Tag Archives: writing

Server Install Complete

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The server installation goes better than I expected.

I had to wait until after 10 AM to take down the server, wipe its hard disk clean, and install the Tiger Server software. That’s because the computer was busy recording KBSZ’s “Around the Town” show and saving it as an MP3 file so I wouldn’t have to.

The first time I tried to restart from the DVD disc, the computer defaulted back to its internal hard disk for restart. Darn CD/DVD reader problems again. I opened the side of the computer, banged on the drive a little, and shut it back up. Then restarted. It worked.

I had downloaded a “worksheet” PDF document from Apple’s Web site and filled it in in preparation for the big moment. It asked things like the IP address, administrator names and password, Ethernet configuration, disk name, and type of setup. So when the installer started asking questions, I had answers. I finally clicked the Install button and held my breath while the installer checked the DVD disk. Actually, I didn’t hold my breath for the whole time because it took about 15 minutes. Imagine my relief when it had no trouble reading the DVD and began the installation. About 15 minutes later, it was done and ready to restart.

I used my worksheet to answer a few more questions. Then, when I was finished, I got my first look at Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger Server. It looked just like Mac OS X 10.4, but had a few interesting icons on the Dock and one or two extra folders in the hard disk’s root level.

I spent the next fifteen minutes or so updating the “out-of-the-box” version of Tiger server with about 500 MB of updates from Apple’s Software Update server. Thank heaven for the DSL connection. It would have taken a VERY long time if I was still using a cable modem.

My next step was to restore the software that had been running on the server that morning. Not restore from backups, mind you. Restore from original copies of the software. I did Evocam first, since that was the easiest, and had the Webcam up and running in minutes.

Next was Nicecast, for KBSZ’s Internet simulcast. Had a bit of trouble getting the audio out, but after a restart, it worked fine. Of course, I had Jo at KBSZ check it there; because of weird DNS/IP looping problems, I can’t test it from a local computer. Jo couldn’t hear it. Later, I stopped by the station and gave it a try. Someone had turned down the volume on the computer’s speakers.

FileMaker Pro and the AppleScripts and Fetch shortcuts was next. By that time, the CD/DVD drive had decided it wasn’t going to read anymore CDs. Fine. Be like that. I put the CD in my production Mac and used the network to access the CD from the server. I did the install that way and it came off without a hitch. The configuration took a while, though, and required that I rewrite a few of the scripts for the new directory structure on the server. Fix, test, repeat. I was getting used to it.

I also set up Audio Hijack Pro to record the four shows it would need to record and modified the script that would get the 8 AM news on KBSZ’s Web site each morning at 8:18 AM.

When everything appeared to be working right, I set up the computer to automatically log in with me as the user and launch the stuff it needed to launch at startup for truly automated operation. Then I crossed my fingers and restarted.

Everything started up as it should, but FileMaker Pro displayed an error message. It appears that it cannot open files unless it is the foreground application. Although I had set it up to open last, other programs were slower to open and became the foreground application, thus preventing FileMaker from doing its thing. Not acceptable. I thought about writing a script that would delay FileMaker’s launch so it would be the foreground application when it finally opened, but came up with a simpler solution: I just set up the other applications to hide after launch. That left FileMaker Pro as the only application that wasn’t hidden, thus leaving it in the foreground.

Restart. Perfect.

I set up the computer to shut down and restart each night at around midnight. This is to force FileMaker Pro to refresh its databases with current day’s information. In the future, I’ll find a utility that’ll automatically restart the FileMaker Pro databases for me.

I messed around with the FTP setup for a while and didn’t get anywhere good. I might have to rethink the directory structure. It appears that I can’t FTP into the root directory for the computer. That’s unfortunate, since I created a bunch of folders in that location that I’d like to get into. It looks as if I’ll be moving them and modifying the scripts that look for them where they currently are.

Today, I won’t be spending much time in the office. I’ll stop in to check things out, then come back later to press a CD for my radio show. This morning I need to pick up my helicopter from Prescott, where it just had its annual. And I have a charter at 2 PM. Possibly another charter sometime this afternoon, too.

Thursday morning, I’ll play around a bit with Blojsom, the blogging software that’s part of Tiger Server. I’ll be replacing wickenburg-az.com with a blog-based Web site, making it possible for a team of people to add content and to automate the formatting of pages. I have a Doctor’s appointment later in the afternoon, so I won’t be spending as much time on it as I’d like. So it looks like Friday will be my next full day working with the server.

