High Protein Menu

It was high time that this site got an update, so here it is... my Portfolio 2.0. The new design has been in the cooker for a couple of months now, with tons of iterations, different features and platforms - it is my personal toy, anyway :)

What we've got here is a synergy of a few different techniques I have been experimenting with lately. The most noticable feature of the site is, of course, the gallery, which I implemented using JonDesign's SmoothGallery, an absolutely incredible script built on top of the Moo.fx interface library.

The design that was finally chosen is definately the most simple and clean, and I feel that it suits the nature of the site well, with understated menus and graphics drawing the eye to the feature gallery.

I decided to teleport a few visual aspects from the old design, such as the maroon headings rockin' their nice Serif fonts.

The backend is once again based upon a highly modified Typo base. I made extensive changes to the Administration parts of the application and hope to commit my changes back to the project sometime in the near future.

In terms of content, there will be a few changes around here. Since leaving my position at Acumentum, I feel that I have the time to blog on a regular basis once again, so I will do my upmost to keep this updated often with new news, thoughts and tips on UI and web development. I've added the special type of blog, a 'braindump' which is essentially what its named - a quick set of links and thoughts dumped from my brain as often as I can manage.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the new site, thanks for dropping by!

I got up earlier today than I have in a long time, and I felt great! Oh, who am I kidding, I felt horrible, but thankfully I had a kick ass time awaiting me at my new job with Acumentum.

Having never been in a real 'office' environment before, the experience has been stupidly fun for me. Sitting down for the first time at my desk, grabbing a cup of coffee and working on something new is a great feeling, one I'm sure won't wear thin too soon.

I've taken the liberty of educating myself on some new tech lately - primarily because I will have some money to invest in projects for a change. With so many changes in my personal life, it seems like a great time to start diversifying my skillset as well.

The industry? Mobile development. Mobile web development, to be exact. Thanks to a few great blogs about the subject, I am now much more familiar with the state of mobile dev, including something that most web designers will be well versed in - limitations. Yep, the mobile web is at least 5 years behind the current desktop web, and the browser market is much more fragmented.

Thanks to open source libraries like WALL, less technical developers (like myself) are now able to make real write once/deploy anywhere mobile web apps.

I've got a few big ideas that I'll be chipping away at over the next few months as I continue to familiarise myself with the platform, so definitely keep your feed readers refreshing if you're interested in Mobile Dev.

I'm also going to start video blogging again, using the user friendly YouTube. I tested it a little while I was in Lennox Head, and had a good time doing so, and since upgrading my cell phone from the terrible Sony Ericsson k700i to the much more modern Nokia 6280, I now have a decent camera to record with!

So, some exciting weeks ahead. I'll report back when I have more info -- or something to write about.

So, we put MatchTag online yesterday - the first time out of demo mode, although we're still officially in development. MatchTag is ready for the real thing.

This last phase of development has been very exciting, as we began to see the finished app coming into place. Jeremy did an amazing job of implementing all the sweet new functionality you'll see around - a ranking system, bug tracking and new profile functionality.

The best reward however, will be the chance to actually USE MatchTag! Call me strange, but I think it would be really cool to get an RSS feed of possible new activities every day. And the best part is that with MatchTag, it's the technology that's doing the work, not the user.

Automatic geo-ip location detection? Check.
Distance to time calculators & detailed maps? Yep.
Customizable RSS Feeds? You guessed it.

We want MatchTag to be as easy as signup, upload a picture and profile, and you're set to go. An instant day planner at your fingertips.

I'm not kidding - MatchTag features iCal support using it's simple calendar system, complete with daily RSS feeds & the ability to share events with friends, everyone or just yourself.

Take a look at www.matchtag.com.

I want to make web applications that people use. Doesn't everyone? Creating a new product that only a tiny portion of the population will even hear of is draining, but this is the fate of so many geek inspired web apps appearing almost daily now.

Lately, when I have been working on a new interface or application I ask myself - "would I use this if I was say, a cab driver?". Honestly, most of the time, the answer is no. It takes an extremely compelling (and well marketed) product to appeal to a large range of demographics, even with the rising web application adoption rates spurned on by success stories like Myspace and let's say, Flickr.

Companies like 37signals have no interest (it would seem) in creating web applications that appeal to a broad range of people. They've picked their niche (geek early adopters) and are running with it - with some measure of success no less.

I don't subscribe to this mentality. I can't remember a time in my life where I have wanted to (for lack of a better word) settle for a niche market in anything I do. I want it all, and to get it all, I have to understand what everyone wants. This is not easy.

I was hesitant to call Flickr a success story because it is a perfect example of an application that only appeals to a small niche of people. Although photo sharing is indeed one of the web's 'killer apps', Flickr isn't the largest app of it's kind -- indeed, it's userbase is far behind that of it's parent companies Yahoo! Photos service. The reason being is that it's capturing the same market as every other marginally popular app, the geek early adopter market.

The hardest hurdle for me to cross is that I am part of this market. I, like many others find it extremely difficult to detach myself from the knowledge I have accumulated through hours of browsing the web. This over abundance of information hinders development - how do I put myself in the cab drivers shoes if I don't remember what it was like?