One of the main reasons that I have yet to get another tattoo, despite the definite urge I have for one, is sustainability of design. As an artist myself, it only makes sense to create what I put on my body, but there are so few things that I create that I want to keep around forever or see another day. Most are simply explorations of a thought or proofs of capability and have very ...

... or "Why backup up, both often and diversely, is so important."

If you know Jodie and I, you know we enjoy movies, own quite a few and often fall into the role of being-a-local-BLOCKBUSTER-to-our-friends. It is for those reasons that we use the amazing Delicious Library application that Wil Shipley and his grass-roots team have developed for the Mac. With barcode scanning, Address Book-based check-in/out and a wifi-synced iPhone application, it is way better than any on paper setup we have had in the past.

This afternoon I got a chance to watch Day 2 of Google's IO Developer Event (the Android Keynote, in particular) and I have to say that I was thoroughly impressed. Not only was it great to see such a strong commitment from Google toward an open platform that is working to strongly support Flash, but the sheer momentum of their device and user-adoption numbers was enough to have me wondering about Android-based iPhone alternatives (e.g. ...

I had intended on posting about all of the features I am excited for in the upcoming iPhone OS 4.0 software update (of which there are many), but Apple did a nice job of spoiling that with ...

More reminders of their continued belief that the HTML5 markup language is a direct equivalent to and a capable replacement for Flash, Flex and AIR ... where it definitely is not.
A re-written development agreement that not only restricts ...

One only has to sit in on my DFP Icon lecture, perused my Flickr uploads tagged osx, or (for you privileged few) use my Mac for a few minutes to realize that I am very particular AND very protective of the way my Finder windows look. I have nice sidebar separators, several essential tool bar application launchers, Windows 7-like window snapping, and a fairly even background image to grid layout ratio ... and that's ...

You may have missed the announcement a few weeks ago, but one of my favorite games, Plants vs. Zombies, from one of my favorite Mac game developers, Pop Cap, has just spouted up on the iPhone. Now you can continue to quell some beautifully illustrated zombie madness on the go!

I know Jodie didn't install this on her iPhone, for fear of losing her life to it ... but I had no such qualms. Parcelling out ...

The last couple of weeks I have been going back and forth between Firefox and Safari as my default web browser, trying to appreciate their full-featured nature over the fact that they are both so sluggish in comparison to the lovely Chrome Beta. Thankfully, Google announced support for two of the things that have really kept me from making it my preferred choice ... Extensions and Bookmark Management.

Even though I have no plans of releasing these to the public, I thought you might enjoy seeing this fun little cross-platform project I have been working on. It is really just a fancy list for me to keep handy and remind me of what to work on most days. Not only does it come with a spiffy iPhone version (including a custom iPhone icon, of course), it now has an Adobe AIR version that ...

I don't know about you, but I've had a Google Wave account for more than a few weeks now and I still have yet to figure out what to do with it. I mean, I saw the amazing Developer Preview from the Google I/O event, but without any immediate collaborative needs or really any contacts already using Wave, this fantastic communication tool is just another inbox for me to check on every now and then.

What ...

Since my beloved Mighty Mouse has not been functioning as preferred (specifically, the top and side buttons were not being recognized) I have been eagerly anticipating Apple's Fall product update so that I could look into getting whatever the new iteration of the mouse might be. Today Apple announced the new Magic Mouse and while I am very excited to try one out in person, I was less excited about the fact that it is ...

All the unnecessary hatin' that has been happening lately toward the Flash platform has been getting out of hand and definitely on my nerves ... so I have decided to start animating small little nuggets of fun into some of my drawings here on the blog. If you are not among the misinformed and propaganda-gobbling masses, please enjoy! Of course, I am also adding a nice bit of accessibility for all the iPhone users, ...

One of my favorite Action Script-ers to follow, Felix Turner of AirTight Interactive, recently posted about all of the applications, plugins and resources he uses for Flash development. It is definitely a list worth checking out (as are many of the lists compiled by the great Smashing Magazine) and if nothing else, it gave me a reason to draw this nerdy guy, marking out all of the languages and frameworks I am either working with ...

I really think Adobe is heading down the wrong path with their no coding push of Catalyst. Didn't they learn anything from the WYSIWYG garbage that can be produced by Dreamweaver? I guess not. While there may be a small percentage of legitimate UX development planned for this app, I can already see it becoming another eyesore in the Adobe periodic table.

