FlyingPen

In the RAF, you don't have to be a Pilot to fly!

2008-07-25T05:48:00.001-07:00

Just thought i'd post this. It's from an advert that displayed in the sponsored link bar of my Gmail. It read

RAF Musician - £16,900 - www.rafcareers.com - In the RAF, you don't have to be a Pilot to fly. Find out more!

When taken out of context it sounds pretty bad. I'm suprised there isn't anything else about it on the internet.

Late Review of Apple's Safari

2007-07-05T10:00:00.000-07:00

I have had Safari for about a week now and I would like to say it has been a pleasure to use and I am definately going to switch. But thats not going to happen. I am a Firefox user at the moment and I thought because iTunes is a great piece of software maybe Safari will follow. So here goes with my thoughts....

First off for the setup... it was great although a larger download than firefox it was smooth and I had no problems. I was also happy it didn't ask to be my default browser. But you can easily set this in the program's preferences.
The browser is really easy to use with it's standard Apple minimalist approach.
The only problems I had with usability were the tabs because I like to be able to close them with the middle mouse button. But, I do like the effects they give when you move them about.
The standard OSX style dragging things are quite nice as well although similar effects can be achieved with firefox.
The scrollbar is a bit beefy and obstructive but that isn't a major problem.
It is true what they say pages do load a bit faster but not that much faster.
I don't see any addons which i use a tone of in firefox?...
My biggest annoyance is the fact that you can't use the task bar on windows when it is open because it fills the full screen... that is really really bad. Although I understand it is in Beta.

That's about all I have to say. But if I were you stick with firefox and if you don't use firefox I would give it a try!

iPhone is out now what?

2007-07-04T12:24:00.001-07:00

So the iPhone has been released and there are some really good balanced reviews on the web about it... although you'll be lucky to get your hands on one now. The engadget review is very helpful and answers the question you want answering.

But, now that Apple has released the iPhone shouldn't there be something else on its way even before Leopard which is supposed to be released in October. Maybe Pink Macbook Pros....

ok maybe not?

Kitten Captcha (KittenAuth)

2007-06-27T10:04:00.000-07:00

This is the Answer! Ok, so I was talking about the problems of captchas becoming completely unreadable and now this seems to be the answer to my call. OK, no it wasn't but it was an answer to my need.

All you have to do is answer a simple question like: "Click all the Tigers" by using the images provided. You would have to be pretty stupid to get it wrong but it is much harder to hack than normal captchas.

To read more about this excellent idea go to the KittenAuth Page.

Hand to iPhone Ratio

2007-06-25T02:14:00.000-07:00

The mighty iPhone which is due to hit shops on the 30th June in the US seems to be getting smaller.... It appears that Apple are using bigger hand models to display their iPhone on.

It's quite funny really why they would choose to do this although to be fair it does look kind off big in the "before" picture. However, I would have thought that if size mattered that much they would go off measurements not what it looks like in someone elses hands.

I think it's just funny.

World's Smallest Computer

2007-06-21T05:56:00.000-07:00

This interesting looking computer claims to be the world's smallest computer. This is the SEMC5071A and with it's pretty ugly looking brightly colored it comes with a obviously large amount of connecters as well as 64 MB of SDRAM and a CPU that can go as fast as 300 MHz!!! There are ports for a monitor, serial connection, USB, microphone, Ethernet and flash memory. Although that may not sound that impressive it is all in a box that is 2 x 2 x 1.8 inches which really is tiny.

Visit the products website here.

I'm sure you'll agree it is a inovation in computers!

SWFObject is a Flash SEO Solution?

2007-06-19T10:47:00.000-07:00

Flash is well known to not be search engine friendly. Basically, no content from a Flash file can be read by a search engine like Google. So therefore, people who have fancy Flash based sites are often shot down in the search results. This is probably one of the main reasons these sites are also made in a html version although usability is also a large aspect of this.

But there is now a small package enables web designers to add flash to their site whilst keeping an alternative for search engines and for people who for any reason can't see the flash file. It has been created for completely free use by Geoff Stearns of Deconcept.

