Josh Nunn’s Geekorium

While I was changing my Twitter picture I noticed that the service suggests that to be more personable and connect better I should use a picture of myself, rather than a random image as an avatar. Currently I use an avatar I created about two years ago that also doubles as my logo for business materials. I crafted it specially to capture something about me while still being abstract enough to hide my physical flaws. It was never about hiding behind a picture, I thought it was a nice way to promote myself consistently.

My logo and avatar for the last two years: E01

» Continue reading How my Avatar differs from my Real Face (a guide)

Good Design in Wordpress 2.7

The latest Wordpress update, 2.7, manages to get WIN all over my keyboard. It fair shoots out of the screen and all over the place with its sexy sexy curves and simple lines. I want to give it a hug.

The 2.6 update was pretty good. It was good enough that 2.5 is all but erased completely from my mind. 2.7 however, looks gorgeous, plays nice with all my extensions and adds a couple of neat features that make me want to go home with it, and I barely even know it.

Awesome Feature Number 1 is automatic site software upgrades. Untested as I write this, the idea of its existence is enough to make me “ghee” with joy. Found under “Tools > Upgrade” on the new left-hand menu, it offers simple upgrades to the latest software that bypasses the old “upload each new file/directory” that some have been subjected to, and even cuts out the middle man web-hosts who have been offering something similar for a while.

Awesome Feature Number 2 is plugin searching and installation RIGHT FROM THE FRIGGIN ADMIN PAGE! This makes plugins so easy to install that it practically guarantees broken Wordpress installations across the world as people just install new plugins ’cause they can! No more tossing up if it’s worth it to upload and install something new. Why waste a second thinking about it when you can just press “install” and see? In minutes of upgrading my site tonight I had a working iPhone version of my site, and (hopefully) some integration with my FriendFeed account. That is the “killer feature” of Wordpress right there my friends, found under “Plugins > Add New”. It makes me so happy I could cry.

So go and update it today. It’ll be the last painful upgrade you do.

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I’ve tried a number of Twitter clients for my iPhone now. Most of them have something that makes them stand out, and all of them have flaws. Here they are, a little mini-review:

Image by dan taylor via Flickr

» Continue reading Twitter iPhone Client Faceoff

I love technology. The thrill of new possibilities. The excitement of learning. There’s nothing that beats it.

Actually, that’s a complete lie. There is something that beats it. Beats it hands down. Without question.

I love my baby girl. The thrill of her potential. The excitement of seeing her learn. By gum it’s the greatest feeling I’ve ever experienced, to watch her discover her world.

Hax0r the interw3bz

I’m totally looking forward to teaching her everything I can about the earth. The people on it, the cultures, the life, the bizarre phenomena we just can’t explain yet. I know she’ll be just as fascinated as I am. And I’m hoping that she turns out to be a geek like her Dad.

» Continue reading Where my parenting meets the “Cleanfeed”

A week ago, Tech Wired offered a $50 iTunes card to the best logo design for their upcoming new website. Since then, they upgraded the offer to a $100 card, and the entries flowed thick and fast. Within minutes of reading about it, I had sketched an idea and began plotting out a logo on Fireworks. It’s the fastest I’ve been able to get from initial idea to sketch to mockup in my career and I was mighty proud of it for only a few hours work. The initial version looked like this:

It’s like Frankenstein built a logo

A couple of people liked the idea, but thought the typography was lacking. So the next day I had a go at sprucing it up, and re-doing the typography.

» Continue reading Logo Design: Tech Wired Australia logo competition

» Continue reading 1960’s Batman has a message for the American People

Check out how many unread netnewswire feeds I have, that’s not really how many I have.

Image via Wikipedia

It seems to me that we (society/schools/the world) tend to rely on technology in two ways. The first is to rely on it to actually work - we expect our computers, email and Intranet page to be working first thing in the morning until 10 o’clock at night (or later). We expect it to work without glitch or bug or problem. Of course by ‘expect’ I really mean ‘cross our fingers and hope’. The way we work belies our hope—we back up, use save often and pray that nothing breaks when we try something new. Some of the more tech-savvy of us (or the more adventurous) quickly rely on technology more than we should. But when our USB device fails or our email service is down, we admit fault for expecting rather than hoping.

Then there is the other way we rely on technology. It began when we (and again I mean ‘we’ as a collective) first sat our kids in front of the television and went off to do our own thing. It has continued until today, but now includes DVD’s, video games, “the computer” and now the Internet. The reliance we have developed is more than just ‘expecting it to work’. We now expect it to fill a role it was never meant to fill, namely: taking over our children’s education and keeping them occupied. Technology-as-babysitter is giving technology far, far more credit than it deserves for being reliable. When our technology lets us down in so many other areas why do we continue to trust it with the minds of our children?

» Continue reading Reliance

My mate Andrew thought my last post was a bit technical for him, and fair enough— it was something of limited value to some of my readers. So this post is for him.

Andrew asked how he could create a ringtone for his new iPhone. He knew it was possible, but it’s really not straight forward (in Australia at least, elsewhere iTunes has this functionality built in). So I’ve whipped up this little tutorial for him to remind him how to do it.

» Continue reading Create free ringtones for your iPhone directly from iTunes

Image via Wikipedia I’d not call myself a website coding guru. In fact, my learning has only really started. In creating the design for my site, I’ve learned a couple of important CSS coding tricks that I had to learn from disparate sources all over the web. I hope by putting them here that I’ll cement them in my own brain, and maybe they’ll help you too. They’re elementary things but they may not be obvious at first glance.

» Continue reading CSS Positioning Tricks for Beginners