So it looks like I’ve not posted anything on the site for close to two years now. Obviously I haven’t been the best blogger in the world.

Writing

I have written stuff in the last couple years, just not for this blog. I’ve written a handful of informational pieces on some of the little utilities and applications that I’ve written over the years. Those can be found at my GitHub blog. Nothing special, but that is where most of my writing interest has been over the course of this year at least, and even then I haven’t done all that much writing.

Over the last month or two my writing related thoughts have mostly been focused on learning about ways to do documentation via some kind of plain text source file. The one I’ve spent most of my time on at this stage is AsciiDoc. It looks like it could do all that I’m ever likely to want a tool for documentation or book writing to do. The fact that there isn’t really any support for it on iOS is a bummer, especially when compared to Markdown, but it can do so much more than Markdown can. Plus, since it’s just plain text, I could still write it, I just wouldn’t have tools to preview it or generate the final product. Plain text FTW! I just need to find reasons to use it for documentation. I can (and have) put it to some use at work for small personal projects, but I suspect I’m not going to be able to really use it in anger any time soon.

Markdown will continue to be the most sensible thing to use when it comes to writing blog posts, and there are literally dozens of quality apps to choose from when it comes to writing in Markdown on iOS. I’ve written this document entirely on my iPad in Markdown. I started writing in Editorial, but part way through switched to using Byword, just to see if it was a better experience when it came to using an external keyboard. And there are plenty of other options, though I want to try and keep things simple. Some of those apps are a bit pricey (by iOS standards), though if you were to spend much of your time writing they would totally be worth it.

Reading

I’m still all about the Kindle when it comes to reading books. In addition to reading who knows how many articles this year, I’ve finished 31 books so far, beating out my (purposefully conservative) GoodReads Reading Challenge goal of 24 books. Happy with the progress on that front.

I’ve been enjoying the Kindle Voyage that I forked out $300 for, but then they had to go and release the Kindle Oasis, which is what I think I’d really like to be using. However, the Oasis is $450! The Voyage was already a bit of a stretch for feeling like it was good value.

The Oasis looks like it would be a great experience to have in the hand while reading, but it doesn’t really offer anything except a better, lighter feel in the hand. Combined with the eye watering price tag, I can’t see myself being willing to get one for a while. Hopefully the price will come down or something.

Work

Work continues to have plenty to do. With the big v4 Go Live for Queensland coming up in early 2017, there has been a goodly number of projects, both big and small, that needed to be done to get us ready for that. Based on what I know, it looks like that is going well. We’re already positioned well in the market, based on what I’ve been told, and if this goes well then we’ll hopefully be able to consolidate our position at the top of the market.

Apple Related Stuff

iPhone

I had a few cases of odd battery behaviour in the first part half of the year, and when iOS 10 came out around September/October, the battery went to crap. So I caught the train into Perth to visit the Apple Store and they ran some diagnostics and decided to replace the phone for me, which was cool.

What wasn’t cool, was that less than a week later the screen went funny on the replacement, and I had to go and get that phone replaced. It seemed to me that the phone was running, but the screen wouldn’t come on and it was completely unresponsive, and the Apple rep I dealt with said as much after running his diagnostics. Rather unusual behaviour, at least as far as I’m aware. On the plus side, none of this cost me anything, and I got what must be effectively a fresh battery for what was a 2 year old phone. I should be able to make it through till the new phones are out late next year, which is when I plan to get a new phone. I’ll have had this one (and it’s predecessors) for effectively 3 years at that point.

iPad

Noting much on the iPad front. I’ve still got the iPad Air 2 which I think I bought in October of 2015, as a refurb. I wanted something a bit newer than what I had, but didn’t see the value in getting an iPad Pro just yet, so I saved some money and got the Air 2, which was a year old at that stage. It’s held up pretty good. My typical iPad work load is mostly recreational stuff that shouldn’t push the machine too hard, so it’s still going fine even now. I don’t use the split screen feature much, but it’s handy to have at times.

I’m thinking about getting an iPad Pro when they do the next refresh, which will presumably be around March 2017. I hope they bring some cool new features to iOS to help make the iPad a more flexible device. I could already do much of my typical daily workflow on an iPad, and I do, but it would be nice if some of the things that are annoying or hard to do could become easier.

I decided that if I’m going to drop a bunch of money on an iPad Pro, then I really should try to start pushing my use case with the one that I have in order to make sure I’m not paying for power that I’ll not really be taking advantage of. So, I guess the goal between now and when the next iPad refresh happens is to try and stretch myself to do more and more with my iPad. Will be interesting to see how that goes.

