http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/ http://www.eblah.com en http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1223079953/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1223079953/#num1
It was rather appalling to watch an eight year old schoolgirl on television a few days ago, as she went around skilfully correcting a number of public apostrophe errors, only to interview a learned language professor who suggested she was wasting her time, and that everyone should forget the apostrophe and just write as they speak because we can't "see" apostrophes in spoken language language.

I don't know what his name was, but the man is a fool. In fact, in terms of language, I'd call him a dangerous fool. While he may be correct in his assertion than an apostrophe cannot be "seen" by the eye in speech, there can be no doubt that it can be "seen" by the mind when listening to a speaker, as the context, tone, and inflection of the their speech conveys much of the meaning of their word, in the same way as the apostrophe does for the written word. It was refreshing to see the little schoolgirl had a better grasp of language that he did (whoever employs him should fire him and hire her), and she was even able to make it clear that the dreaded txtspk of mobile phones was fine on phones, but had no place in when proper words were being used for common conversation and communication. She basically wiped the floor with him.

Apostrophes are policed quite strictly within the main site, and hopefully all but the most subtle uses (and there are cases where the intended meaning can require some careful thought and analysis regarding the final placement of the apostrophe) are handles correctly.

To this end, and to help others who may have suffered from the teaching of any other fools who think along the same lines as the one referred to above, the following site may help simplify the position of the apostrophe, and alleviate their misguided thinking...

The Dreaded Apostrophe

If you don't have time to read the whole thing, then it basically boils down to one simple rule: Use an apostrophe when letters are missing.

Granted, you may have to know a bit more about language than most in order to be able to apply that rule in every case, but if you read the whole site, and the examples, it works. And anything that boils down to one rule can't be bad.]]> Sat, 4 Oct 2008 01:25:53 Admin http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1222540280/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1222540280/#num1
No problems so far except that it messed up the monitor display but it was easily fixed by hitting the Auto Set up button.

]]> Sat, 27 Sep 2008 19:31:20 The Fox http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1221007655/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1221007655/#num1
This means you have to re-size them. Changing the dimensions has always been easy, and you can set height and width in seconds.

The file size has however been a different story, and if you wanted to have a maximum file size for a picture of say, 100 kB, then you just had to try repeated compression levels until you got near to the desired value. Since the amount of compression needed varies with the image content, there's no rule like "Reduce a 4 MB pic by 55% to get about 100k" and the actual compression needed can range anywhere from 80% to 30% to achieve the same result.

Without any more ado, the faithful that have stuck with Irfanview to manipulate their image files, and supported the program now have a new toy in the most recent release, with the option to tell file saves what file size is wanted. So simple, yet so long in coming in a piece of free code.

Irfanview web site

You're looking for Version 4.20 or later, and you must download and install BOTH the program and the plug-ins, then go and have an extra tea or coffee from all the time saved ]]> Wed, 10 Sep 2008 01:47:35 Apollo http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220951051/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220951051/#num1
As usual I switched on the computer and monitor at the wall and pressed the on buttons.  Then I  went and turned on the kettle.  When I had made the first coffee of the day I returned expecting the machine to be ready for me to doubleclick on the Toucan icon to start the broadband connection but  instead of the wallpaper I found myself looking at the Toucan Home Page on Firefox.  It has connected itself to the BB.  It has never done this before.]]> Tue, 9 Sep 2008 10:04:11 The Fox http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220635714/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220635714/#num1
Internet Explorer 8 beta 2 has been available for download since the end of August, and should therefore be a relatively safe and stable option, there's also no hint of when the final version will be along, so there's little point in not trying it. It has a "Compatibility Mode" which means that if you find problems browsing on any sites that don't render correctly - it is supposed to apply the rules strictly - you can activate this, and it will behave like IE7.

I might add that it STILL doesn't work with SeSco - I thought it had done so the first time I tried it. Screen object positions were all correct, unlike IE7, but it took me a while to realise that for some reason, which I simply have not had the inclination to be bothered to track down yet, the FIRST IMAGE on a page fails to appear, but all the rest do.

Now this is just plain silly, since other than actually being the first image on a page, there is absolutely no difference in the code that places it, and any other image on the page. With any luck someone that work on our core code will post something about this, and save me the trouble of tracking down the cause.

Other than that, I don't have any problems with IE8, although the install does suffer from the usual Microsoft bloat, with too many proprietary things to fiddle with. This is something none of the other browsers suffer from since one of their strengths is NOT having all that Microsft rubbish built into them.

