I’m always on the lookout for new productivity / time-management systems - researching different philosophies and techniques has become something of an unofficial hobby of mine (just check out some of the titles in the non-fiction section of my reading list).
There are three main requirements which have to be kept in balance. These are urgency, importance and psychological readiness. Traditional time management systems have tended to concentrate on the first two of these. The neglect of psychological readiness is probably the reason that most people don’t find time management systems particularly effective or congenial.
The most distinctive feature of FV is the way that its algorithm is primarily based on psychological readiness — this then opens the way to keeping urgency and importance in the best achievable balance.
I love both the simplicity of this system and the fact it addresses procrastination head-on.
I always look forward to a new episode of The Talk Show from John Gruber, and this one with Kagi CEO Vladimir Prelovac was no exception.
One of the most enjoyable episodes of recent times, this was an enlightening listen that highlights aspects of search that I had never considered (but which support my general view). It takes some deep dives down some interesting technical rabbit holes. Prelovac is a very knowledgeable and humble guest, and embodies a company whose values I can get on board with.
A few random things I learned (spoiler alerts, maybe?):
Kagi is not styling itself as ‘the next Google’ or the ‘Google Killer’ - it exists to give users an alternative if they choose.
Safari - whilst not created as an extension for any major search engine - perpetuates the ad-driven search model as Apple charges traffic acquisition fees to Google (and the other defaults available). This is part of the reason Kagi cannot be set as the default search engine.
Safari does not necessarily always use the latest version of WebKit.
It has given me tons of food for thought - exactly what I was hoping for before I listened to it.
For the past three months I have been using Obsidian exclusively for note-taking and it has been a game changer for me.
I don’t use ‘Read It Later’ apps as most of the content I consume comes from RSS feeds. However I’ve found ‘Read It Later’ behaviour to be the perfect use-case for Obsidian Web Clipper, a powerful first-party extension for Safari - more so than Safari’s own ‘Reading List’ functionality.
It enables you to save pages (or parts of pages) directly to Markdown-formatted notes in your Obsidian vault, alongside lots of useful metadata. Since it is just another note, it is synced across all my devices and available offline. It also saves a snapshot of the web page, so if it is updated I still have the original content. I’m excited to try this for the next couple of months to see how it improves my content consumption.
One of the reasons behind me resurrecting this website is that I wanted to start documenting more about myself. This is more than just writing blog posts (a habit that I am starting to build). This is my personal space on the web and I want to use it as an opportunity to be introspective and represent myself more fully. But there can be so many facets to a person, where do you even start? What exactly do you include on an ‘About’ page?
A couple of weeks ago I came across Slash Pages by Robb Knight and I knew right away that it was the starting point I was looking for.
Slash pages are common pages you can add to your website, usually with a standard, root-level slug like /now, /about, or /uses. They tend to describe the individual behind the site and are distinguishing characteristics of the IndieWeb.
I already have a very brief /about page, and have a reasonably outdated /now, but now I ideas for what else to write about. I intend to treat this area of the site more like a digital garden that I can tend to and grow over time. I have added a /slashes index page to pull it all together and have grabbed some of my notes from Obsidian to set up a few new pages.
This process is entirely for me - the fact that this site is on the public web doesn’t automatically mean that anyone is going to read it. I don’t have analytics of any kind and I really don’t care if anyone reads this stuff, but I’m looking forward using this as an exercise to consider how I think about various things.
Tuesday, 17 December 2024
| marketplace.visualstudio.com
The official VS Code extension for Laravel has been released in open beta.
When writing PHP I work in the Laravel framework almost exclusively. As a VS Code user (as opposed to PhpStorm) I don't have the luxury of being able to use the Laravel Idea plugin, which is pretty-much the gold-standard in creating a Laravel-specific development environment.
Instead I rely on a handful of extensions to make VS Code more PHP-aware, but it still leaves a lot of room for improvement.
The first-party Laravel extension is something that I have been eagerly awaiting, and even though it is still in beta I have already installed it on both my personal and work machines.
Check out the non-exhaustive list of features on the extensions marketplace page - Merry Christmas to me!
Hot on the heels of the American Dialect Society selecting it as the word of the year in 2023, enshittification perfectly sums up the the modern internet:
the gradual deterioration of a service or product brought about by a reduction in the quality of service provided, especially of an online platform, and as a consequence of profit-seeking.
content, especially as viewed on a social media platform and for an extended duration, which is considered to be of low quality in terms of intellectual stimulation.
When Caleb first demoed Flux at Laracon US I didn’t really pay much attention - mainly due to lack of bandwidth.
It surfaced again at Keith Damiani’s talk at Laracon AU (which I was lucky enough to attend in person) as a shortcut to rapidly building an app, so I circled back to take a closer look.
Whilst it isn’t something I can see myself using a great deal in my day job (and have little space for side-projects) I have ended up purchasing an unlimited license. Watch the original talk from Laracon US to get an idea of the level of passion that has gone into building this - this is not just another UI kit. The insights into building a truly accessible dropdown menu is worth the purchase price alone!
This isn’t the first time I’ve paid for something from Caleb, and I doubt it will be the last, but I do think it is important to support creators like this.
I absolutely love the simplicity of the new PlanetScale website. At first I thought maybe it was a mistake, but no, it’s legit. It’s a bold choice for an enterprise-level platform, but man it is ticking so many boxes for me (probably helps that I love using minimal apps like iA Writer).
Not sure how long this redesign will stick around, but I definitely feel some inspiration for this site coming on...
I use Reeder (Classic) to consume my RSS feeds, which is now pretty much the only way I consume my internet diet. The ‘Mark all as read’ button is my favourite way to regularly clean house.
Looking at the episode list for an interesting entry point I was immediately drawn to this limited four-part series diving into the rise, impact and uses of massive ‘hyperscale’ data centres worldwide.
I guess I was already aware of the resource demands of data centres, but perhaps not overtly aware of the scale of them worldwide, as well as some of the more political reasons for their locations.
This series gave me a lot to think about - especially regarding AI and the longtermist outlook of tech billionaires - but I won’t go over here. Best you go listen for yourself.
This is probably one of the best Apple ads in a long time. Doesn’t take itself too seriously - the category of Apple marketing that I like. Plus, strong LEGO Movie vibes.
I have no need for a desktop Mac right now, but the new form factor (and not to mention the specs) are very compelling.
Kagi, a ‘user centric’ (and paid) search engine, maintains what is essentially a webring to find random posts from the various small web bloggers and the entire list is maintained, out in the open, via a GitHub repository.
Even if you aren’t a Kagi user, this is an amazing resource of some excellent creators. I’ve seen a few familiar names on there, but also found a lot of new people to follow also. You can submit your own recommendations as well, if you fork the repository and then submit your suggestions.
I won't spoil this for you by giving any context. Trust me, just go watch this talk by the co-founder of Panic and enjoy watching it unfold. So very, very good.
I've only been broadly been keeping abreast of the WordPress / WP Engine / Silver Lake saga, and remain fairly ambivalent about it, but this latest development with DHH wading in with his extreme opinions (does he have any other type?) is painful.
Mullenweg starts by insisting that the post / discourse is respectful, but his frustration is palpable, and he's finding it hard to rise above it all.
To be clear, I'm no fan of DHH - I stopped following / subscribing to him a while ago (facts that would not concern him, nor should they).
Everyone seems to be getting confused over the issue, thinking it is a case of an open source project trying to shake down a large profitable VC-backed business. It's not - it's a trademark dispute. The fact that 'giving back to the open source project' is an option for restitution is very charitable in my opinion.