I made two small updates to the site, I updated the look-and-feel of the date. This makes is work much better for 1024×768 resolutions. I also added a Kitt inspired separator. Yup, no big deal.

It seems like everyday Engadget and Gizmodo are bombarding us with tablet rumors.  We already have the horribly named JooJoo and the Archos Tablet.  And, now there are rumors that Dell, Apple, Asus, and maybe even Google are going to produce tablets.  I am all for new form factors for computing.  But, this one does not seem to make too much sense to me.  So, I pose the following questions:  would you buy a tablet PC?  And, how would you use it?

I follow these questions with my thoughts.  I definitely would consider this form factor.  But, I am not sure that it would be much more than a novelty for me because I do most of my computing on a couch or at a desk.  In both those situations, a light-weight laptop makes much more sense.  With that said, I could see the tablet having mass appeal to travelers.  Laptops suck on planes, trains, and automobiles because usually you are in cramped quarters.  But, travelers already split their times between iPhones (and similar devices) and Kindles.  Could a tablet replace any of these devices?  I am not so sure.  I think that the Kindle has been successful because e-ink has a huge advantage over LCDs for reading.  And, I think that iPhone-like devices are good enough for 90% of your media and browsing needs.  So, in the end, I think it would be a tough sell even toward this demographic as well.  What are your thoughts?

Chrome’s Market Share—Buried in an article that points out gains in Win7, Firefox, and IE8 is a statistic that Chrome’s market share (measured by Net Applications) is nearing 4%.  I am a big fan of Chrome.  Its speed, security, and simplicity tower over the competition right now.  I install it on every machine I configure and use.  This is also good news for web developers because it is a great browser to develop on.

Retailer email craziness—This shopping holiday has brought a flood of retailer email.  Personally, I don’t mind receiving an occasional email from retailers that I use on a regular basis.  But, it is getting ridiculous.  I am receiving about 2 an hour.  I am going to have to start unsubscribing if the insanity continues.  Listen marketing and communications folk: as a rule of thumb, you should send 1 email per week per mailing list.  No more.

Dropped call etiquette —Because of the crappy state of mobile voice technology, I propose a dropped call etiquette.  If a call is dropped, the original caller should call back.  If not, it turns into a crazy mess of busy signals and voice mails.

For awhile now, I have wanted to have a personal logo. I really can’t continue to let Kobe, Lebron, and Tiger show me up.  So, here is my first attempt at creating one.  It combines two things I really like:  vintage logos and robots.

Here is the logo:

And, this is how it would appear on the page:

What do you think?  …too much like Obamas?, not enough lasers?

Update:  Eric said the robot needed eyes.  Personally, I see no point to a robot with eyes unless it is shooting lasers out of them.  So, here is an update to the logo.

And, this is what it will look like on the page:

Nickie and I were Wall E and Eve for Halloween. Here is our costume.

The Wall E costume took me about 2 hours to make. I made it from a cardboard moving box (thanks Nick!), spray paint, and duct tape. In this picture, I am holding up the head. Apparently, duct tape is not good as forming lasting joints.

I am not sure if I posted this before, but here is the logo for our basketball team: boom boom pau! The name for the team came from my Laker’s obsessed friend, Eric.  Also, “you’re welcome” for putting that song in your head for the rest of the day.

I was walking through b3 (apparently that is their nickname), and saw a print of what looked like the Mizzou/Nebraska game…

I walked closer to check out the piece, and to my surprise, I saw what looked like the back of one of my friends—Dan “the man” Bockhold.

I am talking about is the gentleman in the blue coat in the corner of the painting. I know what you are thinking—that could be just about anyone. But, I think it is him for three reasons: (1) the tense, arms crossed pose is a classic Bockhold gameday pose, (2) I remember watching that game from that vantage point (although, admittedly the memory is a bit blurry), and (3) the two guys next to him look a lot like the Wrangler and Eric (aka Thundercat).

What do you think?  Am I seeing things or is that Bockhold?

Preface. I have had an e71 for about 9 months now.  And, so far I have mixed feelings about the device.  On one hand, it has an awesome form factor, solid construction, a decent camera, a great twitter app (Gravity), and can handle just about anything I throw at it.  But on the other hand, the interface is pretty poor (even after applying some nice themes from Tehkseven).  As it stands today, I am definitely not going to be getting the E72 and will probably switch to a Blackberry if the next generation doesn’t feature a radically different interface.  Rather than wait around for the next generation to show its face, I figured I would put together some interface concepts of what I would like to see out of the device that follows the E72.

Assumptions. I made a number of assumptions when putting together this concept.  First, I assumed that the next generation E-series would, at the minimum, have the same screen size as the Blackberry Bold.  So, I created the concepts with a 480×320 resolution.  Second, I created the following concepts assuming the device would have a capacitive touch screen.  As a result, the icons are bigger and there are more contextual menu items.  I think the concepts would work without touch navigation, but that is too short sighted for my liking.

