Collaboration with Dropbox
Jun 02, 2009 Filed in: Internet
Kareen Rozen and I recently completed the first public draft of our paper on monitoring with collective memory. One of the key tools that helped us stay productive is Dropbox, a new web-based service that lets you synchronize a folder across several computers and among several users. Dropbox was worked so well for us that I’m now starting to use it with my other coauthors, and recommend it to everyone I know.
The magic all works behind the scenes over the network. Every time you change a file in your Dropbox, the change is uploaded to the cloud within seconds if you’re online; if you’re offline your changes will upload the next time you connect.
If you have multiple computers, you can install Dropbox on all of them, and sign them all in to the same Dropbox account. Whenever you change a file in your Dropbox on one computer, the changes will propagate to the rest of them within seconds (or as soon as they connect to the Internet). So Dropbox works great as a synchronization tool for a single user.
Dropbox also has a web interface, so you can access your files even when you’re working on someone else’s computer. One key feature that you access through the web interface is the ability to restore an older version of a file that has been changed or deleted. Dropbox stores the entire history of all the changes you made, so it works great as a backup tool for a single user. (Update 8/15/09: Due to a recent change, free Dropbox accounts now stores previous versions of changed or deleted files for only 30 days.)
What happens if you both edit the same file at the same time? Unfortunately Dropbox can’t magically combine your changes together. Instead, it creates two conflicted versions, so at least you don’t lose your work. You’ll have to integrate your changes back into a single file manually. If you’re working on an article in LaTeX, you can break your article up into separate files, one for each section, using the \input command. That way you and your coauthor can work on different sections at the same time without generating a version conflict.
On the Mac, Dropbox works especially well with Growl. If you have Growl installed, Dropbox will use it to notify you when your collaborator makes any changes. Growl notifications are particularly nice because they pop up unobtrusively to tell you what you need to know, but don’t require any interaction and don’t get in the way of what you’re doing.
https://www.getdropbox.com/referrals/NTU3NTkzOTk
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Single-user features
Here’s how it works. You sign up for a Dropbox account, which gives you 2 GB of online storage for free. Then you install the Dropbox software, which on Mac OS X consists of an invisible background application and a discreet menu bar icon. On Windows, it manifests as one of those unreadable little icons in the bottom right corner. In the Dropbox preferences, you decide where you want your Dropbox folder. I put mine in ~/Documents. You can create folders and files inside your Dropbox just like any other folder on your system.The magic all works behind the scenes over the network. Every time you change a file in your Dropbox, the change is uploaded to the cloud within seconds if you’re online; if you’re offline your changes will upload the next time you connect.
If you have multiple computers, you can install Dropbox on all of them, and sign them all in to the same Dropbox account. Whenever you change a file in your Dropbox on one computer, the changes will propagate to the rest of them within seconds (or as soon as they connect to the Internet). So Dropbox works great as a synchronization tool for a single user.
Dropbox also has a web interface, so you can access your files even when you’re working on someone else’s computer. One key feature that you access through the web interface is the ability to restore an older version of a file that has been changed or deleted. Dropbox stores the entire history of all the changes you made, so it works great as a backup tool for a single user. (Update 8/15/09: Due to a recent change, free Dropbox accounts now stores previous versions of changed or deleted files for only 30 days.)
Multi-user features
Sure it’s great as a single-user synchronization and backup tool. But Dropbox’s killer feature is the ability to share subfolders in your Dropbox with other Dropbox users. To share a folder, just invite your collaborator using Dropbox’s web interface. Once she accepts your invitation, your shared folder will show up in her Dropbox. Any time one of you makes a change, the other one will get the update within seconds.What happens if you both edit the same file at the same time? Unfortunately Dropbox can’t magically combine your changes together. Instead, it creates two conflicted versions, so at least you don’t lose your work. You’ll have to integrate your changes back into a single file manually. If you’re working on an article in LaTeX, you can break your article up into separate files, one for each section, using the \input command. That way you and your coauthor can work on different sections at the same time without generating a version conflict.
