Read Web Articles Without the Noise
Friday February 03 2012 - web, tips, typography, web-design, recommended, readability, style, ads, advertising, google-ads, banner-ads - 0 comments
Here’s a handy tip for you, something I use probably at least once a day . Many web pages contain useful information and a whole lot of clutter, garish colours, awful typography, poor layout, tiny text, blinky annoying banner ads, navigation, Google ads and stuff that just pulls your attention away from what you really want to see. All this adds up to an uncomfortable, difficult reading experience. In the arms race against annoying clutter and poor design, there is a useful tool called Readability . This little utility installs a JavaScript button on your favourites bar that just removes all the...
How To Report A Problem To Developers
Monday January 23 2012 - bug, software, customer-service, support, error, debug, technical-support, howto, best-practice - 0 comments
Since the original computer bug shown in the image was documented by Grace Hopper , computer software sometimes fails in mysterious ways. This is frustrating for end users and developers alike, but there are a few do’s and don’ts that will get the problem fixed faster. I’m placing this here as something I can refer to in groups and forums that I visit. I see badly constructed problem reports often enough that it is worth spending time explaining what software developers need to troubleshoot a problem and how to avoid making the problem worse. Especially with open source projects...
TiGra Networks Email Policy
Friday January 20 2012 - email, disclaimer, stupid, policy - 0 comments
Introduction In response to the growing trend of ridiculous disclaimers and terms and conditions attached by some companies to their outgoing email, TiGra Networks has instigated this email policy for all mail being delivered to our email domains. Scope of Policy This policy covers all domains owned and/or operated by TiGra Networks, including (but not limited to) the following: tigranetworks.co.uk long-family.com speechclarity.co.uk orientaliadesigns.com mapug-astronomy.net astroanswers.org live-assistant.co.uk va-extraordinaire.com gtinetwork.biz it-superheroes.co.uk Policy Statement All content...
What’s in a Strong Name
Sunday December 04 2011 - ascom, software, explanation, best-practice, astronomy - 0 comments
Developers of .NET assemblies soon come to the decision of whether or not to strong-name their assemblies. There are various pros and cons but I focus here on the requirements for ASCOM components authored in .NET, these components must publish an ASCOM interface via COM Interop. For purposes of COM Interop, the location of a .NET assembly and whether or not it is strong-named affects the visibility of the COM interfaces. The reason for this is bound up with the workings of mscoree.dll (the .NET COM loader) and fusion.dll (the .NET component responsible for locating and binding to assemblies at...
Stock Faults on LX-200 Telescopes
Wednesday November 30 2011 - astronomy, lx200, meade, faults, diagnosis, repair, electronics, telescope, technical - 0 comments
I copied this information from Brian Bond’s web site. I worked with Brian on a fault in my telescope’s drive system a few years back and some of his words of wisdom are captured on the MAPUG Topical Archive at www.mapug-astronomy.net , which we host on our web servers at TiGra Networks . Brian’s web site is now offline and I wanted to reproduce this information online for posterity. Once again I am having to repair faults in my LX200 drive system and Brian’s accrued knowledge is again proving invaluable. Stock Faults on the LX200 Classic. Electrical These are standard faults...
Bad Security Advice from PayPal
Monday November 28 2011 - web, ecommerce, online-safety, security, fail - 0 comments
I get annoyed by out-of-date recycled wisdom. You’d think PayPal would know better. I was checking my account today and I saw a banner ad for the PayPal Phishing Quiz. I thought I’d take the quiz and they scored me 6 out of 7, but I disagree with their answer. Current versions of Internet Explorer and Google Chrome have NO status bar by default. The status bar is not the correct place to look for the lock icon. It is next to the address bar, as these clips from Internet Explorer 9 and Google Chrome 15.0 show: PayPal's advice may have been correct five years ago. In those days, it was a common...
Sharpen the Saw: Bum, Back, Bytes, Brain
Monday November 28 2011 - technical, training, skills, software, it, ergonomics, work-environment - 0 comments
Nice article by Scott Hanselman on how computer professionals deprive themselves of good tools and abuse their bodies. Some (computers, monitors, keyboards and mice) are obvious. Others not so much. Things like a good quality bed, a decent chair and height adjustable workbenches. Scott’s final tool that needs sharpening is: Your Brain. Scott says: Books, classes, experience, and challenges all push your brain. I often tell the story of the senior developer who has 20 years experience. The problem is it's the same year of experience, twenty times. Somewhere in year 5, or year 14, you'd think this...
How Not to Sell Online
Monday November 28 2011 - web, ecommerce, business, fail, software - 0 comments
This is a copy of an email that I just sent to StarDock corporation regarding my experience attempting to purchase ‘Fences’. Not selling many copies of Fences? Your store page and purchase process is badly broken. First, the Buy Now button on your product page results in a 404 Not Found message. But I’m smarter than that, I went to the StarDock Store home page and searched for the product there and I was able to click the Buy button there. The page for entering payment details offers credit card or PayPal. I always use PayPal for online transactions. But on your page, I’m required to enter a credit...
This Explains Winter
Friday November 11 2011 - astronomy, nature, science, seasons - 1 comments
Coming soon: The shortest day of winter. The image here was created with Stellarium and shows the Sun from South Wales, UK, as it will appear at noon on 21st December 2011, reaching its maximum altitude of just under 15 degrees of elevation....
Open Source VoIP–It’s a Zoo
Sunday November 06 2011 - voip, telephony, open-source, q-a, guru, help, it, phone, pbx, software, support, technical, asterisk, trixbox, free-pbx, freeswitch, switchvox, stack-exchange - 0 comments
Open source VoIP solutions suffer from many of the problems that characterize open source projects in general: lack of good documentation and support communities that are horribly out of date and full of misleading, irrelevant or just plain wrong information. A new technology pioneered in the programmer’s Q&A site Stack Overflow aims to help right the wrongs of these unreliable resources, by blending the best features from wiki’s, forums and blogs. It really does work amazingly well. The technology has evolved into Stack Exchange which hosts a growing collection of Q&A sites based on the...