Month: March 2018

Think I might set up some alternative business awards celebrating businesses that stayed small and kept doing the same thing really well for many years. Growth isn’t the only measure of success!

My 6yo son discovered the dictionary today. And very soon discovered that… THERE’S NO POO!!!

So I woke at 6:15, took furniture down, moved it all around, pulled up carpet and hoovered. Carpet fitter (due “between 8 and 12”) is not here yet. I REALLY hope I didn’t get the wrong day. 😕

I’m sure this is the beginning of an important life lesson…

Hah. Facebook basic mobile app. This is amazing. The UI is a bit 2003, but it’s actually faster to use than the app or proper mobile site.

https://mbasic.facebook.com

Oh man. I tweeted the word “m*rk*ti*g” and now some network of Twitter m*rk*ti*g bots is after me!!!!

I can’t work out if my current feeling of despair and exhaustion is caused by the cracks in the tech industry around me, or by my kids waking up 1/2 hour earlier than normal.

Questions: (How) Can we get all the small local organisations and businesses that I want to follow off of Social Media but still online. Would doing this make a difference? How would it be discoverable? How could non-tech folk easily aggregate from other sources?

I want to just retreat from all social media to my blog and the indie web. Can I show people how to use simple websites and feeds again?

But if I did…wouldn’t “marketing” just infiltrate this system instead?

Two very frustrating things.

1) My son’s inability to turn his brain off and just go to bed!!!

2) My own inability to turn my brain off and just go to bed!!!

Some further thoughts on the TDD (Test Driven Development) process I’m trying out with a couple of Laravel side projects.

https://rosswintle.uk/2018/03/laravel-further-forays-into-test-driven-development/

I wish application update prompts would happen when you CLOSE or navigate away from the application (and therefore have finished using it and don’t mind a delay), rather than when you OPEN or switch to the application and just want to get on with using it.

Random: Who’s got ideas for stupid, one-line status pages like this? Must be of the form “Has ….. yet?”

SOOOO good to be back on the bike again. A night-time 10.5 miles around the edge of Swindon. Not hilly. This was cardio.

Another short Kownter update in which I:

a) show what’s been done so far (not much, but it works)
b) ask, again, why the heck I’m doing this
c) rediscover my own analytics and the curiously popular pages I’ve made

https://blog.kownter.com/2018/03/11/why-am-i-doing-this-again/

In a slightly bizarre and genius turn of events, my 6yo son’s primary cultural obsession seems to have switched from Star Wars to Calvin and Hobbes. Light Sabres and X-Wings have been replaced by cardboard-box Transmogrifiers/Duplicators, a small toy tiger, and the cheekiest boy!

Yay! I get to hang out with this cool kid today!

So, umm, in some of my “spare” time, I’m working out if it’s possible/worthwhile to build my own, self-hosted, open-source, cookie-free, privacy-aware analytics. I may fail, but it’s fun so far. Come along for the (geeky) ride! https://rosswintle.uk/2018/03/building-analytics/