Website of the Month - Vincent Van Gogh: The Letters

One of the best websites I've seen, for the sheer amount of information it holds, the way it is organised and its overall design is Vincent Van Gogh: The Letters.

There is an exhibition in London at the Royal Academy of Arts until 18th April 2010. I hope to go to that the next time I'm in London, but for the moment the website gives me a fascinating glimpse into Van Gogh's life.

There is also a superb book of the letters but it costs £395, so thank goodness for the website.

Internet Snooperhighway

The British Government has just set up a dedicated unit for delivering the Interception Modernisation Programme (IMP),  a surveillance project that will record the details of every email, phone call, text message and internet session in the UK. This will cost the taxpayer £2bn over 10 years. 
While the police need to use communication data to stop crime, this does not justify collecting all our private data, on the assumption that we are guilty until proven innocent.
Christopher Graham, the Information Commissioner responsible for overseeing the protection of private information, has described the creation of the IMP as "... a step change in the relationship between the citizen and the state". 
Also, given the Government's ability to lose our private data, we can have no confidence that the data will be kept securely, leading to the possibility of sensitive personal or business information falling into the wrong hands.
At a time when the Government deems it acceptable to make widespread public funding cuts, the Government considers that its creeping programme to snoop on us all is sacrosanct.
Find out more
http://www.publicservice.co.uk/news_story.asp?id=12013
http://www.publicservice.co.uk/news_story.asp?id=10315
http://www.publicservice.co.uk/news_story.asp?id=11189

Content Management with Joomla

I've just built a website for Write-Minded.co.uk, using Joomla! Content Management software and I'm very pleased at how easy and user friendly it is, both for me to develop and for the owners of the site, who can log on and add or update articles from the site's homepage.
In the past I've turned down work because I only offered hand built websites, but now I'll be able to provide function rich websites to  potential clients.
Content Management will allow clients to update their websites, giving them greater control over content as well as freeing up my time for building new websites rather than updating old ones. A win-win situation!

Using Picasa to resize photographs

When I build a website I have to reduce the size of  photographs so that they'll load quickly and easily in a web browser. I normally use Adobe Photoshop Elements to do this.
However, if you don't have this software on your PC, why not use Google's Picasa software, which is available to download free of charge. Go to http://picasa.google.com/ and follow the instructions.
There are numerous tutorials on the web to tell you how to resize photos  (search for "picasa resize image"), such as http://www.latech.edu/tech/rural/website%20project/web_tutorial/articles/resize_pictures_picasa.html . The help within Picasa is good too.
I use Picasa when I want to resize several pictures at once, such as when I want to load up photos to an online gallery.

Family Documents added to The Last Bartlett website

I have just added some family documents I inherited along with my family photographs to my Last Bartlett family history site, including old ID cards, vaccination certificates, wedding invitations, ration books and a letter to my great-grandfather from Prime Minister Gladstone in 1885.
Why not take a look?

New Pictures from Vivid Images and Vanna Art

I've built websites for a couple of Norfolk artists - Andrew Pettitt (http://www.vivid-images.co.uk/) and Vanna Bartlett (http://www.vanna-art.co.uk/) and in the last few days I've added new pictures to both these sites.

Andrew produces beautiful pictures of the Norfolk countryside, such as the recent oil painting Storm Over Cantley (above). See http://www.vivid-images.co.uk/storm_over_cantley.htm for a bigger image.

On Wednesday I added some watercolour paintings to Vanna's site - see http://www.vanna-art.co.uk/Watercolours.htm. Earlier this month I added Vanna's acrylic painting of Winter Apples, Fieldfares and Redwing (above), inspired by the large flocks of fieldfares and redwings currently in Norwich.

Happy New Year from Design Different

Wishing you a Happy New Year from Design Different.

Here in Norfolk the cold snap continues.
Yesterday saw the Norfolk countryside coated with a light dusting of snow, as we went for a lovely walk in the sunshine, starting and finishing at Blickling Hall (pictured).