The whole thing is done in a really simple way and is easy to pick up for anybody with minimal javascript and html understanding.

To give it a try you can read more here

Flashless iPhone

2007-06-18T06:46:00.000-07:00

The iPhone which will be realised on 29th June in the US won't even have the Adobe Flash Player! So although it was supposed to have the "full internet" it won't really be much better than on a normal windows mobile smartphone. There are now so many sites using flash as there actual site not just a small animation on the page.

It just doesn't make sense to me to do this and I think it will have an effect on people's trust on the iPhone because it goes seriously back on one of its main features. Maybe it will come with time though in a software update but not for now. Although as the phone doesn't actually have 3G you'll have to be either in a hotspot or have to wait along time for flash file to download anyway.

A bit of a disapointment really.

Buzz Out Loud

2007-06-15T07:47:00.000-07:00

Buzz Out Loud is a excellent podcast from Cnet Networks. It is probably the best technology podcast I have every heard and is excellent to listen and unlike many technology podcasts and shows there are absolutely no boring parts.

The podcast is presented by three people: Tom Merritt, Molly Wood and Veronica Belmont and they now have their very own Podcast Producer Jason. They make a podcast lasting roughly 30 minutes although it is a "Podcast of indeterminate Length" and is full of the days latest and most interesting news. It apparently keeps many listeners sane on their trip to work.

However, Buzz Out Loud is one of many fantastic podcasts that Cnet offer. For a full list click here.

Related Links

Buzz Out Loud Homepage
Cnet Podcasts
Tom Merritt
Molly Wood
Veronica Belmont
Cnet

Derren Brown guess transplants....

2007-06-14T09:30:00.000-07:00

A couple of nights ago I went to see Derren Brown at the Derngate in Northampton (UK) and it was an absolutely awesome show. Some of the things I witnessed went as follows:

Derren guessed that a bloke had a double kidney transplant.
He guessed people star signs and birthdays.
He answered question from people that they didn't even say and just thought.
put £5000 on the line.
Made a table levitate... yeh that old trick again
Guessed and answered questions based on people's initials - apparently people like him used to do this in the 1920s and 30s.

Derren Brown has had numerous fantastic shows on Channel 4 and has also has several live performances under his belt. If he is ever near you, you must go and see him.

Related Links

Derren Brown's site
Derren Brown Channel 4
Derngate Northampton
Channel 4

Nintendo Wii sales hit 8 million already

2007-06-13T09:13:00.001-07:00

The sales of Nintendo's Wii console have now passed the 8 million mark worldwide. With Xbox360 sales just 2 million ahead on 10 million sold through and PS3 on 3.5 million. DS, meanwhile, is fast approaching the 45 million mark, with PSP sales around half that. Who would have thought this that console would catch up to the xbox 360 so quickly when it is really just I kind of arcade console. I personally think it is good people are more excited about this console because nintendo were willing to do something particularly special on this and I think they deserve a pay back. Whereas the Sony Playstation and the Microsoft Xbox 360 really just made their old ones better.

I think if we want a revolution in gaming maybe we should back Nintendo for the new ideas!

Check this statistic site out to see the current sales : VG Chartz

iTunes DRM Free.... But it costs you!

2007-06-12T09:22:00.001-07:00

Many people will already know that EMI and iTunes have released a new DRM (digital rights management) free music download. But when you think about is charging an extra $0.30 it is actually a bit of a rip off and they gain far more than you do. You are actually paying ruffly an extra 30% of the price again just so you can do a bit more with it. As it still has your account name as a kind watermark on the track it is really just as bad.

So really is it worth paying that extra cash for barely anymore freedom. I won't be happy until the music business realises that it is about getting people to listen to the music that matters not the the huge amounts of cash... but I'd be living in a fantasy world if I thought that was every going to happen.

inline elements have no width!

