I was reading Paul Scrivens’ article titled Smashing Magazine Killed The Community a couple of days ago and for the first time in a veeeeeeeeeery long while a blog entry had such a strong impact in my mind. I read it on Wednesday and re-read it on Thursday and then again today. In the last couple of years I have…...
Oh dear, I realised today it’s been a month since my last entry! Time does fly when you are having fun, working hard, or both as in my case. I have been finding it hard to make time to write in the blog when I’ve got so many things to do. I have about 10 different half-finished articles in the pipeline, most of them written in my notepad on the bus to/from work but can barely finish them off and post them here. Then the weekend comes and there’s more stuff to do, more people…...
I know that this post to some people might appear smug or big headed but forgive me. To the person who sent me this email, it might appear rude that I put this on the blog but again, well forgive me. I consider myself lucky to work at a place I love, to not be desperate for freelance jobs enough to actively seek them out. This to me means I can choose if I accept a job. This also means that if I do decide to take a job, I wont do what I do depending on the client’s budget, but I will do…...
Last night I came home to a very funny DM on twitter. Not “ha ha” funny, but “WTF?!” funny. A very rude twit by one of my “friends” having a go at me for using greek and greeklish in my twits and basically about my posting about what I am doing “and nothing of any value to anyone” as he put it. My first reaction was to mentally flick the middle finger to them, secondly to unfollow them and lastly to have a little rant on…...
Tags: 2009 - loose thoughts - pissed off
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For those of you who read me from your rss come and take a look, I’ve changed the website’ looks again. This might be a little bit weird but I’ve succumbed to the itchy fingers and gave the site its 6 monthly change. I got .net issue 194 yesterday and the intro on Eliot J’s piece on design, rang very true to me. I always am more motivated to post when I’ve changed the site. So I change the site nearly as frequently as I change desktop…...
Tags: 2009 - loose thoughts - site changelog
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I remember today too… exactly where I was at that precise moment. Sadly their are people still dying everyday, in the name of “the war of terror”. Neither the people on 9/11, nor the ones that have died everyday since, should let us forget. those days...
This entry has been floating in my head for days. A little bit of a check list, a little bit a collection of things I have to do or say repeatedly over the course of my days. A few things I want to impress on self and others. I am after all a control freak. As well as being a little bit of a developer and a little bit of a designer (I want to think). I was in reality writing a note to self. But here it is on the blog as my ideal work cycle. What I preach and try to practice sort…...
Μπήκε και ο Σεπτέμβρης. Μετά απο τόσα χρόνια conditioning, το μυαλό μου έχει πια 3 διαφορετικά new year starts. Πρωτοχρονιά όπως όλος ο νορμάλ κόσμος, 1η Απρίλη με το καινούριο οικονομικό έτος και το Σεπτέμβρη, απομεινάρι των τόσων χρόνων σχολείου. Το 4ήμερο που πέρασε μπορεί να μην έκανα…...
Tags: 2009 - life - loose talk - greek 2 you
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While a lot of you, especially those in Greece were still in some sort of holiday, whether it was sitting on an island beach or enjoying the still empty Athens, this past week was once again crazy for me. It continued the pattern of this summer with work, more work and some surprises. In real life, I had the scary experience of getting hit by a car while crossing the road on Thursday afternoon. Although I did not get totally run over, and thank God I am not injured apart from some bruises…...
i’ve been mostly up and down. The last few months having been crazy busy, both at work and at home. Projects to be urgently done, friends visiting, the weather mostly good so we are feeling just a little bit summery. Sure sign my absence from the blog and pretty much twitter, apart from my good mornings & good nights. I’ve been lucky enough to give life to some very nice projects (work updates to come in another post) from sitemap to finished, which for a geek like me, it…...
Michael Jackson, the Elvis of my generation, is dead. It takes something like this to get me back to blogging after a month of being very quite and very busy. My b/f woke me up last night to tell me that Michael Jackson is dead. He never dares wake me up, especially when I’ve had a rough day and really need to sleep. It takes something like this for him to disregard the fact that I’m sleeping and wake me to impart the news. Every single person on this planet has an opinion about…...
Tags: 2009 - michael jackson - loose thoughts
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I got this email from twitter earlier that “Driftube Team (driftube) is now following your updates on Twitter.” Naturally I checked out their profile to see who they are, and from there on their webpage [no link deserved]. Sad and curious geek that I am, I viewed the source [cos that’s what I do, sue me!] only to see at the bottom of the page this: <!-- Mirrored from dialedtone.com/ by HTTrack Website Copier/3.x…...
