Writing about: E–learning Research: blog styles for better academic writing, 30/05/06, transversality – a geophilosophical journal

Most of the time I write my blog entries for my own use, with a few other readers in mind who all use Firefox, so I’m not that bothered about Internet Exploder users. I’m also not interested in how my texts appear out of context in RSS aggregators, so it doesn’t matter that they lose their additional formatting in such systems.

I’m always interested to see the approach taken by the E-Learning Advisors (employed to advise the faculties about the use of e-learning technologies) at Warwick. This is a case in point; Rob O’Toole has formatted his blog to define semantic elements using CSS, so for example a definition is prefixed with *Definition:*.

The problem, of course, is that RSS readers and aggregators, and screen readers do not respect CSS styles. CSS is a description of layout, not of meaning. Just as the web is moving to a separation of content and presentation, Rob is explaining how to take a backward step and tie meaning to presentation, and simultaneously deny meaning to 90% of web users (using IE), anyone who wants to aggregate his work, and anyone who uses a screen reader.

I had left a comment explaining this, primarily as a caveat emptor, but evidently constructive feedback isn’t welcome.

(_via_ Oboeinsight)

All done. Submitted today. No more writing. My life feels suddenly empty again. (Except, of course, for trying to find somewhere to live when I start my new job, woo!)

I’m currently explaining why the the calculations which we have done may not be particularly accurate; one factor is that we haven’t modelled the solvation energy.

Word auto-corrects solvation to salvation.

It’s thesis time!

About time too.

Final editing early next week, should submit by the end of the week.

And it’s looking positive for a start at the small consultancy company that offered me a job a while back. So all good :)

Writing about: Flickr: Photoshop Tennis

For those who dont know, Photoshop Tennis is a game whereby someone chooses a starting image, it could be anything, though generally a decent sized high resolution image usually works best, and then people edit the image following the guidelines that the person who posted the original image lays down, then post their image, then people edit the edited image and post their creations, and so on, the game ends when people stop posting new edits.

There are no winners in the game, it is an exercise in collaborative creation, and often quite cool pictures can be created in this way. And though the group is called Photoshop Tennis, you dont need to use Photoshop to participate, any decent image editing program will do.

Absolutely brilliant :-)

It’s been a while since I responded to a “blog meme” thing, but this one is good fun, so here we go:

Go to your music player, set it to shuffle/random, and answer the
following questions with the title of the FIRST song that you skip
to each time. No cheating!

If you reached the top of Mount Everest, you would scream:
Wie stark ist dein Zauber?

The next time you stand up in front of a group of people, you’ll say:
Wait until tomorrow

Your favorite thing to say when drunk is:
Call the police

Your message to the world:
Blaze of Glory

Your deepest secret:
The Grasshopper

Your innermost desire:
Without You

Your oldest memory makes you think:
Everybody’s Fool

Somewhere in your wedding vows, you’ll include:
Can you feel the love tonight?

On your deathbed, you’ll whisper:
Arethusa

Your friends say behind your back:
Adios

You say behind your friends’ back:
Prose Combat

Your opinion of MySpace:
I can’t stop raving

When you wake up in the morning, you mutter:
Irrlicht

If you found yourself lost on a desert island, you’d yell:
God is a DJ

Right now, your feelings are:
Thank you for the music

What’s your excuse for reposting this bulletin?:
Poison

Your life’s soundtrack:
Nightmare

My best photos at Max Hammond Photos.
More of my photography on Flickr.
Stock Photography at Alamy

New contact lenses – hooray! I still find sticking my fingers in my eyes an unnatural process, but it’s worth it for the peripheral vision…

I’ve got daily disposables at the moment, but I’m considering the new “extended wear” lenses, they can be worn for a month at a time, after a 4-week process of fittings and appointments to make sure that everything is ok. Dailies make sense when I wear lenses occasionally, and when I was working in the lab I didn’t want to wear contacts. But now I’m freed from that, I’m reconsidering whether to wear lenses more often, and logically it makes sense to consider the extended-wear lenses…

via Boing Boing

Writing about: This day in Music

Look up what was number 1 for any date after 1952!

My Birthday: Are Friends Electric? – Tubeway Army

Started secondary school: Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weeny Yellow Polka Dot Bikini – Bombalurina

My 18th Birthday: I’ll Be Missing You – Puff Daddy & Faith Evans

Started Uni: Candle In The Wind ‘97 / Something About The Way You Look Tonight – Elton John

Graduation Day: A Little Less Conversation – Elvis Vs JXL