I have been get a crazy ton of things done at work today. Managed to resolve the "double contacts" issue I was seeing on my iPhone after the 3.0 upgrade, thanks in great part to this helpful article. I also used Terminal to enable the old skool but nifty "hot corner" indicators for a machine at work ... making it plenty easier to remember which corner of the display will start the screen saver.

Then I ...

Apple just released the newest installment of iPhone software sweetness ... Three dot O! If you haven't already, head over the iPhone website or open up iTunes and get it. During the install my phone needed a quick restore, so I had to learn how to put it in recovery mode ... good to know, for sure.

Also, since I always forget, here is a link on how remove the photo-blue lines from a digital scan. ...

If you haven't already, definitely check out AppleInsider's or TechCrunch's coverage of the sweet App Wall that developers at Apple made for the recent WWDC event.

Here are all the deets:

"What you're looking at:
Over 3,000 apps - and growing - are downloaded every minute from the App Store. This is a live feed showing the activity of 20,000 popular apps currently on the store. Every time a customer downloads an app, its icon lights up (5 ...

... well not really, but close enough. Thanks the non-exporting and defunct joy that is SimpleLog, I have been staring my eyes out at MySQL tables and gui blog entries. I am only 1/4 of the way thru, but no worries ... I will continue to digitally dilate my eyes until you can enjoy the wholeness that is the next release of this blog. Soon ... soon indeed.

… err, mouse.My trusty Apple Mighty Mouse hasn’t been connecting immediately/reliably the last few days, despite re-doing the Bluetooth settings several times. Turns out fresh batteries are key … one of my wonderfully green USB Cell batteries has been wonderfully lying to me about its charge and still needed more rest. A couple of new coppertops later and I am back in business … but, of course, not before I made fun of the mighty ...

In my ongoing attempt to fall more and more in love with the “One-Window Web Development” amazingness that is Panic’s Coda app, I have reached another yet milestone. I present to you the following Syntax Modes, re-colored to match the ever-popular Textmate “Twilight” theme:ActionScriptCSSHTMLJavascriptJSP-HTMLPHP-HTMLXMLCoda Coloring Theme - "Twlight"In case you are wondering, the font I am using is the delicious Inconsolata by Raph Levien.P.S. If anyone wants to send me a few example files of ...

For some reason or another, I ended up taking so much stuff with me to work today. I mean … I think I needed it all. Camera, lens, batteries, scanner, USB cables, sketchbook(s), art box, two books and on top of all that, my normal MacBook Pro backpack.Yeah … that seems about right. Let’s call it “being prepared” and leave all those “NERD!” comments at home, ‘kay? Thanks a bunch.

After Sitepoint showed us all how easy it is to add custom references to the "Books" section of Coda (using their excellent HTML and CSS references as examples), I began my search for even more handy code guides with which to fill out that big empty gray space at Command+6.

Jon Hicks had some good stuff to say, as did the Coda Google Group, but what really got me moving was when I found Ray Brown's ...

The last 48 hours or so, I have been chucking a whole pile of new web, logo, illustration and t-shirt projects at the Illustrative Portfolio section. Even took some time to rewrite the CodeIgniter PHP files to optimize their indexing and output. Now, instead of having to manually add each thumbnail and larger image reference by hand, I can simply upload new examples to specified folders and magically, new samples show up on the Portfolio ...

Secret Friend Society by DraStudio on ZooomrIn light of the recent Dra Studio re-design, I thought it might be fun to share some of my ruminations and recent thoughts about back-end content management systems and such that I saw as possible solutions for both the this site and the Illustrative. site, but for some reason or another, abandoned. I also wanted to share some of the more influential sites that I found inspiring me ...

Mac Help (uploaded by DRA Studio)I just realized today that I frequently forget the specific details and diagnosis steps I take when helping others with their Apple hardware and software woes. I guess after the issue is resolved, I just sub-consciously push all the particulars aside and move forward with life. This especially happens when the repair ends up being a typical simple solution. But today I also realized that I have, in the past, ...

Note: This is the second version of this post. Why, you might ask? Let's just say that staying up late, typing in a comfy cozy bed and feeling drowsy while waiting to talk to a friend on iChat aren't the best combination for blogging. At some point while typing in my sleep, I managed to lose the first version. Oh well.

So Christmas morning was most wonderful this year. Not only did we get to enjoy ...