The concept. I broke the concept into 3 screens:  the home, the contacts page, and the contacts page with the new launcher.

The home screen is divided into 3 parts:  the top bar, the notifications widget, and the launcher (the bottom bar).  The top bar has the signal information, carrier information, and date/time.  This is pretty standard.  The second piece of the home screen is the notifications widget (the big white box).  This section provides a hub for all your notifications: twitter, gmail, facebook, text messages, IMs, calendar, etc.  It would be completely configurable. From any message, you could jump to the next message using the arrow button or go directly into the associated application by clicking “launch app”.  The final part of the home screen is the launcher at the bottom of the screen.  The launcher acts as both a toolbar (think Windows 7) and a application switcher.  Any apps that are active are highlighted with a subtle white background.  The launcher can hold an unlimited amount of applications and can be scrolled right-to-left with a flick of the finger.  The down arrow on the right of the launcher provides a hot spot to minimize the launcher to get a little more desktop or application space.

The next screen is an example of what the contacts screen would look like.  Nothing out of the ordinary.  You have a simple menu key on the left and a close (or hide) key on the right.  This is consistent with the current e-series.  Of course, screens like this would have kinetic scrolling with the flick of a finger.

What is unique about this concept is that you can pull up the launcher over an running app.  You could do this using the top key of the directional pad or by simply flicking up from the bottom of the screen.  This would allow you easy access to your applications.

Wrap Up. First a few qualifiers.  This is only a concept.  I am in no way affiliated with Nokia or Symbian.  This is a derivative work.  All icons are property of their respective owners.  A lot of these concepts are borrowed.  The home screen is definitely similar to what is currently being shown by Samsung’s Touch Wiz, Motorola’s Blur, Symbian’s s60, and Blackberry’s OS.  Being that is a concept, there are a lot of holes.  But, I definitely think it is a good point of conversation as to how future e-series devices should work in the future.

What do you think?

Now that I officially have my house up for sale, I thought it was a good time to conclude one of my biggest projects of the last 4 years—my house.  And, what better way to do that, then send it off with a blog post.  When I started this project, the house was a clean slate.  I bought it as an “inventory home” meaning that it essentially came as-is with little customization.  That was fine with me because being both a minimalist and tending to lean a bit modern, I hated just about everything builders in mid-America put into homes.

I started my customizations downstairs.  I painted the place to go with my sofa collection and wall-mounted a TV.  Over the years, I added some art and additional furniture.  I think the end result turned out nice…

As in my desk project, I went with a two tones on the wall. I think for open floor plans this is a must, because it helps to split up the space.

I never realized how much I liked white cabinets in a kitchen until I had them in my own house (although, I probably would think differently if I cooked all of the time).  One of my favorite parts of my kitchen is the wine rack.  It was made for me by my brother-in-law (and master craftsman), Jeremy.  He built it to go along with the spice rack in the corner.  Never underestimate the power of repetition in a space.

A tour of my kitchen wouldn’t be complete without showing off the Dude (another gift, this time from my wonderful fiancé)…

Definitely my favorite project I undertook while at my house was the desk project. My dad helped me on this one and it was a lot of fun. The final results were amazing.

Just like in cribs, this tour would not be complete without a look at the master bedroom.  My mom and Jeremy helped me put together the art above the bed.  We took some cool wallpaper from Naked & Angry and applied it to a frame that Jeremy constructed.

That is about it. There are a few more rooms on the flickr set, but these are definitely my favorite. As an aside, anyone looking for a cool townhouse in St. Charles (MO) send me an email at matt@matthewsmith.com.

This post is a long time in the making.  I began this project in November of last year.  At that point, the project was a success, but I had not finished painting it so I decided to hold off on the post until I finished.  Well, one month turned into two, two turned into nine, and the project stalled.  It took an engagement to my long-time girlfriend and a new need to get my house FSBO-ready to finally knock off this project.  Without further ado, here is the final results…

Looks great, right?  The project itself was pretty easy.  All you need is some 2×3’s, wood screws, paint, someone who knows what they are doing (in this case, my dad), and a couple hours.

I started with a desk in a cramped space….

… and a hand-drawn schematic.

We then created a basic frame and attached it to the studs in the wall. Did I mention you need a level for this project?

We then nailed two precision cut pieces of MDF to the frame. Fans of industrial design probably would have stopped here…

…but we decided to finish it. I sanded it, cut a hole for cords, pounded down the nails, filled in the gaps with wood putty and caulk, and applied a clean coat of paint.

To finish the project up, I painted the walls two shades of gray (yup, that is an accent wall—watch out Antonio), added a couple successories, put up a threadless print, and setup my massive computer.