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Showing posts from May, 2017

Thirty Years Too Early

I was born 'out of time'; that's to say, thirty years too early. When growing up, I had an eclectic mind. I was interested in a lot of subjects and was fascinated by finding how lessons in one subject could be applied to a completely different subject. I loved exploring the connections. This meant that I pursued many subjects and didn't really concentrate on one to the exclusion to all else. I continued that throughout my higher education and try to do as much of this as I can in my working life.  My biggest successes at work have been when I can combine knowledge across sometimes disparate subjects to design innovative solutions and it's the part of work I enjoy most: It really doesn't feel like work. At least two of my bosses have commented that my chief skill is "...seeing connections that other people don't see..." (I paraphrase). The problem for me, is that I get to do so little of this kind of 'work'. Modern IT is still very silo-

Making the Same Mistake Twice

Ever get that feeling of deja-vu? I do and I got it again this week. The reason that I got this distinct and unsettling feeling was the arguments around the need or desire for a second referendum on the whole 'leaving the EU' debacle. The leader of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron was the most vocal in calling for a second referendum and announced that this would be a formal policy of his party, if elected to Government. Immediately after this statement the inevitable, let's say, firestorm came his way. The sounds of knees jerking was almost deafening. I'm not going to bore you here with the way that I voted because what has happened, has happened. I put one of the reasons that the leave campaign won is the way that both sides approached the campaign. The leave side of the argument, to me, concentrated upon arguments that focused upon emotion : Vast additional money for the NHS instead of 'wasted' money to uncontrolled EU budgets; "Taking back con

Democracy Is Important: Use Your Vote!

You have until Midnight  tomorrow to register to vote in the General Election vote on June 8th. Make sure you have a voice. Without it, you have no say in the future direction of this country. From Rize Up UK If you need reasons why, check out Rize Up       The impact of not voting in the last referendum is summarised in this infographic. Although it does appear to assume that all of the non-voters would vote the same way, which they clearly wouldn't, it does quite starkly illustrate the impact of those denied a vote or abstaining. From Rize Up UK. Graphic showing the number of people eligible to vote that did not in the previous referendum.  Please; get up off your butt and register to vote if you haven't done so. Take part in our democracy.

The Difference Between Good and Bad User Experience

I had a bit of an internal debate this week about what to write. Several things were occupying my mind. In the end, I've decided to move from the important to the mundane for this post. Well, it can't be serious all the time! I've been fortunate enough to own all three generations of Xbox; the original, the 360 and the One. They're the only 'Windows' machines I own (go Linux!). I wanted a games console that I could indulge in "couch co-op" with my mates and when I saw Halo, I was suitably blown away. "That's the one for me!", I thought. The rest is history and all three machines still run. About two months ago, I took the plunge, and got an Xbox One. While there's no doubt the hardware is superior to the 360, I have to honestly say my impression of the machine is "meh...". Really and truly "meh". This, I think is purely down to the interface and the user experience (UX). My impression, and yours may be differen

An Exhortation to British Youth

First off; let me state that your political views may well be different than mine. The purpose of this post is not to influence the way you think or vote. Rather, it's to encourage you to vote. Change will be gradual. ---- No doubt many people have urged you to use your vote and have at the same time, bemoaned the fact that by all statistical measures, you don't. Why you don't use your vote, I have no idea. Maybe you aren't interested in general politics and would rather concentrate upon single issues that matter to you. Maybe you're not interested in politics. Maybe you don't particularly care; I don't know. However, I'd urge you to reconsider the reasons that you have for not exercising your right to vote. I do this in your interests, as well as mine. The system that we have in this country is the so-called "First past the post". This effectively translates into "Winner takes all". The candidate with the most votes is the MP

Still unsure how this will work

Wide Eyed and Clueless I have no idea how you can create an interesting text post here, but I live in hope that I may learn how to do so. Being utterly without a clue and completely unfamiliar with the whole blogging phenomenon, the rise of this sort of activity on the Web totally passed me by.  I therefore have absolutely no idea as to whether this blog will ever see the light of day and, if it does, whether anyone will read it. They have no reason to do so and must surely be browsing the Web with time to kill. If you are reading this: thank you. How did you happen across this doggerel? Move Along Now... To be brutally honest, there's likely to be nothing here that will be remotely interesting. I'm just an 'ordinary person'; a complete no-mark. Nothing exciting happens in my life. Ever.  Thus any posts that I put here is likely to be as dull as ditch-water. If there are any additional posts here then they're highly likely to be rants.  It may be t