On a recent cycling tour of Umbria (Italy), me and my stunningly attractive wife (will that do Anna?) stumbled on a fascinating flower festival in the medieval town of Spello (how old do I sound?). But honestly what we discovered there was amazing. Local artists had put together an awesome display using the street as a canvas and flower petals as the paint.

Below are just a few stunning examples; and remember these are all made from petals:

Most pictures are influenced by existing works of art, stories from the bible, and tales from myth and legend. There was even one that looked as though it had come straight off the CEEFAX holiday pages!

Sadly the creations last only a few hours, as a religious procession walks through the streets and disperses all the petals. But for the short time the images exist they are pretty impressive. Art imitating life perhaps?

Yap-potpourri! As they say in Spello.

Here's an example of how someone can get accessibility and usability horribly wrong through not using common-sense and thinking about what they are designing and how it will be used.

Virgin Trains Toilets

Have you used the new Virgin Trains? They're pretty good. Fresh, nicely done out. Pleasant decor (for trains anyway), comfortable chairs, plug sockets to power your laptop, mobile phone, etc. Saying all that, there's one area where Virgin Trains have got something that should be very simple, badly wrong. I'm talking about the toilets. To try and make them accessible for all passengers, they have made them large, with sliding doors to make access easy. An excellent idea, and a thumbs up. But where they have gone wrong, very wrong, is with the door locking mechanism. (more…)

Just been given a new IBM laptop for the job I’m starting in a few weeks.

No grumbles at all about its performance or spec, but I do have an issue with the keyboard!

What a stupid place to put the Function (Fn) key. EVERY other keyboard has the Control (Ctrl) button at the extreme bottom left of the keyboard, and I’ve just realised how often I use it - or in the case of the IBM laptop, how often I try and use it and hit the Fn key instead…

A quick Ctrl+C to copy some text, and then Ctrl+V to paste it…only to realise that I have actually been pressing Fn+C, so I didn’t copy anything in the first place.

What is the logic behind the keyboard layout? Same goes for the lack of the Winkey, which I also use a fair bit. I suspect this is some sort of statement by IBM to Microsoft - but it’s annoying. I’ve had to map other key combinations to take place of the missing Winkey.

IBM - sort it out. Please.

Although many poker books are well-written, and contain valuable information, they are not always focused on what you want to read and learn. Many cover a range of games (Holdem, Omaha, Stud, etc.), and usually cover the different variations of these games; namely limit, pot limit and no limit. Finally, there is also the difference between play in a cash game and that in a tournament. There are times you want to focus on one particular game, and you also want the advice and play to be relevant to the level of the games you're playing.

Low-stakes No-Limit Holdem Cash Games

Most of the poker I play is No-Limit Holdem. Although I play the occasional tournament, the majority of the time I focus on cash games. There are many books that explain the fundamental principles of playing Holdem. Many cover Limit games, or share the focus over Limit, Pot Limit and No Limit. Others assume that the game is being played at high-stakes, and don't include advice on playing at lower stakes, and the sort of play you will encounter. That's where this book comes in… (more…)

The perfect way to send a soon-to-be-groom on his way!

I have just returned from a fantastic Stag-do in Sunny Woolacombe. Martin Horrill (aka Jimmer) will shortly be married to the lovely Kate, and so to wish him well a troop of brave souls accompanied him on a weekend of what 30-something lads do best - drinking alot, talking rubbish, and throwing ourselves off cliffs.

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Too many rock band websites focus on gimmicks, unecessary Flash animations, unintuitve menus, huge dark moody graphics that take an age to download - even on a decent connection.

Now I understand they have an ‘image’ to maintain, and they’re not a dull blue-chip organisation. But come on fellas.

Fans come to sites to find out about new albums and singles, latest tour dates, see what the band is up to, etc. Maybe download some video or images from a recent gig. Whilst doing that, I’m sure some nice design is more than welcome, but not when it gets in the way of what the visitor is after.

Accessibility and usability are thrown out of the window more often than not. In fact, to say they are thrown out of the window probably suggests that they were even considered in the first place.

I’ve picked out two band’s and their respective websites, to show how it can be done.

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