Having thoroughly enjoyed Cooking for Geeks (which I highly recommend), when I saw that a similarly novel approach to fitness was available I was all on board to enjoy this one as well. And…enjoy it I did. Bruce Perry’s approach in Fitness for Geeks is a comprehensive and quirky walk through a new way of imagining fitness. As the author quickly points out, things such as fitness, diets, ets are ejected from the discussion — not for lack of relevance but simply because they connote some popular distractions from the geeky approach proposed. The approach is unique…get into the mindset of the ‘geek’ (not the circus type ) and look at a different sort of approach to fitness and well-being. Read the rest of this entry »
Using Mac OSX Lion Server is one of those lovely, handy O’Reilly overview guides that take the place of manuals not supplied with products. In this one the Charles Edge Jr. aims his guidance towards relatively new server administrators — possibly even someone setting up a family server — and covers all the great basics of determining what hardware and software needs you might have and how these might be served with OSX Lion Server. The 200 page volume (it is definitely beyond a brief cover, but less than many of the exhasutive server admin manuals you might be used to) covers all the basic information and moves into some of the more specialised functions you might put an OSX-based server to such as working with streaming video or handling the backend on some of the glossy OSX’y tools such as iCal, or the Address book. Read the rest of this entry »
Tibits Publishing’s latest Take Control volume provides a starter to power-user tour of Bare Bones Software’s BBedit. This short volume by Glenn Flesihman provides a concise, focused and well delivered guide to get the most out of BBedit — one of the most mature text editing environment available for OSX. The tone is direct, grounded in Flesihman’s deep personal experience with BBedit, is well illustrated and targeted exploration of three principal tasks: working with text, managing websites and using projects. The logical layout of the volume maeans it is helpful as tutorial to gain immediate familiarity with BBedit, but also a solid reference source to be consulted when you need to do something specific. Read the rest of this entry »
Well, it is the first book to hit the market and clearly was prepared with pre-release software for the specific purpose of getting a book to the market. Ironic I suppose after writing that to realize that the book itself is about getting books to the market. Ba-dum dum. I will avoid the larger discussion of the issues surrounding the marketing of books through a single source distributor in this review and stick to the structure, intent and delivery of the book itself. The first chapter of Publishing with iBook Author by Nellie McKesson and Adam Witwer walks the reader through a look at the specific menu items and tools featured on screen. Read the rest of this entry »
This is an absolutely great book. Recommended on Amazon as I had purchased something G12 related in the past, I downloaded a sample chapter to the Kindle (a dangerous action at the best of times) and I was hooked. From Snapshots to Great Shots takes the very prudent and useful tact of assuming you already have the manual and want to go beyond … but here’s the rub, it doesn’t just go advanced … it bridges the gaps from manual and adopts a very practical and hands-on approach to taking great pictures. It doesn’t assume you just want to know how to use the camera…it teaches you how to use it to take great pictures. This may seem rather obvious but the approach of all too many manuals is simply directed at explaining every feature as opposed to identifying a use and explaining in simple, but applied terms how you accomplish it. Read the rest of this entry »
A quite thought provoking piece from James Cheshire at UCL on Fast Thinking and Slow Thinking Visualisation.
Attended a great talk providing a overview of the establishment of the 18th Century Irish Hospital System in Ireland by Dr Susan Mullaney (RAMI/UCC) at the Edward Worth Library @ Dr Steevens Hospital in Dublin.
Mullaney is asking a basic question about the motivation behind the 1765 Act for Ireland calling for establishment of county hospitals to provide for the welfare of the people within 1 mile of the county town in each Irish county. Prior to the act there were a small number of hospitals in Dublin, Waterford, Cork (North and South) and Meath and Louth.
#tweetsmart by Jesse McDougall adopts the premise that many people dismiss twitter as idle chatter and cannot fathom why they would want to engage with it. Although I have encountered many colleagues that personally are somewhat dismissive (and in many cases rightly so) I am not sure that business dismisses it as readily and certainly doesn’t do so as quickly as it once might have. However adopting the tact of proving a series of meaningful ‘projects’ to demonstrate how twitter can be used for building an online community piqued my interest and is something that I readily subscribe to. After reading this book however I am of rather mixed opinion and would caution that this book does seem targeted specifically at online marketing of a product or service. I find writing this review difficult as I was raised very strictly under the premise that if you don’t have anything good to say, then don’t say anything…but I will say a few things and some of them good. Read the rest of this entry »
The Linux Command Line: A Complete Introduction by William Shotts jr is as complete as you might desire / imagine and delivers much more than it promises. This is simply the most fun, yet strikingly comprehensive, introduction to Linux that you could want. As the title states it focusses on interaction via the Linux command line yet delves into popular GUI’s at times and provides such comprehensive coverage that you will go from newbie to pro in no time. Read the rest of this entry »
I had the privilege of chairing a symposium organized by the Irish Manuscript Commission which invited participants from a variety of Irish cultural institutions to discuss issues arising from the new Europeana Data Exchange Agreement. Presentations from Jill Cousins, Director of Europeana and her colleagues, Georgia Angelaki, Paul Keller and Lucie Guibault sought to bring clarity to the new agreement and the issues emerging from the online presentation of digital cultural artefacts. Read the rest of this entry »