On a side note, I’m typing this up on my iPad at the moment, with my regular Apple desktop keyboard attached. It works well enough, though it’s not a very portable configuration at the moment, because I have to provide power to the keyboard for it to function. If I was going to do this on a more regular basis, it would make sense to get an Apple Magic Keyboard, or some other portable Bluetooth keyboard.

This Site

Admittedly I don’t do much with this site, but I’m having vague thoughts about changing the mechanism by which its content is generated, with the primary goals of both simplifying it a bit and also making it something that could be more easily managed and posted to when using my iPad to do all the work. Not sure if it will happen, but it’s definitely a thought that keeps buzzing around in my head.

Back in February this year I wrote a post about my goals for the 2014 Goodreads Reading Challenge. As part of that post I speculated that, despite 2013 showing a great uptick in how much I was reading, 2014 might not maintain the pace.

Well, the year is almost finished and I think it’s fair to say that I pretty solidly surpassed my goal. The initial reading target was 20 books. This was admittedly a number I thought I shouldn’t have any trouble reading. I just wasn’t sure if I would end up reading at the same pace this year and it seemed like a sensible target. So I made it to 20 some months back, and decided to raise the target to 22. At the time I wasn’t reading as fast as I had been at the start of the year, so a small increase felt reasonable. I hit that target as well before too long.

As I write this there are less than ten days left in 2014. I’ve “finished” 29 books so far this year, and there is a good chance I’ll finish another before the year is done. I put quotes around the word finished because one of those book I’d read part of in 2013. It still counts as far as I’m concerned. Including that book this year is fine because next year I’ll no doubt include one or more that I read part of this year. It all works out in the end. I think I’ve read more words this year than last year but I’m not sure it would be by a whole lot, as a few of this years books were on the small side.

Has the Kindle still got it?

Absolutely. I read a few physical books this year because they were manga that I couldn’t get digitally, but everything else was digital, and on the Kindle. I even spent $17 of my own money to read a book for work that I could have read for free if I’d been willing to read the hard cover book work was offering. I just don’t want to read physical books anymore. I’m currently using a first generation Kindle Paperwhite but I’m looking forward to getting my hands on the new Kindle Voyage when it becomes available in Australia. It will be pricey and unnecessary, but it think it will make for a slightly nicer experience and iron out couple of small issue I have with the Paperwhite.

Reading on the Kindle is still enjoyable and “cool”. I’m not sure I’ll ever entirely lose the feeling I get when I stop and think about having a digital book reader and all that it brings with it. That is probably the result of growing up and doing a lot of reading prior to such a thing existing. I image that most kids growing up with these devices won’t tend to see them in quite the same way. Like smart phones and tablets, it will just be the way things have always been.

Next Years Target?

At this point I feel similarly about next year as I did about this year, so I’m planning to set my target at 20 books again. I don’t look at the challenge as a way to stretched myself, but rather as a way to look back at the year and be happy with how much I read. If I can read another 20 books this year then I won’t be disappointed.

Last year I started to really make good on an on-again-off-again goal of the past several years, in which I wanted to try to read more. I read a lot as a teenager, and even in the first half a decade after highschool finished, but with the advent of the modern internet and working a full time job my reading rate had fallen to what must have been maybe a handful of books a year, probably less.

It begins…

I bought myself a Kindle 4 in early January 2012 and that was the start of getting back into reading. I’m not sure how many books I read in 2012, but it was more than I had done for some years leading up to that point and I give much of the credit for that to the Kindle. It helped make reading something I wanted to do again (even now I still think it’s a cool gadget) and that mental barrier was probably the biggest hurdle. The fact that I no longer had to hold a physical book open with two hands was also nice.

2013: The pace quickens

At some point (I can’t remember when) I started using www.goodreads.com to track the physical books I still had, along with a record of books I’d read, either in the past or going forward. Along with this tracking came the data to let me know how many books I was getting through. In 2013 that number was 24 books. They weren’t all of the size I would have tended to read as a teenager, but I still feel that to be a pretty good accomplishment given how far I’d fallen in the last decade.

Goodread’s runs a reading challenge each year, where people indicate the number of books they plan to read during the course of the year and then get an automatic progress indicator as they read and record books in the goodreads system throughout the year. A simple thing, but handy if you are the type who like to challenge yourself, or perhaps just like to gather data and see statistics .

2014: The pace…slows?

