If I seem out of sort during the last couple of week, it was simply because the changes I need to make will require changing not just code but a mental process. Like anything, this will take more than a fortnight to change. It is a process of renewal and making mistakes and just throwing stuff into the trash bin.

What I need is some understanding and some patience while this process works itself out.

Sincerely,
Ivan Wilson
Front-End/UI Developer

O, wonder!
How many goodly creatures are there here!
How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world,
That has such people in’t!

Miranda, from William Shakespeare’s, The Tempest, Act 5, Scene 1

I thought I could organise freedom
How Scandivavian of me

Bjork, The Hunter

Midwest, no specific location. Motel on the side of the road, someplace where Route 66 might have gone through, but got superceded by The Interstate Highway. Instead of a two lane highway, it got the choice placement of being right next to a highway turnoff.

Early hours (3-4AM). Sunrise is still a good hour or so away. Even with at this location, nothing is really moving. Quiet. Seems like the highway is asleep, just getting ready for the next work shift.

In a room. Nothing unpacked. Double beds with a clean bathroom. Little decoration, at least the ones that could distinguish one room from another. I’m lying on a bed, writing pad open but haven’t written anything for about two hours. Laptop open, no files open.

Changed positions in the bed, head facing the TV, remote control ready. Flip through the analog channels, then the digital. Evangelists/Salespeople working hard tonight. Gotta get their quota. Pitchmen are working hard too. Here, everything is for the buying, even if you don’t need it.

[Start of background/scene music – Beth Orton's "Don't Need a Reason" from Trailer Park]

Picked up a pen.

Just write.

If things had happen on course and on plan, I should have been writing this blog entry in a hotel room in Vancouver, Canada. 2011 was the year that I did so many things and traveled to so many places. It was also the year that I found how little it was in an instant.

Historically, second year in every decade has always been the toughest for me, personally and otherwise. By November, I thought that I had escaped “the curse.”

Then, a family member underwent surgery, removing a tumor from the colon. Thankfully, it was beign and little of the large intestine had to be taken out. She is recovering nicely and running around again. She is thankful to the Creator because it could have been worse. I am not so religious but I am just as thankful.

But I’ve spent the remainder of the year having something I don’t have much need for: regrets. Just the “what if’s” and the “what would happen if’s.” I’ve done so much, only to realized that maybe I’ve done so little. In the middle of all this, I tweeted “Human beings are such fragile little creatures.”

Yes, we are fragile creatures. We are these small, flimsy, little things, easily overwhelmed by a virus or a predator or an ice cream truck. Yet we do what we do. Living without much though of what might happen next minute, next hour, or even next decade.

Carl Sagan had a quote from one of his books about human beings being capable of such wonderful dreams and horrible nightmares. One day, my world went from global to the size of a hospital room. And in some ways, it became even smaller, to the size of my own frame.

In all this, I found out that I am the most fragile of all creatures.

If form holds, this will be the worst of it this decade. Which means 2012 could be a big year and it looks like it could be one of the biggest years, work and personal. However, I have lots of questions. I’m a problem solver with the type of questions that can’t be solved with pen and paper. Not with the simple equation. Certainly, not with the wave of the magic wand I once had.

A friend told me during this tough time to take everything one moment at a time. I could say that I readily took his advice. But I can’t lie. I’m the child of the five-year plan. And when that didn’t work, I reworked it and call it the next five year plan and so on. This time, I have nothing. At the point where I could have some of my greatest success, I have no plan and nothing to adjust. I was the Russian who had the plan for everything. Now, I am just a human being.

Well, on New Year’s Eve, I’m here. At home. Not alone. With family and friends nearby. If there was one question that was solved, it was the quality of friends I have – better than I could have imagined.

So, 2011 ends. 2012 start tomorrow.

[End of movie scene:]

Finish the scribbles and close the pad.

In an instant, I’m in motion. Clean up a bit, collect my things, and turn off the TV. Step out and close the door. Quietly, as if a single squeak from the joints could shatter the windows.

Get in the car. Don’t worry about waking anyone up. If they were awake, nothing you need to know about. Still quiet on the highway overpass. The only light sources are those from the highway and from the restaurants. It’s an alien world, as if the aliens took the 1960′s American tourists as a starting point and went from there.

Close the door, twist the key, rev the motor. Then, just step on the gas and move. Not fast (who’s going to notice), just keeping the car in motion. A minute, I’m off tarmac and on asphalt, moving down the road. Passing the lights and signs, quietly without fanfare, slowly passing everything. Soon, I’m away from the light source, like a satellite heading for deep space.

I pointed the car down the road, away from the highway, No signs. Just two yellow lines. If I’m lucky, I will get some direction from the sunrise.

I’m going somewhere.

That direction.

[Last notes of the song fading out as the car fades into the dwindling night.]

This is not a joke.

If you are laughing at this, I understand. It still won’t change anything.

Let me explain.

In 2009, through contact with interaction designers, I saw the coming wave that we now call mobile. That wave moved so fast that it took everyone by surprise. Today, designers and developers are dealing with this via responsive design and other techniques.

