Blog
Microsoft really don't want to break the Internet
Posted by Paul Sturgess on January 25, 2008
When IE8 is released there is talk of it rendering, by default, as if it were IE7.
Kyan Vs Computer Strategies Bowling Challenge
Posted by Piers H Palmer on January 25, 2008
A challenge was made, a date set and geeks rallied.
Lifting the trophy aloft, it was remarked at how similar it looked to a bowling pin; fortunately not one of the dazed’n’confused staff had reported any missing. Two close games, the second only won by 7 points left Kyan the winner on this occassion. Special mention should go to Steven ‘Rocketman’ Thompson whose genuine loathing for bowling pins meant that not only did he get the top score but also managed to upset the ‘magic’ bowling robot so much that a ‘tek’ was required to fix our lane.
Highlights:
Paul taking out his own ankle with a ball
Laurent coming second last
Phil wondering how may pins in ten-pin bowling
Stevie T’s top speed of 24mph
Thanks to all at Computer Strategies, especially Tony for organising and sourcing the prices.
I love my Canon 350D but ...
Posted by Phil Balchin on January 13, 2008
... I just really wish it displayed the ISO on the settings display!
It’s the worst feeling in the world when you discovered you’ve just taken 10 landscape shots, at the top of the highest point in South England on a brilliantly bright and sunny day, with a low midwinter sun, a deep blue sky and just enough cloud on the horizon to balance the composition … ONLY TO DISCOVER THE BLOODY CAMERA IS SET TO ISO1600!!
rant over
Internet TV just got a whole closer
Posted by Phil Balchin on January 04, 2008
The BBC iPlayer is Aunties online TV service. I’m sure you all heard about the strong criticisms when the iPlayer was launched. Put simply, it only worked on WindowsXP and Vista, which upset a few people. As far as I know, at the time, it was impossible to use the service on Mac, and any Linux distribution. So I pretty much ignored it.
The Beeb have promised that they’ll make the service available “cross-platform”, in fact, both the BBC Trust, and the government have said they have to.
Yesterday was quite day, so I thought i would go and check out the iPlayer home page, expecting to still see a “Windows only download link” and then some really limited slow online content. Instead what I found was a surprisingly well stocked catalogue of previous TV programs all ready for watching on the webpage, ranging from News to Comedy to Drama to Music. But the best was yet to come. Even on my really-slow-countryside-BT-please-make-my-internet-faster connection at home, the video playback was almost instant. Even skipping to the middle of a video, the pause is only about 2 seconds, before the video starts to play again! No longer do you have to wait for the buffer to catch up (i’m looking at you, YouTube and Google). The quality is also pretty impressive. Its not TV resolution yet, but it’s defiantly watchable. My only gripe is, because its running through a flashplayer, embeded in a webpage, I cannot control playback with my apple remote controller, but that’s it. Internet TV just got a whole lot closer.