In my freshman year of college(Computer Science) I was just discovering the Internet and the vast information one could get from it. Those were the days of MsDOS, Windows 95 and Windows 98, and my geek hobby back then was to subscribe to e-zines of the underground computer virus geeks. I never learned to build a computer virus(it’s bad, evil and it turns you into a criminal) but, being young and restless, I enjoyed reading how one could conceive such software that resembled most to real life-forms – the smallest and code efficient possible, which could replicate, mutate and propagate around. Nothing much stuck with me from that wild age except for a broader understanding of computers, operating systems and assembly language and, completely unrelated, the tale of one of those virus developers.

The guy was stuck at some point trying to understand how to work around the limitations(security) of Windows 98; he had tried all ideas that came to mind, and was starting to get desperate and frustrated. Yet, at one moment, he decided to just lay back. Closed the monitor, closed his eyes. Tried to think of nothing. Quarter of hour later he was coding furiously and excited. His (memory quote) computer coding Zen had struck again.

Without naming it, I’ve been using this method since highschool; now, in my computer programmer existence, I use it more than ever. Whenever I’m facing a bug I can’t understand, whenever something eludes me no matter how hard I try or how much documentation I read, I will stop.

I breathe, I take a walk around the office, get some water from the watercooler. Chat with friends. When coming back to my computer, 10 minutes later, I close my eyes and try to think of nothing. Call it Zen meditation if you prefer; call it  yourKitKat moment.

I prefer to call it Seiza – the seated 1 minute meditation before martial arts training. Letting my mind free of all thoughts is just what we perceive on the outside; on the inside, our subconscious keeps working, freed from the outside stimuli and conscious noise.

More often than once, stepping back is all it takes to solve even the biggest problem.

[photo courtesy of Flickr]

On the 1st of January I had a skiing accident resulting in the injury my right arm – actually my right shoulder. After about two weeks of waiting for the pain to go away, I got the guts and visited a doctor who didn’t think twice before putting my entire right arm into a tight bandage and forbidding me to use my right arm for the upcoming 10 days.

Easier said then done – after all, I’m a work-from-home software developer, right-handed on top of that. Medical leave being out of the question, how am I supposed to get my job done by typing with only my left hand?

Luckily, I managed to work something out, and here’s a couple of the tricks I did for it, just in case they might help other imprudent skiers out there:

1. System Preferences -> Universal Access -> Keyboard -> Sticky Keys – this is the single greatest mobility impaired aid on the Mac: all special keys become sticky and appear on the screen as you type them, thus allowing you to single-handedly type complex, 2, 3 or more “simultaneous” keys combinations. Option+Backspace, Fn+Backspace, Cmd+Option+Escape and many more contorted keys combinations become now available to anyone
2. Quicksilver – I never really understood the full impact Quicksilver has on my productivity until now – launching an application without a mouse becomes really a life saver when you can only type with your left hand…
3. Textmate – luckily for me, I’m a Ruby(on Rails) programmer using Textmate on a daily basis. Although no longer being able to use the complex keyboard shortcuts that trigger all kinds of snippet generations, I was still able to remain productive using its built-in code completion and the tab-triggered snippets.
4. Terminal – a ROR programmer can’t get any kind of work done without the command line – be it just to change the working dir to the project’s one, or to start a server or.. many more. But typing in Terminal becomes an annoying pain when you need to run the same commands on and on. So I edited the .bash_profile and added a couple of alias for the most common commands I use on a daily basis. The .bash_profile is to be created(if not already existent) in the User’s home directory (just run cd ~ in Terminal and you’re there); here’s a couple of the aliases I defined for my daily use:
   
alias pr='cd ~/Work/MyProject/'
alias prr='cd ~/Work/Projects/MySecondProject/'
alias matem='mate .'
alias ss='./script/server'


There are more to say about tricks that made my programmer life better these last days, but I’ll take a little break for now; hopefully I’ll get back some day with more cool Tricks for the Mobility Impaired Programmers

(image by The Pack)

Who is Tim? You haven’t heard of him? What kind of world do you live in? He’s the one who took over the blogging world and the publishing world alike, by writing a best seller book about business and lifestyle – The 4-Hour Workweek(I’ll call it 4HWW from now on). The book which inspired me to make a series of life changes, all successful so far. Letting go of blogging for a while is just only one of the many.