Now, what does it have to do with me. One day recently, I was tasked to revised some code I made in late 2009. Now, it was good by those standards but it has a few faults. Not perfect but usable and everyone was satisified.

At the time, it was "Job done. Go to sleep."

But I didn’t.

I would say that I spent a year (2009-2010) thinking about this code. What I realized was this code was simply too fragile, i.e. works well for small/mid projects but cracks if scaled for larger sites. It was basically spaghetti without the marinara sauce. I knew that if I was going to go forward, something had to change. And it did.

Change came slowly throughout 2010 from two directions.

First, Project Charles (TWP redesign) helped re-examine a number of ideas. It was first project coded in HTML5/CSS3 and it was a testing ground for changes that I wanted to apply.

First, I heard Nicole Sullivan lecture on OOCSS at An Event Apart conference in DC. Her work with optimizing CSS really made me think about the work I was doing. In the end (and after some considerable thought), decided to take some of those ideas and integrate it into my own work.

Well, between the two, I decided after 2011 New Year’s Day vacation in Vancouver, Canada to make some changes. Those changes have been coming bit by bit during the year. It’s now at a point where the code from today is remarkably different my work in 2009. But, there is still something missing.

For the last couple of months, I’ve been wondering whether or not just making small changes is not enough. I’ve been traveling and thinking. Up to Boston for the JQuery Conference early October, An Event Apart DC conference and Accessibility Camp a few weeks later. Mobile UX Camp a few weeks earlier in September. In the end, its come down to this realization:

At the being of the year, I put up this placeholder at my"development" space at deltatwp.com. The title is 2011: Year of the Devices. When I put up those words, I was looking down the road where mobile had the same mindset that I current have for accessibility. Something that should not be a separate silo, but something that should be integrated into the development process. The change came about seeing the design process originally creating containers to put content altered. Now the process is becoming content-driven, where designers are consciously and precisely taking content and building the box around it like architects have been doing for years.

In my attempt to describe this process, I called it The Information Layer. This was my way of describing the change, where the old model of UI layer was changing. When I first made that sketch and refined it, I was working with XSLT and XML. But the model was expanded beyond this original paradigm.

In The Information Layer, I was recoginzing that the old UI layer description was obsolete. It simply was not granular enough to describe the new model that was emerging. In this model, we have not only the separation of content from presentation; we have to account for two other changes. First, the growth of JavaScript/AJAX to a behavioral layer, the layer where all the advanced (rich) interactions are built on top. The second, important part is the further separation of HTML code in the semantic layer from content. Thus, we get the information layer, where content can be used across media, from mobile to print to screenreaders. That is the real revolution – the concept of designing around content instead of the other way around.

However, my idea was to take it further. In hindsight, what we are viewing now is the revision of the old idea of media, in the familiar terms of print, screenreaders, or screen. Instead of mobile being a platform, why not think of it as any other media. Or to take it further, why not think in terms of devices instead of platforms. When one thinks of content in this way, we are reminded of the rise of API’s, where we can take content from the source and modify it to suit our applications, in whatever form it takes, mobile, print, or otherwise.

So, that is what I have been thinking about for the past couple of years. Unfortunately, I tried writing this out early, only to be met with a good case of writers’ block. At one point, I stopped trying to write this altogether. But then, at the An Event Apart DC conference a few weeks ago, Karen McGrane mentioned all those same ideas and it felt like confirmation. All the things that I have been thinking about are now part of the common discourse. Finally.

So, the future is now. What am I going to do about it?

Today, I’m blowing up my code.

At the beginning of the year, after coming back from Vancouver, I started to think about how things have changed during the last five years. Then, this idea popped into my mind:

What if I was hired today to do my job instead of five years ago?

Seriously. A lot has happened. If I was the same person five years ago taking this job now, what would I need to be successful?

I think it as good as time as any to blow up my code.

Tear it apart. Shred it up. Throw it up in the air and rework it.

I’ve spent the last year making changes to code. Evolutionary changes. Slowly, a piece here, a tweak there. But, with the coming of the new year, I think that it’s about time that I spend some time and do a really through examination of what I’ve been doing. In the end, the goal is to start coding in a way that embraces both the mobile and desktop in an unified fashion.

Starting today.

coding, mobile, Shadout Mapes, Churchill, and John Lennon

Important? What does this mean?

Well, you’ll find out in the next blog entry…

I woke up, did a mile plus on the treadmill, got ready for work. Nice sunny day, last day of the work week and need to score some low-fat yogurt after work. Anyways, I got dressed in shorts, plaid short-sleeved shirt and (closed-toed) sandals. No fencing tonight – which means I can use the bike today.

I got to the bus stop on my bike and another bus rider walked up to me. He was wearing black sneakers and mentioned that today was his company’s “Leisure Dress” day. Of course, he saw my sandals and mentions that it seems everyday, at least from his perspective, is business casual for me.

Well actually it’s true, but I digress…

This is when I replied with the following line:

“I may dress leisurely for work. I just don’t work leisurely. Big difference.”

