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Rhiannon Floyd
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The Safari to Chrome Switcheroo

Despite being perceived by others as a die-hard Mac fangirl (not confirming, not denying), I wasn't always a devoted Safari user. When I bought my first Mac in 2005, I used Firefox because I considered it the best cross-platform browser at the time. This was helpful since I also used Windows on a regular basis (hey, I like PC games, okay?!). It wasn't until February 2009 that I began to use Safari as my default browser. That was when the public beta of Safari 4 was released. It was fast, it was slick, and I made the decision to say goodbye to Firefox for good. Since then, I've had a completely monogamous relationship with Safari for all my serious web browsing needs.

Until today. <insert dramatic music here>

I thought it was time to see what all the fuss was about with Google Chrome for Mac (beta). Sure, I'd tried it before, a little bit, but not enough to come to a proper conclusion. In all honesty, I didn't give it a fair go because I was content with using Safari (the way it integrates with everything Mac, especially MobileMe bookmark syncing to my iPhone, is a hard thing to give up). Today, however, a developer release with extension support was announced. The one thing I always liked about Firefox was its extension support, and it was something I always missed from the switch to Safari.

I've been playing around with Google Chrome for the better part of a day now. I've found a bunch of extensions that I've already sworn allegiance to, and found a few little quirks and details in Chrome that I've fallen in love with. Here are my top five likes:

  • The user interface. Google Chrome is a real slick beast. It doesn't feel like a native Mac app, but it has a refreshing UI that I have to say makes Safari look and feel a bit dated. From the look of the toolbar buttons to the way the tabs open and close, to being able to search Google from the address bar, everything is very simple, elegant, and polished. I'm surprised at Google's attention to detail for the Mac client. Then again, the Mac version has been cooking for quite a while while the Windows users looked upon us and laughed.

  • Pinned tabs and the New Tab page. Being able to pin or anchor tabs in the tab bar and have them only show their favicon is a feature I didn't realise I needed 'til I had it. The New Tab page is also welcome since I got really attached to Safari's Top Sites page. That said, I replaced the New Tab page with an extension called Speed Dial, which works the same way but allows further customisation (background colour, more than eight pinned pages, etc). It works fantastically well. All my favourite sites just a click away.

  • EXTENSION SUPPORT! Can't leave this one out. I'm generally a fan of Apple's locked down approach to their products, but when it comes to a web browser, a bit of customisation never goes astray. A web browser can be a very personal thing, you know. My Google Reader and Google Wave item counts are shown right on my toolbar now thanks to Google Reader Notifier and Google Wave Notifier respectively. Fittr Flickr is awesome, too. Know any other goodies? Lemme know!

  • Bookmark synchronisation to your Google account. I don't have much use for this personally as I use MobileMe and Xmarks to sync my bookmarks to other browsers and devices, but just having this feature included is a giant step up and gives bonus points to Chrome. Bookmark syncing can be a major pain in the arse. This takes all the pain out of it for the average computer user.

  • Performance. I'm running the developer release of Google Chrome because, at this moment, it's the only version with extension support. Google has stated that "the Dev channel can be very unstable at times" which is fair enough, but I'm yet to experience any stability issues. But, once extension support hits the beta release, I'll probably switch to it. Chrome is also blazing fast, and I haven't noticed any speed differences between Chrome and Safari, despite Safari supposedly being slightly faster in JavaScript rendering tests. I don't care much for numbers. Chrome feels pretty damn fast.

So, that's what I do like. Now here are the things that irk me somewhat:

  • The "close" buttons on tabs are positioned on the wrong side. On the Mac, they should always go on the left. In Chrome, they're on the right, presumably to match Google Chrome clients on other platforms. It's a minor detail, and one I'll get used to, but it does niggle at me a bit.

  • Bookmark synchronisation. Yes, this was listed as a positive point, but it's also a negative for the moment and for my current situation. I used to have a great and simple system for this. It's called MobileMe. All of my Safari bookmarks would get synced all the time, and automagically appear on my iPhone and any of my computers, both Mac and Windows (using Safari on Windows). To get the same result when using Chrome, I tried the complex system of syncing bookmarks via Xmarks for Chrome and Xmarks for Safari to get them to show up in both browsers, and then sync via MobileMe to also appear on my iPhone. No good. Too many issues, and MobileMe would constantly whinge and complain about x% of my bookmarks being changed (and I dare not hide this popup window in fear of something terrible happening.... which it once did; l lost all my bookmarks at one point, so hooray for backups). Thus, I'm now solely using Xmarks for cross-browser bookmarks syncing, and then syncing manually to my iPhone via iTunes. Not as pretty, but still functional enough. For now.

