If you use any of the social network websites then you’ve almost certainly heard about the launch of Firefox 3.5. The reason for this is that Firefox has tapped into it’s fan base and community spirit to promote the launch of the new browser.
I am one of those that have been involved in promoting Firefox – and this blog is just one of millions of blogs / tweets / facebook posts that have been circulating in a co-ordinated publicity campaign.
It certainly seams to have worked. Looking at the live firefox download stats over 5 million downloads have been made since the launch about 24 hours ago.
The campaign started about a day before the launch with just enough publicity to get all the Firefox supporters geared up and ready for the big event.
The main part of the campaign is the Shiretoko shock which involves a firework shockwave traversing over the Internet a timezone at a time. It started in Brazil at 3:50pm on 30 June (launch day) and finishes at 3:50pm in Brazil 24 hours later with the Shiretoko Supershock! Everyone posts a comment on any social networking / blog / news sites when their timezone reaches 3:50pm and then the Supershock has everyone doing the same again all at the same time at the end. This blog entry will be part of that Shiretoko Supershock (10 mins to go and I’m typing furiously).
In addition supporters have been encouraged tto change their profile pictures to the firefox logo and other things for additional publicity. I changed my Facebook picture for the event but I’ll be changing it back to a photo of me shortly; much to many peoples dissapointment most likely
The reason that so many people wanted to be part of this will vary, but we are united in our support for firefox. For some they will have been involved in programming, designing the browser or one of the many thousands of add-ons / themes as the browser is community developed there are lots that contribute directly.
For others, including me, it’s about promoting an alternative browser that is open and free (as in beer and speach).
Others may just like the browser and want others too know about it.
Whatever the reasons everyone benefits from knowing about and being given the opportunity to try it out for themselves.
Firefox 3.5 is here. There is a lot of buzz on the Internet about Firefox today for the official launch of version 3.5.
Firefox is a web browser that runs on various operating systems (including Windows, Mac and Linux) and is available completely Free.
I’ve been running the pre-release versions for a while now and I’m impressed by the improvements in the browser. Today sees the launch of the official version 3.5 bringing the browser up-to-date and ready to handle the next generation of web needs.
Below is a video that symbolises some of the new features of Firefox using the analogy of a custom car.
The Javascript engine has been rewritten to be up to twice as fast as previous versions. Sites that are dependant upon Javascript include social networking sites (Facebook and Twitter) and web applications such as gmail. If you are using these you will see a noticeable increase in performance.
Security / Safety
Firefox continues as the safest web browser. The open source, open review community focus encourages vulnerabilities to be identified at an early stage and to have them fixed early.
The Firefox team are constantly monitoring threats and releasing new Firefox updates to stay one step ahead. Operating in an open source world means anyone can help find and fix any weak spots.
Firefox now includes a video player within the browser. This will certainly be useful for Linux users where getting the right plug-ins can be a little tricky, but even Windows users benefit by not having to download and install plug-ins for the browser.
Tabbed browsing how it should be
Firefox is ahead of the competition when it comes to tabbed browsing. Not only can the tabs be easily reordered by drag-and-drop, but now they can be ripped out of the page to create a new browser. You can even drag the tab into another browser window, and if it’s the last window it will close that browser.
You really need to try it to see how it works. In the future you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it.
Private browsing made easy
Private browsing has been made easier with the help of a private browsing mode. Firefox will forget about (and delete any cached files) any sites visited whilst private browsing.
Can’t think about where you’d use this, how about the following less sinister reasons?:
To hide from your girlfriend the diamond ring websites you are browsing?
Organising a surprise party / holiday away?
Christmas shopping habits can be hidden from your partner.
Personalised browsing with Personas
Personas allow you to give your browser a virtual custom paint job.
Firefox is free open source software. This means that not only does it not cost anything (Free as in beer), you are free to obtain the source code and modify or improve as you wish (free as in speech).
Add-ons – Browsing more efficiently, browsing made fun!
Thousands of add-ons provide additional functionality to make work more efficient or just more fun. These include a Facebook sidebar, Xmarks bookmark synchronisation tool (keep different browsers bookmarks in sync) and lots more.
