If you have an Illustrator-based web design workflow, try pictorial which automatically monitors a directory of choice, and runs exported .PNGs (it’s regex-based, so maybe other PNGs or any PNG whose name matches a particular pattern) thru PNGCrush², and shows a Growl notification after every iteration. I do this manually 100+ times a day, and not having to do it manually anymore certainly helps.

If you trace many Git forks locally, or if you do git clone a lot, clone can help by cloning to the “right” directory named with both the user’s screenname and the project name.

@cloudhead went to the future, found CSS 4 and gave us LESS. To write LESS efficiently you need syntax coloring. My fork of LESS Syntax Mode provides many fixes. Have a look into it if you use Coda or SubEthaEdit.

Overloading SSH: swizzling between accounts while pushing to Heroku using Git

Since it goes this way:

$ git push heroku master

and git push authenticates over SSH, who you are is determined by the key that your SSH agent sends abroad. To have git work with your desired credential, first create separate remote endpoints for each Heroku account that you plan to use, then edit ./ssh/config so that they are recognized by the SSH agent.

Creating separate git remote endpoints

Go to your repository, and edit .git/config. Create many remote endpoints. I’ll use one reposiroty of ours that recently got updated for example.

[remote "origin"]
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/origin/*
    url = git@github.com:iridia/redmine-heroku.git

…

[remote "heroku"]
    url = git@heroku.com:keeper.git
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/heroku/*

[remote "heroku_base_iridia"]
    url = git@base.iridia.tw.heroku.com:keeper.git
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/heroku/*

[remote "heroku_ev_iridia"]
    url = git@ev.iridia.tw.heroku.com:keeper.git
    fetch = +refs/heads/*:refs/remotes/heroku/*

Notice that the last 2 remotes have peculiar url configuration. In this case, we embed the respective Heroku account that we would like the push to be effective under into the host name. In that sense pushing to heroku_base_iridia would result in the credentials associated with base@iridia.tw to be used, and pushing to heroku_ev_iridia would show up as if ev@iridia.tw pushed it. The heroku endpoint which is associated with heroku.com was created by Heroku itself.

Creating separate host entries within .ssh/config

Now edit ~/.ssh/config and again we’ll have a working example.

Host ev.iridia.tw.heroku.com

    HostName heroku.com
    User git
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/ev@iridia.tw.identity
    IdentitiesOnly yes

Host base.iridia.tw.heroku.com

    HostName heroku.com
    User git
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/iridia_id_rsa
    IdentitiesOnly yes

Notice that for each pseudo-host, a real HostName is provided, and an IdentityFile is also provided. This tells the SSH agent that once we attempt to SSH to a listed Host, substitute that host with its real HostName, and authenticate using the IdentityFile associated with the host. Since Git usually pushes over SSH, combining this part with the former part allows an user to push to Heroku using any of her many Heroku accounts.

However, you’ll have to add the correct keys to their respective Heroku accounts, either from its administration interface, or from the command line after following the part that follows.

Overloading ~/.heroku/credentials: managing Heroku apps under many accounts

Since pushing is not where all the development happens, we’ll have to make Heroku’s gem ($ sudo gem install heroku) work with multiple accounts. (Un)fortunately, Heroku stores credentials in plain text under ~/.heroku/credentials, so swizzling it makes the gem work with multiple accounts. Check out hero.rb on GitHub.

For example, to add many keys to their respective Heroku accounts (assuming that you have got hero.rb and all the keys):

$ hero ev@iridia.tw
$ heroku keys:add ~/.ssh/ev_iridia_tw.identity.pub

$ hero base@iridia.tw
$ heroku keys:add ~/.ssh/base_iridia_tw.identity.pub

That’s it.

Announcing lib.tidyCJK.js which pseudo-kerns Chinese, Japanese and Korean passages by properly inserting a space between CJK glyphs and Latinate / numeric glyphs in them. Clone it or fork it on GitHub.

It’s an early alpha, so might be full of bugs. With imminent field application, its quality and accuracy will likely improve. tidyCJK uses Unicode¹, so it needs to run in an environment that supports JS 1.3+.