On the Mac, Dropbox works especially well with Growl. If you have Growl installed, Dropbox will use it to notify you when your collaborator makes any changes. Growl notifications are particularly nice because they pop up unobtrusively to tell you what you need to know, but don’t require any interaction and don’t get in the way of what you’re doing.
Get an extra 250 MB for free
Dropbox is running a promotion on referrals right now. If you sign up for Dropbox using the link below, both you and I will get an extra 250MB added to our accounts. (I also used this link in the article, above.)https://www.getdropbox.com/referrals/NTU3NTkzOTk
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Software I use
Jun 21, 2008 Filed in: Mac
I’m planning to blog occasionally about Mac software that I use in the course of my work. To get started, though, I’ll simply list the main software programs that I use professionally, divided by whether I use them for research purposes or only for general purposes. Within each category, they are organized from greatest use to least use.
Research
Research
- Safari (Apple)
- TeXShop (open source)
- TeXLive (open source)
- Preview (Apple)
- Keynote (Apple)
- BibDesk (open source)
- Mathematica (Wolfram)
- OmniGraffle Pro (Omni Group)
- Illustrator (Adobe)
- Mail (Apple)
- iCal (Apple)
- Things (Cultured Code)
- Address Book (Apple)
- RapidWeaver (Realmac)
- CSSEdit (MacRabbit)
- Transmit (Panic)
- Acrobat Pro (Adobe)
- Numbers (Apple)
- OmniOutliner Pro (Omni Group)
- Pages (Apple)
How I made this site
Jun 22, 2008 Filed in: Mac
I created this website using RapidWeaver 4, from Realmac Software, and CSSEdit, from MacRabbit software. I previously used GoLive, from Adobe, but had grown frustrated with it. I tried Dreamweaver, also from Adobe, but found its interface too complicated. Later on I tried iWeb, from Apple, but found it too limited. RapidWeaver offers a great combination of handholding and flexibility, and generates web pages automatically from individual blog entries. Although the blog format is not exactly what I want, it works well enough and offers lots of benefits. Most importantly, using CSSEdit I was able to modify the site template (included with RapidWeaver) to suit my own needs.
When I went on the econ job market in 2003-2004, I created my online resume website using Adobe GoLive. I wanted a simple design that looked professional without being slick or pretentious. It also had to be easy for people to find and download my papers. I had used GoLive for a few years at that time for some personal projects that were definitely more pretentious and hopefully more slick, but I found that GoLive didn’t work particularly well for my text-heavy resume. I ended up using the source code editor view almost exclusively, since the page layout view made it too difficult to move different pieces around without messing up the div tags.
I stuck with GoLive until recently just because I didn’t have any other good alternatives. About a year ago, Adobe announced that GoLive would be deprecated in favor of Dreamweaver. I tried Dreamweaver out, but found its interface completely impenetrable. What’s more, both GoLive and Dreamweaver are complicated development environments where the user is supposed to have a complete and detailed understanding of every aspect of web page design. I am not a real web designer, nor do I have the time to become one. I just want a website that looks nice and does what I need it to. (Real web designers may want to look at Coda, from Panic.)
Having given up on Dreamweaver, I took a look at Apple’s iWeb program. iWeb comes with lots of templates, and just needs you to fill in the blanks with your content. I thought the blog module was particularly nice, since all you need to do is write your blog posts and store them in iWeb’s database; iWeb will then generate the blog website for you. I began to realize that what I really need is a way to automatically generate a web site from a database of my papers. In this paradigm, I would design the website once, and then just add or update each paper as I progressed in my research. I created an entire website offline in iWeb in just a day; this was a revelation compared to GoLive.
Unfortunately, iWeb turned out to be far too limited for my purposes. The blog posts look ugly if the post title runs over to a second line, unless I retouch each post by hand. I also can’t edit the templates. There is no way to organize blog posts by category.
I started looking for an alternative, and found good reviews for RapidWeaver. Since version 4 would soon be released, I bided my time. When version 4 finally came out about a month ago, I downloaded it and got to work. RapidWeaver works a lot like iWeb, but with a lot more flexibility. Like iWeb, RapidWeaver comes with a variety of themes, but there are lots more options to play with. It handles both categories and tags, which I think will be really helpful when I have more papers. Even better, I can edit the themes directly (I already had to learn the rudiments of HTML and CSS when I used GoLive).
