Mammallike universal robots explained with this disruptive technologies style diagram
This site lays out the rise of the machines.
– Mammallike Universal Robots.
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Parliament footage is nearly impossible for constituents to use
I recently contacted the administrators of parliamentlive.tv to see about getting access to about five minutes of footage from a House of Commons session I wanted to include in a video project.
Being that this was a public proceeding, lacking any sort of national security concerns and having to do with the common good, I thought this should be a fairly simple process. After all, the footage is openly available on a government website. It’s already been filmed, edited and posted. Getting the raw file should be no big deal. As it turns out, however, UK Parliament keeps about as tight a control on its content as the BBC does an episode of Doctor Who.
The response I got back cautioned me that “The situation relating to the use of Proceedings of Parliament on website is very complex.” And while I could freely link to any recording on the Parliament website I wanted to, should I actually choose to host and play a clip anywhere else or combine it with a video project, “this would be possible subject to a number of conditions.”
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Tools for better development
While I’m definitely a proponent of the open and the free, sometimes you just need certain tools to get the job done, and I’ve never been against paying some cash for really good applications. Adobe software’s costs are nearly as bloated as their programming. While PhotoShop may still be indispensable, DreamWeaver is more or less really convenient should you have the budget for it.
Thankfully, there are a number of “third party” applications out there made by really talented people that can speed up development, help creativity and otherwise just offer a fantastic user experience without costing heaps of cash that might be better spent on coffee, beer and comics. Here I submit my top 5 tools for developing better websites and the content for them that I either have or would pay for.
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WordPress 2.7: If code is poetry, then this could be the Illiad
The new WordPress release is looking sweet. Will be upgrading soon and trying it out with my ever-growing annual Christmas post, which has been in draft for far too long. Working full time and being a parent has cost blogging hours for sure. In the meantime, see what the best darned open source project is delivering for Crimbo:
I was well pleased with the 2.6 releases of WordPress and had been operating an far fewer thir-pary plugins to make this one do what I wanted. Looking at 2.7, it looks like I’ll be able to run even fewer. Just from the looks of it, my top 5 reasons for upgrading are:
- 1) Blogging from the dashboard – a limited form of this is in my current dash, but this one is fully capable.
- 2) Mass editing from the dashboard. Less clicking around and easier organising
- 3) Browse design themes and plugins from the interface. the less I have to log in and out, the better.
- 4) Plugins organised at last? The problem with previous versions is that people could program their plugins to be managed in any section of WordPress that they wanted and you had to click all over the place to find out where you were meant to manage them. I’ve not really confirmed it yet, but it looks like the interface has addressed this problem and is keeping them all in one place.
- 5) It looks really pretty.
Going mobile with jasper
Out with the boy and testing the iphone wordpress app.
Editing this post on the go to check out the WordPress iPhone application, which works well enough. The camera, which was tried out at left here, handles fine for online posting purposes in well-lit environments, but mostly it’s impressive as an organizational tool and contacting tool, and how great should photography really be through a phone anyway?
I’ve been thinking that these things need a different name than phone anymore. Phoning people is the least I use mine for and when looking around I just see people texting one another half the time. So much technology just to make typing more difficult.
The drew3ooo Modicus Remix theme for WordPress
Get under the hood and see how this blog works.
In honor of the Obama election and Guy Fawkes Day, I’m releasing the theme and associated plugins that make my website function. Download it here.
Download d3.zip from my drop.io drop box.
The design for this blog is an alteration of an alteration. The Modicus Remix theme for WordPress is proving to be quite popular for an unsupported piece of open source brik-a-brak. Modicus Remix by Art Culture is a redesign of the theme Modicus by Upstart Blogger. I use a stripped down version of Modicus-Remix here, sexed up with a number of plugins, and slightly recoded to work better with WordPress 2.5 – 2.6.
I’m now averaging about one question a week regarding the sidebar, which it seems a lot of people aren’t getting to work in their copies of Modicus-Remix. Mine didn’t work out of the box and I literally just hacked it until it did. No, I didn’t document this process and don’t quite remember everything I changed. So goes the fun process of home blog creation. The theme in its present incarnation requires a couple of plugins for it to work. Disable those plugins and your sidebar goes wonky.
Let me tell you something about humans, nephew. They’re a wonderful, friendly people as long as their bellies are full and their holosuites are working. But take away their creature comforts, deprive them of food, sleep, sonic showers, put their lives in jeopardy over an extended period of time and those same friendly, intelligent, wonderful people will become as nasty and as violent as the most blood-thirsty Klingon.
