JQuery UI tabs causes IE7 to freeze
I started hearing complaints that a particular learning module completed a few weeks ago was freezing up at random. It took a while to isolate the problem down to the use of JQuery UI tabs
Continue readingAuthor: ellen
Annotate reality with the LiveScribe smartpen
When I first heard of the LiveScribe Pulse smartpen, I wondered:
“OK, it’s a pen that records a lecture. I already carry with me two or three devices that can record audio and video. Why would I want another ?
After trying it out, I can tell you why you might want this. It is a lot more than a recording device. When the Pulse smartpen records audio, it syncs that recording to whatever you are writing or drawing at the time. Then it OCR’s your notes (even if your handwriting is terrible!), and makes them searchable. You can search the lecture for keywords based on your notes. Then copy and paste the text of your notes into other applications.
Continue readingTroubleshooting “No Service” messages on iPhone, part 2
There has been so much interest recently in my post on the No Service error message that appears to be plaguing particularly 3G iPhones, that it seemed appropriate to put up a more detailed summary of possible fixes for the “No Service” message on the iPhone.
Below is a summary of all the suggestions from the many comments on the original post (thanks to all the commenters!) and from several sites around the web.
Continue readingConfluence: Remove page icons from old-school PageTree macro
The pagetree plugin for Confluence is a commonly used navigation widget for the popular wiki. There are now 2 versions: the older “pagetree” and the newer “pagetree2” which has several improvements, including a less cluttered look. The older version displays the standard Confluence page icons next to each node of the tree, whereas these can be hidden (and usually are) in the newer version.
Old-style “pagetree” New-style “pagetree2”
Check out this little elephant whipping the water around!
Baby Elephant’s First Swim! from Zoos Victoria on Vimeo.
Continue readingSometimes masking tape is all you need: Brother Laser Printer cartridges
I have an old Brother HL-5250DN Laser Printer that’s been giving good service for years. Seems like forever since I replaced the toner cartridge (TN350 Black Toner Cartridge). But the other day, it simply stopped printing! It was out of toner, apparently. There must have been a “toner low” message, but I missed it.
Unfortunately it is quite unforgiving. Once it is below a certain point it simply stops functioning. Of course it was a most inconvenient moment for it to stop working.
All I could do was go look at Amazon for a new cartridge. Lo and behold, the customer reviewers there have come up with a quick fix to get the printer back up and running while you are waiting for the new cartridge to arrive.
Continue readingIE 7 & 8: Navigation to the webpage was cancelled, revisited
If you get the error “Navigation to the webpage was cancelled” while browsing, chances are a security setting needs to be corrected. In a previous post, I suggested a “scorched earth” settings-reset procedure, but I’ve found that that isn’t always sufficient. Sometimes the settings need to be relaxed beyond factory defaults.
For instance, our Learning Management System (LMS) uses mixed https and http content, and Internet Explorer is often set to block mixed content entirely. Sometimes it will prompt the user but often it will simply give the error “Navigation to the webpage was cancelled.” In the case of our LMS, a large clue to what is going on is that the login page appears completely unstyled, because the style sheets and images are part of the blocked content.
Continue readingPass data to a Qualtrics survey and display it in the survey and reports
Qualtrics is an online survey application with many capabilities that aren’t obvious at first glance. I’m currently using Qualtrics to create a feedback form that will be used in several hundred learning modules. This form needs to recognize from which learning module it’s being accessed, and it should determine the author of the module and email them a copy of the user’s feedback.
Qualtrics has a feature called “embedded data” which allows you to pass any arbitrary arguments in the link to the survey. We’ll use this to add metadata to the feedback.
There are three steps:
- Set up a link to the survey that passes “Embedded Data” values
- Set up the survey to access the Embedded Data
- Do something with the Embedded Data
Fish oil prevents onset of schizophrenia: treatment breakthrough
Research starting in the early 90’s has suggested a neurodevelopmental basis for schizophrenia. Other studies suggest a biochemical basis for this abnormal development in schizophrenics related to insufficient fatty acids – fatty acids that contribute to the phospholipids which are the building blocks of neuronal membranes. Growth of axons and dendrites, making new synaptic connections and pruning of old ones, involves the synthesis and breakdown of phospholipids.
Based on findings of reduced fatty acids in people with schizophrenia, researchers have been studying whether giving Long-chane omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) to patients at high risk for developing psychotic disorder would prevent them from developing psychotic disorder.
Continue readingProposal: Advance Directives for our digital legacies
Ten years from now, which is most likely to still be around, your last email or this one by some ancient Assyrian businessman?
Photo by mharrsch / CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
One thing I can tell you is that when the photographer who took this image stops paying for their Flickr account, this photo is likely to disappear, and all sites that hotlinked to it using Flickr’s “embed” feature, will lose the use of it.