Stop laughing - this is serious

My first attempt at a video. Thanks to Tracee for her co-operation in this one.
I speeded it up and added a filter to make it look like old film.

Enjoy.
Oh, and no llamas were harmed in the making of this film.

How's this for temptation.

This is a recipe for the Most Dangerous Chocolate Cake in the World.
I'm putting it here rather than just post the link because I discovered the other day that TAFE has blocked the Gather.com website.

I haven't tried this recipe yet because I'm trying to lose weight and so far I've resisted the temptation. How long this resolve will last remains to be seen.

MINUTE CHOCOLATE MUG CAKE

1 Coffee Mug

4 tablespoons flour(that's plain flour, not self-rising)

4 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons baking cocoa

1 egg

3 tablespoons milk

3 tablespoons oil

3 tablespoons chocolate chips (optional)

Small splash of vanilla



Add dry ingredients to mug, and mix well . Add the egg and mix thoroughly.

Pour in the milk and oil and mix well.

Add the chocolate chips (if using) and vanilla, and mix again.

Put your mug in the microwave and cook for 3 minutes at 1000 watts. The cake will rise over the top of the mug, but don't be alarmed!

Allow to cool a little, and tip out onto a plate if desired.

EAT! (this can serve 2 if you want to share!)



And why is this the most dangerous cake recipe in the world? Because now we are all only 5 minutes away from chocolate cake at any time of the day or night

Recipe Links Added

I've added some links to recipe websites that I've found useful. (See right)
Some of the recipes we've tried and can recommend are:
3 Spice Potatoes - a delicious Indian style recipe which are seriously yummo.

Lamb and Parsley Patties. We've made these a number of times, occasionally with slight variations. We have them with a Greek Salad, pita bread with low-fat yoghurt and parsley dressing. (ps. Mick and I aren't fans of Coriander leaves so we just add extra parsley.)

Or how about Rabbit stew in Beer with Dumplings? We've done this twice. Once fairly closely following the recipe with just a couple of minor variations to allow for not having ingredients . The dumpling recipe is particularly good for transplanting into other dishes (we did a turkey meatball thing and used this dumpling recipe)

Getting stuff done

I'll get back to my assignment after I'd added this cool you tube video... and checked my email, and updated my Facebook, and read my news groups, oh and mustn't forget to wash the lunch dishes...... you know how it goes.

Avatars

After a somewhat frustrating sesssion in class where we couldnt' do everything we wanted and for some unexplained reason, every half hour or so I had to change computers because it would only load a blank page, at last I have an Avatar. A couple actually. Now that i'm home I can also download them onto my computer, so perhaps I'll create a slideshow out of my creations.

EUREKA !! I've found it.

The most useful web tool so far in my roamings on the internet.
Google Reader combined with the iGoogle page. Many groups, websites and most blogs have an RSS feed. Once you've subscribed you can choose whether to have the updates downloaded onto a folder on your browser or to your google reader.

If you choose Google Reader you can then choose to have that feed onto your iGoogle page, which means whenever you open your browser, if you have it defaulting to iGoogle, not only can you start searching, have the weather with you, calendar and to do appointment thingy, along with numerous other bibs and bobs but you get the headlines from all your chosen feeds into one place on one spot on the page. After initial subscribing and wading through everything and marking all as read (at which point they will disappear). It's then a really simple matter to check for updates regularly and keep up with all the groups in one spot. No more trawling about and having to remember which blogs/groups interest you. All in one spot.

Plus you can even get newsgroups fed into your Google reader and iGoogle page.

Enlightenment with iGoogle

I have discovered that the absolute best way of keeping track of everything is via Google reader. Nearly everything that offers update feeds has google reader as one of its options. Quite a lot of what can be added to Google Reader can also be put up on your igoogle webpage. Now that's worth having. Calendar, weather, news updates, to do lists. You name it iGoogle has it.

Bad,bad bunny.

I just realised how long it's been since I last created an entry into my blog.
I'm looking at no 3 on the assessment sheet.
It reads: After conducing a training needs analysis, prepare a portfolio which details a strategy for personal development. The portfolio must include a current resume, a goals/mission statement and a five year plan for personal learning. WHAT?

Training needs analysis? What the heck is that? Is this within the context of web 2.0 tools? If it is, how on earth can we have any idea what's coming down the track?

Videos..

You tube is one of the biggest sources of videos. It's a matter of finding what you want, copying the code and pasting it where you want. This is a You Tube video of celebrity chef, Gordon Ramsay cooking Beef Wellington. It's not that difficult and it's delicious. I know. I've cooked it.. Yummo

Gadgets

This is an example of a gadget that may be embedded in just about any web page or blog. it's a simple matter of just copying and pasting the code. This one is a BBC Recipe gadget available from Google.

NING

Ning is a social networking website which enables people to create their own communities.
For the purpose of this assignment a Ning community was created entitled Family Cooking. A number of people were invited to join and share recipes. There are a few recipes up there at the moment.

To visit the Family Cooking Ning website simply click on the Family Cooking logo on the right hand side of this page and join the community.

Adding RSS feed to your blog.