  • Web page scrolling is a little jerky. It isn't terrible, but Safari scrolls like butter in comparison, especially with the new Magic Mouse. It's a shame because I've become a quite the mouse user (when did that happen? The keyboard used to be my best friend!). Perhaps the scrolling will improve in future releases. I'm hoping so, as it's the type of issue I know will get on my nerves after a while.

  • Bookmarks Bar folder open/close "issue". In Safari, when I click on a Bookmarks Bar folder, it will display all my bookmarks for that folder in a pop-up menu. When I click the folder again, it closes the menu. Clicking a second time on a folder in Google Chrome doesn't close the menu. It just opens up the menu all over again, like it's refreshing it. So, if you decide you don't want to open a web page from that specific folder after all, you have to click elsewhere. Annoying and unintuitive and not very Mac-like.

  • Google Chrome for Mac seems to take aaaages to develop. C'mon, guys! Pull your socks up! :)

And there we have it. They're mostly minor issues for the negative points, which is always a good sign. I'll continue to use Chrome until I have a real reason to stop and switch back to Safari, but right now I don't see any reason to. Chrome for Mac is pretty solid, even the dev release, and extension support is something I've sorely missed.

Hello Google Chrome and welcome to my computer. May we have a very long and happy relationship together.

And, Safari... If it doesn't work out, please take me back.

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Posted January 9, 2010
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The NaNoWriMo experience and the taste of victory

When I decided to participate in NaNoWriMo for 2009 - my very first one - it wasn't just because it sounded like an interesting and challenging experience. Well, there was that, too; I was intrigued by the idea of writing 50,000 words in 30 days as part of a large community of people doing the same thing. But what I mean is that I decided to use NaNoWriMo as a platform to aim for some very specific goals:

  • Imposing self discipline. I wanted to form a daily writing habit, and discover how easy or difficult daily writing goals of this length would be for me.

  • Writing a story sequentially, from beginning to end in order, instead of jumping around all over the place like I usually do.

  • Suppressing my inner editor. I've developed a nasty habit of editing while I'm writing a first draft, which often stifles the creative flow and stops you from really just writing. NaNoWriMo was the perfect opportunity to force myself to just write, to just get the words on the page, and leave the editing until later.

  • Improving my writing. The only way to do that is to actually write, right? Even if I didn't reach all my other goals, this is one goal I'd achieve just by doing it.

NaNoWriMo 2009 is officially over (has been for a couple of days, a little late with this post), and my recorded word count is 50,885. I reached the 50k goal three days early and decided to finish off the chapter I was working on and then stop. I'm pleased to say that I did achieve all my goals, and also discovered some things about my writing process and myself as a writer:

  • 1,500 to 2,000 words every day is actually pretty simple; I can fly through the word count when I know what I'm writing about. It's only when I enter murky waters that things start to slow, and I think this is because I find it hard to string a good sentence together when I'm also trying to feel my way through the story. I realised this about halfway through November, and decided to abandon great writing in favour of increasing the word count. This worked well for NaNoWriMo, but for my own writing, I think I prefer to keep the daydreaming and the writing a little more separate. This allows my ideas to bloom instead of being half-baked and forced, and I think I enjoy the process more this way.

  • My story is an absolute mess filled with sections of bad writing. I actually ended up with two first halves of two separate stories that are linked together. While I'm stoked that I made it over 50k, I'm going to welcome a slightly slower pace once again, and spending more time on the planning and worldbuilding will be nice, especially when I hit a road block and feel the need to consult or rework the plans even while in the middle of a chapter.

  • I learnt to shut out my inner editor completely. A couple of times I'd catch myself going over a paragraph I'd just written to see if it was structured well and made sense, but those occasions were rare and fleeting. It's amazing what you can achieve when you actually force yourself to keep moving forward. Do that enough and it becomes a habit.

  • Writing is work. It might be enjoyable work, but it's still work, and some days you just don't feel like doing the work. It took an event like NaNoWriMo to make me realise that this is perfectly normal, and probably something that all writers go through. Even those off days filled with bad writing are rarely a waste of time; often figuring out what doesn't work helps you to figure out what does.

I'll be honest here: I never had any doubt that I would finish NaNoWriMo. My personality type and work ethic would never allow me to stop without crossing the finish line. That said, I'm still proud of myself and what I achieved, and I think everyone who participated this year, whether they reached 50k or not, should be proud. I think NaNoWriMo is more about the journey than the end result, and I got so much out of the experience that I definitely want to do it again next year.