But I’ll take it slowly:

I heard about the book from the author’s blog, where I read some articles detailing the main ideas of it: outsource as much as you can, de-clutter as much as you can; never buy what you can borrow, never waste time when someone else can do it for you.

This was the first task I let others do on my behalf : on my personal (Romanian language) blog, I wrote a post asking my readers to help me to:
Get a free pdf version of the 4HWW book and get a free ebook version of Harry Potter 7 (ok, this one is unrelated to the article, but still a good example). Less than 6 hours afterwards, a reader sent me the Harry Potter book; another 18 hours and I got the 4HWW book as well. So.. the experiment was already becoming successful: don’t waste time looking for stuff: first ask for it. Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’m eternally grateful to my reader friend who sent the books. Something that would have taken me many hours with an uncertain outcome took him, I’m sure, less than a couple of minutes. He has my thanks, and I gained hours of productivity.

Also inspired by Tim was my second successful example of blog outsourcing: I was looking to buy a pair of Crocs shoes, and since I couldn’t seem to find them anywhere in town I again resorted to my reader’s help. In less than a day I received several tips, locations, best prices, as well as offers to have them bought and brought from Italy. What had taken me several days of unsuccessful research was solved by my readers for me. I am, again, more than grateful to them for their help, and to Tim for giving me the idea of outsourcing everything out of my area of expertise.

This was only the beginning, and many more followed: from asking readers tips about the ski resort I should spend my winter holidays, to asking friends and family for help in fields they are better skilled than me, to start using expert websites instead of Google to find the best information in the fields I’m interested in.

But outsourcing deals, tips, research and projects is not what 4HWW is about. After having read the book(I’m still looking for a paper-based version to buy, but couldn’t find any so far, and Amazon shipping is still too expensive in my country), I decided to go on and experiment with the second main idea of the book – de-cluttering your life. But since this article has already gotten too long, and the following risks to take a bit of time to write, I’ll just stop here for now, promising to continue next week. In the meantime, please take a while thinking what time-wasting chores you could ask others(more skilled than you) to do.

I’m a smart guy. Really. I graduated from top European universities, with impressive academic results, etc. The problem with smart guys is that they have too many choices. Knowing you performed pretty well in the college classes makes you confident you’ll do the same in real life. After all, there were so many courses I was clueless about, but aced them after just a couple of days of study, that any random field can become familiar after a thorough 2-3 days study.

But like any teenager growing up, once I graduated from college I was met with a handful of choices: start a career in software development, follow a PhD in one of the many Computer Science-related fields, or even start my own business. The problem with smart guys is that they get too confident. Any field seems accessible. Yes, unfortunately almost any field IS accessible. So the problem is… which path should YOU take? Most life choices are therefore reduced to decision problems: should I take this path or that other one?

It’s probably a problem of maturity – as we grow up, we must make more and more decisions. Almost unlimited choices make you waste more and more time trying to decide things. In my case, I wasted countless months trying to follow different paths: in the last year alone I tried around 6 different startup ideas, invested energy and time in developing products, only to later change my mind and pick some other paths.

So.. what can one do? Is there a solution to the countless decisions problem?

I guess there’s no unique answer. Or.. is it? For now, the most I can say is that one should try to become a more decided and confident person. Flip the coin if you have to, but make up your mind! Faster! Don’t know what bus to take? Flip the coin! After all, most of our life is governed by hazard, a bit of extra hazard can’t make it worse than it already is…

What about important, life-changing decisions? I can’t help you on this one. But you can help me: what do you do to make up your mind between several business ideas, life changing opportunities or other life paths?

