Shaken Earth

Welcome to the Shaken Earth blog! This is where you will be able to read my rants and raves about technology and other subjects and every once in a while read about my software projects. You can also follow me on Twitter

Web apps are an awesome thing. They save time and are much more efficient. But there are many downsides to them from my point of view. They take away an app’s individuality. Back when the desktop dominated the application market every app had it’s own “personality” to it that added a feeling of individuality to it. What I mean by this is that each app built its own little “kingdom” up. But today a lot of apps don’t stray too much farther away from a much bigger platform. These platforms are these giant kingdoms and the apps are the people who live in the kingdom. It’s not like when apps were their own kingdoms and their wasn’t these huge platforms that reigned above all. Sure apps may get more attention when their all in one environment. In the apposphere today everything is integrated into one environment. This environment is the web. People look at apps differently these days. People just think it’s all part of one giant app. They’ve all become woven into this quilt. The quilt of the web. The quilt of one environment.

But there are good things about this one environment. First of all apps get more users. For example, Facebook is a huge platform. Developers can create an app and get instant users. Apps being integrated is also good for the user. You don’t have to download apps and fill up your hard drive. It’s also sooooo much more convenient. The user doesn’t have to open up each app individuality. But you can update your Twitter and Facebook statuses simultaneously.

In conclusion, I don’t think many apps that are on the web belong on the web. But there are some apps that must be on the web like Twitter and Facebook. They’re lightweight apps that are meant to be integrated with many apps. I also think that the internet should be integrated in apps. But the apps shouldn’t be integrated in the internet.

So recently my school got a “Mac Lab”. In a nutshell this is basically a room with iMacs in it. They’re all set up and ready to go but guess what? We’re not allowed to use them. Actually we’re allowed to use them, but only for ONE CLASS! That class is Graphic Design. At the moment I’m not taking it but I have a feeling I might which is another story. They bought Adobe CS4 and the Macs for probably around $40,000. So why the hell would they use it for only one freaking class!? I have no clue. It’s absolutely ridiculous! Plus in “Computer Club”(I’ll go on to the school’s “Computer Club” later on) we’re not allowed to use them. Macs are SOOOO much more capable than JUST graphic design. Why not use them for a Programming Club too? Now let’s talk about Computer Club.

Read more…

So I’ve been using the Google Wave preview for about a week now. Here’s my initial thoughts: Read more…

I love AI. It’s an amazing thing. In case you’re not aware of it AI means Artificial Intelligence. Whether it’s in the form of a robot, software, or a game it’s just cool how a computer can make it’s own decisions. We may not quite be there with robots yet, but we do have software AIs. The reason we’re farther along with software AIs is because they’re simpler to make. With robotic AIs they’re much more expensive to make because they need actual parts such as cameras, microphones, etc. and they need to be programmed on a much higher level. Some of these higher level things are the ability to not walk into a wall when they’re moving, the ability to take in data through their cameras and microphones. Everyday we get closer and closer to true robotic AI. Once the day comes when we have true robotic AI will be amazing. Think of the possibilities! Leave your thoughts on AI and what we’ll be able to do with it down below!

The Phrasebot Logo

So I’m trying to finish up Phrasebot. There’s around two more bugs to squash. So I’m thinking Phrasebot will be done within the next week or so, if the bugs don’t multiply when I squash one that is…

So tomorrow I will be going to overnight camp for a week. You might be asking yourself “What does     this have to do with me?”. Well that means I can’t finish up Phrasebot and I won’t be able to post on   Shaken Earth or on The Teen Geek. I’ll be getting back Saturday afternoon. Within a couple of days after that Phrasebot will be done and available for download! Have you ever been to a sleep-away camp? If so tell us about it, if not tell us what you think it would be like. Are you hyped about Phrasebot?

So the other day I stumbled upon a blog called The Teen Geek. It’s basically a tech blog that teens run     and right posts for. So I will be writing for that blog and this blog as well. So go and check it out!          http://theteengeek.com

Phrasebot is almost finished and I’ve been thinking of the things to do in the future on it. Wouldn’t it be cool to have a feature where if you couldn’t think of a word Phrasebot would put a word in for you with the click of a button? Or a whole network of everyone using Phrasebot and you could share your phrases up in the cloud and people could rate them on funnyness? Well these are coming! And the wait won’t be long!

Until Next Time,
this is Thomas signing off

P.S I’m dropping the whole chat client gig and replacing it with the PBN (Phrasebot Network) which is coming in a later version.

So wouldn’t it be cool to have a chat client embedded in Phrasebot? Well I think it would! Think about it. So you’re sitting on your computer with Phrasebot open. You love the Phrases it’s generating from the words you entered but you wish you had someone to share them with! So you set Phrasebot to send a message containing the newest Phrase to the Phrasebot chat client so you can share your Phrases. Other then that you’ll be able to chat with other people using the built-in client! Leave your thoughts down below!

So how would you like Phrasebot to go from that old clunky, annoying, and useless interface to this?

The new and improved layout =)

Well I know I do! With this new interface I’ll be able to add tons of new features and make it much more user-friendly. So what do you think of it? Leave a comment! =)