Posted by Thinker on May 18, 2009 in
Thinkable Our skin takes its color from pigments. They are colored pigments. Individuals with dark skin have more of these pigments and those with lighter skin have less of them. This pigment is known as melanin.
The main purpose of melanin is to guard the body from sun rays. That is why, we get tanned when we expose ourselves to sun. Tanning means more production of melanin. Cells known as melanocytes in the skin produce melanin.
If for any reason, the skin begins losing melanin from a patch on the body, light skin develops on that place. This is called vitiligo disease. There is no specific cause known for vitiligo except for the thought that the body destroys the melanin itself. That is why this is called an autoimmune disease (a disease where the body attacks itself).
Vitiligo can develop on the whole body, or it can stop after creating few patches. Anybody can get it on any part of the body. There is no perfect cure for it. There is no prevention for vitiligo. Vitiligo also exposes skin to sun rays and that is dangerous. Let us find out more about it.
Vitiligo can develop on any part of the body, at any age and in anyone. Though it is believed that exposed parts of body have higher chances of developing Vitiligo, it can appear anywhere. Color of skin does not affect the probability of getting vitiligo. Similarly, it can strike both the sexes and at any age and treatments for vitiligo for everyone is very similar.
It is estimated that in about one-fifth of the cases, other family members may also have vitiligo. As vitiligo is an autoimmune disorder, its patients are monitored for other autoimmune diseases such as thyroid disorders, alopecia aerta, etc. You should talk to your doctor about this in detail.
Vitiligo begins with a small area of lighter color, which slowly turns to a white patch. Many patches can also develop at the same time. After some time, the discoloration may stop and then restart after some time. Some people may lose all the skin pigment. The hair also loses color at the site of vitiligo.
The cause of vitiligo is not known and so it is difficult to provide a definitive cure for vitiligo, but it is thought that either the body destroys the melanin or it destroys itself. But the result is loss of pigment that protects body against sun damage.
I hope this helps you better understand the causes and effects of vitiligo. You shoul seek medical advice should begin to experience this mysterious disorder.
DISCLAIMER: I hope this helps, but note that I am not a medical professional so you should consult with a medical doctor before taking any medical suggestions from the online world.
Posted by Thinker on May 18, 2009 in
Thinkable Why are some clicks worth three dollars and others only worth a few pennies? When you check your account and the clicks are hardly worth the effort, Google may have decided you were not worth the money It can be very hard to explain this situation, and there are several factors that attribute to this effect.
Try to examine if what you are experiencing is something that will continue on towards the future or if it is just a fluke. Maybe its not a fluke and there is a reason behind it, Smart Pricing affects everyone especially people that are trying to make money with an undeveloped website. Sometimes the times your most disappointed come from poor planning, even if you’re a portait specialist looking for some photography business cards or a big shot internet marketer, you still need to play your cards right
If the mega search engine decides that the people clicking are not genuinely interested in the offer, you may get penalized. If you are implementing advertisements on multiple websites, try to figure out which sites are the newest and bringing the least amount of natural search engine traffic and then block them from your account for a while. Once you have made the switch, watch your CPM and CTR closely for improvements.
If your revenue increases due as a result of these changes then you should have a good understanding of how to conduct market research. Just because you have stopped your pipes from leaking does not mean you should relax, an email list is a good idea, if you want to make some progress then learn how to monitor your traffic, here is a decent Statcounter Review. All of this boils down to one thing, whether you are improving your Google Adsense revenues or using email marketing and statistics to increase your affiliate sales, you should be doing both everyday.
Posted by Thinker on May 18, 2009 in
Thinkable Introduction
A huge number of people work in offices of one kind or another. They may be offices in buildings purpose built or attached to a factory or in business premises. For many self employed business people the office is a room in their home converted for that purpose. Solicitors, doctors, estate agents and insurance agents, in fact any business that you can think of, works from some kind of office or another. You might even say 80% of the adult population work in an office. But I wonder how many of those people have any say in what kind of office they have and whether or not it suits their requirements. Mostly when someone new joins a company or firm, they are given a space for their office usually left by the previous incumbent. I suspect that if you asked occupants how they would like their office to be they would find it difficult to tell you.
When you think of the number of hours we spend in an office, at least eight hours per day and sometimes up to sixteen hours if it’s a busy period. Yes people are allowed out for breaks and rest times, but it is an awful lot of your life cooped up in small space. If at least a third of one’s working life is to be spent in an office, then it makes logical sense to ensure the environment is as comfortable, pleasant and as healthy as possible.
So how much thought goes into the planning of workspaces?
Where a building is purpose built such as an office, then the architects I am sure will have created good designs to suit the purpose. However, it has been known for new buildings to be problematic for the people working it them. For instance, synthetic materials used for carpeting can sometimes give off toxic fumes which cause allergies or illness of the staff. Air conditioning that relies on recycled air has the potential to carry bugs that can lay the whole office off at the same time. So there are many factors to consider in creating an office environment to ensure the staff are productive, creative, energised and remain healthy.