Why use lib.tidyCJK.js

For the exactly same reason why Cappuccino is strong: standard bodies move slowly, and despite that CSS3, a work in progress, already has much in store, we need similar capabilities now. And we often have to interact with existing material, which comes from all places in all sorts. Better post-process everything and make them look good than wait for everyone to conform.

Finding a character’s code easily

Add this little cute recursive JavaScript method if you’re targeting JavaScript 1.5+ ², so you say String.hex instead of String.hex() ³:

String.prototype.__defineGetter__("hex", function() {

    var response = [];

    for (i in this) {

        var charCodeString = this.charCodeAt(i).toString(16);

        response.push("\\u" + (function(stringToWrap, finalDigits, padding){

            if (stringToWrap.length >= finalDigits) return stringToWrap;
            return arguments.callee(padding + stringToWrap, finalDigits, padding)

        })(charCodeString, 4, "0"));

    }

    return response;

});

And call String.hex — for example:

>   "f(*^%)g".hex
["\u0066", "\u0028", "\u002a", "\u005e", "\u0025", "\u0029", "\u0067", "\u0066"]

Happy Kerning!

Besides the 2 secret (“they’ll be out when they’re done”) projects, publiusEditor and arboreal, I will work on these stuff this week. Git’s submodule functionality totally rocks, and it had led me persuading our cofounder into buying GitHub’s paid plan. (Cabal once said at C4 on Coda Confidential, that, paraphrased, “oh the largest purchase at the time probably was a $500 SSL certificate, and we argued over that…”)

I need to pray. And yeah some stuff got ditched. They will not come back.

Colored

It ALWAYS bugs me why polished OS X text editors have flush white backgrounds. They ought to be rgba(0, 0, 0, .05), so there’s no eye strain. Flush white stuff is never honest.

More on liminal issues

Everything is fine. Flat but fine. Bodily troubles galore, but such is the unavoidable pain that being alive yields. No compromises shall besiege, and definitely. Please try judging me with my pixels (a placebo for “padding stuff”).

I have to interrupt our ordinary program and announce that sadly, audion got cut off. Things are very complicated, but in a nutshell I collaborated with 2 coders, and they ditched my (already paid) interface citing the design being too difficult to implement.

Heck.

My first iPhone app will be released under my own label then, and it would not be a book app.

Another startup team turned me down 2 weeks ago, citing a lack of experience in handling large-scale web apps. (Oh the irony; I was a photographer-wannabe 18 monthes ago.)

I need to rework my personal site and blog some day. They look pale compared to those custom-ordered pixels. Yeah, I am available starting early April, hopefully.

Colophon

If I unfriended you anywhere on Facebook, Plurk or Twitter, that is not because that I hate you; quite the opposite, our relationship is so cherished that it ought not get strained by excessibe babble from either party. Let’s switch over to plain emailing, and so be it.

Anyone interested in a CPCoderNight in Taipei?

Iconology, and tales from blatantly failed ones

Iconology is about delivering idealism, transcending the border between dream and reality. Iconology is not about perspection, nor is it related to realism. Photorealism is a word often used and cited in retrospection, but in actuality it’s far off. Iconology is the art of delivering an ideal in terms of visual metaphors, that melts and immerses in an universal sense.

So using a 3D suite for icons is a pesky move, and needs careful consideration. Apple’s LLVM icon is not done with 3D, but meticulously constructed planear 2D vector graphics. And whenever somebody points you to the Human Interface Guideline, bear in mind that it’s no lesser than the W3C’s CSS 3 book — both standards in progress, and whatmore in retrospection.

Remember that the guideline is in itself anecdotally a guideline. Guidelines are meant to be followed like rules, and rules are ought to be broken by those gifted with adequate merit.

Beginners shall study photography and learn what not to do (I assume that all interested iconologists are merited, and would never resort to a yet more planear mind; I believe in individuals).

So be it. It is hilariously exciting to nit-pick my own old work and find the faults.

—

publiusEditor Iconology / Sketches

—

iPad

I need to deliver more delicate objects. Ventures ahead it’s a brisk world. Transgression is a key in my life and understanding itself with my own senses is a lesson to be acquired. It is the year of revelation.

To whom it may concern I am mailing your share of portfolio books on Jan. 1st, and the 2010 book will be sent around March again to you all with no additional fee for I feel some work in the old one were inadequate.

