Pyjamanating

I’ve been using a program to make sure I take regular eye breaks and longer breaks as well. It’s called Time Out (Free Download) and only works on the Apple Mac computers.

It is very easy to fall into bad habits when using a computer for hours on end. You care about what you are doing, so can sometimes push yourself too far, or over-strain yourself. The human body isn’t built to sit in one position for endless hours, gripping a mouse or typing on the keyboard. Dejal Time Out is here to help. It will gently remind you to take a break on a regular basis.

Time Out has two kinds of breaks: a “Normal” break, typically for 10 minutes after 50 minutes of work, so you can move about and relax, plus a “Micro” break: a very brief pause of typically 10 seconds every 10 minutes, so you can remember not to tense up too much for long periods. You can disable either kind of break if desired, and the breaks are automatically paused when you go away from your computer, and can be reset when you come back.

You can configure how long each kind of break lasts, and how long between breaks. Each Time Out is announced via the screen slowly dimming, with related graphics materializing, and when the break is complete, it fades out again. You can change the time these transitions take… and you can even change the color and the level of transparency during the break. So if you like, you can make it mostly transparent so you can continue reading while on your break… though it’s better for you if you give your eyes a rest during the Time Out.

While in a break, a progress bar shows how long till it is over, and buttons are available to postpone or skip the break if you can’t be interrupted right then. Starting with version 1.5, you can change the number of minutes for the postpone buttons, or even hide them and/or the skip button, if you want to encourage yourself to take the breaks.

I’m still not sure whether I’ll keep this going long term, but for the moment it’s definitely doing me some good.

I’m a great believer in Wiki technology as the simplest collaborative infrastructure that can work.

Moderated forums always seem to end up stuck on just one set of related opinions, with fans of the owner chasing out alternative views, which is bad for community learning.

It takes a bit of work to keep one step ahead of the spambots, but mediawiki is the one with all the social experience, plugins and a development community behind it.

Well, I have to admit yesterday was hard going for various reasons. The online application went in before the deadline, a little brief perhaps, but better than missing out. I am reminded that the human resources people have seriously broken the whole process of recruitment. CVs are not accepted and the trend these days is to require a whole bunch of evidence which matches the candidate against a person specification. The only trouble is that the person spec is drawn up by a committee of stakeholders, who each have to add their own slant into the proceedings in order to exert their influence. The result is a long list of essential skills and experience, across a broad range of fields, in depth and with proven knowledge of both the discipline and the sector. In other words they end up insisting on looking for somebody who is already doing the same kind of job for the same type of organisation, who is capable of being all things to all people. Then they offer a short term contract on the lowest terms and conditions in the market. Anybody who is a suitable applicant on their terms wouldn’t dream of applying, and anybody who does apply is inherently unsuitable for the job as described, and thus likely to be filling in the application with a whole load of answers which bear little or no resemblence to the truth.

Enough of that for a while.

Today I need to get started on designing a course outline for some part time adult education in the local boroughs. It needn’t be too detailed, in fact it needs to be quite adaptable so I’ll use a wiki for the draft and invite my partner to collaborate. This will be creative and fun!

If it doesn’t rain all day like yesterday I’ll spend some time in the garden too.

Ironically one of my first tasks in the role as an independent freelancer is to apply for a position which, if I took it, would effectively put me back as an employee again. But only for a few months. If I get to interview, I will explore the possibilities of making it a part time contract for a start. Then there’s the opportunity to build up experience and contacts which this particular position offers. Filling in job application helps to focus on current skills and experience, keeping the CV up to date and thinking about opportunities. It’s also a task which I will tend to avoid if possible, so getting this done today is a good way of telling myself that I am at work and not on holiday!

I applied for a part time, home-based content editing job today. It’s on a topic which I’m passionate about, has a lot of relevence to this pyjamanating project, and requires skills that are right up my street. So this could suit me down to the ground.

There’s just one tiny little snaggette….

But hopefully the potential employer will be broad minded enough to see it as an opportunity to take the site beyond any perceived restrictions. There could be some interesting business to be made between us.