No rush, though. Rather do it right than do it quickly.

Robert’s Rules of Writing: 101 Unconventional Lessons Every Writer Needs to Know

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A quick book review of a book for writers.

I started Robert’s Rules of Writing a few months ago and set it aside. It wasn’t because I didn’t like it. It was because I felt like reading something different at the time.

I picked it up the other day and took it on the plane with me to New York, where I spent the Thanksgiving Holiday. I didn’t feel like carrying the novel I’d borrowed from the library. I wanted something small and light, something I could pick up and put down without losing track of a plot or having to backtrack to remember what I was reading.

I’m about 4/5 through this book and I can’t say enough nice things about it. The author, Robert Masello, offers 101 “rules” for writers and uses about two pages, on average, to explain each one. Some of them seem to contradict known “rules” that writers have been following for years. For example, Rule #1, Burn Your Journal, would likely upset many creative writing teachers and the students who hang on every one of their words. But Mr. Masello carefully explains why a journal isn’t necessarily a good thing. I have to say that I agree with him.

In fact, I agree with just about everything he says — which is pretty unusual for me. We all know what a disagreeable person I can be.

In short, if you’re a beginning writer — or interested in becoming a writer — you really ought to pick up this book. It’ll give you a lot to think about. Or, in many cases, re-think about.

And if you’re already an established writer, you may want to pick up a copy and go through it. Although you should have learned most of this stuff for yourself, it’s good to read someone else’s take on it. And it’s given me quite a few ideas for essays that I can include in the Writing categories of this blog. Information from my own experiences that I think beginning writers may learn something from.

The only thing I didn’t like about the book was its funky layout. Someone in the publisher’s production department thought it would be cute to mix graphics in a distressed Courier (read that typewriter) typeface with book text, fiddle around with boldface type and indented text, change alignment for certain paragraphs, print some pages white on black, and generally make a mess of the book’s layout. I found it incredibly distracting and a bit difficult to read. When the words are good, why screw around with the way they appear on page? I’m sure someone in marketing had their hand in this one.

Overall, though, it’s a big thumbs up. And with an affordable price tag — $14.99 US — it’s a nice addition to any writer’s library.

NaNoWriMo Expanded

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I talk more about beginning novelists.

The other day I wrote an opinion piece about NaNoWriMo ’05, which I turned into a podcast for Maria Speaks. Here are some related thoughts and experiences.

One of the things that has always bothered me was way organizations prey upon people who want to be writers — particularly novelists. They have writers’ workshops and writers’ magazines and and writers’ Web sites with forums and writers’ mail-away courses. They sell products to writers to motivate and inspire them and make them better writers. I’ve seen these products and although I admit to have bought my share of writing books, I’ve also seen enough to know that only a small percentage of what’s sold will really help a writer. And the thing that bothers me most is the fact that the vast majority of writing publications focus on topics of interest to beginning writers — people just starting out. I’m talking about people who haven’t had anything published yet. It’s as if they never expect their readers to get beyond that point.

The people they prey upon — the beginning writers — have a story (or or two or three or dozens) inside their hearts that they’re trying to get out. They’re convinced their work is better than bestselling author, fill-in-the-blank. They believe that the editors who have rejected their work are stupid, selfish, and evil. But rather than spend their time writing, getting those stories out and fine-tuning them for submission and possible publication, they waste a lot of time whining about editors and publishers and the industry in general in online writers’ forums. Or providing all-knowing (or sarcastic) answers to serious questions posted by other want-to-be novelists.

This is where something as silly as NaNoWriMo can help. If these people would stop wasting time and get down to it, they might actually get some work done. A novel in 30 days sounds impossible, but if they’ve been thinking about it as much as they’ve been wasting time in online forums, they should have all the hard part done: the planning, plotting, and character development. Getting the words down should be easy. Just stop procrastinating.

And if there’s one thing that’s always helped me produce, it’s deadlines. Ask Cliff, Nancy, and Megg, three of my editors. (More on that in another blog entry.)

Here’s a real life story about someone I knew years ago. There’s a slight chance she might read this and, if she does, I hope she’s not offended by me telling her story from my outsider’s point of view.