First of all . This is RSS feed logo. It can come in various colours, but bascially if you see this on a website then it has RSS feed. Sometimes it will just have a text link saying something like. Oh, I dunno. RSS feed.

The meaning of RSS. Rich Site Summary. easier to remember is Really Simple Summary.
There is more information about what RSS is and does at http://www.whatisrss.com/
If that's a bit technical there's a simpler explanation at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(file_format)

An example of a webpage with RSS feed. http://www.aussiecooking.com.au/cook/Australian-Recipe-Sites
If you go to this website and scroll down to the bottom you will see a RSS feed link. Click on that link.

As you will see by the options, RSS feeds can be selected either by category updates or site-wide feeds. Let's choose site wide feeds. This particular RSS feed has only one option - Google reader. You dont actually have to subscribe to google reader (it's free though) to get the RSS feed link. If you click on that link it will take you to a google reader page. Copy the link that appears at the top of the web page that opens for google reader. In this case the RSS feed link is
http://www.taste.com.au/feeds/latest+recipes.xml

Once you've copied that link then go back to your blog. Click on the Customise link at the top right hand corner.
Click on add page element.
In the right hand column about 2/3 way down there is a page element called "Feeds".
Click on that and add the URL from the RSS feed you copied earlier and save.
And voila. There is the RSS feed in your blog. You can add multiple RSS feeds.
Mine is top right hand corner of this blog.

My book haul from the Crime and Justice weekend.

Photo of my book haul from the Crime and Justice weekend. Uploaded to Flickr and placed in this blog.

What a wonderful weekend. Every event seemed to be tailored to my reading taste. The agonising choices that had to be made. We made the resolution to do it all over again next year. If this inaugural year is anything to go by it's going to get better and better and it started from a pretty high base as well.

Anyway, enough of my rambling. This is a photo of my book haul. Now I will add in my own defence that I didn't actually buy all these books. I only paid for 4. We won the trivia competition - Helen, Karen and I in a three way tie. Simon, the event organiser wanted to have a run off but we told him we were all together and we could play nicely and share.

Another nice widget

This one is called Simply Recipes. Has a very nice clean look to it and is easy to use. My pageflakes pages are starting to grow and grow with all the things I'm finding.
The website that contains this widget is http://www.elise.com/recipes/

Page Flake

After considerable research, Pageflakes was tested.http://www.pageflakes.com/ This takes the form of customisable webpage. Elements may be added and removed to create a webpage with everything the user wishes to have at their fingertips. Blogfeeds, weather, calendar,video feeds, the list is endless. It also enables users to create more than one page, so if a user has multiple interests, each page can be customised for each interest. It is incredibly easy to use and there are hundreds of options.

My personal pageflakes web page is http://www.pageflakes.com/sunniefromoz/


It is very user friendly and not only has dozens of items that can be added to customise the page, but the layout may be changed at any time using a simple drag and drop method. There are templates to change the look of the page as well as being able to create your own individual design.

MySites

www.mysites.com is a website that promises a great deal. It claims to offer one password site for blogs, media streaming, webpages, storage and chat, all for free.

It all sounds wonderful, however the user interface seems to be lacking. It was possible to add a background colour, however there was no discernable way to add text to the webpage. The same applied to the blog utility. There was a help link, and that revealed a pop-up box which was blank. An attempt was made to construct a webpage in both Internet Explorer and Firefox, but to no avail. The website owners were emailed with a request for assistance but so far there has been no response.

Perhaps someone else will have more luck.

odiogo

Now this truly is a useful widget. Add it to your website or blog and it will convert your text to speech. It enables easy access for the vision impaired and those who don't have much time to read and want to keep up with what you have to say. Just visit the website, click on the listen now icon and you're off and racing.

http://www.odiogo.com/

You an also subscribe to an audio RSS feed as well.

It's completely free. The down side of that is that before each voice feed there are some musical notes and little message telling you about odio feed, and you don't get to choose a voice, but it's a minor price to pay.

It is a computer generated voice, so it can't manage the inflections of a real person reading but it's pretty good. I have yet to test it out on colloquialisms. But let's give that a try.

G'day mate.

Drongo.

Ooh roo.

See ya lata alligata

Screencast-O-Matic

At the top left of this blog screen there is a little box. It says Screencast-O-Matic. If you click on it you can add your own audio file and listen to my dulcet tones if you're in the mood for a little light masochism.

I can see dozens of practical applications for this neat little widget. Whether any of those will pertain specifically to my assignment topic remains to be seen. Nevertheless, have a go at it. All you need is a microphone.

Online applications and Widgets that might be useful.

For a start there's this blog site. Easy to use, easy to access. It's a great way to share information with others. There is no need to duplicate work. You simply find out what you want and then add it here. No Powerpoint presentations to prepare, no extras to forget. Accessible from any computer with an internet connection.

Screencast-O-Matic

This is a pretty new widget. Not only does it allow the user to record and store audio files, you can also create channels which means that others can add their own audio files without having to go through the process of registering and creating their own accounts.

The Pros: It's easy to use, allows for interaction and sharing audio files quickly and easily.
it can be embedded on a website..
Therein lies the biggest con: there is potential for abuse. However, let's test it out here and see how we go.