Author Topic: Categories of life? (Read 15775 times)

superboyac · « **on:** May 25, 2010, 10:34 AM »

I want to re-categorize my website. Part of the reason is because in Wordpress it's impossible to sort categories in your own custom order. Yes, it's annoying. But it's still the best website thing out there.

But I was just thinking about it, and my website is personal. It's about my life. So, I want to make the top level categories the categories of life. What would you guys say that is? i don't want any more than 3 top level categories. I am very open to suggestions.

Here's my attempt:
--Work (possible alternatives: Career,

--Personal

--Random

I know. it sucks. I'm not familiar with philosophy. Anyways, please help!

superboyac · « **Reply #1 on:** May 25, 2010, 10:38 AM »

How about:
Career
Leisure
Nonsense

mitzevo · « **Reply #2 on:** May 25, 2010, 10:52 AM »

How about Personal, Professional, & Uncategorized

Less is more

daddydave · « **Reply #3 on:** May 25, 2010, 10:53 AM »

Maybe this site gives you some ideas. It is in reference to life goals, but they also tried to divide life into categories:

Artistic:
Do you want to achieve any artistic goals? If so, what?

Attitude:
Is any part of your mindset holding you back? Is there any part of the way that you behave that upsets you? If so, set a goal to improve your behavior or find a solution to the problem.

Career:
What level do you want to reach in your career?

Education:
Is there any knowledge you want to acquire in particular? What information and skills will you need to achieve other goals?

Family:
Do you want to be a parent? If so, how are you going to be a good parent?

Financial:
How much do you want to earn by what stage?

Physical:
Are there any athletic goals you want to achieve, or do you want good health deep into old age? What steps are you going to take to achieve this?

Pleasure:
How do you want to enjoy yourself? - You should ensure that some of your life is for you!

Public Service:
Do you want to make the world a better place? If so, how?

superboyac · « **Reply #4 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:07 AM »

How about Personal, Professional, & Uncategorized
Less is more
-mitzevo (May 25, 2010, 10:52 AM)

I like it! I'd like to have something more fun that "uncategorized". I like the other two though. I'm definitely using those.

superboyac · « **Reply #5 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:17 AM »

Maybe i don't need a third. Everything falls into place nicely with personal and professional. Still, it's always nice to have three. i can't think of anything good, though.

daddydave · « **Reply #6 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:18 AM »

Another tactic is to make a list of all your interests, be as specific as possible, and group from there

For example, if you have a category Engineering instead of Professional, I know what to expect when I click on it.

daddydave · « **Reply #7 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:19 AM »

Maybe i don't need a third. Everything falls into place nicely with personal and professional. Still, it's always nice to have three. i can't think of anything good, though.
-superboyac (May 25, 2010, 11:17 AM)

How about just "Fun" for the third?

superboyac · « **Reply #8 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:26 AM »

Another tactic is to make a list of all your interests, be as specific as possible, and group from there

For example, if you have a category Engineering instead of Professional, I know what to expect when I click on it.
-daddydave (May 25, 2010, 11:18 AM)

That's what I had before, but it got messy because i couldn't sort it the way I wanted. I'd have Engineering, then miscellaneous, then software. i want Miscellaneous at the end (of course).

This change is probably temporary until Wordpress comes out with v3, where I'm hoping I'll be able to custom sort the categories. Then, I'll broaden them up again.

As for Fun. Hmm...I was thinking about that. But Fun stuff is in my personal section.

I was also thinking "Social"...but that also fits under Personal.

I was also thinking:
Piss, Poo, Puke
just because they are all gross and, more importantly, alliterated.

steeladept · « **Reply #9 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:54 AM »

My thought for a third would be Opinion. That way you can separate ideas that go in the other two from your opinions that may apply to both, one, or neither. So that would end up with the catagories:

Professional
Personal
Opinion

mitzevo · « **Reply #10 on:** May 25, 2010, 11:57 AM »

That's the problem with categorization (on computers, not so much our brains)

Categories can fit in and outside of each other, so that's why I said less is more. Always remember when categorizing, are you sorting for yourself or others, in other words, don't be too perfectionist on it, remember it's not perfect even after a lot of thought (think about different languages).

I was trying to think of a better 3rd category, because I had a feeling you wouldn't like 'Uncategorized' (maybe Miscellaneous or Misc.?), but decided that fits tightly, you can then just tag posts/pages with keywords/tags like "random, fun, etc." that you categorize as 'Uncategorized'

When you have just the 3, Personal, Pro, and Uncategorized/Misc, I think it's perfect. You don't want to get too caried away categorizing everything.

