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• 

  It feels great to be Canadian... The last few weeks I've been paying a lot of attention to the Winter Olympics in Vancouver. Maybe it's because I actually have access to my own TV so I can watch whatever I want anytime I want, or that HD cable does make everything look more exciting. Perhaps it's more than that. A lot more people I know have been paying attention to these games than in the past. Maybe it's because we made history by winning a gold medal the first time ever despite hosting 2 Olympic games prior, or that we needed to show the world that we are a nation that is capable of putting on a good show for the rest of the world. But maybe, it's all of the above and that these Winter Olympics were finally the one common ground shared by the majority of Canadians.
  
  For the longest time, our nation has been struggling with finding its own identity. When I was in school, we discussed many times what it meant to be Canadian, and it was always inconclusive. The biggest thing I learned in school about our national identity is that we are a cultural mosaic and not a melting-pot like our neighbour from the south. We celebrate diversity and are accepting of each others' difference (although some members of the governing Conservative minority government may like to have a word with that, but I digress). But what does that really mean? And that still doesn't really define who we really are. Just taking a look at the Opening and Closing Ceremonies of the Vancouver 2010 games, you can find how conflicted we are about ourselves. While many complained the Opening Ceremonies to be too Aboriginal-centric, others complained the Closing Ceremonies were too stereotypically-Canadian (as well as too embarrassing if you count the performances from the musicians we have exported such as Nickelback, Avril Lavigne, Hedley, Simple Plan and K-OS, but I'm gonna pretend that never happened). So what is Canadian then?
  
  Let's face it, we are so absorbed into the American culture, it's hard to differentiate what is really ours anymore. The Canadian TV networks all air shows that are produced south of the border during prime time. Sure, we export a few shows too, like CTV's Degrassi and Corner Gas or MTV Canada's The After Show and The Buried List, they're not anything to write home about. And as for the Americans reading this and was watching the Closing Ceremonies, how many of you knew that William Shatner, Katherine O'Hara and Michael J. Fox were all Canadian? What about other actors like Mike Myers, Ryan Reynolds, Seth Rogen and Rachel McAdams? We have struggled so much to find our own identity, and more often than not, we just associate ourselves with American culture. Just take 2008 for example, more Canadians paid attention to the U.S. presidential election than our own.
  
  However, this past weekend for the first time in my life, I've experienced what it means to be Canadian. I don't mean to over-exaggerate or be over-dramatic, but when 80% of the entire nation's population watches the gold medal Men's hockey game between Canada and U.S.A. and setting the record for most-watched television event ever, that means something!
  
  The streets were deserted before and during the game. And after the game when we managed to capture the gold medal in overtime to bring our count to 14 and making history, the streets just went wild. I was able to hear honking 3 hours after the game was over. Traffic was literally stopped even in Midtown Toronto (I captured a few video clips on my Twitter feed here, here, here and here).
  
  This sense of national pride, spirit and unity, is something I've never seen before in my life. I've never seen Canadians being this happy about one thing. And it brings me joy to finally feel what it is to be Canadian, to be a part of something this big. And damn, I'm proud to be a part of it!

  6 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  Etiquette and Courtesy Last night I went to the Goodlife at Yonge & St Clair for a couple orientations as I got myself a membership there last week. The first session was the Fit-Fix Orientation and what a waste of time that was. And it was definitely not the staff's fault. In fact, I felt really sorry for the trainer who led our session because he must have been so frustrated dealing with people like the ones I'm about to talk about.
  
  The session dragged on and on, because one person wouldn't stop asking stupid questions. Our session had 5 participants which was big enough for something like this already, but she definitely was not helping. At first she was all like "Oh I've used similar machines before, but different brands so it probably won't be useful for me." Hey, know you what... good for you, but guess what? Nobody gives a shit. And it's not like she says it once and that's it, she keeps repeating herself over and over again. Okay, so if it's not useful to you, then please leave so you don't waste all of our time. Otherwise, please shut the fuck up, so we can actually do something productive.
  