Mary (not her real name) always wanted to be a novelist. I think she was partial to fantasy and science fiction, but she may have had other things in mind. I don’t know because I only had an opportunity to read one thing she’d written. She spent most of her non-working hours online, frequenting bulletin board systems’ (BBSs’) message boards (precursors to the Internet’s forums). She had a BBS and so did I. In fact, that’s how we met.

Her BBS posts were consistently negative toward publishers and editors. She spent a lot of her writing time writing short stories and entering them into contests. She never won. (More about writing contests and other gimmicks in another entry.)

Sometime around then, she sent me one of her short stories to read. I don’t remember what it was about. I don’t recall it being bad, though. But it did have one big flaw. At the end of the story, which takes place in Washington, DC, the main character looks out the window and sees the Pentagon. It was an important part of the story’s irony — seeing that building. I remember that clearly. But it was also a serious flaw because the Pentagon is not in Washington, DC. It’s in Arlington, VA. And it simply cannot be seen from the location her character was standing. When I pointed this out to her, she got extremely offended, as if I’d gone out of my way to find something wrong to pick on her story. I hadn’t gone out of my way. The glaring error was there, right in my face. I would have done her a disservice if I hadn’t pointed it out.

Anyway, she didn’t send me any more stories.

Then one day she decided that the biggest thing holding her back from being a published author was her job. I’m talking about her “day job” — the one where she spent time to earn money to pay rent and buy food. That job. So she quit and retreated into her apartment to write her novel.

A year later, Mary was completely out of money and borrowing from family members to survive. She hadn’t finished her novel and she hadn’t had anything published. I think someone pulled the money plug and she was forced to go back to work.

That’s about the same time I left my day job and started teaching computers and writing how-to books. She claimed I “sold out.” I think she meant that I was writing non-fiction instead of fiction because I was in it for the money. Maybe I did, but my current lifestyle sure beats the 9 to 5, suit-wearing grind I’d be stuck in if I’d kept that corporate job. And who the hell wants to be a starving writer, anyway?

I moved to Arizona and we pretty much lost touch. I heard she had a short story published in a small literary magazine. She was paid in copies. (See my blog entry about Freebies.) But she had her first clip.

The point of this story: this is one person I know who falls into the same category as many of the beginning writers attracted to things like NaNoWriMo, writers’ magazines, and writers’ Web sites with their forums. I’ve just reported her progress in about five years of her life. Five years is a long time. Too long to waste if you’re serious about becoming a writer.

Every day you don’t write, though, is a day you waste if becoming a novelist is your goal. And don’t fool yourself into thinking that participating in those writers’ forums is good practice for writing your novel. I’ll agree that it’s good practice for typing your novel. But it isn’t going to get you any closer to finishing your work in progress.

So why are you reading this? Get back to work!

NaNoWriMo ’05

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Maria Speaks Episode 17: NaNoWriMo.

My comments about the National Novel Writing Month project and the NaNoWriMo ’05 Podcast by Darusha Wehm.

Transcript:

Hi, I’m Maria Langer. Welcome to Maria Speaks Episode 17: NaNoWriMo

I’ve been listening to the NaNoWriMo 05 Podcast by Darusha Wehm. And I’m really sorry if I just mangled her name.

NaNoWriMo — that’s capital N – A – capital N – O – capital W – R – I capital M – O — is short for National Novel Writing Month. The idea is new to me. The goal appears to be to write a 50,000 word novel during the period of November 1 through November 30. It’s an interesting idea, a sort of forced deadline for procrastinators who don’t have an editor reminding them of a deadline as it approaches.

I subscribed to Darusha’s podcast to learn more. You can subscribe, too, at nanorwrimopodcast.blogspot.com. I’ve found that after each episode, I have some comments I’d like to add. That’s what this podcast is all about. I’ll record it and send it to Darusha and she can decide what she wants to do with it. She did, after all, ask for comments in MP3 format. I’m not sure if she expected them from such a cynical realist. But I’ll try to behave myself and be gentle with everyone listening.

First, let me tell Darusha’s listeners a little about me. I write for a living and have been doing so since 1992. That means I write stuff and I get paid for it. I’ve had over 60 books and literally hundreds of articles published in the past fifteen years.

I mostly write computer how-to books and articles. I make a good living doing what I do, but there’s no rest for the weary. Every time a new version of a software product I’ve written about comes out, I have to hit the keyboard to revise my book. I don’t earn royalties on out-of-print books, and most of my books have gone out of print. After all, the average life of a computer book is 12 to 18 months.

