Steve Pottenger has set up a new blog on using Nikon cameras. His first lesson covered using the automated flash units and different settings that you can use to get different results.
His lesson got me inspired to go out and do some shooting. Here’s a shot from my neighbor Tom’s garden of his poppies against the quick summer storm that passed through.
http://www.nikonspling.com/
I look forward to his next lesson!
Typing Tutor Demo View
Turn yourself into a typing hero!
A fast typing speed is essential for everyone working on computers, especially programmers. Here’s a site that one of my students told me about that will allow you to increase your typing speed. http://www.typing-lessons.org.
This is an excellent use of Flash technology, giving you immediate feedback with a voice saying “bad” each time you hit the wrong key.
Use Cognitive Science to Help You Learn – Over the years cognitive scientists have discovered some important techniques that help you learn more effectively with less work. As athletes know, people have brain memory as well as muscle memory. You put these muscle memories to work each time you do a typing exercise such as this.
To make your practice more effective, type no more than 10 minutes every morning when you first get up. But, during those 10 minutes really focus on what you are doing. Limit your input to your fingers and the screen. (No music, kids, TV, videos, instant messaging, or emails.) Just you and the typing.
Then, right before you go to bed, do another concentrated 10 minute practice. Your brain will continue to process as you sleep. Then, when you wake up in the morning and start typing again, you will be sending a clear message to your brain, “Hey, this is important! Pay attention.” The reinforcement will continue to increase as you do this every morning and every night, day in and day out.
Earlier I posted a link to TuxType which is a free typing game you can download and play to increase your skills.
CopyBlogger has an interesting article, The Deceptively Simple Steps to
Persuasive Writing That Works by Sonia Simone that compares illustrates how useful it is to use subheads in your web copy: it is like adding steps to your page, helping the reader “walk” through the copy one step at a time.
This works for web pages and reports and will make your written communications much more readable and inviting.
And, if subheads are like steps, than graphic images are like light posts and neon signs along the way, catching the readers eye and giving context to the text.
Just scroll down this page and imagine if I listed all of these articles without subheads or graphics. Just one solid block of text screams “too much work!” to the user and I doubt if even you would have stayed on this site very long!
