Smooth.Haven » General

She’s growing up.

Lawrence Manuel — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 16:39:36 +0000

My youngest daughter is growing up so fast. I’ve got to take more pictures of her to archive her youth as my eldest is already graduating high school next year and will be attending college. I’ve never appreciated life so much as I do now. I love watching my kids grow and discovering new things. My youngest keeps me in stitches as she is the comedic relief in our family. She is so funny. I’m not sure where she comes up with some of her phrases or creative ideas at times. My eldest is so creative. She’ll probably surpass me in the areas of Photography and Videography. She is amazing.

My favorite Twitter Apps (Seesmic Desktop, TweetDeck, and DestroyTwitter)

Lawrence Manuel — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 07:38:56 +0000

Seesmic Desktop Preview – I’m currently reviewing the latest beta release and it is amazing. Currently using it as my default desktop tweet app. Woot! Similar to TweetDeck, you’re able to view multiple panels that are customizable. Cool features that stand out for this version are:

Live user searches
Live keyword searches
Ability to add twitter users to custom Userlists. Even if you are not following them by adding them to your userlist you’ll be able to preview their tweets. Very cool feature.
When replying to a fellow tweeter you’ll be able to view a thumbnail of the user you’re replying to on your avatar.
Ability to view multiple tweeter accounts. This has become my desktop replacement to HootSuite.

TweetDeck v.25 – The four highlighted features that this new version has are:

Preview Twitpic thumbnails directly from TweetDeck
Preview TinyURLs
Update Facebook and view friends statuses
Record video clips within TweetDeck using 12seconds.

DestroyTwitter v1.5.3 beta release : This was the first twitter client that I actually fell in love with as it was easy to use and had a dark color scheme that I enjoyed as I usually work in the dark when my wife and daughter are asleep. The features that I love about this application are:

The cool animated sliding panel effects
Ability to select where the twitter text box would be displayed (top or bottom)
Quick selection when you type @ that shows you twitter users that you’re currently following as an autocomplete menu.
Skinnable. You’re able to apply your own color schemes.
Quick navigation to older, newer, most recent tweets.

iPhone & iTouch Applications

Lawrence Manuel — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 17:40:14 +0000

I am amazed with what Apple has accomplished with the iPhone and iPod Touch. I was never interested in developing applications for mobile devices or iPods because of the limited screen size, but through recent discovery of internet based applications for my iPod Touch I have changed my outlook on this. The screen transitions are amazing, and the interface controls are easy to use. Easy enough that my own father would find it enjoyable as much as he’s not a fan of anything high tech.

AJAX based Web 2.0 applications run fine on these devices and are easy to install. With the lack of plugin support (Silverlight, Adobe Flash Player) for the slimmed down version of Safari, I find it a bit limited especially for us PC based developers but has openned up my eyes to perhaps purchasing a Mac. But this will change as I know I’m not the only one that feels this way and a lot of people must’ve already inquired about this.

Just recently, Apple released the new version of iLife with all of the new features for iPhoto, GarageBand and iMovie. I love taking photos and the new face recognition features with geo-tagging in iPhoto along with the robust video-editing features in iMovie has got me sold. I will be buying a Mac in the near future. Kudos to Apple, for you’ve enlightened a die hard PC user in wanting to buy more of your products.