Works with almost all sites
Firefox is based on the web protocol standards and will work with almost every site. There are still a few sites that are broken and only work with certain browsers, but with lots of people switching to alternative browsers they need to fix their sites soon.
There’s even a useful link on Firefox 3.5 so you can submit sites that don’t work to have them fixed.
Download Firefox 3.5 Now!
Download the browser and give it a go. It’s free so there is nothing to lose.
I bought a new tent earlier in the year and we’re looking at putting it to use soon. This will be the first time we’ve been camping since we’ve had kids – so looking forward to it with a little bit of apprehension.
It’s an Easy camp Go Taranto 600, 7 birth tent. At least the picture shows 7 people, but I think perhaps they are stacked vertically . I put the tent up tonight as a practice for the real thing and to make sure there was supposed to be just one bag and I wasn’t missing some minor component like the poles.
As I lugged the bag outside it brought back fond memories of previous tents.
Insert pole A into the funny looking metal widget thing. Put pole D into the bottom of pole A and connect pole C at right angles to the thinky-me-bob.
Which of course all went fine except you picked up pole F instead of pole A which should have been obvious due to it’s notch being 8mm higher up, but 3mm lower than pole J. So having assembled a frame that looked more like a cross between a boat and a hang-glider you had to take it all apart and start again.
Of course there are none of these problems with new fibreglass poles with shock elastic to keep them together, or are there? I set to work finding the instructions. Having thrown bits of tent, poles and pegs across the garden I was about to give the shop a ring and ask for the instructions when low and behold they were printed on the back of the label telling you the model of the tent. At least I think it’s the instructions, although it’s on less than a sheet of A4 with almost half of the page showing the name of the tent again and the rest split into 3 different languages. In fact it’s eight steps of which two actually have a second sentence.
Well at least it should be straight forward then, no need for an engineering degree. Well I was right on part of that – I’ve got an engineering Masters degree and that didn’t help!
The tent takes two people to assemble it, which is of course accurate, as long as those two people both have 3 arms with a reach of at least 8 feet.
The instructions basically consisted of “poles are colour coded against the tent – stick them through the tent and peg it down”. Actually there was a little bit more than that as it tells you to put the groundsheet in the living area and to use the guy ropes and pegs to secure the tent against the wind. Well I am enlightened.
I would like to say that those instructions included details of how to pack the tent up, but I think I may have missed that bit. All it said was “When unpacking the tent, it is a good idea to familiarise yourself with how it should be repacked.” [actual words]. Well sure, perhaps I should have taken my own notes on how to assemble it when I first saw it in the showroom as well.
Of course the final challenge still remained. How come no matter how tight your roll a tent it always ends up twice as big as the bag it has to go into? I’m sure they must run over it a dozen times with a steam-roller when they first pack it up.
At the end of the day I guess it wasn’t too difficult to put together, but a few more instructions would no have gone a-miss. I’m glad I had a chance to practice on a calm sunny evening, as I’d hate my first attempt to be during bad weather.
First challenge completed, the next is how to get the kids into the car once I’ve got all the camping stuff inside, but that’s one for another day
I’ve now been on the alli diet for three weeks and have lost a further 6lbs this week. The diet appears to be going well and I’m certainly losing weight and feeling good in myself.
During my first two weeks I kept a food diary. This was essential at first whilst getting used to the amount of food and it’s fat and calorie content. Keeping this up-to-date is a little tedious and so I’ve stopped for now. I do still use the calculator when I’m creating a meal that I don’t know the fat content of and may need to keep a closer track again if I decide to reduce my calorie intake further.
Here is a copy of the spreadsheet that I’ve been using to track my food fat and calorie content and some useful websites.
Alli diet food diary
The alli starter pack included a paper based food diary. Not satisfied with that I created a spreadsheet version based on the same information. The advantage of this is that I’ve included some nutritional values based on food I’ve been eating (so no need to look-up each time) and the spreadsheet can calculate the fat and calorie content based on actual weights (useful when home cooking).
The spreadsheet does use an official Open Document Format, but Microsoft has only just added that to SP2 of their office suite and even then, due to the way that Microsoft have implemented it, it may not work correctly, so I’d definitely recommend getting hold of OpenOffice.org – did I mention it is free ?
