kottke's been dying for a shout-out for weeks now. he watched you dive into diveintomark with a nary a reference to his dubious "sherfari" mock-ups. of course he's too much of a rockstar to actually leave a comment on your blog - the mountain should come to him. so today he finally caved a little and invoked TrackBack. he even publicly envied you. and lo and behold. haha. i love weblogs.

keep up the great work, dave. can't wait until the next lean mean safari release. :)

Suggestion about the search feature and Sherlock integration:

I would like two options for the Search box, one that starts a google search, like now, another one that starts a Sherlock search. it would start Sherlock on the internet channel and transfer the word you have just typed into Sherlock and start the search. I think sherlock is apple-scriptable so it should be extremely easy to do.

That would be a neat integration like apple likes them.

Being able to use other search engines would be much apreciated too.

When you click on the little magnifying glass in the Search box you should be able to choose which search engine you want, including Sherlock.

Voila!

P.

Yes, I think they should remain separate applications as well.

I'd prefer a loose integration, not a moosh-em-together integration.

What might be cool would be a Sherlock daemon
running in the background, which could service
search requests from any application, returning
an XML or HTML result set. Or maybe an
NSDictionary via DO.

The Safari search field could be set to any
of the user's Sherlock plugins.

The Sherlock app would then become just a
GUI for getting search results and managing
plugins.

Might I suggest a more broad framework for web applications (http://www.ibiblio.org/jimray/blog/archives/000129.html)? WebCore is fantastic, but it can be so much more than just libraries to parse HTML and Javascript. Create a central repository for bookmarks, the web cache, cookies, preferences, and passwords locked on the keychain. Make it all open and build an SDK that third party developers can use. Make it all tie in to .Mac.

When I bookmark a site in Safari, it should be added to the WebCore bookmark file, then seek out an RSS file as well. That way, when I open up NNW, if an RSS feed is present, the site that I bookmarked is subscribed to in NNW. If I read a blog entry in Safari, NNW should be able to read the WebCore cache and know that I've already read it and mark it as read. When I go home, my computer should synchronize my WebCore bookmark files over .Mac. Or just synchronize a subset or bookmarks that I define. I should also be able to subscribe to other people's public bookmark files like iCal files.

This alone will help users feel like they're having a cohesive web browsing experience. Yes, they'll be using several applications to use the web, but they'll all be tied together. This is the most Mac-like approach I can conceive of.

Yes Sherlock and Safari can be integrated *and* remain separate applications, with this piece of code...

tell application "Sherlock"
search Internet for "" in channel "internet" display yes
end tell

Before you add ANY new features to Safari, *PLEASE* fix the problem it has logging in to PHP-Nuke based sites. That one bug is a total deal-stopper for me, and I can't use Safari until it's fixed.

I think Safari and Sherlock should be one.
- safari and sherlock do the same. just in an other way
- sherlock should be the same as webcore. Option for all developers
- better bookmark managment for sherlock
- sherlock is slow and is not used as it could be

Sometimes I just shake my head... one day the world will catch up.

Thursday, August 15, 1996

And all things become new again.... Welcome to CyberDog from Apple.

Glad you clarified that :-). I thought the way Jason Kottke coopted your previous "thinking out loud" was shameful. To me, it was pretty clear from your post that you were thinking along the lines of protocol handlers for things like NNW, which I think is a splendid idea.

I think the fact that Kottke chose not to include a "comments" option on that particular post is quite revealing.

[to Buzz] Kottke has NO comment option on his blog altogether, so I don't see any particular "revelation" in this case.

Anyway, I find the Safari+RSS idea much more appealing that yet another search engine means in a browser.

kottke DOES enable comments from time to time. he did during sherfari's intial abortion ... so the lack of this feature with respect to his current post is indeed conspicuous. plus, his headline is misleading. he seems to imply that his horrible suggestion is gaining momentum. the opposite appears to be true. and it's especially moot since dave hadn't even read kottke's post when he started talking about netnewswire and stuff.

maybe kottke's gunning for employment at apple. who knows. those mock-ups were mad photoshop skillz, yo. can't wait to see 'em added to his portfolio. remember when he tried to take credit for news.google's interface last year? lol. weblogs.

