Sunday, January 31, 2010
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Recession over but the spectre of inflation looms
OK So whilst the growth in the economy was less than stellar and certainly less than the predictions or even hopes of the economists... GB Plc did grow last quarter. See graph from the BBC. However reports had been expecting a 0.3% rise or some hopefuls wanting 0.4% so the lacklustre 0.1 is disappointing but a start none the less. Certainly one report I heard declared that GB Plc is the last G8 country to emerge from it's deepest and longest recession since the war - grrrr!
However despite the growth and the positive news cycle, we should remember that some of that growth has been spurred by decent Christmas sales and apparently the VAT slash we had last year. That VAT rate has now returned to 17.5% and has added to the rise in cost of living that affects real people. The BBC handily provide a personal "Cost of living calculator"
I pumped my details, rent, eating out, energy bills into and it made a prediction of my own cost of living increase! Thankfully I received this month a cost of living increase in my pay back dated to September, so that helps!
However despite the growth and the positive news cycle, we should remember that some of that growth has been spurred by decent Christmas sales and apparently the VAT slash we had last year. That VAT rate has now returned to 17.5% and has added to the rise in cost of living that affects real people. The BBC handily provide a personal "Cost of living calculator"
I pumped my details, rent, eating out, energy bills into and it made a prediction of my own cost of living increase! Thankfully I received this month a cost of living increase in my pay back dated to September, so that helps!
Uptime
Whilst many of my friends and colleagues think this is certainly one of my weirdest habits. I don't like to reboot my computer, purely because I have SO much open at once and my machine is ready to go whatever I want, whenever I want... see this tweet....
http://twitter.com/musingsonamac/status/8193400547
Anyway... I am pretty sure I now have a new personal best... 71 Days.
Now I've always been a big proponent of how much more stable my chosen platform is compared to others. Even so the life of a laptop, especially how I batter mine, constantly suspending and waking up etc. is never a fun one. I attribute this new stability to snow leopard. I've never hit 70+ days before I'm quite sure. To be fair that means the machine was last rebooted on the the 17th November 2009 - pretty impressive for a working machine that's not a server!
http://twitter.com/musingsonamac/status/8193400547
Anyway... I am pretty sure I now have a new personal best... 71 Days.
Now I've always been a big proponent of how much more stable my chosen platform is compared to others. Even so the life of a laptop, especially how I batter mine, constantly suspending and waking up etc. is never a fun one. I attribute this new stability to snow leopard. I've never hit 70+ days before I'm quite sure. To be fair that means the machine was last rebooted on the the 17th November 2009 - pretty impressive for a working machine that's not a server!
Font recogniser
Well recently I need to match a font to logo we were using on a webpage. I could have just used any old font and most people wouldn't have minded but me being the perfectionist I am - I want to try and get it RIGHT!
In comes the "whatthefont" website beta available at http://is.gd/78L49
You upload an image, or point to an image on the web then. After some OCR the site asks you confirm it's recognition of some fonts... and based on baselines, serifs etc. it will recommend some matching fonts.
In comes the "whatthefont" website beta available at http://is.gd/78L49
You upload an image, or point to an image on the web then. After some OCR the site asks you confirm it's recognition of some fonts... and based on baselines, serifs etc. it will recommend some matching fonts.
Face test
It appears I have completely normal facial recognition ability.
Click below if you'd like to have a go at testing your facial recognition abilities. It does take a while, I admit I got a bit bored towards the end!
http://is.gd/78KgU
Click below if you'd like to have a go at testing your facial recognition abilities. It does take a while, I admit I got a bit bored towards the end!
http://is.gd/78KgU












