The tasks I take on at work range from developing emails and creating new webpages to animating online banner ads. Throughout all of this, there have been a couple of tools that have made these experiences so much easier.

• Aptana Studio - Although a bit slow to load, Aptana is an excellent tool to code anything from HTML to PHP or Javascript in. The built-in previews are nice, but what I really like are the snippets. Snippets allow you to create small, easy to insert, files that you can add to any project you’re working on. They can even be customized to prompt for variables (e.g. a swf’s filename). This is excellent for the web developers out there that have to do any type of regular website maintenance.
  Runner-up: Notepad++ - Up until I started using Aptana, Notepad++ was my favorite windows app to write any piece of code in. It’s extraordinarily fast to load and can color-code just about any file format you want to write code for.
• Web Developer Toolbar (Firefox Plugin)- This single plug-in for Firefox has so many useful features for web development that it’s probably why I took to liking Firefox so much (that and Firefox’s greater use of web standards). You can outline any element on a page, find broken images, display an on-page ruler, view css, and closely examine an elements css. And that’s just to start.
• 960 Grid System - Although I may switch to Blueprint eventually, 960 is the first CSS Framework I’ve worked with and it makes constructing websites extremely easy and fast. Using 960, you can quickly generate mock-ups or full-blown templates in a fraction of the time. No longer do you have to construct the css for every single structural component of your website’s design.
• Firebug (Firefox Plugin)- I admit, I didn’t originally think Firebug would be a plug-in that I’d use so often. But, it’s now an essential tool. It’s great for troubleshooting css problems with the inspection tool and the live-edit feature makes creating “what-ifs” for management super-easy.
• Screengrab (Firefox Plugin)- Before screengrab, I used to have to stitch together screenshots to get one of the full webpage. With this tool, you just right click to get a copy of the full page.
• ImageMajick & Ghostscript - In one of my old jobs, I had tasks that involved prepping multi-page PDFs for the web. Not having a quick computer, Photoshop wasn’t really an option for doing a batch job on these. Plus, I had to adhere to a certain file-naming convention which I’m not certain that PS can handle without me having to type it in. Anyways, in comes ImageMajick, an image editor that can manipulate graphics via the command line. Plus, with Ghostscript it can modify PDFs and convert them to jpegs or gifs. So, all you have to do is supply the PDF and a batch file, and it will do all the dirty work of resizing & thumbnailing(or whatever) for you.
• WinFF - Like many web developers out there, I was inevitably asked to take some video and convert it to another format. Thankfully, I found WinFF, which gets the job done (but it does have a tendency to quit unexpectedly after converting a video - although apparently there is a new version out now….so, you may have better luck with it).
• Terminal - Ok, so this one is probably a little out of place on this list. But, having access to a unix-based CLI is awesome. True story, I was once asked by a certain IT department to provide a list of *ALL* the files I had modified in the past day or two, so they could check each one. If I had had only a Windows machine, that task would have taken hours to complete (which I think was IT’s point-to get me to go away, since they do have access to linux machines). Fortunately though, using Terminal on my Apple I was able to give IT a list of all 300+ files to check on within a few minutes(their response? “f*ck! he’s not one of our usual ID-ten-T coworkers.”).

So, what are some of your favorites?

I had previously said that Lenox Park was one of my favorite subdivisions in Cartersville.  But, as they are getting closer to finishing development in this small community I’m afraid I have to take that statement back.

Instead of building the rest of the houses in the same format as the prior ones, these homes are without a doubt, townhomes. Unlike the other residences, there is no dividing space in between each unit. When finished they will blend in to an extent, but for me it’s a major detraction to the neighborhood as a whole. It puts forth an image of lower quality, which I’m sure is not what the current Lenox Park residents were expecting.

I’m curious as to if upcoming “mega-communities” like Carter Grove will start taking similar actions or if they’ll just weather out the current real estate cycle.

A lot has changed since my previous posting on this topic. I have reached my short-term goal of paying off my car (made the last payment on April 2). I’ve also increased my 401k contribution from 2% to 3% to take full advantage of my companies matching program.

So, how did things look last month?
401k: +25%
Roth IRA: +50%
Brokerage: +8%
Savings: +7%

Also not noted above, is the fact that my liabilities had an overall decrease of 17%. This was primarily due to me paying off the Xb and only in small part to a larger student loan payment. Next month, the decrease won’t be nearly as impressive, but it should be more than the usual clip of the last several months.

So, how has my net worth been affected by all of this? Well, it has increased by 1128%! I’m now back in the black. Hooray!

Lotus Notes continues to be the bane of all existence for email designers worldwide, but here are a few tips you can follow to ease the pain:

• Borders - If you don’t want them on your tables, don’t mention them….at all. Even if you specify a border of zero width, Notes will place a big ugly border around the table. Think of Notes as a disturbed mental patient that gets upset when you mention the word “borders”. Borders? Borders! Borders! BOOOOOOOOOOORDERS!!
• Cascading Style Sheets - In Notes, not all of your stylesheet properties are going to cascade. So, design your emails such that every style necessary for an element is specified within it’s own tag (it’s a safe bet to code all of your styles inline).
• No Unordered List Navs - Using an unordered list as your navigation element works for a lot of email clients, but not Notes. If you try this, you’ll quickly find your horizontal navigation has suddenly gone vertical. (Although, the actual bullets will still be removed. )
• Divs - You’re probably not going to be using divs in emails designed specifically for Notes. Why? Well, it doesn’t support the float property, among other things.
• Don’t rely on padding - If you want your links to have a space in between them, use a   tag or an actual space. Notes will completely ignore padding.

Got any of your own tips? Please add them as a comment to this post. Starting out in email design, I had very few guides to go by, so the tips above are from my own trials & errors.

Like most days in Atlanta, my drive home consists of a lot of time just sitting in traffic. Coming from a Computer Science background, some of that time has been spent thinking of how a computer engineer might approach solving the traffic congestion problems of the Greater Atlanta area. These are the solutions that I’ve come up with:

1. Increase the Bus Speed == Increase/Remove Speed Limits - Our traffic system is only going to be as fast as the slowest components. So, If we want to move more vehicles through these roads, we need to increase or remove speed limits.
2. Make the system Massively Parallel - When it comes to our computers, the data doesn’t have to flow directly to the CPU to be processed. For example, many graphics cards today can reduce the load on the primary CPU with it’s own CPU. Additionally, we’ve also got multiple processors and completely separate ALUs. The real life equivalent to this would be to implement: additional lanes, alternate high-speed roadways, increased bus transportation, and/or implementation of a rail system. Currently, we’re only really taking advantage of the first option….more lanes.
3. Better Thread Management - In the early days of computing, if something in your application was taking a long time to process, it would freeze your entire application. However, now we’re able to take advantage of multiple processing threads so that processes that are going to take a while don’t suspend all other activity. On the highway, this is comparable to traffic on one side of the interstate slowing down because of an accident on the other side. To tackle this, investments should be made in preventing either side of the highway from seeing each other. This could be done with a fixed item(such as a concrete wall) or as a remotely controlled shield that the DOT can raise or lower as needed.
4. Schedule Tasks during Low Loads - Your computer is capable of scheduling work to be done at night, that would normally slow your performance down if done during the day. So, why can’t the DOT? More often, you’ll see construction crews out during the middle of the day, causing severe traffic delays.