To use the spreadsheet find the appropriate food in the Food items tab. Then copy columns A to E (excluding the comments) from the Food items tab and paste into to the diary tab in an appropriate field. Set the quantity to the amount of portions. Eg. if the quantity says 100g, but you use 200g then put 2 in the quantity field.
Then manually add any other food items that are not already in the spreadsheet. The totals will be automatically updated.
The most useful of these is the link from Tesco as it includes calories and fat information for lots of different products including those sold at competing supermarkets.
I’ve been making some changes to the First Aid Quiz website for the last few weeks. The first part of the website update is now complete.
I have now updated all the existing questions in-line with the 9th edition first aid manual. There were more changes than I thought mainly due to a minor change in emphasis or dropping some of the detail in the manual rather than different treatment protocols.
I’ve retired the medical gas quiz. I did not revalidate my medical gas certificate this year so no longer consider myself qualified to maintain the questions.
I am however working on a new quiz to keep the quiz challenging for experienced first aiders (more details coming soon).
Please give it a go and let me know if you find any problems with the new questions.
Some time ago the HSE (Health and Safety Executive) had a survey on First Aid Training. I did participate in that survey, although I’m not a big fan of the outcome. The result was that last year they published the new guidelines for First Aid at Work training and the new training courses will start from 1st October 2009. If you are booking a first aid at work course after that date then you will be on the new course.
The main differences that will be seen is a reduction in the length of and initial first aid course from 4 days to 3 days. The rational behind this is due to a shift from manufacturing to service industry and that first aid protocols have been simplified so don’t take as long to teach. Although they have a point that first aid is getting easier (which is definitely a positive move) I would rather see it remain as 4 days to instead improve the training and to give more hands-on practice.
The 2-day requalification course for subsequent renewals remains the same.
The HSE recommend that a 3 hour update is taken every year excluding the year in which a 3-day initial or 2-day requalification is taken. Although I agree this is a good idea (and in fact St John Ambulance has offered these courses for some time), I think this should be compulsory rather than just a recommendation (at least for the first 2 years after the initial FAW).
Many of the workplace first aiders I speak to tell me that they forget what was trained on the course well before the 3 year renewal is up. The problem with it only being a recommendation is that these will have to argue with their employers to be allowed to take the time out and to get funding for the courses. As such I don’t think that as many people will get the opportunity to go on them.
In addition to the 3-day First Aid at Work (FAW) course there will also be an alternative Emergency First Aid in the Workplace (EFAW) which is only one day long. This is a more formalised qualification to the First Aid for appointed persons course that St John Ambulance run, but at least this more formal recognition should encourage more to attend (as depending upon the size and type of workplace an appointed person doesn’t necessarily need to receive any training).
These are my own views as an employee rather than an employer. I’m sure that many employers would have the opposite opinion to balance first aid needs with the expense on their business.
For another way to help keep your first aid knowledge refreshed try the: First Aid Quiz website.
Note: The First Aid Quiz website is not a substitute for proper First Aid Training provided by a registered training organisation (such as St John Ambulance).
I’ve reached the end of my 2nd week and managed to lose a further 2lbs. Not quite as much as I hoped for, but at least it’s still going down so I’m quite happy with that.
Food Diary
For the last two weeks of the diet I’ve been keeping a food diary. It’s certainly been helpful at the start of the diet whilst I’m getting used to the amount of calories and fat I’m allowed, but I’m not sure whether I’m going to stick with the hassle of maintaining it all the time.
I will publish the spreadsheet in next weeks update (I want to include some more food items first).
Fat and Calories
Keeping within the fat content is fairly easy, but effectively means that there is certain food items that I can not eat. I had to get down to the maximum fat intake immediately due to the risk of side-effects (more details of potential side-effects in my earlier alli diet post), but I’m still decreasing my calorie intake slowly so as not to be too much of a shock or to demoralize me due to feeling hungry.
Cheese has a very high fat content and even the half-fat cheese meant that the quantity allowed was incredibly small. It’s certainly given me an awareness of the fat content of cheese that I never really appreciated before.
Another of the food products that has been restricted is oily fish. Generally considered to be quite healthy the amount of fat means it difficult to eat much on this diet. I have managed to have some smoked salmon, but only in small quantities. It is of course okay to eat white fish and non-oily fish (depending upon how it is cooked).
