Trillian is generally great, version 3 has made the multi-protocol IM experience very sweet. I'm definitely wondering "How will it's nearest Mac equivalent stack up?" However, one area where it does not shine is contact management. Here I have some issues.
I wanted to add a new group to re-organize my contact list. I tried right-clicking in the contacts pane, no menu. So I ended up using "File|Add Contact or Group". Okay, lame but livable.
So I see the Create Group button and click it and make my new group. But where the hell is it? I realise I've created it tucked deep in the existing hierarchy. So I go look for it to drag it to the right place. But it's not there... I can't actually find it although it does appear in the 'Add Contact or Group wizard'. But you can't move it from there.
So, with a sigh, I go back and carefully make the group again putting it in the root of the contacts folder. Ok. This one doesn't appear either. Yes it's in the contacts pane in the wizard, but not in the main interface. I'm getting bored with this now. Let's start again.
Except I can't, because you can't delete them from the wizard either. So I wonder "Is it because I have two with the same name and now it's confused?" I create another one with a different name. That one doesn't appear either. Now I have 3 useless groups which clutter the wizard but don't help me one bit.
At this point I'm pretty pissed off: Shall I just live with the damn folders I have then!?!
I'm definitely feeling that the contact management side is letting down this excellent application. Apart from stuff like this the 'Add Contacts or Groups' wizard feels very Version 2. I really hope this whole area gets an overhaul in v3.2, or v4
It's like casual Friday only with fall-out!
At one point, when I was using liveTopics, there were topics all over this weblog. Then I decided to go as minimal as possible and stripped a lot of it out. Now, on a whim, I'm bringing some of it back.
In the right hand pane I now have a Zeitgiest listing which I shamelessly tried (and failed) to pinch from Joi Ito. Alas my CSS skillz were not sharp enough to work out why the layout goes to hell if I put display: inline on the list elements. So I have to have 'em in a drab list for now (Can anyone tell me why it doesn't work? The list items end up at the bottom of the page)
However I wasn't done stealing there. Looking at a FeedBurner rendered RSS feed gave me an idea. Rather than rendering a table of contents as HTML why not just publish each topic as a separate RSS feed and style it? Then it will work either programmatically or in the browser.
Turns out it works quite well (although it takes a devil of a time to upstream all 534 feeds). The only problem is that the tags in the field are poking through and not getting rendered into HTML. Apparently my XSLT skillz are no better than my CSS ones. Can anyone tell me what I did wrong?
However I think the end result is promising and it means that you can now subscribe to individual topics that I write about. Which is a probably boon if you think I blather on about, for example, politics way too much! :-)
Also I have a quick view of all topics (a blatant ripoff of Joi's format) which highlights those that have been used most recently.
This evening I did something a bit out of the ordinary: I spent an hour in a floatation tank. I'd heard about it in a documentary on Acetylcholine (from Brainwaves a series of documentaries on the chemicals which make our brains work) I listened to during the week and it turned out the centre was right next to Clapham Common tube station. It seemed intriguing so I gave it a shot.
The experience itself was interesting but, because I have so much tension stored up in my shoulders, not always comfortable. But there were moments that are, well, hard to describe. Weightless, alone in a complete void, completely peaceful. Quite a trip.
And then, suddenly the music came up and it was time to get out. And that's when it really hit me, as I sat in the lounge and I felt like I was continuously falling into the chair. I felt light headed and peaceful and happy.
Now, a couple of hours later, I feel better than I can remember, still a little giddy and smiling to myself. Apparently it gets better from here.