Archive for March, 2011
Sunday, March 27th, 2011
Sometimes children may need a little encouragement to do something on a regular basis. They can be used to encourage kids to keep their bedroom tidy, as a reward for working hard at school, or even as a reward for healthy eating (eg. NHS Change 4 Life programme). We have used them in the past […]
Posted in Children, General | Comments Off on Children’s reward chart (star chart) – encouragement for children
Wednesday, March 23rd, 2011
For those that haven’t heard of it yet the Kindle is an ebook reader. The Kindle can hold thousands of books in a device the size of an extra thin DVD case. It’s also lighter than many paperback books. It can also last for several weeks between charges so can be used whilst travelling. The […]
Posted in book, Family, General, hardware, Linux, Reviews | Comments Off on Review of the Amazon Kindle eBook reader
Thursday, March 17th, 2011
Digital Rights Management (DRM) is where a user is restricted in what they can with with a certain media through technology. This means that if you have a certain file then you are restricted in where you can view / use that file. Supporters argue that these steps are needed to prevent copying, but on […]
Posted in book, Computers, Electronics, Family, Linux, Programming, Reviews | Comments Off on Digital Rights Management (DRM) – Music, Films and now eBooks
Thursday, March 17th, 2011
Sams Teach Yourself HTML 5 in 10 minutes provides brief introduction to the new features of HTML 5. The book is aimed at someone with a good knowledge of HTML and covers just the new features, with some basic examples of each feature. For a book that is supposed to be intended for those familiar […]
Posted in book, Computers, General, Linux, Programming, Reviews, Web Design | Comments Off on Book review – Sams Teach Yourself HTML5 in 10 minutes
Tuesday, March 15th, 2011
I recently purchased a new Epson Wireless Multi-function printer to replace my ageing Canon IP4200 printer. One of my primary criteria for the printer was that it needed to work with Linux, as we rarely use Windows at home. The 3 major manufacturers Canon, Epson and HP all provide some kind of Linux driver for […]
Posted in Computers, General, hardware, Linux, Reviews | Comments Off on Epson Multifunction printer – Epson Stylus Photo PX720WD on Ubuntu Linux
Thursday, March 10th, 2011
It’s been a long time since I visited Twycross Zoo (Twycross Zoo with a Baby, and Animal Conservation) and there have been lots of changes since. This time I visited with my two children (5 year old and 3 year old) and a nephew (1 year old). The first thing is that they have changed […]
Posted in Babies, Children, Days Out, Tourism | Comments Off on Day out at Twycross Zoo
Tuesday, March 8th, 2011
This is another recipe using sustainable mackerel fish fillets. For the reasons that eating sustainable fish is so important see The End of the Line – the problem of overfishing (also see Buying and cooking fresh and frozen sustainable fish from UK supermarkets). My previous recipe was for cooking with kids, but this one is […]
Posted in Cooking, Family, General | Comments Off on Cooking sustainable fish – Spicy Mackerel fillets
Monday, March 7th, 2011
This is a nice easy fish recipe that you can involve young children with. It’s also made with Mackerel which is considered one of the more sustainably caught fish. For the reasons that this is so important see The End of the Line – the problem of overfishing (also see Buying and cooking fresh and […]
Posted in Children, Cooking, Family, General, kids, kidscrafts | Comments Off on Cooking with kids – Mackerel Goujons (sustainable fish)
Sunday, March 6th, 2011
It’s Free! It’s not about the cost, it’s about being free! Not another mobile phone review This isn’t a review about a mobile phone handset – Google shows that there are already about 2 million of those for this model1, and it’s not just a review about the Android operating system – there are about […]
Posted in Computers, Electronics, General, hardware, Linux, networking, Reviews, software | Comments Off on Review of the Android mobile phone operating system (HTC Wildfire)
Tuesday, March 1st, 2011
The mod_rewrite Apache module can be used on a web server to dynamically change the web page returned to the end user. It has a number of potential uses including: creating user friendly urls to hide complex backend software pages; redirecting from old web pages when a site is redesigned; redirecting to a completely different […]
Posted in Computers, General, Linux, Programming, Web Design | Comments Off on Apache mod_rewrite – Conditional ReWrites using RewriteCond