point? It's that not only can you contribute, but your contributions here mean a lot to me and every other member of this community.

The second part of the question requires a little bit more thought.

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]]> Thu, 13 Oct 2011 21:39:06 EDT http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/10/13/21/39/06/how-to-help-with-ode The web is what you make of it (Part 1) http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/community/the-web-is-what-you-make-it-part1 You might have seen the new ad campaign by Google. I absolutely love the sentiment. I think it's just inspired.

It embraces the idea of a more personal web.

The web is not what we make it. It's what you make it, and what I make it. Together we create the social web, sure. But the social web is what emerges from our personal interactions and experiences. That's how human beings have always defined social. We're not cogs in some big social machine. We're the center of our own social universe. We form personal relationships, explore personal interests, and aspire to our own personal ambitions.

My favorite has to be "Dear Sophie"

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]]> Fri, 07 Oct 2011 00:16:29 EDT http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/10/07/00/16/29/the-web-is-what-you-make-it-part1 The web is what you make of it (Part 2) http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/community/the-web-is-what-you-make-it-part2 I split this post in 2 parts because I didn't want to ruin the first part with the negative rant that follows.

Back to "Dear Sophie"

Could this be done through a service like Facebook? Yes and no.

Sure you could do it. But you'd have to agree to their terms of service today, and hope that you will still be willing to agree to them by the time Sophie grows up.

You'd also have to hope that all of those messages, complete with photos, audio, and video, will be available to you and Sophie 5, 10, 15 years into the future. Facebook makes no such guarantees.

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]]> Fri, 07 Oct 2011 00:16:28 EDT http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/10/07/00/16/28/the-web-is-what-you-make-it-part2 Pilots wanted! http://ode-is-simple.com/home/news/community/pilots_wanted2011_1002 There's a fundamental difference between being a pilot and being a passenger. The pilot is the person who flies the plane. He or she is in control, and knows how everything works.

The passengers are along for the ride.

There's nothing inherently good or bad, better or worse about either role, but they are different. There are pros and cons associated with each.

It takes work to be a pilot.

You have to learn a lot. But in exchange for that effort you get to do things other people can't do, and go where you want to go, on your schedule.

It's easier to be a passenger.

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]]> Sun, 02 Oct 2011 18:50:13 EDT http://ode-is-simple.com/home/2011/10/02/18/50/13/pilots_wanted2011_1002