• Characters

    I don’t have too much to say about characters actually. They all differ, they are all crucial to your story, and they are all carrying something of yourself.

    That’s right, I subscribe to the idea that there is a little bit of the author in every character. Yes, even the murderer, and yes, even the politician. We are all.

    Characters build over time. Some are planned in advance, perhaps the reason a story unfolds in the first place, whereas others are born during the outlining phase. Main characters usually pop up in your mind before you start writing since they’re probably pushing your story forward, but support characters are sometimes invented while writing. I see no problem with this, other than that unplanned characters are often introduced with just one purpose: To move the story forward. That’s not wrong by itself of course, but even small characters need to be believable, otherwise you’ll risk breaking the reader’s spell.

    A good character is believable. A bad one isn’t.

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  • Jag är Sveriges 50:onde bästa utvecklare

    Computer Sweden tycker att jag är Sveriges 50:onde bästa utvecklare, av 100 listade totalt.

    50. (ny). Thord Daniel Hedengren, vd på egna webbyrån Odd Alice.
    Antal år i yrket: 14 år.
    Kompetens: WordPress, html, PHP, responsiv design samt IOS.
    Verksamhetsområde: Webbutveckling för stora företag, inklusive analys och kampanjer, utveckling och design för IOS.
    Andra meriter: Håller föredrag på agila konferenser.

    Se hela listan här.


  • Outlining

    If you’ve ever read a site or book about how to write a novel (or anything longer than a couple of paragraphs), you’ll have been told to outline.

    So what is an outline?

    You know, that depends on who you ask. It could be a simple disposition with chapter titles and a few sub-headings, or it is a crazy deep index card system that basically tells the whole story. None of those are wrong, nor is whatever method of outlining you might be subscribing to.

    There are no rules for how you are supposed to write a book.

    Again: There really are no rules.

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  • Discipline

    Writing isn’t about getting hit in the head by inspiration. It isn’t about finding your muse, and it isn’t about living the glamourus life of the always suffering and slightly alcoholic writer. Although it can probably be for some, in which case I think you should skip this text as it will only make you sad and shatter your illusions.

    Writing is about discipline.

    If you want to be a writer you need to write. Excuses won’t get you anywhere with writing. So when you put off writing for a day because you’re not feeling inspired, you’re basically fooling yourself. Sure, some days the words come easier than others, but deadlines wait for no man, and writers write.

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  • Will Apple Really Give the iPad mini a Retina Display in 2013?

    The iPad mini is a nice little piece of hardware, light and featuring an overall nice design. It works surprisingly well in both portrait and landscape mode, something I was a bit worried about due to the small form factor. As for writing on it, well I’m tapping away at it right now and it works well enough, I’ll be doing speed tests later.

    One thing that really does bother me however, is the lack of a retina screen. Sure, the iPad mini might share the resolution with the aging iPad 2, and thanks to the smaller screen each pixel is smaller, making text look less jagged than on the iPad 2. If I had never seen a retina iOS device I might not have been bothered by this.

    But I have, and I am.

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  • NaNoWriMo

    It is day two of National Novel Writing Month, or NaNoWriMo as the cool kids like to say, and I’m on track. The concept behind NaNoWriMo is to write a book in a month, a fairly short one clocking in at 50,000 words. That’s 1,667 words per day in November, something I managed just before midnight yesterday by the way.

    There’s a lot more written about NaNoWriMo on the official site, so I urge you to read up if you like.

    NaNoWriMo is a good idea, I like it. It encourages people to write, which is always a good thing. So it is all good then, right?

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  • Introduction To My NaNoWriMo

    November isn’t just about growing a mustache for cancer awareness, it is also the National Novel Writing Month, more commonly known as NaNoWriMo. This got me thinking, something I usually do best when my slate is full (and it is quite full right now). I’ve been thinking about writing a little bit about the art/craft/madness of writing.

    So I sat down and wrote down the titles of some possible articles. It ended up being quite a list, and I’m pretty sure it will grow a bit as I start writing. This is something I intend to do by the way, unless you hadn’t figured that out yet.

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  • WordCamp Stockholm 2012

    I måndags gick WordCamp Stockholm av stapeln för andra gången. Det var en lyckad tillställning tycker jag, och även om det alltid finns saker som kan göras bättre, mål som kan nås, och intressen som kan bejakas, så låter det på besökarna som att de håller med mig. Mer vet jag efter vi skickat ut och samlat in svaren på en enkät om konferensen, och utifrån det kommer vi även ta beslut rörande hur det ska se ut nästa år.

    Synpunkterna på WordCamp Stockholm 2012 kommer inte bara forma hur konferensen ska se ut framöver, utan även vilken inriktning vi ska ta med #wpsthlm. Ni som var på plats har hört mig tjata om att vi behöver prata mer, gång på gång, och jag tänker minsann dra mitt strå till stacken och försöka anordna fler träffar och tillställningar. En del blir under parollen #wpbar, som sprider sig över Sverige redan i vinter, och andra blir inom #wpsthlm. Det finns en övergripande tanke här, en målsättning och en vilja att hjälpa WordPress-Sverige att bli lite tajtare, lite närmre, och lite bättre. Vi gör det tillsammans.

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  • Embed your App.net posts

    Thomas Bensmann have created a nifty little plugin for WordPress that lets you embed App.net posts, among other things. So does it work?

    https://alpha.app.net/tdh/post/992651

    Yes indeed it does. More here, along with a download link of course. Oh, and you should follow me on App.net if you’re one of the 25,000+ hanging out there.


  • Om Quote & Comment-bloggar

    Vet du vad en Quote & Comment-blogg är? Läs mer här.


  • Quote & Comment

    In this week’s column over at WPMU.org I’m talking about the blockquote. You should go there and read it.

    I’m also talking about a particular type of blog, which I tend to call Quote & Comment. This is a blog that is primarily built as a content flow consisting of quotes and links to other sources, along with a few lines of commentary. You might call it a link blog, but I’ve never been too fond of that term.

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  • Follow me on App.net

    Are you hanging out with the cool cats at App.net? I am @tdh there too, do follow me if you want to talk.


  • 10 Million iPad Minis and Millions Spent on Patent War

    Apple is rumored to have placed an order for a whopping 10 million iPad Mini units. This long time rumored 7″ sibling to the successful iPad is said to be announced at an event in October, and hit stores in November. 10 million units are to get Apple through the fourth quarter, and is twice the amount of Kindle Fire HD’s ordered by Amazon, all according to the Wall Street Journal.

    The patent war with Google-Motorola, among others, have made Apple invest more in its patent portfolio than in R&D. Read the The New York Times feature iEconomy for an interesting insight in how a modern day successful technology has to keep up with the patent system.

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  • En liten lägesrapport

    Det är tyst från mig just nu, så pass tyst att det dyker upp pingar på diverse sociala nätverk (Facebook, Twitter och App.net) samt inte minst per e-post. Lyckligtvis är det få som försöker ringa mig…

    Hur svarar man lättast? Jo, med en bloggpost så klart.

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