Unfortunately, I will be unable to attend :(

It is really sad and depressing to see how the Irish Government decided to spend all this money, when they could have used it to make us become the world leader in almost any area of science and technology :(

What a waste!

Very funny ;)

• Apple iPad art: portraits created by David Kassan using the Brushes app on the touchscreen device
• Apple iPad art: paintings created using Brushes, ArtStudio and Sketchbook Pro apps
• Kyle Lambert’s Apple iPad portraits of celebrities: step by step

The first is my favourite!

Lucky, my friend had a very recent external backup. Therefore, I wiped the laptop and simply reinstalled everything, rather than trying to remove the virus.

However, this made me wonder how Drive-By Download infection occurs. Another friend recommended that I read The Ghost In The Browser Analysis of Web-based Malware. It was an excellent introduction, and it was very readable.

I particularly like the last paragraph :D

It is fresh off the printing press :)

I previously wrote about an online photo editor called Pixenate in Online Photo Editor. Unfortunatly, it is not able to sharpen photos :(

So I did a search, and I found Pixlr. It is really slick, and it appears to be very functional!

I read an article in the news today warning travellers about high mobile phone charges when travelling on the Irish sea by ferry. Apparently, these mobile phone charges are not covered by the new EU regulations. The full article is Ferry passengers warned over mobile fees.

It is interesting, because one of the ferry companies, is advertising the fact that they provide free Wi-Fi onboard:

Whilst onboard you can enjoy free WiFi, …

See Ferries to Ireland for more details.

So it appears that travellers may pay above average mobile phone charges, but not pay any Internet charges. Yet, presumably, the access technology is the same in both cases!

I often have to work with companies that already have a well designed website, but they have no content designed specifically for mobile devices. These companies normally have a very strong desire to target mobile users, but they are unsure of the best approach.

In an ideal world, if a website is well written in XHTML then it should be possible to create a separate CSS stylesheet to render the pages well on mobile devices. This solution is usually easy to do, but it only provides a very basic user experience.

Therefore, there is normally a requirement to create new content specifically for mobile users. There are normally three different options, and each of these has its own advantages and disadvantages.

Mobile Application

This is probably the most popular option, and it is the option with which most users are familiar. The advantages of this option are:

• It is possible to create really attractive applications that make maximum use of the underlying hardware (GPS, digital camera, …).
• It is possible to create a really rich user experience.
• It gives a presence in in the application store.

This main disadvantages of this option are:

• It can be expensive to develop a mobile application because it requires specialist skills.
• It can be difficult to develop for all mobile hardware platforms.
• The approval process required to get the mobile application into the application store can be very slow and subjective.

There are many examples of such mobile applications :)

Mobile Website

This is probably the second most popular options. It involves creating a second website that is specifically designed for mobile devices. This new website can be hosted on a new domain (.mobi for example), and mobile clients can automatically be redirected there based on the HTTP user agent header.

The advantages of this option are:

• It can be very quick to develop.
• It uses existing web development skills.
• It does not require any third party approval.

The main disadvantage of this option is that it does not give a presence in the application store.

Hybrid Application

The advent of HTML 5 enables another option that consists of developing a skeleton application that is basically a dumbed-down web browser. This application is configured with an application specific title, icon, and start page.

The main advantages of this option are:

• It is possible to create a really rich user experience.
• It gives a presence in the application store.
• It can be very quick to develop.
• It mostly uses existing web development skills.

The disadvantages of this option are:

• It is not possible to use the underlying hardware.
• It still requires third party approval.

Hopefully I have not forgotten anything!