Since you have to update IE anyway, may as well do it now

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/internet-explorer/beta/default.aspx]]> Fri, 5 Sep 2008 18:28:34 Apollo http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220486209/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220486209/#num1 not a reference to anyone in here - stragely, I do post elsewhere), I thought I'd restore the balance a bit, and if anyone wants to try browsing with a better IE than IE (it make sense if you think too hard ), then they can try browsing with The World Browser

http://www.ioage.com/en/index.htm

This uses the IE engine to provide its functionality, but is not IE.

In fact, it's a lot nicer and slicker than IE, and a number of features "in the box" that you have to go and find to add-in to IE if you want them. Blocking ads and rubbish for example. In use, in my opinion, it's lighter and faster than IE, which has to be a good reason to give it a try.

It's also one of the few browsers I've ever been tempted to reskin, and the version I use at the moment is skinned to resemble Winamp modern.]]> Thu, 4 Sep 2008 00:56:49 Apollo http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220397622/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220397622/#num1 Google Chrome:

http://tools.google.com/chrome/?hl=en-GB

Be aware that this is a beta release, so it is still far from finished, but should be relatively safe and stable.

Bringing my current total of installed browsers up to four IE (unavoidable, and still unable to obey CSS properly after all these years), Firefox (superb rendering and speed now, but has an unidentified hard disk interaction problem), Opera (really superb, super fast browsing, but has no adblocker), and now Google Chrome.

The install is problem free and relatively quick, with the usual importing of bookmarks etc from IE, although I must say Opera was smarter, and brought in my Firefox bookmarks instead. This was important, since I live in Firefox, not IE.

Things are relatively simple and bare, at the moment at least, and every option I tried worked as described. As might be expected from Google, where they tend to promote what is commonly described as "Thinking outside the box", Chrome looks and feels a bit different from IE, and offers features that shows it has been put together by people that both program AND use the product, not just program if for others to use.

I think this has some promise, and I would have to think they will be playing with the code to make it work faster with applications like maps, and new method such as those commonly referred to as Web 2.0

Notably, it works with everything I've thrown at it foe a quick test, including application produced by Google's competition, which can be integrated into the Chrome browser with no problems at all, unlike trying to run Microsoft maps in Opera.

Again, unlike Microsoft's offering, this third alternative new browser also renders SeSco pages as they are designed to appear, so earns itself a Gold Star for that alone, if nothing else ]]> Wed, 3 Sep 2008 00:20:22 Apollo http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220112209/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1220112209/#num1
Tech support that used to be good has went to hell as well, the fact that I bought an ADSL modem from a shop and not from them (at nearly double the price) means they say the fault 'must be' with my modem as I haven't got their approved model.

I've been looking at Virgin Media.  At present I'm paying £23 a month for a slow adsl connection and £16-19 for phone from Talk Talk.  Apparently Virgin can do a better service for cheaper.  Has anyone else used, or know anyone that uses Virgin Media.  I know they might not have top notch reputation, but honestly the way things are going, they can't be any worse.]]> Sat, 30 Aug 2008 17:03:29 JadeFalcon http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1219956286/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1219956286/#num1
However, I'm now noticing that I have to enter the details in every time I visit these forums and would like to know what could be done to solve it.]]> Thu, 28 Aug 2008 21:44:46 JadeFalcon http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1219577832/ http://www.secretscotland.org.uk/forum/forum/m-1219577832/#num1
Every so often, and this can range from a few minutes up to many minutes, the hard disc starts chugging away and takes priority over anything else that might be happening - including me trying to type, so you can understand the intense irritation.

While working way guite happily, the hard disc will take off, grinding away for anythiing up to 30 seconds, during which time I'm locked out of doing anything, and any keystrokes made while this is happening might, or might not, be processed when it decides to stop and hand the PC back to me. This means I can find some really odd stuff being typed on the screen and needign correction - not a lot of fun.

I've tried monitoring for programs and processes running, but can't find anything odd, or what is being done while the drive is grinding away, but nothing odd is reported.

I've also tried to to find other reports of anything similar on the web, but unless I'm having no luck forming the search properly, there doesn't seen to be anyone else reporting the same, or complaining.

I had thought if it was a common problem, there would be a quick update, if Firefox 3 was doing something naughty with a disc cacche or similar, but nothing found in that direction either.

If I don't run Firefox, then things seem to be ok - so far - so it does seem to be down to the new version.

I'm using IE more at the moment, but it's torture, as Fx supresses all the advertisng rubbish - which is something I really really hate with a vengence - and means that IE wastes as much time loading that rubbish as Fx wastes grinding the hard drive, but the ads only load once with the page, so IE wins at the moment - unless the ads are animated, then it has to go.

Wish the first update was out ]]> Sun, 24 Aug 2008 12:37:12 Apollo