Back on Twitter Again

About a year ago, I wrote that I was checking out the latest and greatest Web 2.0 tool out there, Twitter. Well everyone said it was so great but I wasn’t sure. I gave it a good run but eventually it just died out and i went months without even thinking about it. But recently, I decided to go back and check it out.

I’ve had some friends recently get involved with Twitter so I think that helped me go back. So I started writing what I was doing, or feeling, or just whatever. So it’s been probably 2 weeks that I’ve been back to using it and I have to say that this time is much better than before.

One main reason is the fact that I have several friends who use it now and it’s fun to pseudo-chat over it as we have done a few times. I also have it hooked up to my phone so that I can send and receive messages via text message on my Twitter account. I also have it on my iPod Touch. Makes it so I can have access to Twitter basically whenever I want.

So check me out. Here’s my Twitter page:

http://twitter.com/digijustin

Follow me and then you can have another insight in what makes me tick.

Dropbox – Awesome New Online Storage Idea

The couple of weeks ago, I see a link on Digg about a cool new online storage site called Dropbox. I click it since it’s the top one at that time and was amazed at what I found. It is a revolutionary new way of online storage. If you’ve worked with Subversion, you’ll find that some of its features are in Dropbox. Basically, it acts like this:

• You install their software on any machine you use and it will set up a folder in your My Documents folder called My Dropbox.
• On the web site, you add that computer to your account by name (i.e. My Work Computer).
• You can then copy any file or folder into your My Dropbox folder and it will upload to their web site what was in that folder.
• Go to another of your computers with Dropbox installed and open your Dropbox folder and it will get those new files or folders off of their site automatically.
• If you make a change to a file in your My Dropbox folder, it will be uploaded upon saving and the old version will be stored if you ever would like to revert back to it.
• You can also share folders with anyone else. For example, if you and a friend are working on a job together, you can both place assets up there to use but make it private for just those on the project.

I am really excited about this site. Not very often am I blown away by a new Web 2.0 application but I really think that this one is great in all senses. Unfortunately they do not have a way to invite people but once they do and I get some, I’ll post that I have those available. But do what I did and just hit up Google and do a search for “Drop Box Invites” and see what happens.

Things to do with Facebook

So it’s been a while since I wrote but it’s partially because of stuff I’ve been doing with Facebook. That and I’m lazy. I’ve worked on teams that have released 3 applications and in the process of finishing 1 at work right now. Along with those, I’ve personally released 1 and have 2 that I have in the works. So lots of apps in my head right now.

The first app we did is called Finders Keepers. It is a really cool wishlist site where you can keep products on your Wishlist, send your friends items for their Wishlists or buy products. It was my first adventure into a real, fully functional, Facebook application. It was tough but it all came together thanks to a great team and I am proud to say that I worked on it. It is going through some major revisions so keep an eye out for those in the upcoming weeks.

The second app we did was for the Pontiac Game Changing Performance. We worked with ESPN for the College Football season and just last week released the new version for College Basketball just in time for March Madness. We implemented a really nice recruiting component for it that I think helps out with the social aspect that all applications strive to find.

The third application is one that hasn’t been fully released yet but I used the new Facebook JavaScript Client Library. Using this allows you to write applications that do not need to live within the Facebook site. Now any site that can use JavaScript can use it. Really nice and once more documentation shows up, it will get only better.

Personally, I released an RSS reader application last October while I was trying to learn just how the API worked. You can find it here. Simply put, the user adds the feed that they want, how many items, and there it is. Still has some issues with it I am finding but not too bad for a first time app I think. Add it and let me know what you think.

So pretty much since October, I have been working on Facebook apps. I’ve done some in ASP.NET C# and a couple in PHP. I gotta say that each has its pros but being a .NET guy, I had a bit of an easier time with those. But that’s the beauty with the Facebook apps. It doesn’t matter what your comfort level is. You can do it in any language it seems. Facebook releases theirs in PHP and Java but there are many APIs written in whatever language you want. At Terralever, we wrote our own API for the .NET framework and I find it really easy to work with.

So if you’re wanting to get into writing your own Facebook app, it’s really easy to get started. There is a lot of people out there to help now. So do what I did and build a dinky little app and go from there.

What do People Look for in a Blog?

I’ve been blogging for maybe a year now but nothing serious. Picked it up more in the past few months with my discovery of WordPress. It’s a truly great tool. I’ve never been much of a writer nor do I think I ever will be one. But I do feel that I have a lot of opinions about different topics and find this as a good way to get those out. But I got to thinking about what people look for in a blog.

Blogs are an important part of the internet today. Quite possibly the foundation of the Web 2.0 phenomenon. But why are some blogs more popular than others? Are they better written, have better content, what? I read quite a few blogs on a regular basis and wonder what those guys have that the average Joe doesn’t. I watched a video blog on ProBlogger.net last night that mentioned one blog that happens to come at the right time. He did a blog asking people what they thought about who had a chance to win American Idol and before he knew it, he had tons of people looking to talk about American Idol and who would win at his blog.

That seems like the easiest way to “make it big” in the blogsphere. That one hit that gets you noticed. Many blogs would love to have one article featured on Digg or one of the other popular book-marking sites out there. This will usually work to get a lot of users to your blog for a short period. But if my personal experience is common, I very rarely go back to a site that I have dugg.

I’m not sure of the magic mix to get a successful blog going but hopefully I find out someday. Would be fun to look back at this entry and think to myself that this was all crap and something else pushed me over the hump. If you like what I’m doing and want to know more, subscribe to my blog via email or via my RSS feed. Always feel free to leave me a comment, I like to hear what people have to say.

Streamy Review – So Far, So Good

So I hunted down and finally received and invite to Streamy last weekend and got to get my grubby hands on it. So far I like what I see. I tried so hard to get it because of what I had heard; that is was the “Next Latest and Greatest” web app. While I can’t quite agree with that, I definitely can say that I would give it a “Thumbs Up”.

I have never been one to really get into the RSS readers before. I have one on the gadget bar for Vista but nothing other than that. Streamy has a really good way of handling RSS feeds. Very easy to add and go through. After you see one, it marks it read and takes it away. Not sure if it is lost forever from your subscriptions but it does what I would want so I’ve never looked.

I do like the start page but have run into a few situations where I have seen some old stories that should have only been up there for 24 hours. Not a big deal at all.

I really like the instant messaging offered. I haven’t used it yet but it seems really easy to IM your friends and share articles that you are reading. I can see this as very productive.

This brings me to my negative comment about the site. I really wish that they would open it up to more people. I would love to get some more friends of mine in here but I am only given a limited amount of invites (2 per email address). If they were to make that something in the 5-10 range, I can see this thing really taking off. If I was able to easily invite more of my friends and co-workers, I think my experience would be a whole lot better.

Overall I would give Streamy a 7 out of 10 rating (9 out of 10 if they let more users in). It’s a great app and I highly recommend begging anyone for an invite. I still have one left