—

Met Dad for the first time in 3 years straight today. And 2008 was like a distant memory. H (codename) reassured that I am neuter therefore not a homosexual and Dad is very interested in buying a feminine watch for me when I politely refused his giving me a digital watch citing that I seldom wear one, possessing a cell phone already.

So to set things straight I am likely to be diagnosed with GID which stands for Gender Identity Disorder. “Disorder” is a rather harsh word emotionally but is in itself reasonably sound. I love boys while possessing a biological male body, which stands for homosexuality in a broader sensed glimpse; the criteria for GID is, however, actually all about one’s inner representation and understanding of her own sex, and is not that related to the enclosing body itself. — cp. DSM IV.

We really need a neuter third person pronoun here. We need that pronoun badly. It is extremely unpleasing not having one in English, equally irritating to find that the more neutral one in Chinese actually is not so bivalent (it is oft male-inclined) whenever the feminine-inclined one is a standalone. We need a context-free world, in a more radical sense; but putting it mundanely shall we change perspectives, there is a need of mutual understanding whose demand stems from fear, uncertainty, doubt and distrust.

—

Also visited my old high school today. It is surely resourceful in a narrow sense (they really know their words, but beyond that I don’t see much), whilst I now deem time spent there inappropriate, if I haven’t met H and a handful bunch of interesting people. Being burdened, anti-social and pessimistic my first year there was spent learn Latin, which then taught me how most languages work.

A little maneuver assured me a passport that carries a good Latinized name instead of a transliteration. (Names need to be localized, transliteration is the emblem of ultimate laziness and utmost incompetence.) I shall digress and explain — according to our much-mocked government and its notorious Nationality law each person is assigned a difficult-to-change name (not being a criminal nor a duplicate, your name could be changed at most once in the lifetime). Most people get a transliterated name as their “English Name” on their passports for that their parents did not come up with a good Latinized name while filing for their birth. They are screwed.

Laws are to be meticulously and politely broken, and opposed when they do not make sense — and my opposition in this case was thru legally valid maneuvering. A person of Taiwanese origin, that was born on Taiwan, could get a passport bearing a different Latinized name than a simple, funky transliteration if she could provide either: a. a birth certificate bearing the new name; b. a scholarly ID issued by a (public or accredited private) school; c. a foreign passport or other IDs issued by the government body that claims Taiwan, or a government body that is accredited within the aforementioned government body’s regulations; or d. a certificate issued by an overseas Chinese group (this is vague.)

Implementation omitted. This is however pathetic, ugly, dangerous but absolutely necessary for a better tomorrow. Misdemeanor it seems, never try this without through planning.

—

Visited Ökogreen and Youth today, meeting a career companion. The youngsters at Youth are really outstanding for they could communicate in English with relative ease(Nota: honestly, that stands for “oh dear, it’s very interesting [but I am absolutely not interested in that]” [sic([k])] in inter-personal lingo) but talking to a customer while chewing gun is really not a very good habit. Paid them to apply matte film on my MacBook and my eyes are happy again now:

“I have never seen such eye strain, what may be the cause?” “I code for 2 hours every day, read documentation for an additional 2, draw for another 4, and then I have sketches and more mock-ups to do…” “I’m gluing your eyes shut.”

Also spent time looking at the new 27” iMac — a pretty sexy machine with apparent flaw: the glare. Youth also doesn’t have Xcode or any other dev tools installed on showcased Macs, which is not very good.

The MacBook Air has a pathetic screen which ruins the point of having a thin machine. I am the kind of person who asks for a pro-grade panel from a pro-grade laptop…

—

The next thing I am fighting against is the auto-satirical, impersonate, counter-productive, vile and monstrous Military Drafting law which literally calls every person who happen to carry a male sex organ one or a few years away from her sane and productive life, then tortures and destroys the person, both bodily and spiritually, to great extent so they make perfect stupid, irrational, and obedient “citizens” with a process that’s so harsh that some slaves under that considered it a good practice, such opinion often expressed guiltily and groundlessly with a grain of faked prodigious masculinity.

