2010s
- I want to have a cron job run on a Linux server, check if security updates are available, and if they are create a task for me to apply them.
- I want to check a handful of websites. So, I create a daily cron job that looks at the websites using curl and detects changes. It then creates a task to look into it.
- I want to take the RSS feed from a Basecamp project and filter it for actions I care about, and then create tasks in OmniFocus.
- The biggest shortcoming of OmniFocus is that there is no sharing. I would like to share tasks with my wife and others. The Sync server could make that happen.
- I really would like to seeRSS for tasks. It would bereally cool for one person to publish a feed of tasks via RSS andthen have the Omni Sync Server subscribe to that feed. Imagine apersonal trainer sending 20 clients workout tasks. (Seriously, thiscould be huge.)
- There are a lot of systems that I would like OmniFocus to synchronize with. Basecamp is the big one. I would love to see JIRA there as well. The biggest problem building this stuff is a lack of defined end-point to program to. There is a 3rd party sync service that integrates with Basecamp called Spootnik. However, I won’t do it. It’s too much of a commitment to have that be your main sync server. If there was a robust API, developers all over would write synchronization scripts between dozens of services and OmniFocus.
Getting ready for New Year’s Eve Bistecca alla Fiorentina.
Spotted the KBS Pro Cycling team having lunch at Yum! Bakery.
Sorry State of Sleds
One of the really cool things about our new house is that we are just down the street from “the sledding hill”. When we were moving here we would describe where we were moving to and a lot of people would suddenly say “That’s right by the sledding hill right?” Not knowing the sledding hell we couldn’t confirm. With over 3 feet of snow in December we can confirm the sledding hill is just down the street.
Proper sledding options made me check our sleds. Mazie had a little kid sled as well as a slightly bigger plastic one. However, none of her sleds would fit both of us, and they weren’t steerable. In short, they didn’t live up at all to my memories as a kid of a sled.
I started to look for new sleds and that is when I realized the sorry state of sleds. Let me be clear, a flexible slab of plastic 0.5mm thick is no more a sled than a sitting on a garbage bag. All the sleds I could find locally were total junk made to be cheap, fit by the thousand in a shipping container and had nothing to do with sledding. Steering? Nope. Drag reduction? Nope. Total and complete garbage.
So I went online and there I found the small niche of real sleds still alive and kicking. I just placed an order for a Mountain Boy Sledworks kit, two in fact. I’m likely crazy, but I wanted a toboggan as well as a maneuverable rocket. And yes, I got the sled pads too!
I was going to order direct but Amazon had great prices and the shipping was totally free. I’ve got the Mountain Boy Sledworks Ultimate Flyer 52" as well as the Mountain Boy Sledworks 6’ Mountain Boggan.
I’m excited to get them and take a few runs down the hill. I’ll report back on the results.
Park Husband Here. (This scene required commentary.)
Mazie Jewelry Shopping.
Homemade Caramel Rolls. 🤤
Snow Fire. 🔥❄️
Minnesota Grilling.
Smaller Desktop Footprint
For many years now I have sat down at my desk in front of giant monitors. I’ve wanted to become more nomadic in my computing and am going to try to ween myself off of a big 30" external monitor. This will be my setup for the next few weeks.
Kids See Santa 2010
Tammy took Mazie and Tyler for their annual trip to see Santa Claus. Mazie was super excited to see Santa and tell him what she wanted in her stocking. Tyler seemed less excited to see this strange guy in a big red suit. 🙂
Mazie Doing Puzzle
We are celebrating Christmas this weekend with the Olson family. It’s
afternoon break and puzzle time.
Tyler Working on Standing
Tyler is getting better better at standing. We expect it will still be a
while before he is walking. But he much prefers being upright. Meanwhile
he has a bugger of a rash on his face from sucking his thumb.
Got my Glif!
My Glif arrived in the mail today! I was one of the many backers on their Kickstarter campaign. This little widget is to allow you to place your iPhone 4 in all sorts of interesting ways, including putting it on a tripod.
I already used it to tilt the iPhone up while displaying a recipe on the kitchen counter.
Mazie Español
Mazie has been taking Spanish class at Burroughs and today they had a program where all the kids showed their skills. They named fruits, shapes and colors. They had some fun games that the kids played all in Spanish. I was impressed with how much she and and all the other kids had learned. She did an awesome job!