• Avoid prolonged exposure to sun between 11 AM – 6 PM.
• Shut the sun-exposed windows and cover them with both curtains and window blinds. Keep them shut for as long as the outside temperature is higher than the inside. Let the cool air flow in the early morning or late night, while the outside temperature is lower.
• Reduce to minimum running electrical apparel – it tends to overheat and, what’s worse, to heat the surrounding air even more. Same goes for the light-bulbs – replace the incandescent ones with fluorescent ones as they greatly reduce the generated heat.

• Set the air-conditioning to 5 degrees Celsius below the environmental temperature – don’t set it to too cool cause you risk body shock and catching the cold when coming sweaty from outside.
• Don’t use fans if the air temperature is above 32 degrees – the ventilated air gets hotter because of the fan, so it won’t do you much good; plus, the constant air stream risks dehydrating you even more.
• Spend at least 2-3 hours daily in cool places with air-conditioning. If you have none at home or work, malls, cinemas or institutions lobbies are some cheap ways to get some.
• Wear hats to protect you from the sun, light and loose clothes made of natural fibers, in light colors.
• Take frequent showers with slightly warm water – don’t overheat your body with hot water, but don’t overcool it as you risk thermal shock.
• Drink lots of liquids(1,5 – 2 liters daily) – water is best. During heat-waves, a glass of water every 15-20 minutes is a good habit to avoid dehydration.
• Avoid alcohol of any kind as it dehydrates and lowers your body’s heat defending mechanisms.
• Avoid sugary drinks – they only make you thirstier, avoid energy-boosting drinks(coffee, black tea, cola).
• Eat fresh fruit and vegetables as they contain plenty of water – melon, watermelon, tomatoes, cucumbers, etc.
• Did you know that a glass of yoghurt hydrates you as much as a glass of water – being, at the same time, nutritive and refreshing?
• If your body isn’t able to keep the temperature around 37 degrees Celsius or is constantly dehydrated, you might experience heat cramps, heat exhaustion or even heat stroke.
• The main way to prevent heat-related illnesses is to stay well-hydrated, making sure your body can get rid of extra heat, and to be sensible about exertion in hot, humid weather.
• Avoid physical activities, and if the heat related illnesses continue, go see the doctor.
• In case of heat stroke, while waiting for the ambulance you MUST try reducing the temperature of the victim: splash them with cold water, even cold showers, use ice to cool them down.

Useful links about heat, heat-related illnesses and their prevention:
CDC Extreme Heat
American Red Cross Lifeguarding
Medicine Net
Heat stroke signs, symptoms, and treatment by MedicineNet.com
Family Doctor
Web MD

But is the iPhone the ultimate productivity tool, as some have been hoping? I take a look into how this device will impact your working style (disclaimer – I wasn’t lucky enough to be born in the iPhone country, so all information below is based on blog reviews and Apple’s documents) and what applications to use for your organizing and productivity purposes.

Collecting

The device seems to have a decent score at this point, thanks to the easy-to-use software keyboard. Reports claim that you can get pretty fast to a decent typing speed in the built-in apps. Most importantly, it comes with a note-taking app, almost perfect for scribbling down a quick idea. iPhone Notes does have limitations(no “doodle” mode and a strange font) but writing stuff on the screen keyboard is definitely easier than on other PDAs. If Apple decides to sell iPhone keyboards accessories, it might even become your on the road writing tool of choice, replacing even your laptop. The best part of Notes? You can send your notes as email in just a couple of touches.

Planning

The iPhone Calendar looks great and works better than any other smartphone calendar. Its killer feature seems to be the list view, listing today’s next actions. Unfortunately, you can’t manage multiple calendars the way you got used to in Outlook or iCal makes any attempt of implementing GTD the iPhone’s built-in calendar impossible. Not being able to schedule separately contexts or projects kinda ruins the whole idea, doesn’t it? Things are not desperate yet, as Leopard might bring a solution by merging email, notes and tasks in a single outlook-like application. And we all know that GTD can be implemented on Outlook, right? In the meantime, the fact that you can sync it with the Mac one should be enough for the unpretentious.