Tags: 2009 - design - plagiarism - loose talk - pissed off
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Contact forms are an integral part of any website, whether it’s a blog, an e-shop or a simple brochure site. They give your audience a voice and a way to get back to you, they can provide valuable feedback and open up interesting discussions. It’s nice to open the door to people and listen to what they have to say about you, your service or product. By giving a voice to your audience at the same time you open up your “ears” to the heaps of spam bots in the internets.…...
Tags: 2009 - RoR - recaptcha - validation
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I’ve been meaning to blog on a few other things over the last week and some topics are already drafted. However today the only topic worth blogging about is my mom, my mother, my ma, my mommy, cause it’s mother’s day and she is and has been the most important person in my life. My mom is my hero, my idol, my motivation and to be honest the world “love” doesn’t even come close to describing how I feel for her. Born in the late fourties, mommy V. has lived…...
After a very long time in my old clothes [skin] I decided to change the way this website looks and feels as well as some of the content. This change had been brewing for a while now. Since the beginning of the year I started experimenting with different ideas, but like it always happens when I spend too much time on something, by the time I implemented most of these ideas I was pretty bored with the whole look and feel of the “new site”. Being your own client always sucks, cause you…...
Tags: 2009 - redesign - site changelog
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Paul is a colleague and a friend as well as a friend’s son. He is an account handler for bluestorm during the week and a car racer in his free time. Along with Joe they compete in hillclimb, sprint race and stage rally competitions across the UK. For a while now they have had a website, to keep their friends and supporters informed about upcoming and past events, showcase their cars etc. It’s…...
Tonight I made cake. I also took pictures Chocolate muffin cake layers, coffee and brandy mix to moisten them. A very thin layer of chocolate fudge. Then another layer, thick white chocolate and double cream mousse. Another layer cake. Chocolate fudge to cover the whole cake. The anatomy in pictures ...
Tags: 2009 - cooking - picture this - nokia n95
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Yes I’m fascinated by the Humber River and how much it changes from hour to hour. Tonight it was as smooth as glass with the bridge nicely illuminated above. Absolutely gorgeous! So I took a couple of pictures and uploaded some on the gallery section. Unfortunately the phone camera is not best in the world but hell, so what!...
Tags: humber bridge - photomanipulation - picture this - 2009 - nokia n95
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Some pictures I took today around Hull, while it was snowing. I know, I know everywhere else it was packed with it the last couple of weeks but since it graced us in Hull today I thought I’d record it. Plus it was a good opportunity to try out the new phone ;)...
Tags: hull - nokia n95 - picture this - 2009
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Just got back from the first Hull Geek Digital Meetup and I must say I’m pleased to have been there. First impressions are quite good with an impressive turnout of people from all walks of digital life, even a retired teacher who’s into digital photography! With no real agenda for today apart from meeting and greeting each other I think that the venue chosen, although not ideal was quite good. After all what meet-up can…...
He captured our imaginations, our minds and hearts. He seems to be intelligent, hard working, prepared to fight and set on change for the best, for his country and the world. His speech in S.Carolina after he won the primaries, the content of it as well as the passion and the conviction with which he delivered it, brought tears to my eyes at the time and still does every time I hear/read it.
According to Market Share from Feb 08 to Dec 08 overall IE usage has dropped 6.73%. A quick look at browser trends show that in the same period the “evil spawn” has lost a whopping 10%, going from 30.63% to 20.46% in December. From January 2008 to December 2008 according to W3Schools…...
Me-sick, not being sick with myself, but missing the old me. The internet is a strange thing. From checking alexa ranks, I somehow managed to move on to wayback machine and found versions of this site that even I don’t have a backup, or not handy at least. Looking at these, even with some missing images and such, was looking at old pictures. Same nostalgic feeling, loads of memories. Memories of trying to learn wordpress and css at the same time, trying to finish a redesign (or two)…...
twitter is having some oauth changes, twits will appear again here shortly
Follow me on twitterI have a dream that all my websites will one day exist in a Web where they will not be judged by how they look and behave in each browser, because all browsers will follow the same standards and display them the same.
This is my hope. With this faith in Web Standards and Accessibility for all people and devices we will be able to make a better Web. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of the browsers to a beautiful symphony of design, functionality and content. With this faith we will be able to work better, to play better, to struggle less, knowing that all devices will treat our work equally & with respect.
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