OmniFocus and Sync Server Possibilities
I often like to dream that I get to wave a magic wand and influence the future product plans of software that I use. I’ve been a constant user of OmniFocus since the very first release on the Mac. I jumped right in when the iPhone version came out and eagerly grabbed the iPad version when it was released.
A while back Omni started to host their own Omni Sync Server for OmniFocus. Before that, you had to use MobileMe, WebDAV or some other wonky stuff. I used MobileMe for a long time to sync multiple instances of OmniFocus on different Macs as well as my iPhone. I’ve had as many as five separate installs of OmniFocus running and synchronizing and OmniFocus has done a great job making it all seamlessly work.
When the Omni Sync Server was released it made my head buzz with a handful of things that I really wished that I could do with it. Let me take the three ideas that I can’t get out of my head and share them with some hope that Ken Case and the Omni team will think they are awesome and run with it. :-)
OmniFocus for Web
Since my OmniFocus data is on the Omni Sync Server, I would really like to have a HTML browser-based version of OmniFocus that I can get to from any web browser and manage tasks. Why? There are a few reasons.
Even though I have OmniFocus on my Macs, my iPhone and my iPad there are still times that I’m at a computer that isn’t mine and I would really like to get a full desktop-like experience to work on some stuff.
With that being said, I think the biggest reason to do this would be to reach non-Mac users. The iPhone and iPad versions of OmniFocus are awesome, but I would hesitate to recommend it only on those devices. I have friends that use Windows and if there was a web version it would give them a place to go during the workday and hammer away on things.
This could also turn into the hub for managing devices that you are synchronizing with, and a wonderful way to manage any data inconsistencies that may pop up. It could also be a great partner to OmniFocus on all platforms to host documents in the cloud for access anywhere.
Push Notifications
When iOS 4.0 came out OmniFocus immediately started supporting local notifications, which was a step in the right direction. However, it drives me crazy. Here is the problem.
Assume I have a task due at 4:30p and I do it at 2:00p on my Mac. I switch over to OmniFocus (which is open all the time) and mark the task as complete. A couple of hours later I’m getting ready to go and my iPhone is displaying an alert because I didn’t get the task done. Since I haven’t opened OmniFocus on my iPhone and done a synchronize it didn’t know this alert wasn’t correct, the task is completed.
I really think that Omni Group needs to jump in and deal with this using real push notifications. The sync server should be the one to send those notices, and it would have the current state and know that that earlier task has already been completed. There is no need to notify me. This could also be used to dynamically change the badge count to show the real number of tasks due without me even opening OmniFocus. That is another pet peeve. At 9am OmniFocus will say there are 3 tasks to do, when I open it and it walks through the data I really have 14 tasks. I really want the badge number to be right at all times, regardless of when OmniFocus was last launched.
(While at it all of the weird calendar synchronization stuff in OmniFocus could be removed and the server could just host an iCal feed I could subscribe to.)
Web API
My last big, big hope is to have a web-based API to get access to OmniFocus. OmniFocus is scriptable using AppleScript, but that doesn’t work for the types of actions I want to use it with.
My hope here is to be able to merge cron, a bunch of bash, Ruby or Perl code along with curl to create tasks.
Some scenarios:
You get the idea. I think the interface should be simple. Probably should use JSON to transfer data around. Should support HTTPS. Should allow read and write.
This would be really fun, and I think that the creative solutions built around it would go beyond what anyone imagines now.
There is more…
Those three things are the big ones that I want out of the Omni Sync Server. There are more things that I would like to be able to do with it.
I alize doing any of this would likely mean that OmniFocus would have totop supporting the other synchronization methods. That doesn’t bother me. I would still have the data locally. And the added benefits, particularly with an API, would be huge wins.
That’s that. So what do you say Ken Case? OmniFocus 2.0? :-)
Learning Carcassonne
I’ve been learning how to play Carcassonne with some friends. I had the fun experience tonight of playing Aaron, a buddy in Singapore. He took a break during lunch on the other side of the world. I stayed up later than planned.
I lost badly. It all turned when this city blew apart on me. Note the X on the board. Ugh!
Wow… Minneapolis Schools cancelled again tomorrow. Just got the call.