11 ms·
Codename: Svbtle by Dustin Curtis
- ssmoot 15y agoIt's very pretty. I wish I had the skill to come up with a UI as nice as that. I wonder what language/platform it's written in?
- seldo 15y agoFrom the HTTP headers, it appears to be Ruby on Rails, running on Nginx. Server: nginx/1.0.10 + Phusion Passenger 3.0.11 (mod_rails/mod_rack)
- sycr 15y agoIt's Rails. You can tell by taking a look at blog.js - there's a reference to https://github.com/rails/jquery-ujs https://github.com/rails/jquery-ujs
- zalew 15y ago> I wonder what language/platform it's written in? I've recently wondered if we (devs) shouldn't adopt a standard like robots.txt/humans.txt, maybe dev.txt or something where we could put such information and opensource links (instead of polluting the UI sometimes with all the 'powered by' braggadacio). //edit: submitted for discussion http://hackerne.ws/item?id=3742784 http://hackerne.ws/item?id=3742784
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- ricardobeat 15y agoThe last part of humans.txt is supposed to list the technology used.
- zalew 15y agodoesn't look like it http://humanstxt.org/humans.txt http://humanstxt.org/humans.txt looks more like the tools, not the tech stack.
- ricardobeat 15y agoIt's a choice: http://desktime.com/humans.txt http://desktime.com/humans.txt
- vineet 15y agoSeems like Rails. See here: http://builtwith.com/dcurt.is/ http://builtwith.com/dcurt.is/
- aba_sababa 15y agoAwesome. Beat me to it. I treat my writing the same way: like fruit on tree, adding to it slowly until it ripens. How can I get an invite?
- seldo 15y agoI like the "ideas pane" a lot. I have exactly the same workflow, except my "ideas pane" is just a text file in Dropbox. I work on posts there until they're big enough to paste into my blog. I'm not really interested in running my blog on someone else's platform, though (I realize I'm in the minority here).
- dcurtis 15y agoThis is exactly what I used to do. It was during my attempts to move ideas.txt into the platform interface that the dual pane system was born.
- seldo 15y agoI think I might like leaving my ideas in their raw form, though. I tend to create a bulleted, indented outline of what I'm writing before fleshing it out.
- huhtenberg 15y agoYou are not alone in that minority.
- alabut 15y ago"I have exactly the same workflow, except my "ideas pane" is just a text file in Dropbox." Interesting timing - I came up with an idea this weekend for a Dropbox-based blogging app that pushes both final and draft posts to a blog every time they're saved locally, with public access for the final posts and a private password-protected directory for the drafts. I'm pretty sure I can make it with watch folders and Jekyll (I've seen that setup floating around HN comments), although making something more advanced with a web panel and themes might make it a lot more interesting to a larger audience.
- RyanMcGreal 15y agoThe engine I wrote for my personal blog lets me save a draft (no, I didn't invent the idea). I'm not sure what the difference is between drafts and ideas.
- staunch 15y agoDrafts in Wordpress work quite well for this purpose. I just click "New Post", write in some temporary title and a short description in the body, then click "Save Draft". Viewing drafts is easy too. I find formatting to be the biggest annoyance in blogging, but I bet there's a markdown WP plugin for that which I should use. Actually I do like this, but not for the "ideas" feature. I like it for the simplicity and hip minimalist aesthetic.
- sirn 15y agoI think this is exactly the problem that lead to how he designed the ideas pane. This make me realized this is exactly why I don't blog, too. If I save my ideas as draft, it mentally force me to think I will have to publish it at one point. It's more of a subconscious thing.
- jcromartie 15y agoAnd Tumblr, too. I don't see what the big deal is, except that it's an official Dustin Curtis™ design.
- 54mf 15y agoI have conflicting feelings: love the concept, love the design, but jealous I'll never get an invite. At least, happy it exists.
- huhtenberg 15y agoI really like it when people thoughtfully scratch an itch that everyone else thinks has been scratched to death. There is a room for major improvements in every established technology area - be it a blogging platform, instant messaging, analytics or email clients. PS. This also explains why Dustin needed a Markdown symbol back in February - http://drbl.in/daOE http://drbl.in/daOE
- willvarfar 15y agoLovely, very lovely. It looks so usable. I've been irritated by lack of features in Tumblr; whilst you don't those features, it does look like you have a cleaner approach for content-creating. Reminds me slightly of Trello.