I became aware of the challenge in 2013 but didn’t take part. However I’m taking part in the 2014 challenge. I’ve set myself a target of 20 books. I’m not looking to challenge last years record, I just want to read a number that will be high enough that I can look at it and feel happy that I did a solid amount of book reading over the span of the year. I also want a number that is low enough that I feel I should be able to do it without too much trouble. Easy task = less likely to avoid it. 20 books is only 1.66 of a book each month, so I shouldn’t have any trouble reaching my goal. As I write this it is approaching the middle of February and I’ve already finished four books this year, and should have a couple more done by the end of this month, so I’m already ahead.

I’ve little idea of what will happen in the year ahead, but I can at least be reasonably confident that I’ll be able to come out at the end of the year happy with how much reading I did. And that’s what this is all about really.

Back in early 2012 I wrote a post about how I had noticed that I was reading more books since I had bought my iPad. Now a bit more than a year later I thought it might be worth revisiting that and think about what has changed.

Am I Still Using My iPad?

Absolutely. After my work laptop (where I obviously spend many hours a week working) it’s the device that I spend the most time using. All the time I used to spend on my computer reading articles has been translated to the iPad. I’d say I spend at least a couple hours a day using my iPad, often more, especially on weekends. So I’m still reading a lot of web content these days (though probably a little less than when I wrote the previous post) and I’m still doing it on my iPad. It really is an excellent device for that kind of activity.

Am I Still Reading Books on My iPad?

No, but it’s not because I stopped reading ebooks. I decided to get myself a Kindle as I’d been interested in trying one out for some time, and, just as many people before me, I have found it to be an excellent device for reading ebooks. I was happy enough reading books on my iPad but the Kindle is just much more convenient, because:

• It’s small enough to hold comfortably in one hand
• The battery life is much longer than that of a tablet so you don’t need to think about charging it much. I can go about a month between charging and thinking about doing it again, which is great.
• I used the Kindle reader app on my iPad but it didn’t have the store aspect build into it. The Kindle does, which makes it that little bit more convenient when I want to download another book.
• Being a standalone device I can sit down and read without feeling the itch to switch to another app and do something. That wasn’t ever really a big problem for me but there are so many thing besides reading a book that I could be doing, so it’s nice to have a reading environment with just a little bit less temptation to do something else.

Reading In General

My book reading goal for 2012 was eight books, which isn’t a lot but it was more than I had been getting through in previous years. I ended up going well over on that goal. I started reading 21 novels or short stories and completed 17, of which two were short stories. I may never get around to finishing some of the books I started and didn’t finish because they just didn’t hold my attention.

In the last post I thought that the two main reasons why I was reading more with my iPad around were because it was convient and because I thought it was cool. I they both still hold up, though the coolness has now shifted to my Kindle since that is where all my book reading happens. Convenience is always an important factor, but idea that something is just plain neat is always a good motivator and I’m still finding that to be the case even after having a Kindle for over a year now.

The advantages and disadvantages that I mentioned in may last post still stand, and nothing has really changed there. Amazon does have some kind of lending facility in place now for customers who have a Prime membership, but as far as I know that isn’t available in Australia. Even if it was I’m not sure I’d get it. For the $70+ dollars a year it would likely cost I could buy a half dozen books and I don’t go through them all that quickly. For those in the US who have Prime for quicker deliveries I guess it’s just a bonus that they can borrow books as well, but I don’t think I’d bother with it simply so that I could borrow in the first place, not unless I was reading a lot more books than I am.

The Future (again)

I see myself continuing to read at about the same pace I am currently, which means I’ll probably still be able to knock off around a dozen books a year. That’s hardly a voracious pace of reading, but it’s a pace that I’ll be happy to be able to achieve. It’s quick enough that I should feel like I’m getting something done and quick enough that I should be able to get to most of the books I think I’d like to read in a somewhat timely fashion.

What follows are some thoughts about a realisation that I first had several months back, and which I find myself consider once again today (2012-01-02). The realisation is simple enough; I seem to be reading more books since I got my iPad.

Reading Web Content

I’ve always done a lot of reading on my iPad, from the moment I got it. Even before I had my own I borrowed the iPad from work for a few weeks (in order to get a feel for how I’d use it) and I did a lot of reading on it.

One of the primary things I do with my iPad is process my RSS feeds. Some of the feeds I read in place (typically the short stuff) while going through the new articles, but many are saved to Read It Later where I can view a simplified view of the articles without all the extra cruft that many websites have, including advertisements. I’ve always read a lot of web content, comprised mostly of blog posts and articles from various sources of interest to me. Prior to getting the iPad I would read all of this content on my computer, so aside from shifting the activity to the iPad nothing much has changed with regard to reading web content.