3rd party To-do lists

Nope, the iPhone doesn’t have any to-do list software. But all is not lost – future updates might bring it. In the meantime, 43 Folders has a roundup of the already announced 3rd party To-do apps:

• OmniFocus – it seems the OmniFocus development team is planning something tasty for the iPhone users : an iPhone compatible web front-end of OmniFocus, running as a webserver on your own computer and syncing tasks with it.
• Ta-da Lists – The wonderfully simple app from 37 Signals has been quickly adapted into a lovely iPhone-friendly interface.
• do.Oh
• @task for iPhone
• Nozbe

Office productivity

Zoho, the online office suite, has announced the iPhone version of their online office suite – iZoho. It’s free and covers your major needs – online Word with Zoho Writer, online Excel with Zoho Sheet, online Powerpoint with Zoho Show and online Access with Zoho Creator. Rivaling the Google Documents suite, using iZoho from the iPhone seems like the perfect choice for the office manager on the go.

Remote computer access

A little birdie has just brought the breaking news: your OSX desktop is now available remotely on the iPhone, thanks to the magic hands of the QuickSilver creator(QuickSilver is the world-famous application software launcher we’ve written a while ago). The technical wonder doing this is called Telekinesis and allows you to stream music and movies, run apple script programs, control iTunes(so you’d use the iPhone as a very expensive music remote control) and generally do whatever you want with it – you can pretty easily build your own iPhone apps. Talk about never leaving your computer shut down, right?

Finance

Managing your budget becomes a critical matter now that you must pay the iPhone AND the monthly fees. It’s compulsory to keep them under control, also by means of 3rd party online apps that are iPhone ready. The first apps that come to mind for managing your expenses are ExpenseView and iPhoneMiles (for tracking your car mileage), but I bet my monthly finances that new ones will appear in the following days. Oh, and since we’re talking Finance we shouldn’t forget the Stocks widget showing you live updates of your portfolio. It comes pre-installed, so no 3rd party here.

Deal finders

Thanks to the unlimited data plan, you can stay online all the time and find great deals for almost anything. Some of the services designed specially for the iPhone include: travel bargains via iPhoneTravel, shopping(comparing Amazon prices) or movies.

Procrastination? Just a bit…

The iPhone was designed with a specific demographic in mind: the kind of users who’d rather watch the stocks go up and down than play Tetris or Snake. Sure, once you get an iPhone you’re bound to spend a few days playing with its UI, learning new tricks, testing the widgets, camera or maps, but eventually you’ll end up using it for what it is: a phone that can also play music and videos, send email and browse the Internet. Notice that? No pre-installed games, no Flash player, no Java virtual machine – while it’s really a bad point, this lack of features can be a great plus for the productivity-obsessed crowd – less procrastination! After all, you don’t want to spend that much money on a gaming hand held – you want to be productive with it instead. Still, for the hopelessly addicted, there are already several websites out there offering online iPhone JavaScript games, as well as rumors of soon-to-be-launched actual iPhone games. Beware, though, new addictive games for the iPhone appear every day: chess, itouch or avalanche are only a few of them. My favorite so far? Diamenty, a gorgeous bejeweled clone.

Conclusion

‘Nough said for now. From the looks of it the iPhone is here to stay, and although the packaged-in software is far from satisfying the productivity-oriented manager, 3rd party apps come to the rescue, revolutionizing the entire software application paradigm along the way. No GTD app for now? There may be a great one in development just around the corner. If it’s not, maybe you should get started building the perfect one. The iPhone users around the world will be grateful.
[tags]iPhone, productivity, get things done, applications, roundup[/tags]

Me, I’m not a builder, but I do love getting things done once in a while, especially when I get to save a few bucks. Call me cheap, but I really don’t see the point on spending 30 bucks for a laptop sleeve I can make on my own for less than 1$. For less than 10 cents even.