- skeletonjelly 15y agoIs your definition of usable inversely proportional with the number of features and their associated buttons? Yet you're upset by the lack of features in Tumblr?
- sylvinus 15y agoThe animation of the left sidebar on each page is really annoying. Aside from that, it looks really clean!
- aprescott 15y agoMy guess would be that it's an attempt at making it very clear whose blog you're on, to disambiguate. http://svbtle.com/ http://svbtle.com/ now has colours for each member blogger, and it looks like they all have their own left sidebar slideout thing. Additionally, their pulsing icons in the top left have an additional colour hint to them. Edit: I think it's a little too intrusive and clashes with the overall feel of the rest of it, but that's just me!
- bprater 15y agoHrm, I thought it was actually kind of nice. Soft, non-obtrusive and gave a lovely "alive" feel an otherwise cold page. In fact, does anyone know of any tutorials on how to do this?
- alanh 15y agoYou may be talking about different things. There is the temporary red overlay in the sidebar that is, as far as I can tell, new, and definitely a touch obtrusive (intentionally, no doubt); then, the relatively subtle circular pulse around the blog logo.
- pspeter3 15y agoIf the domain name is invite only, is there any chance that the code will be open source so other people can run their own version of svbtle?
- RossM 15y agoI'd be interested in running my own single-user version, but I'm sure there'll be a clone by the weekend (if there isn't I'll probably hack one up at my next opportunity).
- dcurtis 15y agoPlease don't copy it just yet. I'm still working out the problems and polishing the interactions. When they're all ironed out, I'll open it to the public.
- RossM 15y agoAh, I wasn't under the impression that this would become public - I wouldn't reproduce something open to others. Thank you for making something like this a reality - I had a blank-page type editor a while back but didn't have the chops to make it actually usable at the time (hence my interest in recreating this).
- skeletonjelly 15y agoFrom the article it looks like he wants to maintain the "branding" of his blog so people recognise it as having a consistent quality - which I think is totally ridiculous as it's way too minimal to stand out. A good designer could clone the style in minutes. So what sets it apart? The way the editor promotes capturing ideas? This part isn't open to the public. Seems a bit odd. It's working I suppose. And the "invite only" system sure helps drive desire.
- nchlswu 15y agoI'd argue that he's already established the brand and it will forever stand out as Dustin's -- to his /target/ audience.
- waxjar 15y agoI think this system is well thought out. It has a beautiful, minimal design that actually let's you focus on the reading, once you're done playing with the kudos button. The only criticism I have is that it relies on sites like Hacker News and Reddit or email/twitter for discussion. Blog posts may be full of errors, but readers (and maybe authors) may never find out, due to the relatively inaccessible discussion/feedback system.
- cellularmitosis 15y agoActually, I've really come to enjoy seeing a "Discuss this post on Hacker News" link at the bottom of a blog post. I've become annoyed by loading a blog post, only to discover that 3/4 of the page is just comments. But really, the same thing could be accomplished by having the comments page be separate from the article page, yet still be hosted on the same blogging platform.
- revorad 15y agoThis is great. I've had something like this (probably even simpler) in my mind for a while, but never get around to making it. Dustin, I just emailed you with a name suggestion.
- dchuk 15y agoAm I correct in assuming the post text editor was all custom built? If not, can anyone link to a solution that is as clean as that? I love the idea of just typing on the page versus typing into a special box with a hundred buttons along the top
- manuletroll 15y agoThat's pure speculation but I'd guess the editor simply uses a div with the contenteditable attribute set to true. Edit : Okay, so much for speculation.
- cmelbye 15y agoIt's Markdown, not a WYSIWYG editor.
- dcurtis 15y agoI didn't really custom build it; it's just a normal textarea element with the borders removed and the typography matched to exactly how it's displayed on the blog.
- devinfoley 15y ago"This is the blogging platform for creative, intelligent, and witty people. Membership by invitation only." Am I the only person that laughed out loud at this?
- patrickaljord 15y agoI didn't laugh but I found that incredibly arrogant and pathetic.
- dcurtis 15y agoPathetic? It perfectly accomplishes my goal: you'll remember it. (Edit: Sigh. Now I remember why I have a rule of not commenting on Hacker News anymore.)
- cstefanovici 15y agoIt's actually awesome. Invite please....
- patrickaljord 15y agoI've already forgotten how it's called. Good luck to you though.
