Digital UK Design Blog
Yesterday, Microsoft made a first developer preview of Internet Explorer (IE) 9 available for download from www.IETestDrive.com.
The IE 9 Platform Preview doesn’t include the IE 9 user interface; instead, it is the plumbing, specifically the new Microsoft JavaScript engine (which is codenamed “Chakra”) and the new graphics subsystem, coupled with a home page full of test sites. There’s no back button and no built-in security. It’s basically the IE 9 rendering engine and early developer tools.
Well if you work in healthcare, or require high levels of infection control then a washable keyboard with ’silver ion antimicrobial protection’ is for you! It’s also a pretty cool g33k office accessory! According to the BBC the average keyboard contains over 400 times as many germ microbes than lavatories, so having the option of cleaning it could be most appealing to the millions of office bound working around the world.
The Keyboard Company, a UK based company, have developed the world’s first antimicrobial washable keyboard called Silver Seal™ keyboard.
Silver, if you didn’t already know, is known as one of the oldest antimicrobial agents. Silver ions are thought to inhibit bacterial enzymes and bind to DNA. Humans have known about silver and its natural antimicrobial properties for thousands of years.
The ancient Phoenicians, who flourished around 1200BC, stored their water in silver bottles to prevent spoiling.
Hippocrates, the father of modern medicine, noted in the 4th century BC that silver had beneficial healing and anti-disease properties.
Before the rise of antibiotics, during the first World War, silver compounds were used to prevent infection. Today, silver is widely used in water filters and in water tanks. In health care it is used in wound dressings and catheters…and now keyboards!
So…it’s up to the job 
Silver ion antibacterial technology rocks!
The Silver Seal keyboard retails at £29.00 ex. VAT so would make a great gift for a colleague of a self purchase. I personally would use it in the bath, or outside in the rain, just because, though I was never the smartest cookie in the jar…is that even a metaphor?
When I talk to people about getting the iPad, it’s pretty common for them to dismiss my enthusiasm for fanboyism (a word that gives me a headache, just trying to spell it “correctly”). I see this little device as the thing that will make certain tasks easier, and maybe even get me into old habits again. So, while I patiently wait, I’d like to share what makes me excited about the iPad:
I had an argument with a coworker the other day about how I just don’t read books. There isn’t a reason. I like books, and I like to read. I do it all the time with blog posts, news articles, and instructional writings. Honestly, the internet is probably the best thing to happen to my reading habits. The problem is that I’ve migrated to the browser, so my reading experience is looked at as browsing the web instead of the traditional kick-back-my-feet book reading. I know that there will be some kind of awesome news aggregator app designed specifically on the strengths of the ipad, and with the ibooks app, I will finally have a traditional ereader (or should it be ireader?). I might actually be able to find some comfortable middle ground between traditional reading and my browsing habits.
Whether you are an IT professional or a computer novice, choosing the right backup system to use at work or home is a difficult, and frankly uninspiring use of time, and one which almost always results in making undesirable compromises. There always seem to be far too many options and the good solutions come with a price tag that almost matches the cost of the system they were designed to support. A good backup system should satisfy, at least, the following requirements:
If you haven’t heard of MacHeist before, let me tell you a little bit about them. MacHeist create amazing bundles of the very best mac based indie software and sells them at amazingly discounted rates. For example, the current MacHeist, nanoBundle2 is selling $260 worth of apps for only $19.95. Not only do they give mac users a great deal but they also donate 25% of the profits to various charities. While I really love the idea behind MacHeist, it’s not that I want to talk about today, it is the amazing website that they have designed that really caught my eye. Read the rest of this entry »
A designer friend of mine claims to be a ‘novice’ when it comes to typography, stating there are other much more experienced and knowledgeable typographers out there. We completely disagreed, especially when we discovered he had created a ‘Fonz‘ character out of the Garamond type family!
Welcome Fontzarelli – monday, Tuesday… Fonty Days!
Well it’s been a whole week since we launched FrogsThemes.com, and we’ve been blown away with the popularity, both through direct feedback and the levels of traffic. We celebrated the launch by giving away FolioGrid, Wordpress portfolio theme, and have been amazed to find that the theme has already been downloaded over 500 times.
