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The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

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Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#111

Post by yters »

shimon wrote: post #83
dfranke wrote: post #72

I might implement an emacs minor mode that does this.

You're probably thinking of an emacs mode that does this on its own, but it would also be excellent to have an emacs minor mode that integrates with Etherpad. Ideally, you just do M-x etherpad-buffer and emacs tells you a URL that you can then send around and let other people watch / co-edit whatever you're editing in emacs. To make this work, Etherpad would need to provide an API, though not necessarily a well-docum…

Even without an API he could probably hack something with lynx and term-mode.

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#112

Post by TimothyFitz »

pg wrote: post #2

I've been wanting to play back the writing of an essay for years. Since Etherpad saves every keystroke, I convinced the founders to add a way to play them back. "Startups in 13 Sentences" was the first essay I wrote on Etherpad. Now I'm going to write all of them on it. Playback is just one little feature of Etherpad, but think of the implications of this alone. Among other things it will make cheating impossible in…

Indeed, I've written all of my posts on a combination of Darkroom and Etherpad. Etherpad lets me involve a couple editors who can make copy edits and suggestions while I'm still the draft.

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#113

Post by jasonkester »

jasonkester wrote: post #43

Thanks for that. I built this same thing into Twiddla (to replay meetings), but never released it because I didn't like the interface. I had always assumed that nobody would get it unless I built a silly little mp3/cd player timeline with sliders and buttons. This changed my mind. Simple works just fine. Gimme a couple days and I'll polish it up and throw it live. Thanks again!

Followup: Done and launched.

http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=496331

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#114

Post by sofal »

I'm self-critical enough as it is just realizing that someone else is going to read the finished product, let alone everything I wrote before exposing it. I would have a hard time letting my thoughts flow.

In addition, for school papers I would type in sarcastic or snarky sentences just for fun about what I really think of the subject matter or whatever book I was forced to write an essay for at the time. Sometimes I'd go so far that I would save a different copy of the paper just so that I could go back and laugh at it years later.

It looks like a great way to gain insight into how you or someone else writes, but I think it should always be opt-in.

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#115

Post by cpach »

tlb wrote: post #39
there wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i'd love to see how a piece of legislation gets written with something like this.

"To retain respect for sausages and laws, one must not watch them in the making." -- Otto von Bismarck.

That's a great quote. Seems like the original version is by John Godfrey Saxe though, and reads "Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made."

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/21/magazine/27wwwl-guestsafir...

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#116

Post by pg »

olefoo wrote: post #50
pg wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's different when it's built into a generic, web-based editor. Imagine the difference between a) telling students to install a keylogger, write an essay with it turned on, then submit the essay plus the logs, and then the teacher figuring out how to replay the logs, versus b) telling students to write their essay at etherpad.com, they submit the url, teacher clicks on "replay." As for the matter of students being o…

> because all the apps are moving online. I think that pendulum has almost reached the end of it's arc. There are a number of trends that are starting to pull in the opposite direction. From concerns about privacy and security to the proliferation of mobile computing, intermittent disconnection from the cloud has it's uses. Tools like Google Gears and the continued blurring of the line between desktop applications an…

There are pendulums in fashion, but not, as far as I know, in technology. If you get pendulum-like behavior for a cycle, you have to assume it's a coincidence.

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#117

Post by pg »

ananthrk wrote: post #56

As others have mentioned - a great experience to watch PG writing essays. However, I was put off by the speed. Is this because PG was typing so fast or is it the player? Is it possible to control the speed (other than the Prev/Next link at the top)?

It's the player. Controllable speed is high on the feature list.

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#118

Post by kulkarnic »

yters wrote: post #111
shimon wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're probably thinking of an emacs mode that does this on its own, but it would also be excellent to have an emacs minor mode that integrates with Etherpad. Ideally, you just do M-x etherpad-buffer and emacs tells you a URL that you can then send around and let other people watch / co-edit whatever you're editing in emacs. To make this work, Etherpad would need to provide an API, though not necessarily a well-docum…

Even without an API he could probably hack something with lynx and term-mode.

Not so sure; if I'm not mistaken Lynx javascript support is rudimentary (if not non-existent). Doing Comet on that would be somewhat challenging, I guess.

An API to etherpad would realy help, IMO.

Re: The most surprising thing I've seen in 2009, courtesy of Etherpad

#119

Post by kulkarnic »

pg wrote: post #36
YuriNiyazov wrote: post #22

how long did that take in real time?

It's so hard to guess. I remember it taking about 3 days, but not working all day. I know there were 5400 half-second intervals when I typed at least one keystroke (that's what the numbers at the top mean).

5400 half-seconds is 45 minutes. So, assuming you take 2 min to think for every 1 min of typing, that's still working on the essay just 45 minutes everyday (for 3 days).

I think (from comment above: "not working all day") you took much longer than the figure above? Perhaps a lot more thought goes into an essay than I imagine?

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