- Smudge 15y agoI'm curious though -- for a while now I've been seeing the svbtle style as synonymous with you & your brand, and I'm having trouble shaking that even though it's now open to other bloggers. Was this side-effect another one of your goals?
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- stuartmemo 15y agoIf your other goals were to be arrogant and elitist, you've accomplished them as well.
- ihodes 15y agoI think the most interesting thing about whatever Dustin does is the hype he's able to build around it—I'm consistently impressed, and wonder if he might not be as effective as a promoter as he is a designer.
- cemregr 15y agoI think you meant it the other way around?
- Smudge 15y agoWho's vetting the bloggers invited to join the Svbtle network? Is it Dustin himself? Something about an exclusive, invite-only network for "creative, intelligent, and witty people" really turns me off. Not that I wouldn't be interested in reading what only the best and the brightest have to say. Maybe it's just the way it's been presented, but in its current form it seems sort of like the Mensa of blogging platforms.
- endlessvoid94 15y agoYesterday I made a quip about how 3 of the 5 members were on the frontpage of HN arguing, and how I didn't want an invite. Insert foot in mouth. I really like the idea of the two columns. I'd totally use this.
- alanh 15y agoTo indulge your tangent: They were indeed “arguing” in some definition of the word, but I think they kind of agreed a lot, and together painted a coherent picture I could agree with, and was glad to have read.
- endlessvoid94 15y agoWhat I actually meant was that the argument was extremely narrow to the point of pedantry. Is Rails good for an API? It's a tool, and it has different merits depending on the situation. That's the answer to the question, and it's the answer to any question like it. I said I didn't want an invite because I didn't want to be associated with the three of them arguing over so fine a point, and getting so much exposure for it. It all seemed very weird to me. That was my real point.
- duaneb 15y agoI expected a github link to the software, found... a snobby, invitation-only network. No thanks, amigo, I think I'll steal your idea and release it for free.
- davidu 15y agoPlease, seems simple and useful.
- deleted 15y ago[deleted]
- Smudge 15y agoHow many other blogging platforms have boiled everything down to just that simple workflow? I'd say this is much more about execution than about the idea.
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- davej 15y agoI wonder how many people gave kudos to the post by mistake? I know I did and there's no way to remove the kudos you gave afterwards. User actions should be a click not a hover.
- Smudge 15y agoHe's already received complaints and sort of laughed them away: http://dcurt.is/unkudo http://dcurt.is/unkudo Personally I think it's bad UX, but what do I know; I'm not Dustin Curtis.
- Killswitch 15y agoI just hovered it, damn you dcurtis!
- 54mf 15y agoI have a ton of respect for Mr. Curtis, but he's utterly and completely wrong on the issue. It's not a "serious" thing, just like calling someone a mean name isn't necessarily a "serious" thing, but both kind of make you a dick.
- tptacek 15y agoHow could you possibly care enough about Curtis' made-up number to call him a dick? Never mind. I couldn't possibly care. It's a game. Relax.
- 54mf 15y agoIt's a dark pattern. In my opinion, at least; an ambiguous interface element with unexpected and unintended consequences. Judging by his obvious design talent, I think Mr. Curtis should know better, especially in light of the incredibly negative response. It's a dick move. You care enough to follow through with replying to me, it seems. I'm plenty relaxed, I just thought it was worth calling a spade a spade in this case.
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- 3pt14159 15y ago"When I'm writing, I want to have no distractions, so I removed all of them." When I'm reading it is the same damn thing. You have TWO flashing beacons.
- catch404 15y agoPretty hard to read any text with that going, it's a shame it doesn't respond to <esc>.
- bkorte 15y agoThey are super subtle, how are they even remotely distracting?
- wjbr 15y agoThe attack and sustain stages aren't long enough. If they were longer like the breathing sleep LED on apple laptops it would be less noticeable.
- nwienert 15y agoI cloned it in Ruby on Rails and wrote about it here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3744237 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3744237
- Killswitch 15y agoAwesome job, I am actually slowly building something like this myself.. Just a simple blogging platform, no fluff, just the essentials.
- swah 15y agoHe has "the eye" for design, though... everything looks effortless and kinda great... unlike when I try to make a page look good (yes I read about Mark Boulton and grids and a visual hierarchy and spacing and baseline and rhythm and UX but it doesn't do miracles...)
