Sesame Street recording for TomTom GPS – behind the scenes
Pretty funny sketch with Bert and Ernie recording his voice for TomTom – well worth a quick watch and a laugh!
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Unruly Tech Night – Mini Robot Workshop
On October 19th I headed off to London for a Tech night with Unruly Media, one of the advertising distributors I work with to bring some of the funkier ads to the blog.
I love attending any tech event and particularly love meeting people I work with online and it was a great opportunity to meet some of the Unruly guys and gals over some beers and nibbles before the main event – Building a cool bug!
It’s been quite a while since I’ve done anything remotely arts ‘n’ crafts like, so was different… NOTE: hot glue guns are rather hot. Particularly when you get the hot glue all over your fingers…. OUCH!
After a lot of fiddling and fun I finally made my awesome little bug.
Was great fun and certainly different evening, and I now have a cool little bug bot on my desk… shame he lost a leg on the train home… need to find some glue!
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University, MSP, Tech – here we go!
It’s now exactly 2 weeks since I rolled up to Reading University, and exciting times are beginning!
Not only am I now at University studying (sometimes) for a Computer Science BSc Degree I am also lucky enough to once again be a Microsoft Student Partner!
Last year I was a Student Partner and it was a fantastic experience and I have met a lot of awesome passionate people and friends – both those working in Tech, but also other students with similar tech tastes – particularly with the #UKMSPMeetup event which was awesome fun, to both help plan and attend.
Other fantastic events include the Imagine Cup UK Finals at Microsoft HQ which is yet another great student focused scheme run by Microsoft – and I can definitely recommend entering as its great fun and offers the chance to compete and travel internationally!
This year looks to be even better, and I am eager to get going with the exciting plans for both University and the MSP scheme, with great technology to play with, awesome people to meet and hopefully a lot of people who I can be inspired by, and hopefully a few I can also inspire along the way.
I’m raring to go and I look forward to sharing my tech fun and journey on here, so watch this space!
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Dan’s day – powered by the Web
It occurred to me as I sit in the 2nd Starbucks of the day that almost all of my day and indeed my entire life is now powered by the Web. Everything I do is connected, funded and enhanced by technology and the power the internet has given, and continues to give me.
Today I came to London for a meeting with a potential employer, the meeting was arranged over email, the ticket was booked & paid online and I found my way across the East-end to the office using my phone & Google Maps walking directions so I didn’t get lost.
Because my super-duper off-peak ticket means I technically can’t get on a train until 7.15 I’ve resorted to sitting in Starbucks all day, enjoying the free WiFi and catching up with months of missed Security Now podcasts on my phone.
On a deeper level the internet has completely changed my life, and without it I wouldn’t be where I am now, through the internet and all the wonderful things which I have learnt from it I now run a successful online business, run successful tech blogs and in the past month I have been offered 3 jobs, most of which have better pay than the average 19 year old can expect.
But, me being me that’s not enough, I want more and I want to enjoy it. I’m heading off to the University of Reading soon again, something which never would have, happened if it wasn’t for the web, and the people I have met through it.
The story behind why I am attending University, and indeed Reading University is all because of the people I have met online, and what they have inspired me to do, and how that has shaped everything.
In an indirect way, me going to University, becoming a Microsoft Student Partner and indeed choosing Reading University in an odd kind of way all comes down to 1 person, who I’ve only met once or twice in person. I met him many years ago on a webmaster forum, moving forward a few years we both follow each other and I notice he was getting involved with Microsoft and the Student Partner program. It seemed cool, and I wanted in too through that I was able to become a MSP and my online social circle exploded.
I met lots of awesome people, both those involved with Microsoft and other geeks on Twitter in Reading. This lead to me attending a few of the Reading Tweetups (#rdgtweetup). Again, I met a lot more people and fell in love with the Town of Reading, I love it and there are some great people there.
All this, from being the fat geek who sits in front of a computer all day…Awesome Job offers, awesome friends, and an even more exciting future. Not bad eh?
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Halifax Holiday Matchmaker
It’s become a fact of life that our Facebook profiles have a lot of information about who we are and what we like. Halifax Travel Money have created a great Facebook App which harnesses this and matches you to your ideal holiday based on the information in your Facebook profile, it also suggests what you might like to eat, drink and do while on your ideal holiday. Apparently Westfield & Union Sq. is the place to shop in San Francisco!
Halifax Travel Money decided that I was a 92% match to San Francisco, and helpfully also shows how much typical items are, such as how much a nice burger might set you back (£1.32) or how much a Napa Valley Win Tour will take (£23.68).
From a geeky point of view, this app is a great example of how to harness what must be an extensive database of information and then matching that to the wealth of social information from my profile, and it does it pretty damn well!
This isn’t the first time that the Halifax Travel Money app has made an appearance, it was first launched in June 2010 and made a great impression then too, and now it’s back new and improved and is just a fun app to checkout and see what your holiday scrap book might look like!
There are over 17,000 people using the app, and it’s well worth a checkout, even if you’re just curious as to what a tenner will get you – I can get 2.32 loaves of San Francisco Sourdough bread in case you wondered – or just to checkout what the weathers like!
Check out the Halifax Travel Money app!
This is a sponsored post.
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Skype for iPad
Skype has recently launched it’s Skype for iPad app which looks pretty impressive, while I don’t own an iPad (if anybody would like to send me one to play with I’d love you) but I of course know a few geeks with them.
Chatting to a friend who’s been playing with the app it seems like it really is as impressive as their ads and provides a nifty tool for video calling, particularly with the ability to use both the front and back cams on the iPad2.
One of the small problems which was pointed out is that the chat box is a little on the small side which can make text chat a little cumbersome.
Check out the new Skype app below, and let me know your thoughts in the comments!
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How to use square brackets in WordPress
If you have ever tried to use square brackets (e.g. [ and ]) in your posts it can be slightly frustrating when WordPress thinks that it’s a short code and tries to process it or simply remove it.
The solution to this is simple! All you need to do is add the HTML code for square brackets in the HTML editor or Source view of the post and insert “[” for the left bracket ([) and “]” for the right bracket (]).
So for example if you wanted to display [twitter] you would put [twitter]
Hope this helps!
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How to create a lightbox in CSS3 & HTML 5
This video tutorial describes builds on the tutorial I posted previously for how to create an picture gallery and shows how you can build a Lightbox on this to enlarge images in a large form.
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