Of course, I added some additional emphasis with the “Issac from The Love Boat” double finger point on “Big difference.”

Now, he could have perceived that statement with some “attitude” but it wasn’t. We both had a nice smile and laugh afterwards.

And it was so true…damn right.

However, there is the “formal” name that gives more of an explanation of what this groups of writings will be about, based on the following:

The Information Layer
A group of writings/blog entries based on the observations of the mobile/web environment
by Ivan Wilson

Beyond that, still working on the initial step.

Of course, I just realized that there are two initial steps and I have to figure out a way to work this out.

Pain.

Sorry for the three month delay. Usually reasons: work, personal, and fencing. I would say that nothing has changed but that would be a bold-faced lie. As a matter of fact, more things will be changing in the next six months than the last year.

Writing

• Finally starting work on The Information Layer, with the first part ready Saturday, August 6th.
• Writing a few more blog entries for CDG, one this month
• One very important blog entry for TWP this month, currently writing now

Conferences

Going to a number of events during the last couple of months of this year. Two of the most important are in the month of October:

• jQuery Conference in Boston (October 1-2. 2011)
• An Event Apart DC (October 24-26, 2001)

Exhibitions

In short, been really too busy to go any art exhibitions in the last couple of months. However, there are a few that I am trying to get to before they close in September.

• Designing Tomorrow (National Building Museum, Washington, DC) – about the world’s fairs in 1930′s
• Talk to Me (MoMA, NYC, NY) – design exhibit about interaction between objects and people
• The Allure of the Automobile (Portland Art Museum) – automobile design during the last century
• The Colour of My Dreams: The Surrealist Revolution in Art (Vancouver Art Gallery) – various works from the Surrealists

Work

As I mentioned before, many things will change. How much/what kind will be detailed more in the next TWP blog entry, called “A Love Letter.”

Indirectly, eventhough Project Charles ended in April, the Delta version of this site will be completed by the end of the year (if nothing else drops from the sky…).

Fencing

Well, fencing will be…fencing. Practice three times per week, one competition per month. Still working out the schedule for 2011-2012 season.

Music

Due to my work schedule, missed out on attending Met’s performance of Berg’s Wozzeck. However, looking at the 2011-2012 schedule, will be marking my calendar for the following operas:

• Satyagraha – Philip Glass opera about Ganhdi (November 2011)
• The Makropulos Case – Leoš Janáček opera, based on a story by Karel Čapek (May 2012)

Apart from the classical scene – Elbow comes to DC in September (Yeah!!!)

That is that I have for the next couple of months…

And yes, I will be taking a vacation. Back to the PNW (Portland, OR/Vancouver, Canada) for my birthday.

What’s that sound? That’s the sound of my Google Calendar crying like a baby…

First sketch of new information model (same date)

New information model (current view, comparing with previous model) – Basis for “The Information Layer” essay

After two years this month, I have decided to end Project Charles in April. This will also mark the 10th anniversary of The Wilson Project.
Mar 14 (Twitter)

Depending on the ever changing schedule, Project Charles will be ending this year, if not sooner. After a long two years, I should be happy.

I'm exhausted.

I've carried this thing around, weathering all the stuff that gets thrown at me in the course of human life. This project became the internal motor of change, reflection, and experimentation. And a number of people have really benefitted from the results.

The basis of Project Charles was redesigning The Wilson Project with the state of the art techniques in front-end development. No, we are not talking about the dazzling canvas experiments and all the fireworks. It was about learning all this new stuff to be able, like an experienced chef, to use this wider pallette to improve their work. Well, I'm still doing that. But Project Charles brought about an urgency to the process.

Well, that urgency has come full circle. It's at a point where this project needs to end in order to go further on with other things. And since The Wilson Project Site is a working blog (and soon-to-be) portfolio site, I needed to end this thing to start doing new projects. And basically, I just need this monkey off my back. So why am I writing this blog entry?

Because I feel that the need to apologize [to myself].

This project was started with the idea of using XSLT via Symphony CMS. It's a very interesting application that I am sure will grow and improve. The cast of characters over there are currently working on the third version as I am writing this.

Now, I'm in a time crunch. I cannot, at this time, learn XSLT and learn a new CMS without some focused time and effort. Unfortunately, considering the numerous hiatus periods in this project, that will never happen. So I took the hard choice and decided to move the project back to WordPress to speed up completion. I'm relieved at be removed of this burden. But I also feel sad, as I made some sort of bad compromised to complete this project. I know I shouldn't, but I'll live. I may feel bad for not completing the project in the way that I wanted fully but I have to move on.

The other reason for Project Charles was conceptual. The "residue" of studying and observing the work around me of interaction design and front-end development. Yes, I have a few ideas that I've squirrel away.

It's called The Information Layer.

Ideally, Charles would have been the best demo, especially with Symphony/XSLT. But with the external changes of the last two years, there is a real need to share something now and not wait further down the road for an actual demo model.

So, I'm shipping now. Everything can wait.

I need my life back.