- jarek 15y agoFor future record: An article about a by-invitation closed-source blogging platform created by a self-proclaimed superhero is the top article on Hacker News on March 22, 2012 at 17:16 PST.
- shashashasha 15y agoAlso: maybe we'll see a rise in LinkedIn profiles of people calling themselves programming / designer superheros.
- icki 15y agoHave you considered displaying a collective feed of your networks' posts on the homepage?
- brettbergeron 15y agoThe animating sidebar and kudos buttons are cute the first time around, but annoying when I start to try and move around the site with real intent. Overall, it feels like the designer is wagging his/her tail in my face.
- 8ig8 15y agoInteresting concept. Like the panes. But this seems contradictory to me: > It really is the essence of blogging[...] no social bullshit. > And, of course, you should follow me on Twitter here.
- marcamillion 15y agoI like the concept, but then I clicked through to the other blogs, and it felt wrong. I felt like I should be reading John Collison's blog, but I keep hearing Dustin's voice in my head. The same goes when I switch to other authors. I get what he is trying to do - by keeping it minimalist and all, but I think it gets in the way of the content and the author by not offering a distinct enough experience on each author's words.
- encoderer 15y agoPoints to DCurtis for shipping. That's what this life is all about and it's easy to lose sight of that. But my own personal opinion is that I don't love it. The UI of the published blogs is nice. I actually like the animation on the left, though I personally would only show it once per session. I think the challenge will be making this a more usable, integrated experience for the user while retaining the sparse and appealing UI. Even for "vetted" bloggers, audience reach and accessibility matters. I'm not a big fan of the UI for the backend. I like the concepts. But the UI seems too designed. The strict use of black and white, for example, seems almost a gimmick to me. And I really dislike the Kudos "button" and his response to the criticism. There is absolutely no functional benefit. People know buttons. They expect buttons to work like all other buttons work: You have to press it if you want to press it. I could go on and on about why this is bad (unfriendly to touch UIs (even if it also supports clicking), people shouldn't have to be careful about where they rest their mouse, it takes 1s to "hover induce" this button and far less than 1 sec to click, etc.) But the biggest UX blunder, IMO, is not being able to undo it. I was less than impressed by DCurtis's response to the Kudos issue: that a kudos is meaningless. If it's so meaningless why not let people kudos the same thing more than once? Why have a kudos at all? I hope this can be seen as constructive, because I think his project is much bigger than this critique. He worked on something, and shipped. Our industry is more of a meritocracy than most. Congrats on shipping, high-five and well done. Now make it better, please.
- jodrellblank 15y ago"The side effect of this is that ideas I would never have written down before now become fully developed posts. It has hugely surprised me." And all you're replying about is the look of the UI. Aren't you missing the most important bit?
- delinka 15y agoWait. This isn't some downloadable blogging engine? I'm disappointed. If that "creative, intelligent and witty" bit isn't sarcasm, how about the guy 'puts up' and offers the code for download? Unless this is the guy's business plan and he just doesn't want to kill his server. But this really looks like an "I built this really cool thing for me and some friends and you can't play" kind of thing.
- nwienert 15y agoI re-created it: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3744237 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3744237 https://github.com/natew/obtvse https://github.com/natew/obtvse
- gaoshan 15y agoAfter reading that my impression is that the whole thing seems kind of douchey to me. Then again, I'm not a superhero with my own exclusive club so I'm not really qualified to say anything.
- Katelyn 15y ago1. Kudos Button: Why the controversy? I've always viewed it as a meaningless counter that's fun to hover over. I never took the counts seriously. Sometimes I visit your site just to send arbitrary kudos. What's most concerning about the buttons is the number of readers that feel "victimized," "deceived" or "tricked" from, well...a css element. 2. Svbtle: There are few names I've come across in my career that are as painful as this one to read, spell or pronounce. It gives me anxiety, and what's worse is that it's inspired by Svpply. A good name is a word that you can tell someone over the phone without them asking you how to spell it. Period. 3. The ideas panel is cool. Is there a way you could generate the list in other ways than just manually adding tags? Could you add a bookmarking tool, for example, that adds keywords to your Ideas List once you bookmark a page you find thought-provoking? 4. The S* Network: Your strategy to build a platform exclusive for exceptionally high-rated bloggers to use wont work for several reasons, here's just a few: 4a. I loved your site's design until I saw others on your platform using it. Then it became boring and nauseating. The design of a blog tells a story sometimes just as much as the content does. It gives the blogger personality, and the reader something fresh to look at. 4c. Top bloggers (any bloggers) not only use design to express themselves, but also to stand out. To be remembered. Eventually when you notice a site's design enough times, you realize you might want to check out who the author is. 4d. Social elements and "Sharing" buttons can look messy at times, but the fact is, bloggers like their content shared, and readers like to share content they enjoy. Removing arguably the most widely used tool on the web much poorer design that displaying a 'tweet' button after each post. 4e. Aside from 'ideas' your platform doesn't have anything that takes away the pain that enough users have to make it worth building. I add 'blogging' to pg's list of frighteningly ambitious startup ideas..
