There are certainly a large number of URL shortening services available today. Tinyurl.com is probably the best known, but there are dozens of clones and competitors that have popped up (just search for “url shortening service”). I recently found a new entry called DecentURL.com whose goal is to make shortened URLs more…decent! The author has implemented two unique steps: First, the original domain name is included in the path (minus any “www.” prefix and the top level domain stripped), so you get an idea of where this link is taking you Second, the link creator can edit the title to…
Kent Brewster (from the Yahoo Developer Network) has created another cool hack making use of the Flickr photos API: Ransomizr (Kent’s blog entry). Ransomizr makes use of the Flickr “One letter pool”, a collection of photos of single A-Z letters found in the real world. Type in a short message and it will be drawn in ransom-letter style. Kent also includes the HTML code snippet so you can use the result in your blog, MySpace, or wherever.
Earlier this week Yahoo! released a public version of an internal website performance tool called YSlow. Visit the YSlow page for instruction and downloads. YSlow runs on Firefox and requires the Firebug extension. I’ve used YSlow a lot to help improve the Messenger web sites, so I’m pretty familiar with its operation. I can see where some people using it on either personal blogs or smaller sites will be surprised a the somewhat harsh grading for things like using a CDN. For a large site with huge traffic like Yahoo, it’s a no-brainer, but for a small blog it doesn’t…
Russell Beattie, a mobile developer and now entrepreneur, took a break from blogging for the last year, but is back at it again. If you’re interested in mobile devices and trends, Russell’s blog is worth following: Russell Beattie’s Weblog » Filling in the gaps. Also worth checking out is Russell’s new site Mowser which transforms normal web sites to make them readable on mobile devices. Initial results look promising and I want to dive into this a bit deeper. Russell is also running mobitopia which is a mobile bookmark site (based on open-source software). I need to keep an eye on that…
Finding and keeping up with quality podcasts is not easy. I have some ideas for a better “podcatching” client that would help with this, but in the meantime it’s a manual process to keep pruning my subscriptions to a manageable level. Here’s my current subscription list, using the old Sears “good, better, best” lineup and indicating how many of the episodes I listen to completely: Best The Bitterest Pill – a classic with great, funny stories; sometimes runs a bit long (almost all episodes) Hanselminutes – one of my favorites; in-depth technology without being overly long (all episodes) Reel Reviews…