The beginning of the new school year always cuts down on writing time a little, so rather than posting another droning essay, I thought I’d share a few ideas that I’ve been thinking about lately.
Idea one: Web designers, Linearize online addresses. When you place an address on a website, it should be formatted as follows:
123 Main Street, Chapel Hill, NC 27514
rather than:
123 Main Street
Chapel Hill, NC 27514
Why? It is much easier to cut and paste the former, rather than the latter into Google/Yahoo/Live maps. The latter form of the address is optimized for letters and envelopes, while the former is optimized for online consumption.
Idea two: Let me schedule my cell-phone ringer. Everyone carries a cell phone to class – the students, the teachers, etc. I want to be able to program my class schedule into my cell phone, and for those times, I want my phone to vibrate, not ring. The problem I’m trying to solve is not remembering to turn my phone to vibrate – I can usually do that – but rather remembering to turn my phone back from vibrate to ring. If I can Bluetooth a video from my phone to my laptop, why can’t I schedule my ringer? It seems so elementary, but it is missing completely.
Tags: ideas
Fred Stutzman is a doctoral student, researcher and teaching fellow at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill's School of Information and Library Science. He studies how people use social media.
Your second suggestion is so brilliant and intuitive, you really wonder why it hasn’t already been done.
I know! Sheesh. If the iPhone has ringer programmability, I’m done. That alone is worth 500 ;)
I’m with you on both counts. As for the phone, you would think that it’d be simple for any smart phone with a calendar to understand that *any* scheduled time should be vibrate time. I’ve taken to keeping my phone on vibrate all the time and keeping it my pocket so I’ll know when it rings. I know of some places experimenting with this idea, but haven’t heard of any implementations yet.
Idea one:
OmniWeb flattens newlines when you paste into a one-line text box, so I, at least, don’t have this problem. Hooray, OmniWeb!
Idea two:
My Sony-Ericsson T68 had automatic ringer based on the built-in calendar, if I recall correctly… which means it was done about 5 years ago, at least.
I’ve been actively bullying anyone whom I though could make #2 happen——for six years now; I promissed I wouldn’t have a cell phone without it (and a GPS feature to notice that I decided to go to church at the last minute). . . Nothing so far, and I work at a cell phone operator!
I’ll try to get one of those T68, Rich; thanks for the hint.
I need a Sony T68. Last night my (the instructors) phone rang in class. I had turned my phone to vibrate but I hadn’t “confirmed” the change. This was a little embarrassing. This whole semester is going to be a little embarrassing. :)
I just upgraded my years-old Razr to a Samsung Blackjack, which I was suprised to find has the very feature you’re asking for. It’s labeled, unintuitively, “Automatic”, and it auto-switches you from vibrate to sound depending on your calendar…it’s even smart enough to only silence when the calendar says you are busy, not just for a reminder.
Brilliant feature…I’m not sure how I lived without it now.