If that feels too minimal or "funless", don't worry, you can let loose with your tags/keywords, even posts/pages in different categories can have the same tags/keywords.

superboyac · « **Reply #11 on:** May 25, 2010, 12:06 PM »

I don't like opinion, because everything in these articles is my opinion, and rather strong ones at that.

mitzevo, I agree with pretty much everything you said. I like Miscelleneous, but because of the alphabet, it would appear in front, which is bad. but I can write a function to sort backwards. Or I can use 'Other".

superboyac · « **Reply #12 on:** May 25, 2010, 12:09 PM »

Also, to asnwer the question of who is this for? It's a mixture. The motivation behind it is because Wordpress has limited sorting abilities. It's not anything more profound than that. But after getting into it, now I want to have somewhat logical divisions. So now it's for me. Of course, i also want it to make sense to my readers. But, honestly, I have maybe less than 5 readers, and I don't think they spend much time browsing the site.

mitzevo · « **Reply #13 on:** May 25, 2010, 12:14 PM »

mitzevo, I agree with pretty much everything you said. I like Miscelleneous, but because of the alphabet, it would appear in front, which is bad. but I can write a function to sort backwards. Or I can use 'Other".

Ha ha, there's another problem.. especially in your case, the order in which things a stored/seen

Obviously you want the more important subjects/categories to come first, and the least important last. This is a categoriztion/sorting/priority/importance/etc system in itself - the order in which items/things appear.
I guess 'Uncategorized' is best suited for you here

edit: Sorry, yes I missunderstood you, you can just modify the wp category listing function to put it last

superboyac · « **Reply #14 on:** May 25, 2010, 12:15 PM »

Personal
Professional
Nonsense

I like Nonsense because it's sort of funny. In the other categories, I'll have serious topics. In the Nonsense category, I'll have my stupid, fun articles...like the one about my coffee mug.

And it gives a little humor to the menu bar, which is always nice. Not too much, just a sprinkle.

superboyac · « **Reply #15 on:** May 25, 2010, 12:33 PM »

Well, here it is. I've re-categorized everything. I had to edit some code to make it go reverse alphabetical.

mitzevo · « **Reply #16 on:** May 25, 2010, 12:40 PM »

Progress

superboyac · « **Reply #17 on:** May 25, 2010, 01:07 PM »

I do get involved in a lot of nonsense. It's only fitting.

40hz · « **Reply #18 on:** May 25, 2010, 01:17 PM »

Maybe i don't need a third. Everything falls into place nicely with personal and professional. Still, it's always nice to have three. i can't think of anything good, though.
-superboyac (May 25, 2010, 11:17 AM)

I plan on using the designation Madness & Winks on a website I'm currently in the process of designing.

It's a catchall category for all the oddball art, literature, technology, philosophy, news, and other bits of zaniness that I'm intellectually flirting with. This section will be fairly fluid, with things appearing and disappearing in in response to my ever shifting interests and whims.

Feel free to use it if you like.

Addendum:

Couldn't help but notice...

Professional, Personal, Random...

Isn't that another way of saying: Life, Liberty, Pursuit of Happiness?

superboyac · « **Reply #19 on:** May 25, 2010, 01:19 PM »

Maybe i don't need a third. Everything falls into place nicely with personal and professional. Still, it's always nice to have three. i can't think of anything good, though.
-superboyac (May 25, 2010, 11:17 AM)

I plan on using the designation Madness & Winks on a website I'm currently in the process of designing.

It's a catchall category for all the oddball art, literature, technology, philosophy, news, and other bits of zaniness that I'm intellectually flirting with. This section will be fairly fluid, with things appearing and disappearing in in response to my ever shifting interests and whims.

Feel free to use it if you like.

-40hz (May 25, 2010, 01:17 PM)

I like it! before I steal it, can you tell me how you came across that phrase? The backstory would make it more appealing to me!

40hz · « **Reply #20 on:** May 25, 2010, 01:32 PM »

^Wish there were a good backstory to it. But in this case, it just popped into my head late one evening while I was working on the draft of a piece of steampunk fiction. My character Victoria Deering dismissed a scientific rival's 'proofs' as being little more than "Madness and winks."

"Here then are my proofs. What say you to them, Madam?"

"Madness and winks, Sir!"

AFAIK it's mine.

(Edit: I stopped being lazy and corrected the above dialog after I looked it up in my draft. )

Gwen7 · « **Reply #21 on:** May 25, 2010, 02:42 PM »

@40hz: nice! photoshop?

tomos · « **Reply #22 on:** May 25, 2010, 02:53 PM »

That sounds like a good back story 40hz!

I very much like the look of the other combo though
Professional Personal Nonsense
&
I think "Madness and winks" would work better on it's own (it would overpower the other two IMO)

An variation on first would be
Professional Personal Nonsensical

40hz · « **Reply #23 on:** May 25, 2010, 02:55 PM »

@40hz: nice! photoshop?

-Gwen7 (May 25, 2010, 02:42 PM)

Paint.Net actually. Just a quick & dirty character ref image for when I'm writing.

(JPG > Sharpen > Sepia > Ink Drawing > Glow. Manually adjust color curves, resize, and save as JPG.)

I try to create images and write a curriculum vitae plus fair bit of backstory for each of my major and semi-major characters. Helps keep me focused.

It also helps prevent any characters from staging a 'mutiny' around page 125!

superboyac · « **Reply #24 on:** May 25, 2010, 02:56 PM »

40, I like the term and explanation. I'd use it, but I think I'm going to stick with my one word category name, even though I like yours better. Nonsense give off a similar vibe anyway. More crude...but similar.

I just saw tomos' answer. Yes, you said it better.