Look, safarifan, just relax about Mr Kottke.

If you'd read only the initial blog entry, you might well get a different impression than if you'd read Dave's subsequent follow ups.

Francois: As safarifan pointed out, both of Kottke's previous Sherfari posts had comment options. This one, conspicuously, did not.

As for your assertion that Safari+RSS is a good idea: it may well be, but that's a far cry from "Sherfari," and saying that David's comments support Kottke's ideas is a bit of a stretch.

remember when he tried to take credit for news.google's interface last year

Um, clearly you've got some sort of aversion to Jason's work, but the last version of Google News (before the current layout) actually did revamp its design based on Jason's screenshots that he posted to his site. They linked to his site with a thank you at the time.

FYI: The first link to kottke.org is broke.

I imagine you've all read this too, but it puts it in a nutshell for me: http://www.0format.com/archive/000213.php

Seperate should be the default, as should playing well with others.

Put the burden of proof on the integrators and MSFT wannabes.

What exactly is everyone's problem with Jason Kottke? Geez .. some of the comments here are awfuly harsh. If you've got something to say about the content of his suggestions, say it, but the personal stuff just discredits your posts and your thoughts.

An you guys wonder why we have $500 toilet seats? It's because of this kind of creeping-featurism.

Why not have a web browser that, well, browses. Just that. It has all the features I need to browse.

Let the RSS guys come up with a human interface that works for them and give them access to the HTML rendering engine - it's not HTML that makes a web browser what it is, after all.

Small is beautiful. Honor being small and quick and efficient. Share code. Good inter-process communication.

Keep it simple, make it elegant.

I don't really have a problem with Jason Kottke per-se (I mean, he's a good writer and I think a lot of interesting stuff comes across his weblog), but I definitely felt that his post this morning took Hyatt's open-ended brainstorming very much out of context and pressed them into the service of his "Sherfari" idea. Whether you like "Sherfari" or not, I think that much is fair to say.

To be honest, it seems to me that a lot of people have been frantically trying to hitch themselves to the Hyatt wagon since the release of Safari, and I think it's getting kind of lame. But, hey, I guess that's weblogs for 'ya ;-)!

"To be honest, it seems to me that a lot of people have been frantically trying to hitch themselves to the Hyatt wagon since the release of Safari, and I think it's getting kind of lame. But, hey, I guess that's weblogs for 'ya ;-)!"

I agree. The great Blogroll cum circle-jerk that's been going on amongst the A-listers is becoming quite comic. Mr. Hyatt here at least has the good taste to only roll when he's been specifically rolled upon.

I totally agree with Adam Bridge. Make the apps separate. Make them work well, and work independently.

Then, if you really want to, use the OS as a conduit for these apps to talk to each other. A model for this? Apple's forthcoming iLife. The integration of iDVD, iMovie and iTunes seems logical, but what makes the solution elegant is that these are three separate programs which do three different things. How many people would use iLife if Apple made iDVD, iTunes, and iMovie one huge application? A few, perhaps, but my guess is that app would go the way of Netscape Communciator.

I do think Jim Ray's earlier comment (in general, but also specifically about communication between iCal and Safari) makes a lot of sense and articulated my point much more eloquently.

What I think should be done is make Sherlock into a "core service", like WebCore is. So Sherlock can still exist as a standalone application if you don't want to use your browser (though I don't know why you'd want to do that, Safari is a heck of a lot faster in everything than Sherlock is). But also, the sherlock searching functionality could be integrated into Safari....