Here’s the complete detail on How I Did it:

1.  Get the material: This was the hardest, but also the cheapest thing on the list. You need to get hold of a piece of thick textile material you fancy. The rough size is of 40*60 cm, meaning around 2.5 times the dimensions of a A4 sheet of paper. For me, this took the longest time, cause I wanted something modern and thick at the same time. Eventually I found it in the material used to make packages in a local clothes depot. Did I mention it was cheap? It was free, a minor gift from a relative with connections.
2. The only hard part – getting the right dimensions for the piece of cloth. A MacBook has the size 325 x 227 x 27.5 mm (sorry US visitors, they are in metric), so according to your design you should pick the right ones. I went for an envelope bag model, which means a piece of material of 50 cm length and 40 cm width. The extra material is just to make sure we have enough and to make for nice rounded edges.
3. The laborious part – You fold the material in two, splitting the length in half. The trick is to do it with the backside showing up. With a needle and a string or, much better, a sewing machine, you just go ahead and sew the margins, leaving about half a centimeter outside(or as much as you need to make sure your laptop still fits). The expert tip? Use a bit more material in the first place – you just cut the remaining parts away, once the sewing is done.
   
4. The finishing part – go ahead and cut the outside pieces of material and, for a nice touch, gently saw the margins individually for a nicer look.
5. Turn the sleeve inside out, the front of the material on the outside. Looking good, isn’t it?
   

Bored already? I bet you are. Still, as you saw, anyone can make their own laptop sleeve. It takes about half an hour and saves you tens of dollars. Not to mention the exciting feeling of having cheated the system, having proven that you can do stuff for yourself. Did I mention the elated feeling of the artist polishing up his masterpiece?

If my lame do-it-yourself tutorial didn’t convince you, there is still hope. Take a look over the instructables for tutorials on making your own laptop sleeve(also check the related ones) or the Makezine page of ideas on making one from a sweater or Ikea towel.

I lived in Paris and its suburbs since 2003 to 2006. No big surprise that I fell in love with it – I sincerely believe that it’s the most beautiful city in the world(though Prague, visited 2 years ago, isn’t bad either). Now, after having left France’s capital for more than a year, I’m returning there this week in a short 5-days trip with my girlfriend.

But please, shed no tear – it’s the perfect moment to write down what I missed most about this beautiful city, and start a blog tag game, named Your favorite city’s 5 best spots. While this is not necessarily a post on productivity or life improvement, it is about discovering the not-so-obvious beauties of your favorite city . So please feel free to join in!

The rules are classic – if you’re tagged you must join in, if you’re not but would want to, do it anyways, but also drop a comment below so we can keep the record: write the blog post about the best 5 places/things to do in your favorite city, link back to the blog who tagged you and, at your turn, tag three other blogs.

Me, being a stinkin’ cheater, I’m going to break the rules and share with you a 15 things to do in Paris, as in 3 times as much:

• 5 main tourist sights in Paris
• 5 romantic getaways in Paris
• 5 not-to-miss eating spots in Paris

5 main tourist sights in Paris:

1. walk the Champs Elysees
2. visit the Louvre
3. climb the Montmartre, taking pictures of the Sacre Coeur church
4. view Paris from the top of the Eiffel Tower
5. visit the Notre Dame cathedral and eat sandwiches in the small park behind it

5 cheapest romantic getaways in Paris:

1. bateau-mouche sight-seeing on the Seine river
2. picnic in jardin Trocadero or Champ de Mars at the shadow of the Eiffel Tower
3. rollerskating and picnic on the Seine quays
4. slowly walking around the Marais quarter, stoping by the Musee Picasso and Maison Hugo
5. enjoying the street artists at fete de la musique and the Pompidous center

5 not-to-miss things to eat in Paris:

1. best icecream – Berthillon – ile Saint Louis
2. best chocolat chaud – La charlotte en Ile – ile Saint Louis
3. salade basquaise – Chez Gladines – Bute aux cailles (11eme)
4. best crêpe banane nutella – Saint Germain coin Saint Michel
5. fondue savoyarde – fondue fromage and fondue chocolat

+ as a bonus, if hunger strikes while you’re visiting the Latin Quarters – Quartier Latin, you should try “Le Gyros” – cheap junk food with cheap beer by the side

+ as an extra bonus, I love the Japanese raw sea-food in by the Passy place in the 16eme arrondissement “Comme les poissons”

I’m tagging in this simple tourist game the following : Sully from Lifelearningtoday, Dragos from eDragonu, Ben from the Instigator Blog and Scott from ScottHYoung. All you others, feel free to jump in the wagon. What’s your favorite city and why?