- MartinCron 15y ago2. Svbtle: There are few names I've come across in my career that are as painful as this one to read, spell or pronounce. Absolutely. I thought that "kiln" was a horrible product name (it still is) but we've set the bar lower with this.
- blvr 15y agoSo am I the only one who just reads it as 'subtle'?
- nchlswu 15y agoA couple of general things. (1) Svbtle is actually a decent name (I sort of thing the 'v' is tired, but that's just a product of things I'm following doing that) Unfortunately, it's probably not appropriate for a tech audience (2) I'm very surprised at the significant negative reaction to his 'curation' of his blogging network. I understand the feelings of condescension, but is it really that big of a deal? Many things are invite only, vetted by one person. I'm personally bothered by /other/ elitist attitudes prevalent in the industry. This is pretty consistent and he never said this was never going to be public...
- obilgic 15y agoI think this is a really good example of "being famous does not mean that you are good at everything". Do not forget why you are famous. If you are really famous actor and body builder, you might be governor If you try really hard, but do not run for presidency.
- jamesjyu 15y agoAh yes, this reminds me why I made QuietWrite. Except, QW is open to all: http://www.quietwrite.com http://www.quietwrite.com
- digitallimit 15y agoYou're just missing the stark, black and white interface.
- methoddk 15y agoIt all seems really snooty and lame. Not digging the attitude, dcurtis. Sidenote: The judos thing is annoying and the design is mad plain.
- spindritf 15y agoIt looks weird without javascript, there's this huge slab of colour on the left, and the script eats up half of a core (Firefox 11). Are all blogs in Svbtle centrally hosted? Not just federated?
- adeelk 15y agoWhen I have an idea, no matter how developed, I throw it into the ideas pane. This creates a physical scrapboard for organizing my thoughts. I work on ideas over time, and, when one of them becomes developed or good enough, I'll publish it and it'll move over into the published column. This is so important. I’ve been using SimpleNote to the same effect. I just handle the publishing part separately; I publish so rarely that it doesn’t make sense for me to couple the two together.
- lusr 15y agoI don't get it. What's the difference between a "draft" and an "idea"?
- adeelk 15y agoIn my system each note corresponds to an idea, which usually starts as just a sentence or two (e.g. “You don’t understand something until it’s obvious.”). In this note I collect links, quotes, and my own thoughts relating to that idea. At some point I may turn all this material into a draft.
- lusr 15y agoHmm OK, could still be a draft, though :) I use Evernote for similar stuff, but then I don't blog.
- raganwald 15y agoI love the design, but shrug at the idea of vetted bloggers. I have HN and twitter and reddit and FB and many other ways to filter content for me. I don't want or need a curated brand. I especially don't want writers on the network hesitating about whether to write low-quality material. Insay, wcatter your ideas and let "the market" decide.
- rwc 15y agoAmusingly, he's gone from being a "superhero" to a "villain" according to his tagline at dcurt.is
- brown9-2 15y agoIt seems ironic for someone not interested in "social bullshit" to have what is essentially a Like button on each post.
- boristhespider 15y agoHmm. I wouldn't call the essential Like button "social", since it doesn't get "shared" with one's "friends" or anything like that. Still, I don't think that's an important difference - it retains the lab rat overtones.
- farinasa 15y agoI'm sorry, but isn't this just a reversion to late 90's style frame design? It seems all you've done is build it in the latest trendy standards and add a few little CSS tricks. Minimalist design is supposed to be about presenting the content first and foremost. But the content is overshadowed by your frame. Your name and flashy CSS tricks are the only constants on the page and take up nearly 25% of the view, but you claim you're trying to draw attention to the content? Perhaps if the content you're presenting is you, then you have a successful design.
- MaysonL 15y agoReminds me of Google's redesigns...