  One of the purposes of the session was to get your correct seat positions (exciting, I know!). She managed to waste even more of our time during it. She would get on the machine, adjust her seat, then ask the trainer what the seat position was which required our trainer to look over to the seat to find out the number, do a couple reps, then ask again before actually writing it down since she forgot. Uhh, what's the point of asking it twice when you're only writing it down after the second time. Does knowing it make you work out differently?
  
  She also kept interrupting our trainer before he finished explaining and asking about things either things he already mentioned or things he was about to say anyway. Towards the end she admitted the session was useful to her since she didn't realize that some of the machines have stickers to guide you in aligning you elbows/shoulders/etc. to a certain part of the machine. Figures. Yet, she refused to even try to go on some of the machines, because she claimed that she knew what she was doing. Guess some people never learn.
  
  ---
  
  In addition to her, there was another person who was being a total dick. This orientation session we were in was focused on the strength-training machines, so obviously we were demonstrated how to use each of the machines in order. While we were on one as the trainer was explaining the machine, this bitch just comes over, throws her towel on and started using it. When the trainer asked her to leave since we needed it, she gave us attitude and said that we could've used the ones that were reserved for the personal training sessions instead, which obviously we couldn't because we're not part of that category. So, we had to wait for her to finish. And it wasn't even a short wait either as she decided to do multiple sets when she said she would do one. Later at another machine, she does it again! Excuse me, but I too pay the same membership fee as you, so get off your fucking high horse and leave your sense of entitlement out the door.
  
  I'm not sure what the point of this post is, other than that some people are assholes. And that you shouldn't be one. Thanks.

  7 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  Pasta Carbonara Truth be told, one of the biggest things I miss about living away from home is being able to cook. I mean sure, I can still make food while living at home. But I like being able to shop for my own groceries (reminder to self: bus to the slums to get groceries at Walmart Supercentre, No Frills, Food Basics, or Chinese supermarkets; urban grocery stores such as St Clair Market a.k.a. Loblaws, Metro and Sobey's Urban Fresh are expensive and don't even have a good variety), use the kitchen however I want, and not worried about other people's food preferences. Not that I don't like my parents' cooking, it's just that they rarely cook anything outside their realm of Chinese food, and some days I just feel like making white people food. Like today.
  
  This recipe is delicious, easy to make and simple. In fact, I already had all of the ingredients minus the cheese when I decided to make it! And really, what the hell was I doing without parmesan cheese anyway?
  
  What you'll need:

  • 250 g of your favourite type of pasta (For this, I used rotini. Why? It just happened to be one of the three varieties that were on sale at No Frills and I normally find spaghetti to be boring. Normally I like fettucine or linguine if you ask me.)
  • 5 strips of bacon, sliced (May consider the low-sodium variety if you're health-conscious, but don't kid yourself, it's bacon ffs)
  • 3 eggs (large preferably)
  • 3/4 cup of grated parmesan cheese (I realized this is a hell lot when I started making this, but you can get these suckers sometimes for $1 at Walmart Supercentre)
  • 1 cup of mushrooms, sliced
  • 2 cloves of garlic, minced
  • 1/4 cup of pasta water
  • 1/4 cup of milk (I used 2% because the local Mac's sold out of 1%, who knew they had the cheapest milk around?)
  • Some ground black pepper, to taste

  What to do:

  1. Bring a large pot of hot water with some salt and bring it to a boil. Cook pasta until "al dente" as per package's instructions. Reserve a bit of it (around 1/4 cup) of the pasta water for later use.
  2. In the mean time, whisk the eggs, cheese, pepper and milk together in a bowl, then set aside.
  3. Using a frying pan, fry the slices of bacon until crispy in medium heat. Probably takes around 10 minutes. Drain fat, and throw in mushrooms and garlic to cook over medium heat while tossing constantly.
  4. Once mushrooms appeared cooked, add in drained pasta as well as the pasta water.
  5. Gradually add in the egg + cheese mixture while constantly tossing for consistency.
  6. Add salt and pepper to taste.
  7. Sprinkle additional grated parmesan cheese after plating to taste.