I’ve worked on a number of novels over the years but have never finished one. I think it’s because deep down inside, I fear the rejection of something that’s near and dear to my heart. You see, fiction comes from your imagination and soul. Having an editor say he won’t publish it might hurt. Having an editor turn down a new computer book title, on the other hand, doesn’t faze me in the least because there’s so little of me wrapped up in it.

Maybe I need NaNoWriMo to get my latest work in process novel done. I don’t know. I have some thoughts about the 50,000 words in a month deadline that I’ll get to later on in these comments.

And now my comments about things I’ve heard on Darusha’s podcast.

NaNoWriMo gear?

Darusha mentioned that you can buy NaNoWriMo gear on the NaNoWriMo Web site. That raised a flag. And I may as well start these comments with a bang by pissing off some people.

I visited the nanowrimo.org Web site and maybe I’m just dense, but I don’t understand why they need to raise $110,000. I’m also trying to understand why would-be novelists should be so interested in building children’s libraries in Laos. I’m not trying to say that children’s libraries aren’t a worthy cause. But why do NaNoWriMo writers need to support it? And why not support libraries in their own countries?

Okay, so I’m a cynic. It’s hard not to be one when you’re born and raised in the New York City metro area. It just seems to me that the NaNoWriMo gear you can buy at the Web site does more to serve the people selling it than the people buying it.

You want to write a novel in a month? Do you really need a t-shirt to do it? I don’t think so.

And who are the people running the NaNoWriMo web site anyway? It looks to me like some kind of scam to get wanna-be novelists to fund annual vacations for a bunch of Web programming geeks. There’s no indication on the Web site of any real writing organization behind it.

Sorry.

Supporters

Darusha’s episode 3 talked about the importance of supporters. I couldn’t agree more. And I have some comments to add.

I agree that you cannot write a novel or anything else in your spare time without the complete support of your significant other or family. If you just require support for this one month, it’s easy. Ask for it. Explain how important it is to you. Make them understand that by supporting you, they’re helping you achieve your goal. When you achieve your goal with their help, it’s a team effort. But the ball is in your court: if you get the support you need, it’s your responsibility to succeed. Failure would let down everyone and make it just a little tougher for them to support you next year.

Remember, you can’t completely neglect your responsibilities. Do your best to fit your regular chores into your schedule. Rearrange your schedule if you have to, if you can. Just make sure you fit in the things you absolutely must do — like have dinner with your family or go to work — with enough time to get your writing quota done each day.

If you’re trying to write a novel outside of the NaNoWriMo one-month deadline, getting long-term support from your significant other and family might be a little more difficult. One word of advice: be reasonable. Locking yourself up in a room every evening or morning or whatever and neglecting your responsibilities because you’re writing a novel month after month, year after year is just plain irresponsible and stupid. Don’t do that to the people you love. Don’t do it to yourself. Make a deadline and stick to it. And take off enough time during the writing process to keep your life alive.

Novel writing software

Episode 4 talked about tools. Darusha specifically mentioned the phrase “novel writing software.”

I’m sorry, but isn’t any decent word processor an appropriate tool for writing a novel?

This reminds me of an e-mail I got from a guy who wanted to start writing computer how-to books. He asked me to recommend some book proposal software. I told him to try Microsoft Word. That’s what I use and it hasn’t failed me yet.

Here’s the point. There’s no special software that’ll make you a better writer — unless it comes with a creative writing teacher who can critique your work and offer tips for making it better. You can fool around with writing software all you like and it all comes down to your own capabilities. Either you can write or you can’t. Either you have a good idea that you can form into an interesting plot or you can’t. Either you can write realistic dialog and good descriptive prose or you can’t.

That’s not to say that you can’t get better. The best way to be a better writer is to read more, write more, and listen to feedback about your work by people who know what they’re talking about. That doesn’t include your spouse, aunt Tillie, mother, or fellow writing club member — unless one of these people has already had his or her fiction published or works in the industry.

But novel writing software? I looked at CopyWrite, the software package Darusha suggested. It doesn’t look like something you could pick up and start using effectively without a lot of experimentation. So don’t run out and start playing with it now, especially with the NaNoWriMo clock ticking. Use your favorite word processor to write. It has a word count feature built in. And take notes on index cards. Big ones or small ones — your choice. They’re easy to sort, modify, and read. That’ll help make your downtime — like the time you might spend on a bus or train on your way to work or the time you spend at lunch — more productive.

