I've written before about the importance of playing a computer like an instrument. Employing many small efficiency tips on a laptop will add up to copious amounts of time over the span of a year (let alone the span of your working life in front of a computer!) I've calculated that playing a computer as an instrument can literally create one week (about 40 hours) each year in efficiency gains. So learn these tricks and then take an extra week of vacation!
Now, to quantify a standard against which we can benchmark people's skill at playing a computer like an instrument, I'm challenging anyone to beat me in the F1 GeekSpeed Challenge.
Here's how it works:
Here's the leaderboard so far:
Other non-qualifying submissions:
Here are the instructions
(you might want to print these out so you can follow them more easily):
1. Start recording your desktop (you can use iShowu on the Mac or a similar screencast program on the PC)
2. Open any browser
3. Open the following websites in 3 separate tabs:
4. Open the following website in a new window:
5. Go back to the tab that has www.google.com. Close it.
6. Open any text editor. Create a file called "findme" (.txt or .doc etc - anything is fine). Write the following text:
"Let's see if I can win this awesome challenge."
Then edit the text to say:
"I'm sure I can win this awesome challenge. My video will be the shortest of them all."
7. Save it in your documents folder.
8. Quit all your open applications
9. Find the document you just made in the your finder (or explorer if you're using Windows). Click on it once to highlight it. (you don't need to open it.)
10. Open a mail client (or gmail, etc.). Compose an email to "[email protected]"
11. Attach the file you made. Write the text:
"Dear Daniel,
Here is the file I made. Did I win?"
Attach the file you made to the email.
12. Send the email.
13. Stop the screencast (this is still part of the competition!)
Then, post it to Vimeo or YouTube. The length of the video will be your official time. Send me the URL to the video along with your full name. I'll put you on the leaderboard based on your time.
Additional rules:
Most everyone uses a computer. But a few of us, well, we play a computer like an instrument.
If you're on a computer for 10+ hours per day, this blog is for you.
By "instrument" I mean we know the in's & out's of the device. We know how to eek out maximum performance from it. We're the people who others just look at in wonder when our keys fly across the keyboard.
If you've ever found it excruciatingly painful watching others use a computer because of how slow the person is, then you know what I'm talking about.
These are just my tips, but really, I'm writing this because I want to know about your tips. I want to know what saves you time and makes you more productive. So please post comments below.
Today I wanted to follow the instructions on "How to Make a Video Blog and Screencast" to learn to make a quick video blog or screencast. Only one problem - the guide there describes how to do it on a Mac, not on Windows.
Odio describes and demonstrates his basic process:
1 .PhotoBooth to record video, comes standard on any Mac 2. iShowU by ShinyWhiteBox for screencast capture 3. Vimeo (similar to YouTube) for uploading videos. Especially useful is their desktop uploader tool.
Unfortunately, PhotoBooth and iShowU aren't available on Windows. It took me a couple hours of research, but eventually I found a program that does both: Cyberlink Youcam. It's quite a good program, it's minimalistic and stays out of your way, but has enough power. Fast learning curve. Elegant. Auto-saves when you've hit stop, so you're already ready to go.
