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Why accessibility matters

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My mother-in-law has cancer.

It’s been painful, these last few months, watching a woman who was skiing in the Alps at Easter hobbling around on a crutch this summer. Though not a fraction as painful as it has been for her.

The disease has entered her bones, causing them to become so fragile that she has fractured her pelvis. Which is where the crutch comes in.

Fortunately, her prognosis is good. Radiotherapy, not chemo, was prescribed. Bones can recover, and injections speed the healing process. Her health improves daily. Continue reading “Why accessibility matters”

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The problem with pixels …

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You see, Apple’s newest tablet, the iPad Mini, creates a vexing situation: Its device-width viewport tag defaults to the same values as Apple’s original iPad (768×1024 pixels), even though the Mini’s screen is physically 40 percent smaller. That means every button, graphic, link, and line of text on a web page on the iPad Mini appears tiny—even when we try to do the right thing and build flexible, multi-device experiences.

http://www.alistapart.com/articles/vexing-viewports/


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Loan me your phone. I am off to China.

Reading Time: 3 minutes

The question?

What would your response be if a colleague told you, they were going to China for a week on business, and then asked for a loan of your phone.

For me it would fall into 2 camps:

  • Camp 1: If it was my phone I might suggest, (strenuously), that they seek a phone elsewhere
  • Camp2: If it was a work phone I would suck my teeth for a bit, take out the “strenuously” and still suggest that they look elsewhere for a phone.

Why the unkind response?

The simple reason for this rather unkind response is that most of us eat sleep and breath our phones. They have become integral to most of our daily activities and they also store a lot of personal data on them. I would probably loan you my car rather than hand over my phone.

Continue reading “Loan me your phone. I am off to China.”

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Mindmap Packages

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I have probably used north of 20 mindmap packages across various operating systems in recent years. They all have their strengths and weaknesses and none are perfect.

My ultimate choice was to use Mindomo. It does everything I need it to and works well across all platforms that I use.

Here is why I chose it:

My choice for the ipad filtered down to 3 packages

  1. MindJet
  2. iMindMap by Tony Buzan
  3. Mindomo

Mindjet (Mindmanager now branded just as Mindjet)

Pro
This is a great package and works well on the ipad.
We use it within our organisation for on Desktops and Laptops
Con
It does not work without a network connection (show stopping fail)
The online version is very “Laggy” and frustratingly slow.

iMindMap by Tony Buzan

Pro
Tony Buzan “is” mindmaps and the package reflects that. It does amazing tactile genuine mindmaps
Visually rich
Uses colour well
Con
Ipad version is quite tricky with normal sized fingers.
The mindmaps can sometimes look too tactile and do not plug into formal documents well.

Mindomo

Pro
Generally good at most things
Online version is fast
Ipad version is fast
Works offline on Ipad
Syncs with cloud version easily
Con
Nothing much.
It lacks some features of the others and can be a little bossy about layout but none of these are large issues at all.

 

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Opening the box – on new Ipad

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The long wait begins whilst the IPad charges for the first time.

I set up a new iTunes account using work email address. This needs a credit card to complete.  Using personal one at present. Now to load up basic apps for adding business functionality.

  • Dropbox and Google Drive for file sharing. (Google Drive is also an entry point to Google Docs which gives a good spreadsheet and word processor amongst other tools)
  • Evernote for note taking and bookmarking useful websites.
  • Adobe Reader for PDF files.
  • Flipboard for research and Media awareness.
  • Pocket for clipping websites to read later.
  • Grafio Lite (To explore graphing flowcharts etc)
  • Skype, Vibr, Teamviewer, Webex, Logmein & GoToMeeting for Online Conferencing and messenging
  • National Rail and Easyjet  apps for travel.
  • Bump for sharing Business Cards/Contacts
  • Scan, DocScan HD & ScanBiz lite for QR and Business card scanning.
  • Mindjet & Mindomo for MindMapping
  • YouTube and all the various TV apps for media access
  • Print Agent as Text Editor
  • Roambi (To investigate rich presentations built from PDF’s).
  • AudioMemo and Quick Voice for voice recording.
  • Print Agent (to explore WiFi printing)

Continue reading “Opening the box – on new Ipad”