Steve Cooper's Personal Blog

I’m feeling an itch to move my LJ to a nicer blogging system. I’d like to have some more control over the design, and generally a more advanced system I can modify and integrate and so on…

But, while I think I can handle the technology side, I really don’t want to lose my place in the LJ community. I’d like to remain on people’s friends pages, to get LJ people’s comments, etc.

So I was wondering – anyone know of a good way of cross-posting between LJ and another blog? To keep the two in sync, if possible? If it comes to it, anyone know of a technology underpinning LJ that might be used to do this?

It occurs to me that I’ve not been very forthcoming in explaining to people how they can actually get a hold of a copy of Ariadne. For a mere £15, you can get your own copy. Head over to GetAriadne.com annd click on the ‘Buy Ariadne Now!’ button. Alternately, you can pick up a copy in Travelling Man, York.

A friend from waaay back in the past has just emailed me about Ariadne. He designs stories for computer games for Trangnarion Studios in Spain, and he want to use it to plot the non-linear story of his computer game! He’s gonna get a copy, and so’s his boss. Which would make three customers! I’ll be rolling in cash! Mebbe.

All in all, what with Wey‘s brother and sister-out-law helping me with design, and actual customers paying actual money, well, today’s been a good day 😉

wey has, fantastically, got in contact with her rather talented brother and he’s gonna be working with to produce some stuff for Mindfire and Ariadne! Here’s the news in wey‘s own words;

“I spoke to Dan and Caron his partner last night, and they’re keen to work with you on Ariadne – Dan on the design as discussed, with Caron overseeing it as an exercise in project management. They understand that you haven’t got any money, but both jumped on it as a portfolio opportunity. I’ve told Dan to email you asap to arrange to talk about concepts and timescales.”

Snaps for Wendy! 😉

Hi, Everyone. Ariadne’s been getting quite a bit of attention, so I thought I’d post some information and about the program, especially where it is at the moment.

Version 1

At the moment, Ariadne is really a diagramming tool, allowing you to create pictures showing how all the plots in your story tie up. It’s a great way to get an overview of the story. One thing I’ve found is that a lot of people can go great guns through their story until about chapter three or four, and then things fizzle out. When people talk about this effect, I mainly hear that people lose track of the details, or that they aren’t able to steer the story properly. Ariadne’s diagram is one part of keeping track of the whole picture.

Version 2, and 3, and 4…

In the future, though, it’s gonna include lots more features for keeping hold of the many threads. (In fact, the name ‘Ariadne’ is from greek myth; she’s the daughter of King Minos who gives Theseus the thread, so he can find his way through the labyrinth.)

We’ll be including different types of diagrams like spider diagrams and mindmaps, some outlining and synopsis tools, a word processor, to-do lists so you can plan a writing schedule, etc. Lots and lots of stuff you can use to keep your head together. Since most people writing are writing part-time, knowing what you’re about is probably one of the trickiest things…

Of course, all of this is ‘when we can do it’. These things take time. Lots of time.

Who’s ‘we’?

I’m saying ‘we’, because Ariadne’s starting to get a team behind it. I’ve been on it for a year, doing everything, but now I’ve been joined by lots of folks who are eager to see Ariadne take off. I’ve got a team of about half-a-dozen people together, and we’re going to be splitting the many, many jobs among us. Hopefully, that’ll let me get back into code, which is where I really should be.

Neil Gaiman

Neil received the parcel yesterday morning, and hasn’t had time to play with it yet. But he says he’s really looking forward to it. I’ve gotta say a public thank-you to him here, because even though he hasn’t even installed it yet, his interest has kindled other people’s interests, and the whole project seems to have achieved this great momentum, and I’m really grateful to him for that.

So, here goes: Neil Gaiman. He’s a great guy, and he writes great stories. Go buy them. Spend all your money on his stuff (except £15 pounds, because there’s this bit of software you’d really like to buy, too 😉 )

$$$!

Ariadne’s been available in Travelling Man York for a week, and it’s now available for purchase on getariadne.com, although trade is not yet brisk 😉 Version 1 is going for the very reasonable price of £15, which is only the cost of a DVD or a graphic novel or something. Very reasonable, when you think about it. Why not buy one today?

Learn more

Here are a few websites you might want to visit;

My Livejournal on Ariadne

GetAriadne.com – description and help

The Ariadne Newsletter – subscribe today!

