2007 is almost over. It's been an interesting and (at least for me) a rather turbulent year. But... it's been a lot better than 2006 in many aspects and I hope 2008 is going to be even better. I have never done this before but I figured it would be nice to do a little summary post looking back at the highlights for 2007 on this blog. I'm also planning a more philosophical 'end of year' post if I find the time to do so but let's start with one about the 'best of 2007' on this blog. In case you missed any of it, this post is your chance to catch up on it!

In the beginning of 2007, the life of yours truly was quite a mess. I was stuck in Sweden, going through some serious hell in my personal life and looking for a new professional challenge. To be really honest, back then I had already started the application process with Yahoo! but since that took a very long time I had to look at all possible opportunities, just in case things wouldn't work out with this application process. Luckily I ended up getting my best job ever as a frontend engineer at Yahoo! in London, UK where I still am today.

Let's have a look at what happened on this blog in 2007

For those who have been here before: The website you're looking at right now now is quite different from what it used to be the last time you visited it. The changes however are completely invisible to the casual visitor.

Every once in a while I get the urge to redesign and redo all the markup for the entire website. On the other hand I still quite like the design and I think it will take me a considerable amount of time to come up with something I like better than what I currently have. And of course I'll have to come up with something I like significantly better before I'd replace this with something new. Therefore it will probably take a while before this happens. I may not even redesign at all but just reorganise things a bit and do some spring cleaning like I did before.

So... no redesign in the near future! Still however I felt there's plenty of room for improvement on the current site! Therefore I decided to start refactoring parts of it. The first wave of improvements does not have anything to do with the look and feel but with what's going on under the hood. Slowly but surely I'll be ironing out all the things that have been bothering me for quite a while now. A few important things have been improved in this round: the javascript and the previously non-degrading tabs in my sidebar. Let's have a look at what has changed!

This post is about the world's most popular homepage. It's a really simple page but it's done remarkably poorly in terms of frontend web development. It's pretty much beyond me how a multi billion corporation manages to make such a poor effort when it comes to the most visited webpage on the planet. I'm of course talking about Google. I suppose it's safe to mention their name. Just about anything else seems to be off limits when it comes to the branding of Google which is why I decided to work my way around the guidelines for this post in order to prevent a very unwelcome C&D.

The world's most visited webpage is a very simple page. There's not all that much on it. A menu bar, a form with one textfield, two buttons (one for the normal people and one for the lucky few) and a handful of links. Not a huge web development challenge you would think. Apparently it is. In this article I'll go through the sourcecode of the page, highlight the most remarkable atrocities to the noble art of web development I found in it, discuss some possible reasons for some of the approaches followed and finally present my own attempt at improving the page.

I have no idea what kind of effect this post is going to have but I felt like writing about it for quite a while. I suppose I should start with some disclaimer to make sure I'm not trying to smut-talk anyone. This post is merely a critical view on things and not intended to talk bad about anyone discussed in it. I don't have any background information /facts or whatsoever. Just going on intuition and common sense here.

I'll Take You By the Hand and Teach You Step-by-Step Exactly What You Need To Know and Do To Create, Build and Grow Your Own Popular Blog That Consistently Pays You $1,000 to $5,000+ Every Single Month Whilst You Have Fun Working Just Two Hours a Day Simply Writing About Your Favorite TopicsYaro Starak

This post is about 'professional blogging'. For quite a while I've amazed myself at statements being made by people such as Darren Rowse and especially Yaro Starak. And there's more people like Yaro who claim that one can make thousands and thousands of dollars just from blogging. Style-wise, blogmastermind.com looks like many of the spammy looking 'make money fast while doing fuckall!'-websites the internet is full of. Apparently this design style works, whether the service delivers what it promises or not. Endless large-font promo-texts, unstyled hyperlinks (typical!) and tons of 'testimonials' that try to convince the viewer that a fat ass monthly income is waiting for them to be earned. All they have to do is.... run a blog...

Since a few weeks I have an iPod Touch. This has got to be the most amazing hand held device I've seen in a very long time. Even in it's default configuration it's pretty awesome but what really made me want one is what you can do with it after it's been Jailbroken. When you Jailbreak your iPod Touch a world of goodness will open up for you. Not only can you install the applications that Apple reserved for the iPhone such as Google Maps, the Stocks and Weather application and most important: MobileMail but in addition to that there's a huge collection of third-party applications available for use on your iPod Touch or iPhone. In this post I've compiled a list of 3rd party applications I found most useful or cool. At the end of this post I'll also provide some pointers on how to Jailbreak your iPod touch and how to make the most out of it. What I will NOT discuss in this post is how to get the missing iPhone apps. I figured it would be unwise to discuss illegal matters in detail in this post so don't ask for it in the comments either. I'm pretty sure you'll be able to find out on your own. Search engines are your friend! Now let's have a look at the applications!

Some disclaimers and warnings

• In order to run the applications discussed in this post you need to Jailbreak your iPod / iPhone. This process may screw up your device if you don't handle responsibly. It may also void your warranty. Use the applications and the information at the bottom of this post at your own risk. I'm not responsible for any 'bricked' device!
• I don't own an iPhone. I prefer the iPod touch and a different mobile phone with proper 3G and a proper camera and I feel the iPhone and the associated mandatory mobile contract are a ripoff. Therefore: Don't ask me any iPhone related questions. I cannot answer them!
• All information in this post is current for Firmware 1.1.2 and lower. When Apple releases an update I recomend NOT updating your device without some online investigation if you care about keeping all your nice apps. Stay tuned in what's going on in the Jailbreak scene in order to find out how to make sure everything keeps working smoothly.

If you don't like the above, stop reading now. Now that we've got that out of the way, let's move on to the good stuff!

UPDATED: Added a list with some more cool apps that I really like.