2007-06-11T07:09:00.000-07:00

I noticed this the other day when I was making a header for a site and realised that I couldn't set a width to my menu elements. I wondered if anyone knew why because it seems a bit rediculous to me. The only other way can think of displaying a menu bar accross the top of a page apart from in tables would be to use alot of floating elements. But, some how it is actually possible to do it with the "block" property but I don't really understand the point of that.

In the end this is what i came up with to do it:

.navTabs {
list-style-type: none;
display: block;
float: left;
text-indent: 10px;
margin: 0px;
width: 95px;
height: 25px;
padding-top: 5px;
background-image: url(images/tab.png);
background-repeat: no-repeat;
font-size: 110%;
font-weight: bold;
margin-top: 0px;

}

I really hope they update the property in css 3.0 so that you can actually do this properly.

Captcha is just an annoyance

2007-06-07T11:09:00.000-07:00

Captcha has been brought onto the web to use of forms to stop spam bots from posting on sites and sending messages to people - Hence there name Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart. But, it now seems to me that some sites have taken it just too far. Obviously, spam bots aren't stupid and could be and probably have been programmed to recognize simple captchas. But, really they should be either made so atleast humans can read them! For example the third captcha down on the image to the right... what is that supposed to say?

For me I think the Digg Captchas (the top two on the image to the right) are about the limit for for what i would want to have to read to submit a simple form. Because, personally when you are writting a 10 word comment to a blog post you don't want to have to click submit 5 times before you eventually get thing to post!

I think we should start thinking about other things a person can do that a computer just wouldn't be able to do (or atleast not without considerable effort on the programmer's part). The best example I can think of is to put an extremely simple (and easy) flash game in the place of the captcha. This is the kind of game I am thinking of:

you would have to use the navigation keys to step left then right.
Then shoot a large target using the mouse.

I would have thought this game would be simple to write and "complete" but pretty hard for a programmer to make a spam bot complete. I think that would stop people having to submit forms 5 times and stop 99% of spam bots.

Hey... if anyone is a talented programmer, give it a go!

Who needs 4oD?

2007-06-06T08:21:00.000-07:00

Who really needs Channel 4's on Demand service? The answer is plain and simple... nobody!
To introduce things: in the UK there is absolutely no mention of putting any TV online. The closest is 4oD but even this you have to pay for!

However, there is an excellent website that has absolutely every UK tv program on it under the sun. It is called "TV Links". You simply select from it's vast menu of programs and then select the episode you wish to watch. Now of course I am not sure how legal it is but it is still really excellent. Oh, and did I mention it actually has Movies and music videos on it as well. They also update their site daily and have all the shows and movies I personally could ever want to watch and if you can't find there and I quote:

Well, you could ask us, but better yet, ask at the forums!

So, you really don't need to pay for 4oD with a service like this. Just go to tv-links.co.uk

Bittorrent breaks land speed records!

2007-06-05T07:43:00.001-07:00

I use bittorrent quite often to download off the bittorent site and I have never seen what is portrayed on this image. They have several things downloading and NONE uploading but they have also managed to get it over to 7mb/s download! I have never managed to get it over 200kb/s which I thought was quite good... but 7.5mb/s.

I don't think bittorrent really though it through because they are suggesting that you don't actually have to do any uploading. Which, kind of ruins their whole idea.

Maybe it's really different in the US with broadband connections but there are very few service providers that actually give you that much bandwidth. I can't wait to be able to download a movie in a few minutes. That would be awesome!

FlyingPen is Up and ready for business

2007-06-03T09:09:00.000-07:00

This Post takes FlyingPen out of construction so now there is nothing stopping me bringing you lovely people some news, articles and other interesting things for you to read.

As I said in my very first post this Blog is about: technology, music and humour and web design... Ok I didn't actually say anything about web design but that's what i do so you may as well hear about it. There is always something you can learn there.

So welcome one and all to what I hope will be a long lasting project of mine... welcome to FlyingPen!

Welcome Flying pen.... it is a blog

2007-05-31T06:23:00.000-07:00

This is what is known as a blog... so welcome to it. I will post stuff here for you to read... so good luck with that..

It will be about technology, music and humour, pretty simple really.

But for now this site is under construction..