Battle of the Lifestreams: Sweetcron vs. Complexlife

*BHUFF! SCRACK! HRUAGHHH!*

Those were the sounds I was making yesterday by banging my head against the table, trying to push the Deadlamb property further into the realms of Web 4-point-MEGA-AWESOME and appending a lifestream onto these necrotic pages of excellence. Helping me achieve this invasion into the future were the Wordpress plugin Complexlife and the “automated lifestream blog software” Sweetcron. After much code-wrangling, -mangling, and -fandangling, I finally got them both working and will now share with you how I did done it. Yay.

Sweetcron

Not much to look at, eh? Sadly, my attempts at creating a unique theme for my Sweetcron lifestream/blog have ended up making the page look like some sort of cyber-whore victim of a webular Jack the Ripper. Don’t let that put you off however, from hands more skilled than mine I’m sure exciting and attractive themes will become plentifully available. You can see a more beautified incarnation on the creator’s own site here at www.yongfook.com.

Sweetcron is downloadable software that you can upload to, and then install on, your server. It’s in beta at the moment, meaning functionality is a work in progress and you can only download it by subscribing on this site. If you enjoy being on the cutting edge of existence (like I do) then you’ll sign up right now. It functions like your typical lifestream aggregator but takes the concept up a notch. It’s whole existence is a statement that the traditional blog as-we-know-it is going the way of the neanderthal.

First off I should say that Sweetcron and Complexlife both need PHP5 to work. This meant that my arduous journey to lifestream mecca began several days ago trying to get my Easy Internet Solutions server upgraded from four-point-two. Fortunately, the support guys were bloody brilliant and sorted me out in no time despite my constant barrage of ignorant questions. For the record, if anyone reading this has Easy Internet Solutions server-space be assured that a full-scale rollout of PHP5 is being planned for October. Lovely guys.

Once this had been sorted, it was a mere freakishly painful nightmare to fully install Sweetcron. To be fair, I think it was more my fault than the software, and I was eventually able to solve all my problems by studying the documentation, searching online and blindly hacking at code. The instructions are fairly simple, it’s just the execution isn’t all that easy.

Once installed, it’s easy to get to grips with; though it seems a bit bare on the backend at the moment which severely hampers it’s mainstream appeal. For example, it would be great to be able to configure the appearance of individual themes via the dashboard rather than having to configure the code. I don’t see myself using it as anything other than an experimental addition to the Deadlamb empire for the time being, but once I’ve got a spiffing theme I’ll undoubtedly warm to it more. Until then, I’m just happy following the development and inexpertly fiddling my way through CSS.

Complexlife

Complexlife was almost as painful to get working as Sweetcron; though this was more to do with Cyberduck being an uncharacteristic pain in the ass than any problem with the plugin. Following the instructions properly (and ensuring you install SimplePie Core first) should see you getting Complexlife installed and running without any problems, and it’s easily customisable so anyone will have enough power over it’s appearance to be able to claim ownership.

The only real stumbling block I had was a bunch of error codes appearing at the top of the page. Turns out this was because the plugin was trying to access a folder in Wordpress called Cache. If this doesn’t already exist, simply create it on your server under the wp-content folder. Problem solved.

My lifestream has been designed to match the simple aesthetic of the site, but each different element of your stream can be assigned a different background colour (i.e. Last.fm = red) if you want. Mostly, this will create an early Myspace-esque monstrosity of vomit-like proportions but the option is there nonetheless. I’ve also chosen to have my stream go back only seven days, though you can set this timeframe to unlimited if you’re that bloody interesting.

Ending

Which do I prefer? Complexlife has been far easier to integrate into what I’ve already got than Sweetcron – though that’s kinda the point of it. Likewise, Sweetcron has the potential to move beyond the dull list appearance of most streams but this potential isn’t easy enough to tap yet. Basically, I’m on the fence. Complexlife is pretty much a done deal now; Sweetcron, on the other hand, has plenty more to interest and frustrate me with.

So why am I going to all this effort to get a Lifestream on my site when I already have a FriendFeed and SecondBrain account? Partly it’s because I like to fuck around with stuff I don’t fully understand, but there’s also an element of genuinely perceived value involved. I come across all sorts of cool shit on the web every day which I want to share with others, most often without the need for commentary. A lifestream as a homepage means that people can dip into all the cool stuff I’ve seen and (if this thing catches on) I can dip into what they’ve find. Why bother writing a blog post about your favourite video on YouTube when you can just favourite it? Same with news: don’t republish it, just digg it. Save your blog posts for proper editorial or journal articles.

So that’s why my lifestream is awesome. Enjoy it.

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