Reading Books

What I’ve noticed that has changed, is that I’m reading more books than I typically would prior to getting the iPad, and I’m using the iPad to do that reading. When I say books, I’m referring to any content that would normally be found in a typical paperback or hard cover physical book, be it fiction or non-fiction. It so happens that all the books I’ve read on my iPad so far have been novels, but I have a few non-fiction books lined up to be read at some point and I’m planning to read at least one of them during 2012.

I’d noticed that my book reading had dropped of considerably in the last several years so at the start of 2011 I set myself the goal of reading six books (one of which I’d started in 2010). I ended up finishing eight. Based on that positive indication and the fact I still have a number of books I’d like to read, I’m aiming to finish eight books this year (three of which I started at some point in 2011). Even if I reach this goal I’ll still have a backlog of books that I want to read, but at least I’ll have put a sizeable dent in the pile.

So Why Am I Reading More?

The following are some of my thoughts on why I think I’ve started to read more books since getting an iPad. I’ve not spent vast amounts of time trying to self analyse all of this, but after several hours of thought over the better part of a year, I think it would be fair to say that these points make up most of the reasons for which I’ve started reading more books.

Reasons

• Because I still like to read books: I still have a goodly number of books I want to read eventually, and I’ve been meaning to try to read more for some time. I think the iPad combined with a little will power and the following points have finally come together to produce a scenario in which I want to read books a bit more.
• Because it’s another cool thing I can do with my iPad: It seems shallow, but there it is. There’s still a small part of me that finds using the iPad to do something is cool, and reading ebooks on it is one of the things that falls into the “feels cool” category.
• The convenience factor: Since the ebooks I have are on the same device that I’m often holding for a variety of reasons (playing a game, reading articles etc), switching to reading a book is simple and easy. I also find using the iPad easier than holding a book. I have a Book Bag (like a small bean bag) which I place in my lap and sit the iPad on. Since I don’t have to hold the iPad’s weight that aspect doesn’t bother me, and it’s real nice to not have to use both hands to hold the book open. Call me uncoordinated if you will, but I’ve never felt comfortable holding most paperbacks open with one hand, and doing so tend to promote bending the book enough to break the spine, something I hate). And holding a book with one hand is almost never an option with hard cover books, which are large and heavy in my experience.

There are a number of pros and cons that come from using the iPad to read books, a (probably) incomplete list of which follows.

Advantages:

• ebooks don’t take up any physical: This is nice for someone like myself who has aspirations towards minimalism, and who just doesn’t want to have to lug a large library around if I move. I got rid of most of my physical books last time I moved, and I’m not looking to grow my small pile of books any more than I feel I absolutely need to.
• Portability It’s easy to cart my digital library with me if I choose, which means if I’m taken with a fancy to read something again, or switch to another book I haven’t started yet, I can easily do so. (This is related to the previous point, but is an advantage in it’s own right so I’m listing it as it’s own point.)
• Customisation: Because the rendering of an ebook is controlled by software all the various reading devices (or apps that run on devices) offer some options to alter the appearance of a book to fit the way you like to read. These options typically allow you to change the font, make the text bigger or smaller (great for those with failing eyesight) and often there is also an option to invert the colours to put less strain on your eyes when reading in a dark environment.

Disadvantages:

• DRM: It blows, and I don’t like the concept of having my books locked to a single provider. Fortunately that doesn’t seem to be a too big a risk currently, since the Kindle platform is available on pretty much any device you can think of, and Amazon aren’t likely to disappear any time soon. Since it could be argued that the Kindle store has the best selection of books, this means that Kindle is king of the hill currently, and probably for some time to come.
• You can’t (really) lend books: There is a limited form of lending provided by Kindle (and some other devices as well, I think), but it’s so restrictive that it almost might as well not exist. I think/hope that this will improve in the future, but I rarely lend books so it doesn’t really effect me. For those that are accustomed to swapping books, this means your swapping days are largely over. The move to ebooks also means that the age of cheap second hand books is quite probably also drawing to a close. This isn’t great for the consumers of books, but it might end up meaning more money for the writers, which could possibly translate into them being able to produce more content. Given that, the inability to purchase ebooks second hand might turn out to have some benefit to consumers, though it will probably be some time before such an effect could be seen or felt for most writers. I think it would be good if the companies providing the book stores implemented a mechanism where you could resell a book you no longer wanted, but I can’t see this happening for number of reasons (would need to be full prices because there is no degradation of quality; there’s no money in it for the publisher/author etc)

The Future

As things stand, I don’t see myself wanting to move away from ebooks and back to physical books. All of the advantages of ebooks are things I like, and the disadvantages either don’t bother me or have little or no impact on me so far. One change I am considering is to by an actual Kindle device, rather than just limit myself to reading on the iPad (or iPhone), which is how I do it currently. For the most part I’m fine with using my iPad, but it would be nice to be able to read on a device that is sufficiently small and light that it could be held in one hand for an extended period of time.

