This blog is created with RapidWeaver 3.6. It's a very easy to use web content tool and I recommend it to anyone who needs a nice-looking blog with minimal set up and hassle, especially if you want to touch HTML as little as possible. I tweaked one of the standard templates to my liking and was up and running less than a day after I downloaded the software.
	To experiment with and tweak the CSS while maintaining my sanity at reasonable levels I employ the services of CSSEdit 2.5. I highly recommend it to anyone considering web design.
	Diagrams are created with OmniGraffle, a very interesting graph and diagram editing tool. It's flexible and quick, and creates nice looking output.
	Transmit an FTP client that I use to keep some parts of the site synchronized with my local copies and to do other maintenance functions
	I used to use Apple's Grab utility for getting screen captures, but found it limiting. So I paid real money for Ambrosia's SnapzProX 2, a product so capable it will strip barnacles from dry toast.
	All Objective-C code on the site is written in Apple's XCode, and it is XCode that does all the syntax coloring.
	For simple image editing and other tweaks, I use ImageWell, a very capable drag and drop utility.
	My e-commerce provider is E-junkie, with PayPal providing payment. E-junkie provides the Buy Now buttons, shopping carts, and all that. They're inexpensive, flexible, and easy to use.
	I use Apple's Pages 2.0 application to lay out my Aperture e-book. My book is 500 pages long, and I'm stretching Pages a little, but it is quite usable and does a good job. Pages is part of the iWork suite, now at version 3.
	Pair Networks provides hosting. They've been helpful and quick, and their rates are reasonable. So far I've not noticed any downtime or accessibility problems, so I'm happy.
	I host my galleries on SmugMug. They charge a yearly fee for unlimited storage and bandwidth.

I also have badges to use to link your site to mine on the Link To This Blog page.

The site currently gets about 40,000 page views a month.

I have a knack for understanding how people understand and misunderstand. The challenge is to take that, apply it to complex subject matter such as Aperture, and to create bite-sized articles that consistently help learning without overwhelming or confusing. Feedback (I call it fan mail) confirms that I am succeeding.

I originally started this site as a Cocoa programming blog. I had a little time on my hands and decided to get back in to programming after a long time away. Years ago when engineering paid the bills I wrote real-time embedded systems-level code like drivers, file mangers, OS extensions and all that bare-metal stuff. Been there, done, that, so this time around I tried some high-level, OO, Cocoa programming and had some interesting experiences for about six months. Eventually work and life got too busy and I couldn't keep it up.

Then I bought a Canon S3 at the instant they were available in the US and got the blogging bug again. There were so many people hungry for information on the camera I attracted an instant audience.

Then, because I was taking so many photos (up to two a second with the S3) and was interested in tweaking them, I needed to replace iView MediaPro that I had used since it was given away free with hot dogs. So I bought Aperture and started to learn how to use it, again blogging the results. More recently I have gotten back into Cocoa and have written an Aperture plug-in called Random Wok that has been extensively blogged as I have progressed. I now have a real DSLR and, you guessed it, blog about that as well.

It is pleasing to have found a significant demand for the articles I have written. Perhaps I am only a phone call away from appearing on Letterman. Who knows?

My computer is an Intel iMac 24" with 2G RAM and the faster graphics card. That's my fifth Mac. I have worked my way though a 25MHz 68040 Quadra 700, a 233MHz beige G3, a 17" 1.25GHz flat panel G4 iMac, and a 2GHz 20" iMac G5. All but the first is still in use.

Recent stats show that you, the reader, are most likely to be in the US or Europe. The percentage of US readers is increasing.



Thankfully I picked the right language to write in. The number of non-English readers is, however, increasing.



The percentage of Mac users is high, as I would expect:



And Firefox makes a big splash among users of all OSes. Almost all the Mac visitors are running Tiger based on ther percentage of those using Safari 2.0.



Some of you have huge screens, but many of you don't.