  Serves 2 (or if you're me, serves 1... just kidding! I eat half for dinner and pack the rest for lunch)
  
  
  
  (Not actual size of full serving)

  9 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  Sunny's List of Things to Buy Now that I finally got my first paycheque and it finally cleared, it means it's time to think about what shit to buy! So here is a list of big purchases I would like to spend money on in the future. Some are short-term and some are long-term. These are listed in order of priority:
  
  1. Refresh my wardrobe - Contrary to popular beliefs, I don't actually like spending much money on clothes. Shoes, yes. Clothes, not really. Unless I'm going to some dressy party, then I guess I'd have to. Ever since I've had my last paycheque, which was back in December 2008, I've been cutting down my spending on clothes. I used to be able to get away with it by simply shopping at Aéropostale, because their clothes were cheap and but still looked half-decent. And nobody would know that they were cheap because I would buy them in the States and bring them over.
  
  However, ever since they started opening stores in Canada especially in prominent shopping centres and the economy being hit badly, I can't get away with that anymore. Not only that, now I'm not the type who would stop liking something because it's popular, but it crosses the line when it gets to the point when I spot people on the street wearing the exact shirt I'm wearing. Same style and same colour! How embarrassing! For example, I had to retire the turquoise t-shirt prematurely after 5 wears because there were at least 3 times when I wore it out, I saw somebody wearing the exact same shirt. For that, I've been shopping more at H&M and Esprit, the latter is surprisingly becoming very affordable.
  
  Besides, I notice that Aéropostale's styles are becoming more and more like a rip-off of Hollister, A&F and AE. They used to actually be creative. And I feel like I'm getting too old to be wearing the preppy-style of clothes nowadays.
  
  And yeah, it definitely seems like nowadays clothes need to be rotated faster because of Facebook. Once somebody has taken a picture of you and posted it online (and tagged you), it's hard to wear the same outfit to an event where you'd be photographed again. It just looks... bad.
  
  
  2. Apartment - Every time I tell someone about 1.5 hour daily commute to work (each way), the reaction is always something along the lines of "Whoa, how do you do it Sunny?!" You know what, I don't fucking know. It actually doesn't seem that bad during the commute. Well, I listen to my iPod and read the Metro every day, and the ride back I read t.o.night, so now I feel more informed than ever. The effects are more obvious when I feel really tired every time I come back home, and also that I don't have much time to myself after work due to the time I waste each day on it.
  
  Moving out for me is inevitable considering I don't even have a room in my parents' condo right now. Lack of personal space (sometimes I just want to be alone, and quiet), privacy, space for all my shit (my clothes are in piles on plastic bins, and most of my stuff is in the storage locker by the parking garage), convenience (I don't have a car, so I have to take public transit to go anywhere, and Mississauga Transit is not quite TTC). I'm hoping to move into a bachelor or 1-bedroom apartment in mid-November. I make enough that I'm not going to cheap out on that.
  
  As to where? I haven't quite decided. It'll likely be somewhere between downtown and where I work in North York. Since I don't have a car nor do I have any intentions of getting one, it'll likely be on the Yonge-University-Spadina subway line. That leaves it to Yonge and... St. Clair? Davisville? Eglinton? Or even Sheppard?
  
  
  3. iPhone 3GS - This would've been #1 or #2, except last week Bell and TELUS announced that their HSPA+ network will be launching next month in addition to their EvDO networks, which will effectively end Rogers' exclusivity of the iPhone. So I'm going to hold out for a few more weeks until Bell and TELUS announce their plans before I decide which provider I'll go with.
  
