Ronda, Spain, Spanish, Themes, and Everything Else

Boungiorno, my partner and I have decided to start seriously learning Italian, and after months of watching any Italian tv programs we could find, we now feel ready to embrace language study.

We bought a language pack, the Hugo Italian in 3 months course, a couple of dictionaries and a software program for Windows that teaches Italian using short sound bytes.

So now that we've started, we plan to spend about half an hour a day going through new exercises, and as often as possible we're going to speak Italian to each other. Read More

This is the original version of my theme contest entry, and is the version that includes the $startpage link at bottom, the word count in the detail page, and the alternative comment styles. This also includes a link to archives at the bottom which may need to be changed so it points to your archives if you find that my link doesn't work. Hope you all like it. Download carl_s9y_v3_original.zip

Anyone who has been reading this blog would see that some of my articles have been translated, and since that request went out I've noticed my French visitors have increased, only by a couple percent, but add the countries where French is the major language and I think if this trend continues... So, do we have any french translators?

I really need to support my other users as well so I'm looking for help translating my articles into Italian, Spanish, French, and Chinese.

Other countries that regularly show up in my logs include Poland, Brazil, and South Korea.

If you would like to help me, simply comment on this page, I'll reply to your email address within 24-48 hours. Thank you.

Blogging is the next big technology trend, and I fully expect that almost everyone will have one in the next few years. Ten years ago nobody thought that every business would have a website and now you struggle to find one that doesn't.

If you haven't blogged before now, you may be wondering what all the fuss is about. But take a moment to think of how much easier it is to keep in touch when you have instant messaging, email, and sms on your mobile phone.

The big advantage of blogging is that you don't have to send anything to friends and family, they can simply subscribe to your feed and read what you write whenever they want to.

Already it is becoming common to record verbal blog messages, and I imagine it won't be long until video messages gain in popularity, especially given the pace of broadband uptake.

So with that said, who are the bloggers of tomorrow, why will they be the driving force of blogging in 2006? Read More

Edit 1-3-2006: I am opening up the translation of articles to all languages supported by Serendipity. I will also be taking a very long hard look at the documentation on the Serendipity website. Anyone wishing to join me with this project should post a comment here. Languages most in need of translations include, German, Russian, French, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, and Korean. All posts on this blog are moderated so if you need your privacy, let me know and I'll email you separately.

Edit 25-2-2006: To make it easier to find Serendipity related entries I have completely re-structured my categories. Our first russian entry by Gleb has been posted. We also have another German post by Hokey, thank you for joining the project.

Edit 22-2-2006: This is very exciting, the first two German articles are ready. They are by Matthias and Fabian. Thank you both.

My blog, especially the articles about Serendipity, are attracting a very large German audience, 36% of traffic this month, and I would love to have these articles translated into German for those readers.

I plan to install the multi-language plugin and any German translations would then be directly available from the post. I'm doing this out of respect for my readers. Would any German speaking person be willing to translate any of my Serendipity articles? I could either create a new author account for you, or you could simply send your translations and I could post them. I will happily credit you with the translation and offer a link to your blog.

If my request is well received, I would also happily consider translation into other languages.

The 21st century is already proving more complex than the 20th, at least at a global level. Traditional time management skills seem quite scientific and logical. Almost boring.

I remember when I first started teaching time management. At the time a number of very accomplished authors had published books that were designed to work alongside a day planner system that could be purchased separately, or you could attend a workshop and learn the intricacies of the system.

I no longer teach time management skills. Instead I debate matters of psychology with my clients, I ask them to complete research assignments, I test their cognitive abilities, I'm especially interested in their abilities to follow threads and remain focused. I particularly enjoy it when they bring various threads together into a single cohesive discussion.

Why do I do this, and how does this help with time management in the 21st century? Read More

I've been very interested in the effects of poverty on people within society, and then on society in general. When I think of how many people, good people I might add, lack the basic necessities to cope I can only wonder at the strength of character these people must possess to allow them to continue their daily fight for life.

Sadly, my thoughts and words are not enough to make a difference, and when you look at the kind of technology needed to read this article, you realise the people I'm writing about will probably never even know that I'm thinking of them.

Luckily, many of the government officials whose citizens live in poverty do have the capability to read my thoughts. To those people, please keep reading, my intention is not to lampoon your government, cast doubt on your ethics, or attack your culture. It is my sincere belief that poverty is a social evil that must never blight another generation ever again. And I believe fervently that the vast majority of officials and politicians in developing countries agree with me. Read More

In a previous post I discussed my feeling that the next/prev links which appear at the base of the overview pages, I call them the page footer, were flawed, and I suggested a fix for this. I believe this creates a more visually appealing link than the original serendipity default.

The page footer is comprised of three elements, the previous link, the footer info, and the next link. This article suggests a usability enhancement so that where either the next or previous link is missing, for example on the startpage, that instead of the link being left out, the link text will remain in position but greyed out and not clickable.

I have two reasons for suggesting this improvement. First, users become accustomed to seeing these links and the greyed out link text is a friendlier method of alerting them that they have reached the end or beginning of the overview pages. Secondly, I like the symmetry of seeing the page footer maintain its position and size across all overview pages. Read More