Ads and things

So that I can find out a bit more about how a variety of things that can be added to web logs work you may see all sorts of odd extra panels appear in the sidebar. Can't really advise people on these sort of things until I've tried them out myself. One will be Google's AdSense programme which will include ads., hopefully not plastered across the page or flashing annoyingly at visitors. I need to see what sort of content appears and how the adminstration works. Obviously, as I have no idea what products or services will appear, I cannot endorse any of them. To be honest, the similar stuff I've seen on other blogs or sites always looks a bit sad and I can't imagine how anyone makes any money out of this but I get so many questions about this I can't answer I need to collect some facts myself.

PowerPoint notes

With so much new stuff around these days it can be very easy to forget that sitting on most people's desktops is the excellent Microsoft PowerPoint. I've just been asked to run some sessions, some for people who've never used it before and some for those who would like to use some of the more advanced features. Of course, the people I'd really like to see are those who think they're good at presentations but aren't and those who just need to know how to speak in public! Anyway, watch this space as I'll be making the new notes available here soon.

Vista? wait a while and tweak XP this year

Vista does look pretty with some nice work on liquid rollovers and clever use of transparency and the higher-end versions have some smart visual features but, having recently watched a not inexperienced colleague struggle with a whole host of previously straightforward tasks there would seem to be much sense in waiting for some fixes from Microsoft and for key applications to be fully compatible.

While you're waiting, there are some extras you can get for XP called Powertoys. Created by Microsoft staff, but not officially supported by the company, they can add some interesting features and TweakUI has utilities to help change otherwise impenetrable parts of the operating system code. Choose what you'd like to try here.

You could also impress anyone passing your desk by installing a free 3D Windows logo screensaver, available here.

Web tools

Just completed a major revision of the Webtools site. This has links to all sorts of free wonders and links to a pbwiki site where people can leave comments on useful some might be. Cheekily, I suppose, I included this blog but it is free and it is an example of quite a few of the tools mentioned. You'll find technorati, del.icio.us and wink bookmarking tools in the left panel, for example. Only slightly odd people like me would need more than one but any one can be a great way to store sets of bookmarks or share developments on a particular theme. Must remember to tag this post . . .