I have already witnessed the withering of several personae of intelligent mind, and will never devote myself to such collective governmental crime. There are fine lines between a government, the people, a nation and a state which our politicians tend to forget, and our fellow people on Taiwan tend to oversee. Never, ever, forget that this law is made before the now-powerful government-in-exile-still (Lee’s reform is remarkable but inadequate, Chen and Ma simply made things worse in a big way), which owns it and claims sovereignty over Taiwanese people, ever came to Taiwan. There is ambiguity and people who succumb dies silently. I want to die a loud death if there must be.

However thanks to its existence I finally am facing my true self. There is always fortune lying inside every unfortunate incident and I now often think this way. Fortuna imperatrix mundi. Let’s see what turns up in a few months.

—

Life is struggle and there must be reasons for this. The human mind is always looking for solutions, and once they’re found other questions are quickly asked.

I am not feeling well yet am fine. Everything seems going fine. Seeing my healer for the first time next week. Let’s see what turns up then.

Cocoa / Obj-C is a fine environment, and it is so easy that even a retarded developer-wannabe like me could pick the fundamentals up in days.

—

Rounding Up

$.monoHighlightOutgoingLink() — available today

Punchy Live — before December ends

$.monoConvert() — before December ends

Punchy — around January

Cloudy — around the second week of January

Fi (Cocoa; Mac only)— around January

Numinis — around the third week of January

Publius (via Cappuccino) before January ends

Stickies — before January ends

Colophon — before February ends

Jet:「看「朋友不值三千塊」的文章，有個人回應在台灣作算命排星盤是比作設計好的工作。」

Ev:「沒錯。（第一個念頭：你這幾月的文章了，現在纔拿出來談。）視覺設計的特質就是由於大家都有眼睛，所以業主也會有很多建議；狀況好時，會更有效率；狀況不好時，建議就會變得很詭異；算命、排星盤的人面對的多半是完全茫然無措、不可能回嘴的客人，所以一定是看似比較輕鬆的工作。」

01: 對了，「冏標誌的接龍」那篇文章底下，有位前輩很認真地告訴我們⋯⋯別太批評台灣的冏標誌。

02: Freelancing 最大的好處就是可以上半身正襟危坐開視訊會議、下半身穿四角內褲、腳踩絨毛拖鞋。有個不那麼好的好處則是：你與你的作品之間甚麼都沒有，且必須完全地誠實。但，同樣地在你沒有靈感、死線（deadline）逼近的時候，要麼趕快說點話，要麼立刻砸掉招牌。

03: http://www.obta.uw.edu.pl/~draco/docs/voccomp.html — Vocabula Computatralia. 各位軟體開發者前輩與夥伴：在撰寫 Cocoa 軟體、測試 Sparkle 自動更新框架、不想讓其它人知道自己做了啥，卻又信奉古老的「祇要你能讀懂，你就自動有權力閱讀」規章時，就用拉丁文寫 change log 吧 — “hodie magnum mendum eradici…”

04: 錢人們都歸納出了「A 等的人纔會找更多 A 級的，B 級的只會找 C 級的人」這種事情，親愛的教育部好像⋯⋯？

05: 基本上有幾個面向。自由度：有。深度：完全沒有。前者重要嗎？答案是對庶民生活而言很重要⋯⋯後者呢？答案是要維持這樣的庶民下去的話，不得不有些。但好像大家都不太想要。而在人家啃一堆書、「求達到世界水準」的時候⋯⋯台灣的小孩似乎是在快樂學習、在大學裡過童年。網際網路的發展代表的是印刷世界的壟斷即將結束（正確）、知識的壟斷結束以後歷史會回歸（應該正確）。

06: 反正水準跟尺子都掛在牆上了。要做啥隨便。

07: 廢話。

08: 要幹驚天動地的大事必須忍受的孤苦與寂寞，並不是常人敢於想像的。問題是，忍得了這種孤寂，並不代表所期待的事情就一定會成功。更多時候，成大事需要大的資本，而忍者等的祇是棋局結束而已；有更多的愚勇人會朝向日落的方向等太陽。假若自己可以說嘴的祇餘下猛勇的姿勢，就要趕快拿出自知之明。其實最討厭的一件事情是：學會享受生命、分享與理解、以及找到正確的團體這些事情，總是在最精華的年代過去之後纔發生。

