Month: January 1970

“Epicycles” is the theory created by pre-Copernican astronomers to explain away the movements of the planets that countered the accepted heliocentric view. This definition can be found in elaborated form near the bottom of Epicycle’s front page. With that statement and the astronomical map that is the background image of Epicycle, you can see right away the scientific and technological focus of this site.



Epicycle feels more like one of those 1995 personal sites than a standard blog. The “About Me” page gives the writer’s full name as well as a photo, family information, and job history. It also gives a list of the published works of Dominic Thomas, the person behind Epicycle. Other sections on the site include pages devoted to Dominic’s home-built computer, his space models, Dominic’s digital art, his father’s monograms, and his fiction; all are worth a look.



The blog itself is chock full of tech jargon that can turn off a normal web surfer, but not me. Reading about the trial and tribulations of a network analyst as he combats the Yaha worm is refreshing. Every entry is about technology, from recommending a cyberpunk-influencing novel to the solving his sound card problems. Sometimes all the tech-talk can get a bit much, as the writer does assume a certain level of know-how that most people do not have, including myself. But it is still worth a read, if only to marvel at the writer’s in-depth technical knowledge.



Stylistically, Epicycle is not the prettiest thing to look at. It does present the content in an easy to read manner, but there is no sophistication of color or design. Otherwise, it is a very nice site.



Epicycle is unique among blogs. It’s an old-time site that offers the reader much more than daily musings, it gives us the world as seen through a tech-head’s eyes. It is worth visiting, especially if you are at all interested in computers, and even if you are not.
Epicycle

To tell the truth, I visited http://honyaks.crazyrocket.net a few times, hoping there would be something new to draw me in on each visit, but there wasn’t. I’m not saying this blog is terrible, because it isn’t, but there is nothing there, no spark, no extra allure that differentiates this blog from the multitude already out there.



The writing is technically pretty good– there are no horrendous spelling or grammar errors, and it is coherent and somewhat amusing, but for a site that’s slogan is “a site of style and humor for the uncool,” it is sadly lacking in both regards.



Most entries have at least one link with commentary, and the commentary simply isn’t that funny. Even when it is straightforward, the writing is not particularly interesting.



The blog also lacks style in web design. It uses a Moveable Type template that while easily navigable, further quagmires it with the blogging masses. It also lacks any other pages to entice the reader, and I had a hard time staying interested.



In short, http://honyaks.crazyrocket.net is nothing special. But it could be, if some more personality were shown.
Chemo Warfare

Wow, does Epicycle know his computers! This website is a refuge for anyone who knows each wire in his CPU. The design and layout of the site is easy to navigate in a simple no-frills way. Much like the computers Epicycle loves, everything has it’s place on his website. Part blog, part ode to all things computer, this techie has a lot of good information on his website for other techies.



I personally know next to nothing about the innards of my computer, but despite this I had fun clicking through Epicycle’s website because he offers other things as well – pictures of space models and some digital art, to name a couple.



There is very little personal information at Epicycle, but that’s not the intent of the site – it’s not a personal blog. It’s a computer blog, and so in that regard it’s near perfect because each and every entry goes into detail about something computer-oriented.



I would have given it a 5 but for a couple links that brought up empty pages under construction. If it had been a completed site, it would have been the perfect computer site.Epicycle

The layout of militant veggie (no caps, as per the owner’s entry) is very simple. The green on white is relatively easy on the eyes, and given the “veggie” part of the site’s name, makes sense. Links to a wide variety of stuff are to the right.

The name “militant veggie” had me expecting something fairly witty, and it delivered. There aren’t many entries on the main page, but never fear, the archives have it covered. There is a complete lack of capital letters, which might annoy some people, but it doesn’t detract from the writing style in my opinion.

Fun extras on the sidebar include an “about” page wherein the author’s favorites are listed by each of the five senses, photography (some by the author, some not), and two sub-blogs. One is dedicated to music, the other to “little things.”

Overall, this is an interesting little blog that is good for a quick glance at the author’s life. If you were to run across it by accident, you might just as swiftly pass it by, but it’s worth taking the time to look around it.militant veggie

The first thing that struck me about honyaks was that the post titles are, to me at least, unreadable with out highlighting. They are a small, bold, red font on a grey background, and make my eyes go all blurry when reading them…ok so post titles are not the most important thing about a blog, but it is a design fault the author, dairyair, might want to keep in mind.

Reading the blog itself, there isn’t much to it. Entries come once or twice a day, every few days, and consist mostly of links with a few words of description. However, sometimes this description is not incredibly informative.

The site design (besides the post titles) is simple and functional, but there is nothing special about it. When combined with the relatively average writing, and complete lack of other content (not even an ‘about me’ page), it is hard to recommend this site, unless you like reading blogs as a way of finding links to other sites.Chemo Warfare