  As a technodork and Apple whore, it's like blasphemy that I don't even own a smartphone, let alone an iPhone. The original iPhone came out just months after I got my current phone, so I couldn't justify that purchase. And the fact that I've been moving back and forth, to and from the States, made it hard for me to commit to a long-term phone plan. But now that I'm settling down, I can finally get one. Besides, my Sony Ericsson W810i phone is starting to flake out on me. Some of the buttons stopped working (one time 7, 8, 9, *, 0, # stopped working, thankfully it fixed itself somehow! Now it's just the Walkman button, but I don't use that anyway), the camera button works half of the time, the ambient sensor is busted (the screen would randomly glow, draining the battery), etc. My 5th generation iPod is also flaking out as the battery capacity is turning terrible. If I press skip while playing a random playlist maybe 15 consecutive times, it would drain all its battery.
  
  
  4. TV - This is a given. When I get my own place, I need a TV to get my entertainment fill, especially since I have a Wii anyway. I may even get a DVR to go with it too. I'm the type that like to sometimes turn on the TV and watch whatever is on without much choosing or waiting, so call me old-fashioned and impatient, but I need cable.
  
  
  5. Apple TV/Media Centre - Of course, every geek's TV needs some kind of media centre, how else would I watch downloaded content? Okay, I guess I can always just get a DVD/DivX player that has a USB input, but I'm lazy. Now that Apple TV has dropped its prices, getting a refurbished one wouldn't be a bad idea. Besides, I can always install XBMC on it. Alternatives would be getting an Xbox 360, a PS3, or just a cheap computer.
  
  
  6. Digital SLR Camera - I love to travel, and what's the point of travelling if you're not taking pictures? It's too bad I didn't have a nicer camera to take with me during my Europe trip this summer, otherwise it'd be awesome. Photography is definitely something I would like to pick up.
  
  
  7. Turntables - Another hobby I wanted to pick up is DJing, but I never had enough time or money to learn. Now would be the perfect opportunity to start. Of course, I haven't gone as far to do any research on it, so I have no idea what I'll get. It'll be something I'll look at further down the road.
  
  
  8. Keyboard - It hasn't been too long since I bought myself a keyboard to force myself to get back into playing music, which is something I would like to continue doing. But I admit, it was a pretty cheap keyboard. When I get more money, I'll definitely upgrade myself to something nice.
  
  
  Hmm... I wonder if I'm missing anything else. :P

  10 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  Mat Kearney in Concert Mat Kearney came to town on Monday for his headlining tour and I must admit I wasn't that big of a fan of his. I mean I really liked his song "Nothing Left To Lose" to the point that it became my soundtrack for 2007, but that was about it. I occasionally listened to his two major label albums since. But being the show was only $17 (including everything) and that I already have transit passes in Toronto, I figured why not check it out, especially since I've been going on a concert-drought this past summer to save money until I get a job, and I already missed bands I would've liked to see, such as Green Day.
  
  Luckily and surprisingly, I didn't have to go alone as Melissa also happen to know who Mat is and wanted to see him as well. The venue was at Lee's Palace, which was a small club conveniently located at Bloor & Bathurst. The show was 19+ thankfully, so there were no teenyboppers coming by because it was a cheap show and/or they heard one of his songs on one of the many TV shows (according to Wikipedia: Dirty Sexy Money, Kyle XY, The Unit, Without A Trace, Laguna Beach, The Hills, Bones, Jericho, Friday Night Lights, Wildfire, What About Brian, South Beach, 8th & Ocean, One Tree Hill, Scrubs, The Closer, NCIS and Grey's Anatomy).
  
  The opening act of the show was Diane Birch. And I have to say, I was very impressed. Usually opening acts are far inferior than the the headliners, but not this one. Diane may look petite and pretty, but she's definitely not just a pretty face. Her voice was simply stunning. She carries influences from soul, blues with a bit of pop/rock, and it was exactly the direction she went from the beginning to the end of her set. She even did a cover of Haddaway's "What Is Love" alone. I was both amused and amazed by the way she worked that song. I have to say after listening to her sing live, I'm a fan.
  