As for the my 50,000 word novel, it's definitely not my best writing to date (which is probably to be expected), but there's some great ideas in there that I want to explore, and will do so now that I've developed a writing habit and realised it's not so hard when you take the time and do the work. I'll be continuing with it and aiming to finish my first draft. But I doubt I'll be working on it exclusively; one thing I didn't anticipate from NaNoWriMo was all the ideas for other stories that sparked just from being in a creative kind of head space. Can't wait to start writing those.

Filed under  //   blog   writing  
Posted December 1, 2009
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NaNoWriMo: Hitting the half way mark

25,003.

That's how many words I've written so far, in the space of thirteen days. Nice big, odd number, that. Three words over the half way point. Can't help but feel just a little bit of pride at getting this far with my first NaNoWriMo, and that's perfectly okay (and encouraged!) because anyone who's written any number of words this month deserves to feel proud of their achievement. For most of us, it's more than we would ordinarily write, myself included. Hell, it's more than many published authors write in that amount of time.

Tell you what, though: this experience has been pretty damn interesting. The week before NaNoWriMo started, I did a fair amount of planning. Outlines, character sheets, bits and pieces and scraps of notes, ideas that I thought I could use. I put them all down in my Scrivener document, ready and waiting for D-day. About ten days into it, I changed everything.

I hear that's considered a bit of a no-no for NaNoWriMo, that you should just stick at it, persevere, keep going, just keep writing. But I felt like I was writing a sequel. I wanted to know what happened to my main character before all of this stuff, the stuff I was writing about, happened. I wanted to know the events leading up to the events that were unfolding on my screen. My mind kept drifting to an earlier point in the timeline of my story, and figured I'd have to write at least something about it if I wanted to be able to focus again. As it turned out, I'm still writing this "prequel" (I suppose that's the best way to describe it) because it mostly seems to be writing itself.

Everything that I'd previously written isn't suddenly irrelevant. It still fits into the grand scheme of my story, will still count towards my NaNoWriMo word count, and may appear as a story all of its own some day, possibly as a sequel. But what I do know for sure is that those 18,000-odd words definitely weren't wasted. With every paragraph, my writing skills have improved, I've gotten back into the swing of things, started to challenge myself more, gained the ability to weave a mean sentence better than I could before. To witness that in the space of thirteen days is a pretty damn awesome experience, if you ask me.

I guess the point I'm making is that I now realise what's so special about NaNoWriMo. It encourages people to start something, even if that something seems hard to reach. It gets us challenging ourselves, settings goals for ourselves, becoming motivated and disciplined. It encourages us to share and discuss and be creative 'til our heads are close to exploding. Yeah, it's about writing, but I think it's about more than that. I've learnt some things about myself during November that apply to me as a person, not just as a writer. I bet many others participating in NaNoWriMo have, too. That's got to be considered a win.

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Posted November 12, 2009
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November is a write-off, quite literally

Here's to a productive November! Yup, NaNoWriMo is just around the corner, and already my nails are getting shorter with the anticipation!

Nah, that's mostly a lie. I'm actually pretty excited about it. This will be my first ever NaNoWriMo, you see. I discovered its existence a few days before November last year, but the time just wasn't right and I didn't have any plans or outlines. But this year is a whole different story (though I did almost forget about it until the middle of October, but that's a... minor detail).

If none of this is making any sense to you, you might want to go here and read up on all this NaNoWriMo business. Otherwise, if you're lazy like me, I'll give you the nutshell version:

NaNoWriMo stands for National Novel Writing Month, and the goal is to write a 50,000-word novel during the month of November. Anyone can participate, writers and non-writers alike. This year, at the time of writing, there are already over 80,000 participants. There are no real prizes per se, but you'll have a written novel at the end of it. You don't even have to submit your novel or let anyone read a single page of it; you simply update your word count on the NaNoWriMo website.

Why would anyone do this? I can think of a few reasons, but it's different for everyone. For me, it's mostly for the challenge and motivation. I've never written 50,000 words in a month before, but it's a habit I'll need to form if I ever want to be a published author. Another reason is to silence my inner editor who always wants to re-read paragraphs to make corrections. This is my chance to just write in a mad frenzied state and not have to be a perfectionist; the joys of editing come later.

The sense of community is also a pretty good reason to do it. The forums are thriving right now, with people trading tips and exchanging ideas, and even just supporting one another. Plus, there are scheduled events all over the globe; you can put some faces to names and knuckle down for a solid writing session, if that's your thing.

