Over the weekend Scott Hanson was able to use Drummer to write prose that was published by a popular open source static site generator called Gatsby. Apparently the software is a Gatsby plugin. Gatsby is also a company, based in Berkeley, they have raised $46.8 million. I'm looking for an quick tutorial. I have literally never used it, so i would like to at least be able to talk about it, explain what it is and what this connection means. BTW, our goal is to connect everything with everything with Drummer. Outlines in the middle. We rock! 😀#The fact that I've never used Gatsby and I'm sure they've never used Drummer (do they use outliners?) says we have to create better connections in tech. I hope that Drummer will do that. Get us looking at each others' work and figuring out how to help our users make our products work better together. I've been motivated in this direction ever since I developed an integrated product in the 80s and the #1 feature request from users was I unbundle the components. They were right. We need interfaces, not behemoths. #
BTW, Scott posted his notice on the Drummer RFC site. It's a place I started for non-support stuff. Perfect for this project. I've found over the years if you mix support and development the users are often intimidated. Each thread has it's place. In a user oriented tool with a deep scripting capability, you always have to be aware there are both plumbers and poets in the same space. That's where the power is. You don't want to keep them separated, but you want to be careful everyone feels empowered to ask questions, get help. #
BTW, the ad I wrote about the other day showed up while I was watching a game yesterday. I caught the end of it on my iPad. #
Working on a server today, I moved the software for a 1999.io server that's been running for a few years and remembered there is some nice stuff there. I designed it to answer the question -- what would a blogging system look like if it was created after Facebook and Twitter already existed. There are some good new ideas in both products, and they should influence blogging. I wrote Scripting News in 1999.io for a few years, but in 2017 I realized what I really wanted was what I had in 1997, leading to Old School and eventually Drummer. But 1999.io is still running. Here's the positioning document. #
A breaking change in a forgotten package in a utility I wrote that I allocate zero percent of my consciousness to, pops up as I was provisioning a new server, and already juggling more than I should try to manage. #
I wish there was a Cliff Notes version of the Washington Post article about the insurrection. An Axios version would be perfect. A podcast. I went looking for one and found nothing. #
Mark my words -- outliners are destined to be in the middle of everything. That‘s why I’ve invested so much in OPML, the open format designed for sharing outlines. It's the native file format of Drummer. We don't need to have another giant Facebook in the middle of everything controlling everyone. Much better if it's distributed. That's what's made possible by open formats. #
- This is the first "monthly ritual" I've done since Drummer shipped. So I'm going to write down what I did in more detail than usual.#
- I do my blog writing in Electric Drummer, so all the files are on my local disk. #
- In the finder, I make a copy of my blog.opml file. I move the copy into a special folder for archives. #
- I open the copy in E/D and delete the portion that's in November (the stuff I'm writing now). Once it's saved, I close the file. #
- I open the GitHub archive for Scripting News in the GitHub desktop app for the Mac, and click the Sync button, to get all the new stuff in the last month on my local disk (the nightly archive of posts in JSON and OPML).#
- I copy the archive file for October into the local folder for Scripting News on GitHub into the correct location. #
- In the GitHub app, I note the new file shows up in the list of changes. I set the Commit Message to a period (I don't have anything to say about this change) then I commit the change, and sync. #
- I visit the site on the web to be sure October's OPML file is there. #
- Back in E/D, I delete the October branch of my blog.opml file. #
- Then I click the rebuild icon and pray. #
- And... it did not work! (Most of the month of October is missing. I figured since this was part of the overhaul there likely would be problems. I will finish this post after I do my debugging.)#
- Back from debugging. The mistake was I wrote theDay.getDay instead of theDay.getDate. The first returns the day of the week (0-6) and the latter returns day of the month (1-31).#
- So the monthly ritual is good. #