I’ve finished the build of the software for Neil Gaiman, and I’ll be sending it off monday morning. Great big thanks to everyone who’s had a go, including but not limited to: , , eddie777, for documentation and testing, ravenlas, roninstorm, eequinch, James, Andy and Derek for testing, WoOdy for producing my CD covers, Tom for suggesting a funky security algorithm, failmaster for some excellent business advice, and everyone else who offered to help but I couldn’t find a job for. It’s been emotional.

I’ll let you all know how it goes. But despite what may or may not happen with NG, I have to say two things;

First, I’m incredibly lucky to have friends like this. I’ve been astounded, frankly, by the willingness to help, and the quality of that help. Marvellous.

Second, my enthusiasm for the project, previously grinding to a halt after a long year with few solid successes, has enjoyed a tremendous boost, both from an actual author who thought it worth looking at, and from my friends who saw something worth supporting.

Thanks, everyone, for all the help and encouragement. It means a lot.

For all those helping with the Ariadne project, I thought I’d lay out my timetable to show the full plan of next week’s development. This might help people co-ordinate the bits they’re doing for me.

The Neil Gaiman/Ariadne rush

I’m looking for a license agreement for Ariadne. Anyone help with any ideas?

Wow. today’s been mad. And it’s taught me something. But I’m not quite sure what yet…

So far today, I’ve got myself a new website admin (Chris K), a set of early-beta testers (Paul Tucker, Paul Marshall, Jerry), a load of late-beta testers (rosie, ellen, ) a production guy (woody), possibly a logo designer, I’ve become a paypal online merchant, got a forum for my testers, and … well. I’ve forgotten everything I’ve done today.

But I beheld the power of the hivemind. And verily, I wondered with great admiration.

Thanks, everyone.

Would you like free software and dinner? Want to help save a drowning man?

As you all know, I’ve got to get a damned good quality version of Ariadne out the door by the end of next week. The better the program, the more likely NG is to react well and either give me a quote or mention me on his blog. His blog, I hear, gets about 50,000 hits a day; if I could get even a small fraction of that audience to look at and buy Ariadne, I’ll be very happy. If I have a big NG quote on the front cover of the CD, I can probably expect to quadruple the chance of a sale.

It’s a pretty tall order for me – the program’s nowhere near a tested and ready state yet – it’s not even feature-complete. There’s no documentation, and I have no way to sell it even if it were ready. So, I’m spending every free second this week trying to whip it into shape.

I’m hoping that I might prevail upon some of my friends for help in this; I have a number of ideas for discrete jobs, and if anyone is willing to complete one of these jobs to a professional standard, I’ll be happy to give them free copies of Ariadne for life. If NG either gives me an endorsement or a blog-mention, I’ll take you for dinner, too.

So here’s the list of jobs. If you want to help, tell me what you’ll do by sending an email ASAP to steve at stevecooper.org.

The Jobs;

DOCUMENTATION

* The Rough Guide: Write a short description (probably 5-10 pages) of how Ariadne works. I just need a tutorial-style guide, a getting-started kinda thing, not a full reference. This’ll involve lots of coordination with me, as obviously the software isn’t finished yet. Probably a rolling thing that goes on throughout the week. (Hell, if you want Neil Gaiman to read some of your writing, this is your chance 😉
* Website: Redesign my website to inform people about ariadne, and guide them to a sale. Really needs less than a dozen pages, focusing more on clear written content than graphical tomfoolery.

TESTING

* Early User Testing: I’d like three people to download, install and run Ariadne by tuesday this week (25th) to give me general user interface comments.
* Download & Test: Next weekend (29-30 Jan) I’ll need as many people as possible installing and running the software, and giving me feedback.
* Testing at Frances Street: On Sun 30 Jan, I’ll be hosting a ‘bring a laptop and test stuff’ session. As bugs crop up, I’ll fix and give out reinstallation CDs.

PRODUCTION

(In both cases, obviously, I’ll cover any costs)

* CD Cases; Print 100 copies of my cover art onto quality A4 paper. Trim with a guillotine, insert into DVD cases. (I have the DVD cases, but don’t have photo-quality paper).
* CD Design: Design an image for the top of the CD itself. Print 100 blank CDs with the artwork on top, so that I can burn them when they’re ready.

WEB SALES AND ACTIVATION

* Merchant Site: Recommend me a site which will take credit-card orders for the software by Wednesday 26th Jan. If I OK the recommendation, set it up for me.
* Software Activation: Recommend an off-the-shelf activation system for preventing piracy that can be built into a .Net application.

BUSINESS

* Business Setup: Recommend a legal structure for selling things; should come in the form of a set of instructions I have to follow, something like ‘set up a limited company at website A, send a letter to Companies House stating ‘B’, contact the inland revenue and tell then ‘C’, ask your bank to do D.