Old buildings, originally built for other uses, when converted to office space will have different challenges to resolve. Often old buildings have very high ceilings where the heat rises up so that the inhabitants below are cold yet the heating bills are going through the roof, literally!! How to maximise the space available to provide a comfortable working environment will be a real challenge and this is where often the use of a mezzanine floor and suspended ceilings are valuable.
It is a well known fact for any business that happy workers give better performance and generate more revenue than unhappy workers. The workforce are more motivated, creative, helpful and have less time off work for illness if they are happy in their jobs. I am sure there are statistics available for these details, which will state how comfortable, happy, employees are an essential ingredient of any successful company, get recommended interior fit out specialists involved to create that great working environment.
Ergonomics
Ergonomics is the study of workplaces and the equipment used, to achieve the best design for comfort, safety, efficiency, and productivity. Research has been carried out over the last few years at Nottingham University on office space allocation problems.
Workspace planning is fast becoming a specialist industry because of all of the current regulations and legislation. Formerly known, in the UK as the Factories Act and now known as the Health and Safety Executive regulations are in place to ensure that employees have sufficient working space in which to perform their work. This can be a potential minefield including such things as physical space, usable space, corridor spaces, and minimum light and ventilation regulations. If you are about to commence on an office refurbishment project ensure that your interior fit out specialists of conversant with all of these regulations before you engage them to perform your work.
What are the Criteria for a good office environment? We are sentient beings, which mean we resonate with feeling and perception as well as intellectually to our surrounding.
Seeing
The first thing to consider when commencing an office refurbishment project is how does it look? The initial impact on us comes from what we see. The decor and arrangement of furniture, the window aspect and lighting are important in our perception of whether or not it is pleasing to the eye. Does the office have all the necessary equipment, computer, phone and sufficient storage for files and books etc? Plants create a sense of balance in the space as long as they are discreetly positioned and don’t make it look cluttered. Plants are oxygen generators and help to refresh the air.
Smell
On entering a new place the first thing we take in is the smell whether we pay attention to it or not. We notice immediately if the air is stuffy or if there is an unpleasant smell such as sweaty bodies. However a pleasant fragrance or no smell at all will be inviting. Baker shops nearly always pump out the fresh smell of baked bread into the street to entice people in to buy the goods. So although we may not be aware that smell plays an important part in our responses, we are still animals and we do use our olfactory senses a great deal more that we realise.
Feel touch
How does the furniture feel? Plastic seats can be very uncomfortable to sit on for a long time. Plastic does not breathe, it draws moisture from the skin so that when you stand up your posterior will be damp and uncomfortable. Padded fabric is warmer than leather for comfort and not as expensive. The desk chair needs to be the correct height for desk and give suitable support, a computer needs to be set correctly to avoid neck and wrist strain of the operator.
The temperature in the workspace is best if it’s not too warm and not too cold. When arranging an office refurbishment accept that people work best in an ambient temperature of 20 degrees.
Too warm and we become sluggish and sleepy, too cold and we become distracted and use up valuable energy keeping warm. Fresh air is also beneficial to stimulate the brain cells.
Sound Hear
What can we hear? Is it noisy or quiet? When I was first starting out in business, I went to visit a local manufacturing company to learn about the way they managed their business. At lunch time I was taken into the executive dining area where there was a waitress service and we had a very civilised lunch. Later I was taken to the works canteen. When we walked in I was hit with a blast of noise such as I had never experienced before. The hall was large with a very high ceiling and nothing to damp down the echo. The result was that everyone ended up shouting to be heard and there was loud music playing as well. I was shocked, not just at the noise level but by the contrast between the executive dining room and the workers canteen. I had come from an environment which treated all members of the company the same so there were no executive areas and everyone, high and low mingled together for meals and break times. Guess which company had the better worker relationships and higher output?
Where a company utilises an open plan office then noise levels can be very distracting and one solution is to incorporate ‘White Noise’ which is a low level background noise to interfere with the general office talk going on over the phone or mini meetings. Sometimes quiet relaxing music is introduced as background noise but this is not common in a business place.
Taste
Well we are not going to go around licking the furniture, but another important consideration is to ensure that a there is an area to enjoy a nice coffee or tea away from the desk throughout the day. So is there a pleasant area for making drinks and preparing snacks, or even lunch facilities alongside the office. I once worked in an office where they had a small kitchen area off the main office for making drinks and snacks and there was always a bowl of fresh fruit for employees, as the company recognising the refreshing effects of fresh fruit.
Workspace planning
So as you can see there are many things that can make the work environment a agreeable place to be. However getting the original layout and size of spaces for the employees is a complex process.
How much room does each individual need to work in? According to the Officewise publication from the Health and Safety Executive in the UK employers must provide a minimum of 11 cubic metres for each person permanently occupying a workplace. However there are all sorts of exceptions and caveats to this rule, such as making sure the space is usable space, and clearly if that space were under the stairs with no windows, or ventilation then it would not be suitable. So it is very important to ensure that your new office fit out adheres to all of the current legislation with regards to workspace laws.
