personal

  • January 31, 2011

    10 Android Apps the Make my Life Easier

    It’s no secret that I love Android as a platform, and I favor Android phones over the iPhone. I did my Master’s Thesis on the G1, bought the Motorola Droid- the first Android phone available on Verizon, and recently upgraded to the HTC Droid Incredible. One of the reasons I like Android so much is because of the openness of the Market Place, and the ability to install non-market apps on your phone. Apps are very powerful for any platform because they make your phone more personal. Today I want to tell you about 10 Android apps that have made my life easier!

    (more…)

  • January 25, 2011

    Manifest Development Redesign 2011: The Homepage

    [singlepic id=7 w=320 h=240 float=right] Last week I launched a redesign of my freelance site, Manifest Development. I started developing it in late November, and wanted to revamp the site completely from design to content. I got some feedback from my students during one class when we were talking about the importance of a small business’ website, and I wanted to integrate that, as well as some of the new things I learned over the last two years. I’m planning on making this a multipart series, and in today’s installment, I want to talk about the most important part of a website: The Homepage.

    (more…)

  • January 9, 2011

    Links Round Up for 01/9/11

    This week I also redid my About.me Page to make it simpler, and created a Twitter account for my company. You can follow @manifestdev for updated on the redesign, news, specials, and web development related links!

  • December 31, 2010

    Favorites of 2010

    Happy New Years Eve! As tradition for the last couple of years, here is a list of my favorites from 2010.

    • Favorite Tech Toy: Amazon Kindle. Competition was pretty stiff this year with all of the new gadgets I got- an iPad, a new Macbook Pro, and most recently, the HTC Incredible. I also broke from choosing my cell phone as my favorite tech toy. I got the Kindle for Christmas last year and love it. I’m including it in the 2010 running because most of the use came in 2010. The reading experience is superior to the iPad, the book selection is huge, it’s lightweight and very portable, and I love that you can make notes and annotations on it. I feel like I read more in 2010 because of the Kindle.
    • App/Website: Dropbox. This is another thing I had in 2009 but didn’t start really using until 2010. Dropbox makes it amazingly easy to sync across all of my devices (Mac, PC, iPad, Android Phone). I’m considering upgrading so I can try some of the neat advanced things you can do.
    • Favorite Book: The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. My friend Katie recommended it, and even though it’s a fairly long book, it’s a quick read because of the fast pace of the story. I highly recommending it. I’ll be starting the next one soon!
    • TV Show: Dexter. I was lucky enough to start a series this year that I’ve been missing out on. Dexter is an awesome show about a good guy who’s also serial killer. The show is thrilling and intellectually stimulating, and the acting is rock solid. I highly recommend it if you’ve never watched it.
    • Movie: Inception. Leo DiCaprio had a great 2010. For a while, I though Shutter Island would be the best movie of the year. Then Inception came out and blew my mind. Cause for a lot of discussion and speculation, it’s a movie that keeps on giving, and an original idea at that.
    • Music: The Gaslight Anthem. My brother Phil and friend Danny told me about them in August/September and I’ve been listening to them daily since. I love their classic alternative rock sound (non of this new-alternative Nickelback crap) and the lead singer’s vocals are awesome. I highly recommend them. As far as new in 2010, Mumford and Sons is pretty awesome. You should check them out too.

  • October 24, 2010

    Links Round Up for 10/24/10

    • Dropbox’s Y Combinator Funding Application: Y Combinator is an investing firm for tech companies. This is the application Dropbox submitted to them and ultimately won funding with.
    • Above the Fold: “Above the fold” is a term used in newspapers for when you fold a paper in 1/2. The most important stories should be on the top half, or above the fold. People try to apply this to websites by wanting to put everything important before you have to scroll. You do not have to do that. People can scroll just fine.
    • Oct. 18, 1985: Nintendo Entertainment System Launches: See how awesome Oct. 1985 was? NES launched just 2 days before I did. I was destined to play video games.
    • FaceTime for Mac: Apple launched a beta of their popular iPhone app for the Mac. Allows you to make FaceTime calls to other Macs or iPhone users.
    • The Truth about Burning Bridges: This is something I’m often worried about, but have found about the same results.
    • After 31 Years, Sony Ends Production of the Walkman: The Walkman was awesome. It let you take music with you. How crazy is that? I had one, which I used to listen to Green Day, mostly.

    A new personal splash page service called About.Me entered beta this week. Here is my profile. Also, I saw Muse last night in concert. If you ever get the chance, you should most certainly go. Finally, I bought an iPad this week. Expect a review in the near future.

  • October 20, 2010

    15 Video Games that Will Stick with You

    Got this from a Facebook Meme, then felt it would be a good blog post.

    The rules: Don’t take too long to think about it. Fifteen video games you’ve played that will always stick with you. List the first fifteen you can recall in no more than fifteen minutes.”

    Here we go!

    (more…)

  • October 10, 2010

    Links Round Up for 10/10/10

  • September 26, 2010

    Links Round Up for 09/26/10

    • Facebook is not worth $33 Billion: So there was this time in the late 1990s when Venture Capitalists invested billions into websites without any strong models to make money. Good thing nothing bad came from that. (also, what ever happened to valuing a company based on the money it makes?)
    • Think You Know Baseball? No, You Don’t: This is a shining example about why statistics can be used to prove whatever you want. This guy doesn’t actually tell us anything of substance. “A metric called Win Probability Added (WPA) goes plate appearance by plate appearance to see just how much a player helped or hurt his team’s chance of winning. Value is added for big plays at crucial moments.” That is a completely made up, BS stat, probably because the guy doesn’t like Derek Jeter. You know what matters? Wins and Losses.
    • Degrees that Hiring Managers Want: Toping the list is heath care/nursing. IT is also on there.
    • What it Means when You say ‘Literally’: Wrote about this a while ago. This drives me insane….not literally.
    • With no Jobs, Grads ‘Gamble’ on Education: This is pretty interesting. I think it was grad school that made be the developer I am. I was also able to get an assistantship, which meant school from free.
    • Wait. What Does Your Startup Do?: I get way to many pitches for websites like this. “It’s like a Facebook for orphans.” 37signals said that there is a social network that doesn’t exist today, there is probably a reason. Think about that, because it’s true.

    In other news, Facebook was down for the good part of a day and Twitter was hacked. Crazy!

    And for music…The Gaslight Anthem. I recommend it all, but if you’re only choosing one, The ’59 Sound is the best.