I played around with the themes for a while, and settled on this one, which is my own modified version of “Caribou.” Based on the recommendation of Real Mac Software, I bought CSSEdit to make these modifications. It’s not that CSS code is hard to write; it’s just nice to have an editor that is aware of the syntax, as well as a user interface that makes all of the CSS properties available so I don’t have to look them up on the web.
In the end, RapidWeaver still isn’t quite ideal for what I want to do, but I think I’ve managed to fit most of what I wanted to do into RapidWeaver’s blog paradigm. I highly recommend RapidWeaver for anyone who can fit their web page into the paradigm of a blog, is willing to work with preformatted templates, and doesn’t want to spend a lot of time.
Summary
When I went on the econ job market in 2003-2004, I created my online resume website using Adobe GoLive. I wanted a simple design that looked professional without being slick or pretentious. It also had to be easy for people to find and download my papers. I had used GoLive for a few years at that time for some personal projects that were definitely more pretentious and hopefully more slick, but I found that GoLive didn’t work particularly well for my text-heavy resume. I ended up using the source code editor view almost exclusively, since the page layout view made it too difficult to move different pieces around without messing up the div tags.
I stuck with GoLive until recently just because I didn’t have any other good alternatives. About a year ago, Adobe announced that GoLive would be deprecated in favor of Dreamweaver. I tried Dreamweaver out, but found its interface completely impenetrable. What’s more, both GoLive and Dreamweaver are complicated development environments where the user is supposed to have a complete and detailed understanding of every aspect of web page design. I am not a real web designer, nor do I have the time to become one. I just want a website that looks nice and does what I need it to. (Real web designers may want to look at Coda, from Panic.)
Having given up on Dreamweaver, I took a look at Apple’s iWeb program. iWeb comes with lots of templates, and just needs you to fill in the blanks with your content. I thought the blog module was particularly nice, since all you need to do is write your blog posts and store them in iWeb’s database; iWeb will then generate the blog website for you. I began to realize that what I really need is a way to automatically generate a web site from a database of my papers. In this paradigm, I would design the website once, and then just add or update each paper as I progressed in my research. I created an entire website offline in iWeb in just a day; this was a revelation compared to GoLive.
Unfortunately, iWeb turned out to be far too limited for my purposes. The blog posts look ugly if the post title runs over to a second line, unless I retouch each post by hand. I also can’t edit the templates. There is no way to organize blog posts by category.
I started looking for an alternative, and found good reviews for RapidWeaver. Since version 4 would soon be released, I bided my time. When version 4 finally came out about a month ago, I downloaded it and got to work. RapidWeaver works a lot like iWeb, but with a lot more flexibility. Like iWeb, RapidWeaver comes with a variety of themes, but there are lots more options to play with. It handles both categories and tags, which I think will be really helpful when I have more papers. Even better, I can edit the themes directly (I already had to learn the rudiments of HTML and CSS when I used GoLive).
I played around with the themes for a while, and settled on this one, which is my own modified version of “Caribou.” Based on the recommendation of Real Mac Software, I bought CSSEdit to make these modifications. It’s not that CSS code is hard to write; it’s just nice to have an editor that is aware of the syntax, as well as a user interface that makes all of the CSS properties available so I don’t have to look them up on the web.
In the end, RapidWeaver still isn’t quite ideal for what I want to do, but I think I’ve managed to fit most of what I wanted to do into RapidWeaver’s blog paradigm. I highly recommend RapidWeaver for anyone who can fit their web page into the paradigm of a blog, is willing to work with preformatted templates, and doesn’t want to spend a lot of time.
Summary
- RapidWeaver 4 is a great way to generate a powerful, good looking website, especially in a blog format
- CSSEdit is a convenient way to modify RapidWeaver templates
- iWeb is fun but not very flexible
- GoLive is outdated, complicated to use, and makes it too easy to write bad code
- Dreamweaver is poorly designed and complicated to use