Hello, this is Jan Lehnardt and you're visiting my blog. Thanks for stopping by.
plok — It reads like a blog, but it sounds harder!
↑ Archives
Inspired by Daniel Jalkut, I finally found the time to write down my list of ideas for software or enhancements to existing programmes. I call these ideas stickies because I originally kept them on MacOS X Stickies and because they reflect ideas that stuck with me.
Like Daniel, I don’t claim anything for these ideas. I just want to see them happen and I might not have the time to get to work on them. Oh, two claims, I’d like to get credit for #3 and #5 :-)
So here’s the list:
Have the contact list show what time of day it is for the users by showing weather widget-like imagery.
Discussion: This is just a gimmick. Low priority. Might be nice to have it for iChat as well, check out Chax. It might me problematic to find the timezone information, try anyway
Next steps: Dive into Adium source. Dig up neat images. Look at Chax.
Make it possible to search by Alias instead by account name which does not help with all the ICQ numbers my friends have.
Discussion: Big usability issue, but then, Adium is Open Source. Maybe it’s fixed already or I miss an important option. Make it a default then.
Next steps: Dig into Adium source. (Been there..?)
Have blog comment RSS feeds as contacts in Adium and enable blog entry discussion via Instant Messaging.
Discussion: Could be super-big once all blogs offer an API for adding comments from other apps. Needs to prevent Spam.
Next steps: Check out possible APIs or write one. Do a reference implementation for S9Y because I know how to write a plugin. Checkout WordPress and Movable Type plugin APIs. Dig into Adium source (again!). Solve the Spam problem involved here.
No need for Instant Messaging when you are on a local net to share URLs quickly.
Discussion: Useful for home and office use as well as moving between two machines.
Next Steps: Dig into Bonjour and Safari plugins.
Fix basic typography
Discussion: Current browsers do produce butt-ugly justify-aligned texts. TeX knows how to do it properly, so a browser could do it as well. Needed are the algorithm, which is free since 1455, and word separation rules. They are part of TeX and free as well. Just need to write the glue.
Next steps: Try to write a reference implementation in JavaScript (get it to work with Greasemonkey) and then get it into the Browsers. Might be a good Summer of Code project.
Don’t lose text input on a browser crash by saving all typing into a cookie in realtime using JavaScript.
Discussion: Major usability issue here! Webmail sucks when you have to type something twice because your session timed out, you accidently clicked on a link or your browser hung itself. The goal would be to have a solution in all browsers. Until then, stick with the JavaScript solution.
Next Steps: Spread the word. It is there! Create more plugins.
That’s it for today.