  Then of course, was Mat Kearney, who hit the stage not too long after, spotting almost the exact same look as the cover of his latest album, City Of Black & White with both the white shirt and black hat. His two major label albums were actually quite different from each other. Nothing Left To Lose was a bit more acoustic and has him doing a lot of "rapping", err... spoken word in addition to just singing. City Of Black & White ditched all of the spoken-word business and went for a more mellow electric piano sound. So it was really interesting to hear the contrast between the two during the set as it covered much of both albums, especially since he kept switching instruments from acoustic to electric guitars then to electric keyboard. I felt sorry for the guy who had to keep running back and forth with different instruments between songs, or randomly pull out the keyboard, or push it back behind.
  
  What can I say, he sounds exactly like he does on his albums, and I'm not even exaggerating. His vocals were entirely on par, except maybe for a few spots when he doing his spoken-word parts in "Undeniable" and "In The Middle" that he stumbled a little bit. There's something about the way he sings that totally moves me, it just has so much feelings and he's such a talented songwriter.
  
  Mat also made a few jokes here and there, like he mentioned "You know know when you started writing all these songs, they become like babies to you. Then one day, you get a call 'Hey, we would like a doctor to make out to one of your songs.' And I was like, 'Yeah, that was entirely what I intended" when he introduced "Where We Gonna Go From Here", in reference to Grey's Anatomy of course.
  
  He also seemed very posey sometimes towards the end of songs as if he wanted to make sure there fans can get good pictures of him on stage. What a guy! He also jumped off the stage during "Runaway Car" to sing with his fans. He walked literally right beside me too. Too bad I couldn't get a picture with him! You definitely don't get that with bigger concerts.
  
  The set ended up with his two biggest singles, what a tease: "Nothing Left To Lose" (to which he made changed the lyric "California" to "Ontario", props for knowing the actual province he was in!) and "Undeniable" (when he "freestyled" a humourous verse towards the end in reference to Canada and Toronto). The encore songs were "City Of Black & White" (he actually brought out a vocoder for the outro), and "Closer To Love" (latest single, lame encore, I know, sigh...) and Diane Birch came back out with her band to cover Bruce Springsteen's "Can't Start A Fire Without A Spark".
  
  Overall, amazing show. Definitely worth the $17. I picked myself up a copy of City Of Black & White, it's too bad they weren't selling the other album, because I would've gladly bought that too. I am definitely now a fan of Mat's. We were hoping to meet Mat after the show, but unfortunately he wasn't around. Le sigh... I may post pictures when I get them from Melissa.
  
  Now I'm going to be cheesy and leave you with his lyrics + music video:
  
  "Nothing Left To Lose"
  Something's in the air tonight
  The sky's alive with a burning light
  You can mark my words something's about to break
  
  And I found myself in a bitter fight
  While I've held your hand through the darkest night
  Don't know where you're coming from but you're coming soon
  
  To a kid from Oregon by way of California
  All of this is more than I've ever known or seen
  
  Come on and we'll sing, like we were free
  Push the pedal down watch the world around fly by us
  Come on and we'll try, one last time
  I'm off the floor one more time to find you
  And here we go there's nothing left to choose
  And here we go there's nothing left to lose
  
  So I packed my car and I headed east
  Where I felt your fire and a sweet release
  There's a fire in these hills that's coming down
  And I don't know much but I found you here
  And I can not wait another year
  Don't know where you're coming from but you're coming soon
  
  To a kid from Oregon by way of California
  All of this is more than I've ever known or seen
  
  Come on and we'll sing, like we were free
  Push the pedal down watch the world around fly by us
  Come on and we'll try, one last time
  I'm off the floor one more time to find you
  And here we go there's nothing left to choose
  And here we go there's nothing left to lose
  
  I can still hear the trains out my window
  From Hobart Street to here in Nashville
  I can still smell the pomegranates grow
  And I don't know how hard this wind will blow
  Or where we'll go
  
  Come on and we'll sing, like we were free
  Push the pedal down watch the world around fly by us
  Come on and we'll try, one last time
  I'm off the floor one more time to find you
  
  Come on and we'll sing, like we were free
  Push the pedal down watch the world around fly by us
  And here we go there's nothing left to choose
  And here we go there's nothing left to lose
  
  
  
  Mat Kearney - Undeniable
  
  
  

  11 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  Google Street View Comes to Canada
  
  Hey look, here's where I am right now!
  