This is the last of a 3 article series on dealing with the stress of an upcoming event. We talk about an exam, but most tips apply to tests, interviews, business meetings.
Go read, if you haven’t already, Part 1 – The evening before
and Part 2 – The morning before

Stress handling during the exam

Pointers:

If blocked out, breathe
Don’t panic
take a break, think of something else
break the writer’s block – write down anything
reread the subjects
underline the key points
sketch out ideas of solutions

The exam has just started – the test subjects have been given. If you’re prepared and stress free, go for it, don’t waste useful time.

If not, you might feel blocked out – nothing seems familiar, no idea comes. Stop for a minute or two. Breathe, look around. Try not to think of the subjects in front of you for a while. Write down your name, age, etc…

Then, slowly, get started reading the subjects. Start copying the requests, underline what seems important. Let the zen mind and spirit come to you.

Even now, don’t rush into it. First read them all and underline the key points of each. Once again.

Then, pick whichever looks easier to solve and try to do sketch the solution or steps to it on a side-sheet. Don’t rush into solving it, just think a bit of how you could approach it. Then, pick the next in line. See? You already noted a few things down, your brain starts working again. The rest is up to you.

This is part 2 of a 3 article series on dealing with the stress of an upcoming event. We talk about an exam, but most tips apply to tests, interviews, business meetings.
Go read, if you haven’t already, Part 1 – The evening before
and, once you’re done with this one, continue with Part 3 – Handling the stress during

I guess you had a nice pleasant sleep after all the relaxation from the evening before. Or, yet again, maybe you didn’t. You woke up at 6 AM although your exam, interview or presentation only starts at 10 AM. You might have had nightmares that you went unprepared and woke up sweating in fear.

The morning of the event

Pointers:

Last minute study almost never works
Personal calming ritual: familiar gestures, focus on the senses
Healthy breakfast
Look briefly over your keynotes
Get there half an hour before
Talk to others

Don’t rush to study. It can’t help you much now, can it? Instead, go start your daily calming ritual. Everyone has a calming ritual, a routine, superstition or quirk before the major events. In my case, here they are:

Get energized. Pour yourself a cup of coffee, tea or natural juice. Go out on the balcony and admire the sunrise while slowly eating a french croissant, a french toast or any solid food you can get. The eating/drinking ritual are familiar gestures that if done slowly will eventually calm you.

Any familiar ritual or gesture is helpful against stress, especially if it involves concentrating on the senses, not the thoughts. What do you think about doing some invigorating exercise followed by a Scottish shower (alternate hot with cold water for several seconds each) to get your body moving and cast the sleep away? Sounds nice, doesn’t it?

Eat healthily. Breakfast is the most important meal of the day not necessarily because it needs to be a rich one, but because it can’t be skipped. Your brain absolutely needs the energy boost. Your stomach as well. Don’t get shy eating a sandwich or two in the morning – you don’t want to get hungry or even faint from low glucose levels, do you?

If you are really anxious and want to study, don’t overdo it. Just skim briefly over the subjects you are least prepared for. Look over the notes from the previous evening, where you’ve summed up the most important things to remember. Don’t spend more then 10 minutes on it. If you’re not prepared for it, you’ll never be. Just go for it, worries behind, trying to focus on the spot.

Try to get to the target half an hour before schedule. Use the remaining time to relieve stress and get ready for the event. Get your gear out and ready. Test it. Breathe calmly, if you are too tired try to close your eyes and relax. One great stress relief is to introduce yourself to others, talk, chit-chat, socialize. You’ll see others are nervous about the BIG event too – there’s nothing to worry about, you are just as prepared as they are.