I don’t relish the idea of having a second device on which I would do my book reading, but now that the price of the low end Kindle devices has come down I find myself thinking more and more that it’s something I could buy and not regret. I’m aware that part of the desire for a Kindle is the “it’s a cool and nifty gadget” feeling and that I really don’t need one, which is largely why I haven’t yet made the purchase. However, with the prices as low as they are, the value proposition keeps getting better and better, and I think that I will keep finding it harder and harder to avoid getting one. My current excuse for not getting one is to wait until the Kindle Touch is released in order to be able to compare it to a regular Kindle 4. I suspect that I will probably find myself the owner of Kindle by the time the end 2012 rolls around.

This week was a little bit different from how I would normally spend a typical week. For one I’ve been reading and playing games a bit more than normal, and then I decided to watch a game of ice hockey. Since I’m really not into any sports in general watching a sports game it pretty out of character for me, and this is one that’s not even played in my country so that makes it that little bit odder still.

The Stanley Cup Final (Ice Hockey)

So after seeing a few people tweeting about the Stanley cup final game that was played this week, and also reading about the rioting that occurred in Vancouver because the Canucks lost, I decided to download and watch the final game of the cup. About the only contact I’ve ever had with ice hockey is via the movie The Mighty Ducks and it’s sequel. Given that I felt that was a chance it could be interesting (I enjoyed the movies after all), but wasn’t sure if a real game would be much like the ones portrayed on the silver screen.

I can happily say that the game was enjoyable enough and, assuming most games are similar to this one, I could probably stand to watch it from time to time. The fact it was a grand final probably makes it more interesting that a regular games is though, so who knows. I don’t really want to watch footy regularly, but I do enjoy watching the AFL grand final each year because it’s usually a good game with plenty of action and tension.

More Reading

I decided to read The Redemption of Althalus again (I must have read it at least three or four times now), so I bought it on the Kindle store and have been reading it on my iPad, even though I already have a hardcover copy of the book. Books are nice and all, but I’m more interested in the content that the physical medium so I wanted to have a digital copy. Digital has it’s issues and restrictions at the moment (the conversion of most books seem to have typos here and there, so the quality control could stand to be improved) , but as someone who wants to avoid accumulating physical items that need to be stored and moved I find the idea of digital media to be very attractive and it’s something that I’m planning to make use of for the foreseeable future. Also after a discussion with Doug last weekend, I’m beginning to think that one day I might have to try to get back into the Wheel of Time series, and reread it all the way through. The last book I read was book nine or ten, but with the final book due out later this year it might be time to try and take a crack at finishing the series. I really enjoyed reading it when I was younger, and I must have read all of the first 6 or so books at least twice at one point. Presumably that is one series of books that I should be able to buy digital copies of, which would be great from a space saving point of view. If I bought physical copies of all the books the series would probably need an entire shelf to itself, which doesn’t do much for my goal of reducing my physical item count. Plus, if I have digital copies, I can have them on my phone as well and my iPad, and having the books with me all the time means a slightly greater chance that I’ll decide to read a bit when I find myself with an opportunity.

I wish it was possible to get digital versions of all the old books that I have, though I’m not going to hold my breath on that. I’m pretty sure some of them are out of print, and while the publishers could probably make some money (in the long run) by getting all their back catalog converted into digital format, they aren’t likely to do so any time soon. They still haven’t embraced the digital medium well, despite the fact that adoptions seems to be going well, and it’s quite probably the way of the future. Given the fact that books of recent years would have their manuscripts in electronic form already, there certainly isn’t much of an excuse for not creating a digital version of the book and benefiting from those sales as well as the sales of physical copies.

More Games

So after watching a short video about it from the Playstation blog I decided to buy the platform game Outland. It’s pretty neat. The visuals are a bit different, with your character and most of the enemies, and even the levels themselves, being shown in a profile kind of style, where you see the outline but no real detail within the outline. It doesn’t sound that great when described like that, but it actually presents well and I quite like the look. The running and jumping of your character make for a nicely flowing game and the light and dark spirit switching is something different. There are various obstacles that will damage you only if you are the opposing spirit colour so switching to a matching spirit allows you to pass those obstacles without being hurt, and then in contrast there are the enemies that can only be damaged when you are the opposing spirit colour. The result is a game where you can find yourself fairly rapidly switching back and forth between the two spirits types as your run and jump and fight your way around a level. It’s an unique mechanism that I haven’t encountered before in a game, and so far I’d say it’s one that lets the games designers create some interesting challenges.