Generally though most food products are still okay (although in small quantities) or there are low fat equivalents.
I haven’t logged everything into the food diary, but the ones I have no included have practically zero fat. This includes drinks (all diet / sugar free) and some fruit and vegetables that I’ve had but not listed. These could add up to 100 kcals as I do often have a small glass of fruit juice.
Five a Day
One thing is that before I started the diet I normally had at least 5 portions of fruit or vegetables. I have reduced this now as I have reduced the amount of food I’m eating, but I am still getting in between 3 and 5 portions a day (need to count fruit juice, max 1 portion, and the salad that I’m sometimes adding to sandwiches etc.).
I may still try and cut down some of my other treats and replace with some more fruit, but the treats are helping to keep me motivated at the moment.
Snacks / Treats
The alli diet allows for a snack of up to 3g of fat per day. I have been using it as an opportunity to have a treat of low fat chocolate bar or something else nice. This is helping me feel as though the diet is less of a chore. I’ve also been having low fat desserts with a lot of meals.
Ready Meals vs. Home Cooking
Although I have made some of my own meals I find that healthy eating / low fat ready meals are convenient and easy to keep track of the fat and calorie content.
The fresh ready-meals also taste a lot better than ones used to in the past and are far closer to the ingredients that you may use at home (with no hydrogenated fats etc.).
When making home made food then the ingredients have to be worked out weighed properly. Alternatively it’s possible to follow a recipe from a low fat cook book, such as The Alli Diet Plan book. Using my own recipes it seams to be almost impossible to make certain food within the limits, but they are available as ready meals (eg. lasagne).
I will be trying some more home cooked food in the forthcoming weeks.
Food labelling
Food labelling is now much easier as a lot of food includes a visual guide on the front of the pack. The one thing to check for is the portion size as sometimes it may only include a certain amount (eg. half a pack).
Another thing to be careful is in the labelling of fats. Most display the actual total fat (per portion) on the front, but weight-watchers food can either display the total fat or just the saturated fat. I find this can be confusing. I could understand this if it was all their items that were labelled with just saturated fat along with a diet programme that restricted saturated fat, but the way it stands at the moment is very confusion.
Eating out
It’s very hard when eating out to know the actual number of calories or the amount of fat in a meal; even when it is a healthy eating food it may contain cheese and even a salad could have an oily dressing.
I ordered BBQ chicken with jacket potato. I removed the skin from the chicken, but there was butter on the potato as well as in a pot (perhaps melted onto the jacket potato due to it’s proximity), and there was dressing on the side salad. Therefore I skipped taking alli for that one meal so as to avoid the risk of side-effects if I exceeded the maximum amount of fat.
It’s been over a year since I wrote a DVD review on my blog, mainly because I wanted to concentrate on the 3 main topics. This is one film that really had an impact on me and so I wanted to post a review.
The film The boy in the striped pyjamas is about two 8 year old boys that become friends in the most unlikely of situations.
The film is set during the second world war. Bruno is German and the son of the newly appointed Commandant of a concentration / death camp. He meets Shmuel (the boy in the striped pyjamas) who lives on the other side of an electric fence.
The film is about the holocaust, about fascism, racism, hypocrisy, brutality, but also about friendship and the innocence of these two children.
Although this film is rated 12 this is a very intense and distressing film. It is also good as a thought provoking, educational film and a reminder as to why we should never allow ethnic cleansing to ever happen again. I would suggest you watch it first and make up your own mind, before letting a 12 year old watch it.
I’ve watched many other films on the holocaust, in particular Escape From Sobibor and Schindler’s List, both of which are very good films, but this has had the most profound effect out of all of them.
As with most fiction that is based around a real theme, the film has had its critics about lack of realism. I can understand that in reality it is extremely likely any 8 year old child would have been murdered almost as soon as he arrived at the camp, the young age of the child was critical to the story working as it did.
This is such a powerful film which left me thinking about it for hours afterwards. I watched it yesterday on a rental DVD, but then went and bought my own copy today, which I think shows how much I thought of the film.
I’d certainly recommend anyone to watch this film, but be prepared for a very distressing story relating to the way that Jews were persecuted under Hitlers Facist Nazi regime.
