{ 2002.04.13 } Search Google from AOL IM or MSN Messenger with Googlematic (screenshots).

{ } Omniglot: background information on different writing systems, and well-linked to other resources too [via #!/usr/bin/girl].

{ } Perl MSN Messenger Client. Downloadable code to be found here.

{ 04.12 } googlematic [send an AIM message to that screenname] is up for another 500 Google queries. If you miss it, here's a screenshot of googlematic in action. Heh. I love that this is so easy. Feed me web services! Feed me!

{ 04.11 } Update on the Google web APIs. I've knocked up a simple client in Perl using SOAP::Lite, just to make sure it can be done. There are a couple of gotchas to do with boolean data types, so you might like to grab my Perl demo script for the workaround. Proper applications coming soon.

And, temporarily, I've resurrected googlematic. Send an AIM to the bot, and receive the top result from Google. Limited to 500 searches, this evening only. Oh, this is going to be fun.

{ } You know that voicemail from the prepubescant Kelly I had? I had another one the next day: "hi kelly it's kelly. when you get this message can you ring me or somefink. it's urgent. cheers-bye." (I've decided they're both called Kelly by the way, it sounds more like that.) Kelly-caller sounded flustered and very anxious to get in contact with Kelly-me.

Well, I've just had another one. My phone didn't ring. For some reason it went to my voicemail, and then my voicemail called me. And it said the message was left one minute in the future. And Kelly-caller: She sounded subdued, anxious, upset, possibly a little scared, speaking quietly but very close to the phone.

"'lo kelly... kelly please please please get hold of me [long breath] it's [mumble] fucking head in okay... cheers. please get hold of me. cheers-bye."

What is this? Does Kelly-caller think Kelly-me has been dispatched by Kimberly and the one Ashley went out with? If they were really such good friends, why does Kelly-caller keep getting the phone number wrong? This is beginning to feel like a cross between Archer's Goon and the answer machine sketches from The League Of Gentlemen radio series. Only IRL.

{ } !!!!!!!!!! Welcome to the www, Level 2. Google Web APIs have arrived and, well, they're everything we wanted: "Your Google Account and license key entitle you to 1,000 automated queries per day". Let me see, what do I say here? Let a thousand flowers bloom? Oh yeah. THE FUTURE IS NOW.

{ } Two things, one blue-sky (so bear with me) and one more practical.

one | Yes, we are entering the next phase of the web. Tim O'Reilly, Tim Berners-Lee, and even fucking Matt Jones can say this with more clarity than me, so I'll leave most of it to them. But here's where I think it's going to come from: Web services [SOAP, xmlrpc] are symptomatic of a understanding-shift. We know the net well enough now to give it APIs, languages [XML, IM bots], which makes it scriptable. And I think the reasons we're able to make it scriptable is because we understand it. The www itself, now it's a combination of two things: The real life thing and the technology combine to make a virtual thing. And it used to stop there. But because we understand and because the capability for scripting is there, that means we can recombine things on the net that we couldn't touch before. And recombine them, and them, endlessly recombine. Web services [and what they represent] truly are an order of magnitude change.

Oh, but so what. Progress happens. Blah blah grand sweep.

two | People are saying the www is dull nowadays. Well, no, I disagree, we're getting world weary is all. But I do have this vague sense that I'm not experimenting as much anymore, not in the html/www space anyway. There are so many other things to do. If everyone's like this, we lose the network effects. Maybe. Or something. Anyway, this is just a preface to: Does anyone know shitloads of javascript?

Is it possible to track the cursor position on the page to rank popularity of words, navigation elements, weblog posts? Is it possible to server-side cluster the posts in Blogger or Radio Userland and keyword them to make dynamic zeigeist graphs? Can a tool be written to organise all the posts on a weblog into a Yahoo-style tree, interlinked with other trees, all ranked on popularity, without the weblog editor having to learn any kind of code? Can I use the cursor-tracking to present more interesting content, and tailor the navigation?

I don't know shitloads of javascript. But I'd like some help to do the above.

{ 04.10 } We Made Out in a Tree and This Old Guy Sat and Watched Us, dedicated to odd things of the English language [via mindspillage].

{ } Tim O'Reilly, Inventing the Future, or, How Web Services Will Change the Www. (Good solid state of the nation.)

{ 04.08 } Dad, MySQL's down!! Printed out, on the wall at work, thankyou Paul.

{ } A unified theory of software evolution, or, how software tends to evolve (and deteriorate) [thanks blackbeltjones].

{ } "Local Girl Disappears, Feared Abducted". A rather topical Upsideclown from James. "Hertfordshire police still have no solid leads in the search for missing schoolgirl Jenny Wilcroft, 16". You should read Beggering Belief.

And whilst I'm on the subject, there's been a string of really good Upsideclones these last few weeks, especially the current one (if I'm allowed to be prejudiced towards any in particular). If I were you, I'd go there now and read through the archives. A little sci-fi, a little offbeat, a little paranoid. Exactly what the 'clone is all about.

Getting personal for a second, I'll tell you what I really like about doing 'clown and 'clone: That I love the writing of every single person writing for them. I'm not sure that all of these people would be doing creative writing if these sites weren't there, and if they were I'm not sure that I (with my Reader hat on) would be able to find their work. The fact that it's all in one place and it lands in my inbox and we get submissions from people who also write extremely well makes me very very pleased. It's magnificent. And you know, I'm not sure whether I've ever said thankyou to everyone. Time for another party I think.