And that brings up something else. Writing a novel is more than just typing words 2 to 4 hours a day until you’re done. It’s planning and plotting. It’s creating backstories for your characters so they’re real. It’s including little details that make your work come alive. When you’re not sitting at your desk, typing away to meet your NaNoWriMo deadline, open your eyes and look around you. Take notes about what you see. Use the index cards. You can put them in your purse or a jacket pocket. Make the most out of all your time, not just the predefined writing time you’ve set aside for this project.

NaNoWriMo forums

Darusha’s Tools podcast also mentioned the NaNoWriMo forums. I visited those on the Web site, too. And here’s my sad report: There are literally hundreds of thousands of posts. My question: why aren’t these people working on their novels? I know from experience that fooling around on the Internet is a great way to procrastinate. Cut it out! Get to work!

If you feel you absolutely must participate in these forums, set a time limit for yourself each day. Something like 15 minutes. Remember, if you type 50 words a minute — which is probably pretty average for someone who actively participates in Internet forums, in those 15 minutes, you could have typed 750 words in your novel. If you wasted an hour in a forum, that hour could have been spent meeting your word count quota for the day.

The good thing about podcasts is that you can listen to them while you’re doing something else. Like driving the car, taking a shower, or working out. So if you must get an Internet fix, do it with podcasts. That’s another way to make the most out of down time.

Backup plan

Darusha also talks about having a backup plan — that is, a plan to backup your novel files. This should be a no-brainer, but I’m sure it isn’t. Most people probably don’t even think of backing up important files — until those files have been wiped out by a hard disk crash, virus, or fire.

Back up your important files. Period. It doesn’t matter what kind of files they are: accounting records, contact databases, or word processing files containing your novel. If you’ll miss it when it’s gone, back it up so you won’t lose it.

Darusha makes some good suggestions for backing up. The main idea is to have an offsite backup. That means backing up on a computer or other device that isn’t sitting right next to the computer where the data lives and breathes. What good is copying your important files to a CD once a week if you store the CD next to your computer? When the burglar steals the computer, don’t you think he might take the disks with him? When the fire breaks out because your superfast, undercooled computer processor got too hot for its own good, don’t you think everything around the computer will burn, too?

Okay, so it isn’t likely. But it is possible.

It’s odd because I was sitting at my desk finishing up for the day while I was listening to Darusha’s podcast in iTunes. Just as she was talking about backing up, I was setting up a folder on my publisher’s FTP server to back up my current work in progress. That folder is accessible by me, both of my editors, and my indexer. I made sure my editors knew why it was there. You see, I’m also a helicopter pilot and there’s always the possibility that I might not match successful landings to take-offs. If something happens to me, I want my editors to be able to get someone else to finish the job without reinventing the wheel.

Check with your ISP. Chances are, you have space on your ISP’s server for your own Web site or something like that. Use that to back up your important files. All of them.

Well, that brings me through Episode 4 and I’ve already said nearly 2,000 words. (Hmmm, if I were writing this for NaNoWriMo, I’d already have my quota met for the day.) But I do have one more thing to say, and that’s about the whole idea of NaNoWriMo.

If you’re participating in NaNoWriMo because you see it as a great way to meet the challenge of writing a novel before a specific deadline, great. You must know what goes into writing a novel and see that it’s more than just the challenge of getting words down so they can be read.

But if you’re participating just to see if you can write 50,000 words in a month, stop and think about it. Are you writing 50,000 words that someone else might want to read? In other words, are you crafting a novel or doing what 100 monkeys at keyboards could do?

My point is this: if you want to be a novelist, it takes more than just saying you’re one and typing 50,000 words as a way to prove it. It takes planning, creative genius, writing skill, and a lot of hard work. NaNoWriMo is one way to see if you can meet deadlines. But there’s more to being a novelist than meeting a deadline.

Do I think it’s possible to write a publishable novel in a month. Yes. The people who do it regularly are referred to in the industry as hacks.

Heck, I’ve been referred to as a hack. But there’s something magic about seeing your name on the cover of a book in a bookstore. Even after the 60th time.

Good luck!