By using suspended ceilings the industrial fit out specialists make good use of otherwise dead spaces which makes the installation of services easier and more cost effective. Electrical supply, air conditioning units, water pipes and telephone cables can all run behind the suspended ceiling making access easy if anything goes wrong and repairs need to be implemented.
Positioning of the electrical and telephone outlet is also crucial. The computers used in offices today all require their own electrical supply even if they are networked with the system.
External light from windows is a requirement for offices. The days of the cupboard office cubbyhole are gone. Light airy spaces make people feel good and doses of sunshine each day lift our spirits. However too much sunshine will overheat an office so the use of vertical blinds is recommended to deflect the rays of the sun without reducing too much the level of illumination.
Costs
To preserve office space costs some industrial fit our specialists have come up with the idea that instead of having a board rooms for meetings they have their meeting standing up around a special tall coffee table. This reduces the amount of time spent in meetings and the space is reusable for the lunches. Other schemes encourage employees to work from home for part of a week and utilise a system of desk sharing or moveable desks.
Reconfigurable spaces
Another way of economising on the cost of office space is by careful rearrangement of the existing floor area. There may be dead areas which could be released and turned into useable space. The installation of new interior partition walls can rearrange the existing space to create a friendlier working environment. Sometimes working in an open plan office is beneficial for communication between staff, other times it is a distraction and prevents efficiency. So having the option of both open space and separate offices provides the full range of options which can be easily introduced with new partition walls.
For example one of my clients, took over a set of offices and had various walls moved, so instead of it having two small offices, one without a window, they created one large office for the MD and a really good sized store room which they needed for long term storage of customer files. They then took out another wall and made a good size open plan office space and rearranged another wall to create a board come conference room. Also access to the little kitchen was changed to be more convenient. The choice of subtle colours on the walls and new vertical blinds caused the whole suite of rooms to be transformed into a pleasant and airy working area. Where there is plenty of ceiling height the introduction of a Mezzanine floor generates valuable areas perhaps for storage, private meeting rooms or extra offices.
Other thoughts in workspace planning, is the situation of facilities such as kitchen, toilets, relaxation areas and outside space if available. Sometimes the introduction of a simple partition can create a relaxation/dining area without losing too much of the work area.
All Health and Safety regulations are paramount they have to be adhered to in the workplace and must be incorporated into any plan along with full fire regulations.
Conclusion
Many organisations may feel that upgrading the facilities is a ‘nice to have’ idea and the reality is that it usually comes at the bottom of the list on money allocation. However this is erroneous thinking; office refurbishment is never a waste of time or money. Creating a pleasant office environment by upgrading worn out or old fashioned surroundings and furnishings will make a big difference to the working life of the employees. Improved working conditions may be only part of the picture in achieving real job satisfaction, but it is a good start in the right direction. It also says a lot about what the senior people in the organisation think about their employees. If they ensure that their staff are given the necessary equipment and facilities to do their job effectively then the employees will give better service and can be more efficient and there will be a better working environment all around.
Posted by Thinker on May 18, 2009 in
Thinkable So you’ve come up with a great idea for a new application that is sure to take the world by storm. You’ve sketched some GUI designs or maybe even written up an informal design document (if anything, putting thoughts down on the paper helps find any lurking flaws). However, there’s still one hitch in the plan - OS compatibility. Software that can run on a multitude of different systems is sure to have a wider appeal than one that is confined to a single OS, so you want your applicaiton to be cross-platform.
In this post I’ll discuss some general tips for developing cross-platform programs. The tips aren’t specific to any particular programming language, they can be helpful regardless of your design environment.
Use framework(s) and libraries
This is a rather obvious one. Many popular frameworks and modules/libraries/what have you are already cross-platform. Aside from the usual benefits of frameworks, using a framework will cut down on maintenance and testing costs. For example, if you implement your own image loaded class, you’ll have to ensure that it performs as expected on all target systems. On the other hand, a third-party library that claims portability will (usually) have already been tested on vairous platforms by its developers.
Stick to open standards
Often your application will need to store some data on the disk. Should you use one of the existing file formats, or invent your own? The answer is most certainly “don’t reinvent the wheel”. Well-known standards are more likely to be supported by different operating systems and other software. For example, if you’re writing a CD/DVD backup tool, use the ISO format instead of MDF file or some other proprietary nastiness. Your users will appreciate the ability to use the file with other applications, too.
Avoid unnecessary optimization
Now, you might ask : “Okay, this is a good tip, but what does it have to do with cross-platform development?”
While avoiding unneeded optimization is generally recognized as good practice, it’s doubly as important when creating a cross-platform application. Making code portable usually means introducing some overhead, and it can be all too tempting to go to great lengths minimize this inefficiency.
However, it’s often not really needed. For example, an application written in C/C++ may be much faster than one created in an interpreted language, but the JavaScript-based Adobe Air platform would still be a better choice for a simple, network-bound RSS reader or a fancy Twitter client.
All of the above can be summarized as “look for existing solutions first”. Chances are that there is already a cross-platform way to do what you need, so check the ‘net before rolling your own. Otherwise you will get bogged down with ensuring compatibility very quickly.
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