09: 鞭笞年輕人的臂膀以肯定自己已逝的年華尚未真正老去。諷刺爛設計、歪七扭八的對齊、標楷體、詭異框線跟腦死的字體學（或者，明顯偏移兩公分的海報）以確定自己的功夫還未朽壞。又仍或者，嘲弄賺大錢的眼棍（作「神棍」之「棍」解；或曰牛屎設計人，bullshit designer 也），用以撫慰自感梁木大朽、良禽擇枝別棲的悲哀？

10: 設計本身根本沒有規則。是一團亂。任何設計管理軟體只要是硬把既成規則套上設計過程，一定會賣得慘⋯⋯所以軟體的樣子必須適應這一團亂的東西。對了，我不知道有沒有提過，聶永真君之所以這麼紅（inordinately famous）的緣故，跟誠品、學學受到大家熱愛的事實也很有相關性？

—

Quotes

01: 台灣人是用一種很奇怪的方法生存下去的：大家互相補血、共同累積起了生存所需的底限資源後，就這樣苦苦地撐下去。

02: 只是，腦袋 IQ 180、把實驗室當家又有什麼用？一炮就被打死了！英文爛、學校知名度差、錢少雜事多、與一流公司接頭的能力弱、只能在邊緣掙扎、追求表現：標準的事倍功半！我真的覺得⋯⋯台灣的教育，實在是在蹧蹋這些優秀、聰明的人。

03: 誠品是因避稅而起的公司，賣酒賺得比賣書多。

04: 所有的冠冕堂皇，一概在篳路襤褸之後出現。

05: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WD70iQzXlxE — 關於李登輝的紀錄片，《臺灣民主化之路》。

06: SCAD 的擴張速度幾近瘋狂，但不可諱言地，它所能給的奬學金數額也十分地瘋狂。

07: 叢林之王永遠壓過法理之王，但也永遠死在前面。

08: 自恃當隱者的前提是不拖人家下水。公司往往是由異志之人組成的，唯一的共同目標是賺錢、過日子、建造自己的小太平。有志一同的創業者通常的通性是⋯⋯想要一起賭一把。

—

A Plan

Project Ceres… not publicly disclosable as of now.

See http://tuber.monoceroi.com for more information. Tuber lets you watch six videos simultaneously, but hackers can easily give it a twist. (hint: change tbConfig.dimensions, then hit tbActions.init(); to see as many videos as you would, if you have a giant display.)

I do feel like Leeloo while playing with this.

Next stop: a photostream visualizer that actually tells stories. This is quite difficult and may take a long time.

—

Nota

The breeze that kisses my face in 4 a.m. visits paid to the streets around the habitat feels yet so cruel that I can see Neil (cp. Mysterious Skin) staring back in the reflection.

Feeling flat, I am well.

Those which are truly exciting does not actively arouse a wave before they came.

Same principle applies to the Cloud App, presumably the highest hyped and most disappointing Mac application of the year. Private betas were sent out delayed by an entire month, and when the second patch of 200 beta-testers were invited after the initial 1000 (add 2 more weeks) their infrastructure still isn’t finished.

“How do I access the files in the cloud and zap the ones no longer desirable?” One developer asked. “Hi, we’re working on this, ” a voice came from the cloud. True story from the vine.

Heck, Dropbox rules. And if you were going to show, show a finished product. Premature debut still is a debut, and people remember every debut fondly. Debuting in an unfinished fashion, Cloud is in hot water.

Let me digress and introduce some ideas presented in Agile Web Development and Joel’s advice on showing betas to customers (The Iceberg Secret). Show a finished mockup and people think your software rocks, even before you’ve written a single line of code. Show a sketch, and people understand that it’s only a sketch.

Instead of fixing their product, they are bashing a desperado who happened to like their blog layout so much that he stole the entire .css file. Dear, why the hell do you have to add a :before tag instead of simply renaming the file? And have I mentioned that its icon closely resembles MobileMe’s?

Cloud is dubbed every Mac user’s wet dream. My empirical, personal results say that a single programmer’s quote, or a line of overset text would ruin an entire wet dream . It is like playing in a theatre: everything must go in the right direction, and the slightest glitch would ruin the show. I quit playing in the Cloud after five minutes of initial use. Dear Cloud, please give me an opportunity to even love you.

—

v.i.

Must make an experimental piece based on Pamelia Kurstin, TED 2002. Amazing piece.