Blogging

I get all these ideas of what to blog about, usually while I'm on the pot or while driving my long commute, or any of a variety of times where I don't have the computer handy. And, "no," I don't use my wireless laptop while on the crapper, but that's not a bad idea.

Miles has taken to carrying a little audio recorder to take messages, which is kinda dorky. Plus, next to his cellphone and pocket PC, it seems a bit redundant. Whatever, that's not for me. Plus, I'd have to listen to myself, and I don't like that - I'm lucky other people are nice and pretend to listen to me.

My latest idea was to blog about my xmas wish list, but that seemed even more vain and self-absorbed than normal. So I'll have to slide the gift ideas in subtly. Like, if I were to get something to record voice messages, I'd probably go whole-hog and get the iRiver 799 because it plays mp3s as well (and can now be found for under $200). Though the N-10 looks real slick and is less than half the size.

I'm still looking for good programming blogs, but it turns out that most of the good programmers spend their time programming, or if they've got enough ideas, writing books like Modern C++ Design or C++ Template Metaprogramming. Maybe if I spent more time programming and less time looking for blogs on programming I could write a book. (BTW, both books are on my wish list).

About the best thing I've found is USENET. I've been reading usenet for years - before the Web was even around (not long before). I read the emacs newsgroups (gnu.emacs.help, gnu.emacs.gnus, gnu.emacs.sources), the C++ group (comp.lang.c++.moderated), and occasionally comp.lang.tcl. The C++ one generally has some pretty big names on it and the quality of the information is relatively high - especially when Andrei or Dave Abrahams writes.

The one thing I've gotten really accustomed to is RSS. I wish all web pages would provide an RSS (atom, whichever) feed so I wouldn't have to manually check them for updates. I really appreciate the "pull" model it provides, as opposed to the barrage of email and spam I get in my inbox. I think it'd probably work well in the work setting as well.

But enough of blogging, must get back to "reality."