  Google Street View finally launches today in Canada after some controversial privacy concerns. All the faces and license plates have been blurred. It is now available for Vancouver, Whistler, Banff, Calgary, Kitchener-Waterloo, Toronto, Hamilton, Ottawa, Montréal, Québec City and Halifax as well as some of their adjacent suburbs.

  11 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  Car err... Bike-Free Day So part of my 1.5 hour daily commute to work consist of a bike ride from my parents' condo to Cooksville GO station. Yesterday, I parked and locked my bike in the morning. When I got to work, I realized that a bunch of my co-workers were planning to go for dinner at a hot pot place, so I figured I would tag along.
  
  By the time I got back to Mississauga, it was around midnight. Since the bike didn't have lights installed and it was late, I decided to take the GO bus directly to Square One, and leave the bike overnight, so I can grab it today instead as to not having to deal with the hassle.
  
  Today after work, I arrived at Cooksville GO station, and to my surprise, the bike was gone!
  
  Not quite sure what happened, but I'll call GO Transit tomorrow to see if they removed it. Sucks though, not because the bike is worth much (it really doesn't), but it's actually my brother's since my bike's chain broke, and now my commuting time will increase from 1.5 hours to 2 hours. Sigh...
  
  I guess on the positive side, walking may give me more exercise than biking?

  11 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  The beginning of my career... Yes, that's right, after months of going through job postings after job postings, submitting countless of résumés, my job search has finally come to an end. I have started my first full-time position (not counting co-op/internships) and my career as a computer engineer is coming to a full swing. As of this week, I have started work as a Software Engineer at Volanté Systems. It's a small software firm that specializes in POS (Point-of-Sales) software applications for food establishments using Java and I'm very excited to join their team. What really appealed to me about this position is the broad perspective I would be able to gain by fulfilling such a dynamic role, which can really be found in a company of this size. As well, I am quite impressed about the future plans that are in store for this company to grow.
  
  The office is located within the former city of North York in Toronto, near Don Mills subway station by Fairview Mall. Right now my commute is around 1 hour 30 minutes which consists of a bike ride, a GO commuter train ride, 2 subway train rides and a short bus ride. This will be temporary though, as I plan to move into the city in the very near future.

  11 months on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  HitzRadio.com 4.0 Launch After the public-release of the new design for HitzRadio.com in the form of beta for a bit over a week, I figured it is about time to officially launch it and replace the outdated previous iteration. It's kinda weird looking back, that we are just 8 days short of the 5 year mark of when the last revision of HitzRadio.com launched, right around the time when I was about to go to Waterloo. And now that I'm done school, I'm finally releasing a new revision. I guess I needed this kind of downtime I have right now to motivate myself to sit down and do something like this. You can read my release notes for Preview 1 and Preview 2 for the design decisions and motivations behind them. What have changed since the release of the beta version?

  • Full compatibility with all major browsers including IE 6+, Firefox 2+, Safari 3+, Opera 9+ and Chrome. Extensive work done to ensure IE 6 & 7 compatibility.
  • A non-AJAX version (well, it's pretty much a non-Javascript version really) of the website has been implemented to cater to search engine bots and users opting to not enable scripts. All pages now degrades gracefully to that version if user chooses to turn off Javascript at any given time.
  • Significantly optimized Javascript code to minimize use of jQuery selectors and fixed a bug where code is continuously added to listener functions as more pages are clicked. Pages now load and run much faster on all browsers. It's very noticeable with browsers that have slower Javascript engines (i.e. not Chrome, Opera, Safari).
  • Redesigned database and started from scratch to match updated design requirements. Most of the site's content is no longer stored in the database. It's pointless when they are fairly static.
  • Minor cosmetic adjustments, including slight change in colour scheme and increase in line-spacing.
  • All sub-menus follows to the top of the window if the page is scrolled.
  • Sub-menus for sections with anchors update links' colours based on scrolling position of the page.
  • "Just Played" sub-section on the Home page now also auto-updates every 30 seconds, in addition to the Currently Playing bar.
  • HitzLog now shows songs played in the last 3 hours along with timestamps instead of just the last 10 songs, made possible with new database design.
  • HitzList now shows top 50 played songs in the last 7 days in any given time. As well, made possible with new database design.
  • Added Feedback button with working AJAX form.
  • HitzLog and Feedback pop-ups can be closed by pressing Escape key.
  • Added Tune In button, links to SHOUTcast Flash player.
  • Added Amazon.com affiliate links to all song name references.
  • ASX file updated to proper specs with new logo and banner.