Me, I'll probably be holed up in my room, at my desk, madly trying to get the ideas out of my head and onto the screen as fast as possible. Actually, the ideas for this one have been bubbling in my head for over a year, so NaNoWriMo is somewhat of a relief. Finally, my characters can stop pestering me in my sleep ;)

If you've ever considered writing a novel at some point in your life, even had so much as a passing thought, NaNoWriMo is a great way to make it a reality. 50k words is the goal, but even if you don't make it that far, you'll still be better off for the attempt. Each word is one more than you'd have written otherwise.

If you're participating, gimme a buzz over at the NaNo site and we can buddy up. My profile page is here.

And for those who are participating...... Good luck and have a blast!

Filed under  //   blog   writing  
Posted October 26, 2009
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The Blog Switcheroo

If you've been arriving here lately using the rhiannonfloyd.com domain, you've probably noticed things look a little different. After some serious thinking, I've decided to combine all my personal stuff here on my Posterous blog. This blog has now become rhiannonfloyd.com and exists as my scrapbook on the web: in-the-moment photos and videos from my iPhone, awesome stuff on the web that deserves to be shared, and ramblings about the stuff that's in my head or is important enough (to me, at least) to give my opinion on.

As for the content that existed on the old rhiannonfloyd.com Wordpress blog (well, the good stuff at least), don't worry; it's only gone away for a little while. The technology related articles and reviews will be back (along with brand new and regular content) on a new blog that will be launching sometime in the near future.

I hope that resolves any WTF moments anyone may have had. :)

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Posted September 24, 2009
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Testing out this Posterous Thingo

I kind of miss having all my personal content (short snippets of stuff) in one place, so I thought I'd give Posterous a go. Any posts prior to this one will be posts I've imported into Posterous from other blogs.

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Posted July 19, 2009
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Joining the Moleskine Club

I live in a digital world, and that has never been more evident than right now. I wake up to a digital alarm and read my news online. I spend my day working on files stored digitally on my computer. I carry a digital device everywhere with me and use it for phone calls, internet, note-taking and games. For fun, I listen to digital music and watch digital TV and movies. I use a digital camera. Sometimes I even read digital books.

But there’s something I must confess; I’ve become so immersed in the convenience of the digital world that I’d forgotten all about the importance of doing something for the experience of it, rather than for the sake of saving time or for ease-of-use. I’ve become so dependent on my keyboard that I actually forgot what my handwriting looks like up until very recently when I purchased my first Moleskine notebook and put pen to paper for more than a few scribbled notes or a shopping list.

Growing up, I would take a notebook with me almost everywhere and write down everything that popped into my head; usually ideas for stories and poems, but sometimes just observations and questions that I had. It was a habit I enjoyed very much and one that I assumed I would carry into adulthood. I’m still not really sure when and why I dropped that habit, but the last notebook I’ve kept is from about three years ago with barely more than ten pages filled.

Handwriting in a notebook is very much a catharsis to me, and when that notebook costs AU$22, you tend to treasure the experience and place more importance on the words that you write. It also doesn’t hurt that this particular $22 notebook smells lovely (I adore the smell of a brand new notebook), is a pleasure to write in, looks rather fancy, has quality acid-free paper, and is put together quite well.

It took me a fair while to justify the cost of a Moleskine notebook when there are far cheaper alternatives out there. I think what ultimately swayed me was the fact that writing in an el cheapo notebook almost always ended in failure because I wasn’t motivated to use it. The experience of writing in it felt unimportant, and I wasn’t inclined to keep my notebooks after I was finished with them; rather, I would just throw them away.

So, my new classic Moleskine pocket ruled notebook is mostly an experiment. I want to see if an expensive notebook really does help to get my creative juices flowing. It’s also an experiment to see if handwriting - at least some of the time - helps the creative process for me. I plan to take it everywhere with me and use it to jot down any ideas I have, observations I make, and anything that gets stuck in my head and needs to work its way out.

It remains to be seen whether I’ll be a part of the crazy Moleskine cult following that exists (just take a look on Flickr, Moleskines are taking over). It’s starting to seem very likely, though. I’m loving my little black book.

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Posted February 10, 2009
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My New Year's Resolutions for 2009

1) Learn to manage time better

2) Improve photography skills and techniques

3) Take more photos and take my DSLR (almost) everywhere

4) Find full-time writing work

5) Read more books regularly, both fiction and non-fiction

6) Spend more time writing fiction and finally get my novel underway

7) Write more blog posts

8) Get fit, eat healthier, and designate time each day for exercise

9) Watch at least one movie per week (I have a huge list)

10) Buy less crap and more music and books (ie: get some culture down me!)

11) Get back into music production and drumming, even if just for fun

12) Build a halfway decent audio setup

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Posted December 30, 2008
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