There is an ancient Native American Indian Cree proverb which goes something like:
Only when the last tree has died
and the last river has been poisoned
and the last fish has been caught
will you realise that you can’t eat money
It’s actually probably one of the most misquoted proverb ever, although the generally gist remains the same. Most actually say “we” instead of “you” whereas other versions refer to “White Man”. I don’t know which is write (probably the latter). Whatever the actual words, we seam to be getting closer to finding out how true the proverb really is.
Of course the line (no pun intended) I’m referring to is: and the last fish has been caught
as most people have surely heard the latest hype about overfishing generated by the film “The end of the line”. Unfortunately I’ve not been able to see the film myself yet, but based on the preview it’s something I would definitely like to see.
The film is based on the book by Charles Clover and is a documentary highlighting the problem of over fishing the worlds seas.
There are screenings of the films scheduled up to August, but there are only a few in each area.
Just watching the trailers and reading that and related websites has changed my opinion about the fish I eat and have decided to change the way I shop to reflect that. This is similar to making the choice to buy free-range or fair trade, but it’s the survival of fish that is at stake.
There are ways to buy fish that can make a real difference. This can be by choosing a fish from a source that is not at risk, ensuring that fish is purchased outside of the spawning seasons and by only buying fish caught using sustainable methods – such as pole and line instead of drawler nets.
I intended to implement this when I went shopping last week. I went to Tesco’s, but found very little fish marked up as sustainable sources. In particular there was no pole & line caught tinned tuna, and there was no indication of the fishing methods against most of the fish.Sainsbury’s faired much better having at least 2 brands of sustainable tinned tuna when I went, with Marks and Spencers and Waitrose also leading the way. This is also reflected in the Greenpeace supermarket tuna update.
Unfortunately Princes and John West appear to be ignoring these issues.
To win this battle needs consumers to vote with their wallet and choose sustainable fish. This is one issue which does have a solution that we can help contribute towards.
I started a new diet and weight loss programme a week ago. In the last week I’ve managed to lose over 7 lbs.
I’ve been trying to lose weight on and off for several years and have tried all manor of different diets / programmes including low fat, low GI, high exercise, eating less food and even Paul McKenna’s I Can Make You Thin weight loss programme with hypnotism CD. I’ve had some success with all of these, but in the end have given up and put the weight back on again.
The alli weight-loss programme
This time I’ve enlisted the help of alli.
Alli is a weight-loss pill, recently made available from pharmacists without prescription. It isn’t however a magic pill that makes you lose weight. To lose weight means following the alli weight loss programme.
The means doing more exercise and reducing the amount you are eating in terms of calorie and fat content. Doing this on its own is enough to lose weight, but alli claims to increase the weight loss by a further 50%. So if you would have lost 2lbs through the diet programme you will lose an extra lb with the help of alli.
This works by preventing 25% of the fat being absorbed by the body. There are potential side-effects (or treatment effects as alli calls them) which are more likely if eating more than the recommended fat content of 15g-19g per meal (depending upon your current weight and exercise level). Eating more than that recommended fat levels can result in some unpleasant effects (such as sudden need for the toilet and stomach cramps). I did experience these once, which I think may have been related to having a late breakfast and as a result two meals too close to each other. They only lasted for a couple of hours. Enough to deter me from eating too much fat, but not so bad as to put me off taking alli.
When taking alli you also have to take a vitamin supplement in the evening as alli can prevent some of the vitamins in food from being absorbed along with the fat.
Food quantity and choice
For this diet I have invested in a set of digital kitchen scales and I’m weighing out the food that I eat. This is something I did not do with my previous diets and I have certainly noticed that my meal sizes are a lot smaller than I’ve had before.
I am finding it is quite easy to stay within the fat content, with the help of a lot of low fat products available. I am sometimes going over my calorie target. I don’t think this is necessarily a bad thing at this stage as it means that I can still reduce my portion sizes in future (it’s not such a big shock) and I am doing a lot of exercise to burn some of these calories off.
I am certainly feeling the effects of having less food. I do get times when I’m feeling hungry, but it’s not as bad as I thought it may. I’m actually enjoying eating the food a bit more as I’m trying to eat more slowly and savour the food more.