  Here it is, at HitzRadio.com!

  ~1 year on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  New HitzRadio.com Revision 2 Preview
  
  After launching the preview site of the new HitzRadio.com last week, and getting some feedback, I decided that the design didn't achieve anything I really wanted, so I headed back to the drawing board to come up with a new and better design. For this new design, I kept many of the same design principles and decisions. But these were my goals that differ for the new design:

  • The previous design was too dark and simplistic. Need to add some new design elements and add some variations of colour (even though I still wanted to keep it to the blue scheme).
  • Target for 1024x768 resolution. According to Google Analytics, only 3% of my site's visitors use a screen resolution lower than that, so it only makes sense to expand the layout to cover more screen real estate.
  • Make room for ads. I kinda forgot about that last time.
  • I wanted to change the look and feel of the website to match a CHR/Rhythmic (i.e. Hip-Hop and R&B) station last time by changing the colour scheme. However, I realized that wasn't enough. So I decided to do a little rebranding and change the logo as well as the look and feel of the site to make it less "cutesy".
  • Yes, the site totally breaks with IE, even IE 8. Will have to hack that soon, as well as create an AJAX-less version for those NoScript people as well as bots.

  Here it is, let me know what you think!

  ~1 year on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings
• 

  New HitzRadio.com Preview
  
  It's sad to think the current HitzRadio.com design has been in use since 2004. That's right, it's 5 years old! So it was definitely overdue for a makeover. I decided to take a shot at it this time, as last time I had help from Steve of Centova Technologies to do it. I've been putting off for a while, but in the last few weeks I decided to give it a go, because I actually had time on my hand to dedicate to this.
  
  These were some design decisions I made and my justifications:

  • Condensing the site. The current website has too much content and much of it we can do without. In fact, much of it has turned rather stale because there was too much for me to keep up as I became the only person to update the website and I just don't have the time.
  • I wanted to keep it simple and compact. The current website required 2+ clicks to get to the most useful content and we really don't have that much useful content!
  • The main focus of the site should be letting people to tune-in, so I dedicated a significant portion of the layout for that.
  • I decided to make the entire site and its navigation with AJAX. And no, it's not because it's the latest cool thing or just to show off. I plan on embedding a Flash object on the layout so that users can listen while they surf the website without being interrupted. The only alternative I can think of is IFrame, but then you lose the functionality of navigating to specific pages directly. I plan to make a no-script version of the identical layout without AJAX for browsers that disable Javascript though.
  • The website should be accessible for all. Including those using netbooks and smartphones who may not have as much screen real estate.
  • When it was 2004, HitzRadio.com was still a CHR/Top 40 station. Since then, we have now move and slanted towards the CHR/Rhythmic direction. And so we need a colour scheme that reflects that, which is why I chose to use a darker and cooler colours, such as neon blue and black.
  • Yeah, the site sorta breaks in IE. I know. :P I'll have to jump on a Windows computer so I can fix up on that. Too bad I upgraded my mom's computer's browser to IE8 already.

  
  
  Please do check it out and feel free to give me some feedback! :)

  ~1 year on
  Sunny Ng's Random Ramblings