Home Page Improvements
Let’s talk about your home page.
You know, that first page you see when you open up your browser.
For most of us, it is something you don’t even look at. Maybe you have it set to Google or Yahoo, but more than likely it is whatever it was when you first opened the browser and stayed that way.
However, if you are a Firefox user, I have a suggestion for a homepage that will be much more useful. (You can do this in any browser, but it is clunky in Chrome and Safari.)
TiddlyWiki
Yes, it has a strange name. What is it? It is a wiki (like Wikipedia) but one that exists only in a single file.
This means you don’t need a web server to use it. You will simply download a single file, save it somewhere safe (your dropbox is a good place!) and go from there. Get it here:
http://tiddlywiki.com/#GettingStarted
So, for me, I downloaded it, put the file in my Dropbox and renamed it “startpage.html’. You can name it anything you want, but it must still end in “.html” to work.
You will need to do one thing through Firefox first, and that is get a plugin.
Install the Plugin For Firefox
First we have to go get the plugin:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tiddlyfox/
Install it, and when it is done, you’ll need to re-start.
Chrome, Safari and IE
You can use this idea for all of these browsers as well. Check out their documentation for more information:
http://tiddlywiki.com/#GettingStarted
Setting up your Homepage
First step, open up the TiddlyWiki in your browser. Go to File -> Open File… and find your newly downloaded TiddlyWiki.
Now, go to your preferences page, which is a gear icon on the left hand side.
Info
This tab is for general information. pay attention to this part:
Choose which tiddlers are displayed at startup:
We will come back to that later.
Settings
Under settings, make sure it is selected to save automatically. This way, when you are done editing an entry (tiddler, they call them ‘tiddlers) it is saved without having to remember to hit ‘save’
Saving
Once you are done with that, there is a icon near the gear that is an arrow pointing down into an open box looking thing. It should be red. Click it, and it will tell you it saved (in the upper right)
But…
Yes, you set it up so that it autosaves, and it will for just about everything. The settings are different, and you’ll need to manually save them.
Making entries
Hit that green + button and you’ll be shown a brand new entry form. Change the name from “new tiddler” to something more like “Start Pages”.
In the box, put some links. There are ways to fancy format things, if you want, but for now, just add the links on their own line, and hit enter twice after.
Hit that green checkmark when you are done.
You just made your first entry. Wasn’t that easy? Something to notice, on the right hand side you’ll see a list forming. Your new entry is now there.
Back to Settings
Now go back to that gear again, and on that “Info” tab where it says:
Choose which tiddlers are displayed at startup:
These are the entries that will show up when you first open this file. Delete what is in there, and add the title of the entry you just made, surrounded by double square brackets [[ ]]. So, if you named it “Start Pages”, then put:
[[Start Pages]]
in that box.
Now hit that arrow save button again.
Set as Homepage
We’ve set up the file, now just one more thing: making this file our homepage.
Make sure no other tabs are open first. Then open your Firefox preferences. Under General there is a place for “Home page”. Click “Use Current Pages” and it will update to your TiddlyWiki.
Ok NOW what?
Now you have a file that when you open your browser, will show you links. At first, this may not be amazingly useful. For example, you probably don’t need to click on Facebook often.
What it is good for are those things that you like, but don’t often use. For example, I have an entry for my bills. So when I need to, there is a nice organized list of the things I need to pay, and links for each.
I also use it as a research tool. A tiddler just for Markets, one for fonts I like, another for how to edit tumblr themes.
I’ve been storing information here. When I do a search for something, especially something like editing a blog theme, where I know i’ll need to know it again, but not for a while, I make an entry here and keep it.
Now it is easy to find. I just hit that house button on my browser, and my start page is filled with things I’ve added.
I have entries with links to images, to how-to’s on HTML and CSS, references to Markdown and fonts. You can store text as well, copy and pasting from files or pages to keep things how you like. I had even used TiddlyWiki as a story notebook for a while (something I suspect I will return to)
I want Fancier Formatting!
Here you go: http://tiddlywiki.com/#WikiText
There you can learn how to make links prettier, how to format entries and more. Despite being just a single HTML file, the wiki is pretty powerful.
And your homepage is now a little more useful.
On Sentence Clarity and Oxford Comma Memes
If you are a writer for any appreciable amount of time you will come across one of the great debates of our trade: the oxford comma.
This is not to be about that. Rather, I would like to talk about the example sentence being passed around on a meme. Yes, this is a discussion about a meme, but as it is being passed around to educate, I want to comment on it.
There are a few, but they have similar structure to this one.
We invited the rhinoceri, Washington(,) and Lincoln.
(Oxford comma in parenthesis)
The meme goes like this: with the Oxford comma, you have a list of three things (a group of rhinos, two people, one named Washington, the other Lincoln) but without it, just two things (two rhinos, one named Lincoln and the other Washington, which are odd but acceptable names for rhinoceri).
The sentence, while correct, is poorly constructed. While one can argue the function of the comma, it is the ambiguity of the sentence, not the Oxford comma that is the issue, and why the sentence fails.
Perhaps context would have fixed the ambiguity, but we should not rely on the surroundings when clarity can be presented in the sentence.
The striking part of this sentence is the specificity of “the” for the rhinoceri. THE rhinoceri were invited, not “some” or “a few” or any other designation. Clearly this was done to make the sentence ambiguous.
“The rhinoceri” are not the same rhinoceri as “some rhinoceri” or even “a few friendly rhinoceri”, etc. I suspect the context of this sentence would remove the ambiguity, as it would explain the use of ‘the’ over any more appropriate word.
But, back to our list. There are two situations: Washington, Lincoln and a whole bunch of animals are coming; two animals are coming, one named Washington, one named Lincoln.
There are three things in my sentence
The first point of this situation is ordering in your list. In general, it is best to go specific to unspecific, as well was singular to plural.
We invited Washington, Lincoln and the rhinoceri.
Of course you could argue that “Lincoln and the Rhinoceri” could be a punk band, but that’s just you being difficult.
Since there is a change of the noun from both proper to general and from singular to plural between our subjects, care needs to be taken in the phrasing.
We invited our friends, Washington, and Lincoln, and several rhinoceri.
or perhaps:
We invited Washington, Lincoln, as well as the rhinoceri.
They are just two Rhinos with odd names
The first solution to this one is a simple change of punctuation.
We invited the rhinoceri: Washington and Lincoln.
However, it would be better to make the sentence read clearly.
We invited two rhinoceri named Washington and Lincoln.
Clarity is key
The take away is not that a single punctuation mark can fix all of your problems.
It is that naming rhinoceri “Washington” and “Lincoln” is probably a great idea.
But you didn’t tell me whether to use an Oxford comma!
If you are a lawyer, always use an Oxford comma. This is their fault, after all, stemming from nit-picking text in contracts. IANAL YMMV AAFYB.
As for the rest of you, do what you will, just be consistent about it, and in your sentence structure, be clear.
Rhinoceroses
And for those wondering, “rhinoceri” is not the proper plural of “rhinoceros.”