The low fat, low calorie diet is no different to many other diet recommendations. The one thing that is different is that exceeding the fat amount can be unpleasant and as such it adds an extra incentive not to snack or to try and exceed the alloted portions. The alli programme also encourages the food to be shared across 3 meals (plus a snack) across the day. It is not possible to save up fat from one meal to use in another due to the risk of the treatment effects. Saving food for a larger meal is also more likely to encourage overeating at the meal or snacking when hungry before.
I’ve been recording my food intake over the last week.
Exercise
The other aspect to the programme is to increase the amount of exercise. I’ve always been fairly active (except for a short period after our first child was born when I didn’t make the time) and I’ve been going swimming regularly before I started this programme. I go swimming for normally 2 to 3 times a week which is something I started over 2 years ago. In fact I’ve always enjoyed swimming, but it’s been a case that I’ve had long periods that I’ve been swimming lots and others where I’ve hardly gone at all.
I’ve built up my swimming speed over the last couple of years, but I had reached a plateau where I had reached a reasonable ability, but then hadn’t been pushing myself to improve. I’ve used this as an additional incentive to improve. Serendipitously the pool I go to has now split the swimming lane into a slow and fast lane, and swimming in the fast lane has also encouraged me to maintain a faster pace of swimming.
I’m also making more effort to go on the Wii Fit each day as that is a form of exercise that I can do after I’ve put the kids to bed in the evening. This is helping too. The Wii Fit also helps by giving me a daily progress on my weight loss.
Alli is available without prescription from a chemist.
There are some rules before they can sell them such as being over 18, having a BMI of over 28 and not on certain prescription medication (especially those for heart related conditions).
I bought my first pack from Boots Pharmacy, but you will see the advert for alli in the shop windows of many pharmacies at the moment.
When I bought mine I had to have a 15 minutes consultation with a member of staff (although obviously trained in selling alli, I don’t think she was actually a qualified pharmacist, although I may be wrong). Before I had the consultation I had to pay to use the in store scales, paying for the more expensive BMI result (75p).
The consultation was actually quite good, she explained the product, how it worked and the possible side-effects. She also related some examples of how other customers had got on with the programme (obviously maintaining patient confidentiality she didn’t mention any names etc.). It was far better being explained these face-to-face with the emphasis on the importance of the different aspects than could be gained through reading a booklet.
I think that the pharmacy consultation is less formal and feels more friendly than discussing it with your GP or nurse. Obviously if you have any other health concerns it would be better to go to your GP before starting to take alli anyway.
An alternative is to order online through a registered pharmacy. I don’t know how these check the criteria is met, I’m guessing it’s some kind of survey that needs to be filled in. For the first time I recommend going to a pharmacist and having the consultation as it was worth attending. I don’t know whether a consultation is needed for subsequent purchases (you can take alli for up to 6 months), I’ll find out within the next week (unless I buy online?).
How much does alli costs
Alli is not cheap. It costs about £35 for a 2-week supply or £50 for a 4-week supply. You can take them for 6 months which you work out would cost upwards of £300. When you think of the health benefits of losing weight then assuming this does work in the long term it will have been a worthwhile investment in my health as long as it can be maintained.
It’s still early days yet, but I’ll see how it goes over the next few weeks. It’s looking promising so far.
When buying the first course you are given a pack including a booklet describing the programme, a booklet with some recipes and a diet diary. If you want some more information there is a book available The Alli Diet Plan. It’s retail price is £15, but it’s available in some places for only £9.
The book goes into more details describing the diet plan and techniques to make the most of it. It also includes lots of recipes and some nutritional information based on products available from some supermarkets and other retailers. It also gives advice on determining which food should be chosen when eating out, as some foods can look innocent but have high fat content.
If you use any of the social network websites then you’ve almost certainly heard about the launch of Firefox 3.5. The reason for this is that Firefox has tapped into it’s fan base and community spirit to promote the launch of the new browser. 
. Using my own recipes it seams to be almost impossible to make certain food within the limits, but they are available as ready meals (eg. lasagne).
and 
, both of which are very good films, but this has had the most profound effect out of all of them.
. I’ve had some success with all of these, but in the end have given up and put the weight back on again.
each day as that is a form of exercise that I can do after I’ve put the kids to bed in the evening. This is helping too. The 
, but don’t know what extra that adds but it is 