Google "Keep" A Friendly New Way To Manage Your Life Of Lists, Notes, Photos, To-Do's

Google Keep is an amazing little web based note taker!

 I can understand now at this point that inviting a new app into your live to keep lists and reminders is a crowded space. But I really want to open your minds to this one. Google Keep has some tremendous benefits for the super busy person who wants labeling in one place.

• Syncs across Google Accounts, Allows Sharing and Exporting to Google Docs
• Provides Notifications and Reminders
• Allows for labeling, labeling
• Creating checkboxes and crossing items off of your list without losing the item.
• Allows for archiving, changing of list color and email sharing.
• Has nice smooth web and desktop interface linked with your Google Account.
• It can also be added as a shortcut to your Google Apps(The same place you find Drive and Docs).

I was slow to start using Google Keep as it was very similar to Evernote in its features but as a dedicated Google Docs user the creation of Docs from my lists was the biggest selling point. Additionally, the ability to have a cross platform application that syncs with my Google Desktop as an option makes efficiency when moving from location to location amazingly simple.

Desktop View Of Google Keep

I have used this app to share lists which are constantly evolving and changing in real time. I have also used this list maker to more easily enable blogging on the run and turning into a Google Doc in a click of a button.

So go ahead download the "Keep" app from Google Play or find the 3rd party "Go Keep" app from the App Store and test out the sharing of lists,notes,photos and whatever your heart desires across email accounts.

Also be sure to view your synced desktop version when logged into your Google Account.

https://keep.google.com/

I think may find yourself returning to it before you know it as your go to list maker/ creative space.

A change in plan

In the past couple of weeks of innovation lab, we did a variety of things.

Immediately after my last blog, some of us were looking at the haXe programming language. As I learned, it is a nice framework for writing cross-platform applications. I was planning on looking at Web Development at some point, and I think that haXe looks like a good place to start. Maybe by June I will try to make a small project in haXe just to figure out how it works. The one problem I had was trying to find an IDE which works well. I tried flashDevelop and IntelliJ, but I had some problems with both of them :3. Hopefully I can get one of them to work in the next few weeks.

Regarding my project - For the time being (maybe next few weeks or so) I want to switch gears. The problem I was finding was that I chose a project which involved a lot of skills I didn't have (F# experience, experience with .NET and Monogame, AND a lot of complicated algorithms for collision detection and physics related things). In Heinz sight, that was probably not a great idea, I should have focused on one or two skills that I didn't have, and learn a lot in the areas chosen. For the time being I want to cut out a lot of the complicated physics and collision detection related things, and just focus on making a game with F# and Monogame.

The *new* tangent idea I had was that instead of a racing game described in previous blogs, I would work on a smaller more manageable game without the added complexity of some of the physics and collision detection. My idea is more along the lines of a racing game where the cart is controlled with the mouse, and the cart must race against something (either time, or AI controlled characters - depending upon which I have time to make). Its a little hard to explain, and so, I created a short video, which hopefully can explain it.

This is the video of what I have worked on making in the last few days, hopefully I will be able to work more on it, and make it into a polished game. If I have time, I may try to work on my original idea, by then I will be familiar enough with what I am doing that I can start using more complex algorithms, but until then I don't want to push it (I really want to have a working game by the final)