Last week I gave a talk at ScreenMediaExpo, a UK trade show for the Digital Signage industry, entitled ‘Are you un-future-proofed’?
In the unlikely event that you want to listen to it, it can be found here.
Screened from the future
May 14th, 2010
Curvaceous Computing
May 11th, 2010
I miss being in UI research.
About 10 years ago I put together a plan for a cubic computer, where every side of the cube would be a touchscreen, and it would also contain accelerometers so you could scroll around maps and things by rotating the cube. The only imperfection would be a small power socket in one corner so you could recharge it. That, at least, was the idea. I had to abandon the project when I couldn’t find a manufacturer that would make square touchscreens at any sensible price, even for research purposes.
Microsoft, however, have gone one better, with a spherical multi-touch interface. I hadn’t seen this until now, but I think it’s beautiful.
More info on the Sphere project home page.
Calling all dog owners! Wagipedia is live!
May 9th, 2010
Wagipedia is now officially online! Find the best places to take your dog for a walk! Tell others about your favourite spots!
I created this because I realised, after getting a puppy, that the places I had gone for walks in the past weren’t necessarily the best places to take dogs, and that there were a whole range of really good dog-walks that I had never discovered.
The database is still small, but if you can contribute even a small entry – or ask your dog-owning friends to do so – I hope it could become a useful resource. After all, you may think that the park at the end of your road is nothing particularly special and that everybody knows about it anyway, but what about the person visiting your area for the first time? Or on holiday? Or dog-sitting for a friend?
You can also comment on existing entries.
Eventually, the site may expand to include all sorts of other canine-related resources, advice, discussion forums, etc, but I had to start somewhere. And, of course, most of these are also good spots for a stroll even if you don’t have a canine companion…
Feedback most welcome…
Living in the past
May 2nd, 2010
One of the great things about video rental services like Netflix and Lovefilm is the easy access to TV favourites from the past. Even better, you don’t have to buy a whole series if you find the first disk a disappointment.
Rose and I have always liked Ultraviolet, a modern vampire miniseries from the late 90s, and the Jeremy Brett Sherlock Holmes adaptations from the 80s.
Now we’re going further back: we’re currently half-way through Danger UXB – wonderful stuff – and are looking forward to Wings, of which I have only the vaguest childhood memories beyond the good theme music. Actually, the end of the eighties was about when I stopped watching TV, so I have a lot of catching up to do. Any other recommendations?
Sometimes I wonder about the wisdom of revisiting these. Will Blake’s 7, a favourite of its time, and roughly contemporary with Star Wars, stand up to several evenings’ watching when the cheapness of the BBC’s special effects is viewed through modern eyes?
Ah well… if things prove disappointing in outer space, there’s always All Creatures Great and Small…
Gateway to Heaven
April 28th, 2010
The view from Crishall churchyard
The Foggy, Foggy Dew
April 27th, 2010
As seen last week by the doggy, doggy few.
The Cam at Grantchester
The Face and Tripod
April 27th, 2010
I met Brian Robinson at a local function a little while ago and enjoyed talking to him. Originally an actor, he’s now a coach of speaking and communications skills.
Brian’s written a book, called The Face & Tripod. No, it’s not the name of a pub. You’ll need to read it to know why it’s called that. This book, ‘A simple guide to making The Business Speech’, is full of useful thoughts and comes recommended.
Only sixty-something pages long, it may seem rather pricey for such a slim volume. But it’s wonderfully compact… you could pay the same for something which said less, was less enjoyable to read, and had a lot more padding. And he’ll give you a nice discount if you mention my name…
Info about Brian and the book can be found here. Definitely recommended.
Disclaimer: I have no interest in this other than as an impressed and happy reader. I admit, though, that I didn’t pay for my copy… but I plan to buy the sequel should it ever appear.
Xauth Overload
April 25th, 2010
The Story Of X:
- In the beginning was xauth, a command-line utility that let you set which machines and users had authority to connect to your X windows display.
- Then there was XAUTH, part of the authentication mechanism in IPSec secure connections.
- xAuth, on the other hand, is variation on the OAuth protocol. It’s being proposed by Twitter as a more convenient way for apps to authenticate with online services.
- And now we have XAuth, a platform developed by Meebo to allow one website to see which other online services you might be logged into.
Come on guys! It’s time to start using some other letters!
Otherwise, we’ll have to think of a way of pronouncing the different capitalisations, so that when geeks say to each other over coffee, “Why don’t we just use x-auth?”, they don’t then all go and implement incompatible things…
Ex-books and eBooks
April 24th, 2010
Two rambling thoughts this morning about ebooks.
Mmm… an aside, before I’ve even started: How should I capitalise or hyphenate e-book? Quentin’s Law of Technological Pervasiveness says that a (non-proprietary) technology has been truly successful when it’s no longer capitalised. There are those who insist that ‘internet’ should still be ‘Internet’ but I don’t tend to bother, any more than I would talk about the Electricity Grid… now, where were we? Ah yes…
- Unlike their predecessors, e-books have no real reason to go out of print. This is encouraging if you’re an author who has poured years of your life into a work and can now take comfort in the idea that it will always be accessible, even if only a few continue to read it.
- Many publishers have made downloadable versions of their books freely available, confident in the knowledge that most people, if they like more than a chapter or so, will splash out for the paper version because it’s so much nicer than reading on screen. Will the advent of the iPad and similar, really rather nice, portable PDF viewers put an end to this practice?
The tracks of my tyres
April 9th, 2010
On the slopes of Mt Rainier.
Early multitouch input device
April 9th, 2010
A couple of days ago I had the pleasure of meeting Walter Taucher. Among other things in his Seattle office, he has a card-punch machine from the thirties.
Yes, kids, the connection between your keyboard and your computer used to be, not a USB cable, but a stack of cards that you’d carry across the campus to the computer building. This was the thing that punched the cards. Part of the intrigue for me was that this came from a company we know well, but which now has a rather different logo.
The machine still works, apparently…
The Times, they are a-fellin’
April 7th, 2010
There’s a widely quoted trivia fact on the web: that the publication of a typical Sunday edition of the New York Times takes 63,000 trees.
Wow. That’s pretty striking number, if it’s right. But does anyone have a source for it?
There are about 1.5M subscribers to the Sunday edition, so I’m guessing they sell about 2M copies in all. That means a single tree gives you only about 32 copies. Does that sound right? The paper is pretty bulky on a Sunday, but still… I don’t think the economics would work out if that were the case. How much does a tree cost?
Of course, they may be very small trees…
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