Just make the search field in the toolbar behave like the one in Mail (so you can choose what you want to search - Google, Ebay, Dictionary, etc)... and instead of the "bug button" right of the search field, put in a Power Search button (when you want more control). Pressing that button would open up an interface similar to that of your bookmark system.... you can select the channel on the left (like the Calendars area in iCal), enter the search words and other parameters just bellow it (where the months are displayed in iCal). Safari could display the resuling search list just bellow the bookmark bar (where you would select Artist/Album in iTunes).... A user then clicks on one search result, and the webpage is previewed bellow it (just like where one has a list of songs in iTunes that matched the Artist/Album you selected in you library).

Of course, if he is happy with the result, there would be a button that would load the result page in the entire Safari web page area, just like you got there if you typed in the address yourself.

Oh, I forgot to say WHY I think that should be done (the Sherlock/Safari integration). It's because it simplifies things and enhances productivity for begginers and power users alike. Its what Apple is all about. It's why I too wondered even BEFORE I downloaded Safari on the day it was released - whether it contained Sherlock integration. It makes sense - both apps are used to find and display information on the internet. Use of Sherlock in most cases ends in launching the browser. Why would we need 2 steps and 2 apps for that?

Some people might argue that they'd rather see an integration like iMovie/iDVD have. And while that would be an improvement over current situation, it is not a big one. Why is such an integration (interaction is more the word to use) less desirable? Well because when you finish editing your movie in iMovie, it is not imperative that you burn a DVD of it. In fact, I use iMovie all the time, but I only used iDVD twice or so. That is because the DVD is not necessarily the final step in the movie creation process (unlike the web is for sherlock searching). One can encode it in a number of different formats and burn it on a CD, put it on the web or stream it. I can also use it in games, presentations and other uses that iDVD is useless for.

Now think of iTunes - would you like to exculde CD audio and MP3 burning from the application? Because, hell, you can do that with other tools (Disk Copy, Finder or whatever). Sure, let's strip that out, make the app a bit smaller and then explain to the users why they need 2 more steps in their Rip. Mix. Burn. motto

Think about it.... the integration of Safari/Sherlock makes sense... just find a way to do it efficiently and so you don't bog Safari performance down :)

Where are the Sherlok Channels? If Apple provided a Channel update much like the Software Update I think I would actually use Sherlok often. Who want's to go searching for Channels that you don't even know exist, and then downloading them and installing them. If there is a website that has a list of Channels let me know!! Even if there is how are ordinary people going to know about these sites! Sherlock needs to be more of a window to the internet, and use the internet to provide that feature!

I think a loose integration between Safari and Sherlock is a must! Who wants to jump back and forth to use the internet? Both apps would be hurting and are! If you make one app out of both of them then you have an application that is bloated like many are now. Make both of them quick and interchangable within each app.

Just my 2¢

E.

I too vote no Uberness what so ever!

Am I the only one who really hates Sherlock?

I think this is just more evidence that an embeditable brower is the right solution, so Sherlock, Watson, NetNewsWire etc dont need to implement their own browser to display html.
Mark

Sherlock is about accomodating for poor web interface. Remember that and you realize why it is useless as it stands now

E. : www.sherlockers.com

Sorry, I just posted this to the wrong thread.

AmphetaDesk is a perl doohicky which lets you read OSS feeds in your browser. I've been using it for a couple of weeks now. I find this interface much simpiler than having to use two apps at once. I have it set to open the page it makes with my RSS feeds as my homepage. For those who want their RSS integrated into their browsers, it's worth checking out.

Da link:

http://www.disobey.com/amphetadesk/

I'm most interested in RSS integration with Safari.

Let's face it, the reason RSS readers like NetNewsWire are so cool is that you can parse the data without annoying banners, and miscellaneous bits of HTML strewn about. It's content, pure and simple.

If something interests you, you can browse to the site and let the banners load. No big deal.

Safari has a bookmark icon in the upper-left of the bookmark bar. I suggest putting a "news" icon just to the right of it. Clicking on it will yield a similar window to the bookmark window. Instead of the left-menu "collections" it'll be "subscriptions". Instead of individual bookmarks will be the individual blog/news entries. Simple! Effective!

Of course, first order of business, IMHO, is tabbed-browsing. I've re-learned to live without it... but should I have had to?

i agree