CSSMania.com started the hype by featuring FrogsThemes.com in their showcase. What followed that was a snowball effect where dozens of sites in different niches blogged about us. Giving away FolioGrid for free really has excited people. Many Wordpress theme directories have also added FolioGrid and generated dozens of downloads each.
Just to emphasise the impact for giving something of quality away for free, here are some quick stats.
We’ve already seen a few portfolios popup using FolioGrid. Creatives have demonstrated FolioGrid is a versatile portfolio template by molding it around their work. We’ve seen portfolios showcasing logo design, photography, digital art and even pottery, with the artist adding Paypal options and turning FolioGrid into an online shop.
It’s amazing to think that a new site could become so immediately popular so quickly. Without doubt the catalyst for success has originated from the giveaway of FolioGrid. Besides from the traffic and download levels, FrogsThemes has benefited from over 200 confirmed newsletter subscriptions in the first week, more than the total gained in the entire first year of this blog. By going viral through social media, blogs and even word of mouth, FrogsThemes.com now has an awareness that far outreaches our initial estimates. The life blood of any site is the links it gains. By choosing to give FolioGrid away we inadvertently created a linkbait campaign that has helped us gain much needed authority from much bigger and established domains. Over time we also expect to see benefit in having a link back from every FolioGrid portfolio, which was part of the CC licence. Now if there was ever an argument against giving away things then this is surely a case study for!
An amazing first week for FrogsThemes.com, fingers crossed the success continues…
Google is massive, let’s face it. Soon they’ll be running the number 10 bus through your village and sponsoring the local school sports day but the question is ‘How big is Google?’. Pingdom have answered this by creating this massive infographic on Google’s facts and figures.
Infographic copyright Pingdom.
The boys and girls over at ohnodoom.com have created a concept pair of jeans with a big ass pocket at the back designed to hold your iPad.
At this time it’s simply a concept with an amusing message, focusing on a product created by a company whom we respect to the utmost.
We currently have no plans to produce the iBap apparel line for any market. Our intention was to bring our idea to life and send a message about the future of mobile devices and their portability. We enjoy fashion with function, but can it go too far? What will unite our technology and couture as we
creep into the next generation of moibile devices? Just some questions we’ve asked ourselves, and now we ask you.We hope you enjoy the concept, stay tuned for the newest addition to the bigasspocket… a bigasswallet! <3
On a semi serious note we think these jeans look awesome. It’s true that once you sit down you’ll break the iPad with your big old arse but at some point all great inventions needed to be revised, we just wonder what the iBap’s would be. Building on from the iBap, you could put these big ass pockets on anything big enough. An inside pocket in your jacket, pocket in your shirt or how about, crazy as it may sound, in a bag!
Designers rejoice and huddle together for the unveiling of our latest addition to the Floating Frog family. We’re extremely proud and excited to announce the arrival of FrogsThemes.com, a new website dedicated to providing all a creative needs to create their online portfolio. FrogsThemes.com will primarily be focusing on creating professional looking Portfolio Wordpress Themes and HTML templates. We’ll also be showcasing the best portfolio templates on the web and bringing them into the limelight on FrogsThemes.com. We’ll also be offering helpful articles, how-to guides, best practices and tutorials to those creatives wishing to create their own portfolio from scratch.
To celebrate all the hard work that’s been put into FrogsThemes.com, we’re giving away (some say foolishly) an amazingly designed Wordpress Portfolio Theme called FolioGrid. Designed specific to fit purpose, FolioGrid is a new breed of Wordpress Theme. 3 colour schemes and packaged with advanced automatic features, FolioGrid aims to be a dynamic blank canvas for any creative to build upon. Painters can showcase their artwork, install a ecommerce plugin and sell online. A web designer may want to reskin FolioGrid but use the sophisticated grid based jQuery layout and automatic thumb generation to create their own unique online portfolio and finally Joe doe, with no programming or Wordpress experience may just want to use as is. Anything is possible with FolioGrid and we’re over the moon to be in a position where we can give it away, into the online creative community and lift the professional bar on online portfolios.
The new place to be seen and heard.
A FREE Wordpress Portfolio Theme
Summary: Wordpress Portfolio Theme, 3 colour schemes, built with love.
Features at a glance:
More information on FolioGrid
Licence: Free to use with a link back to Frogsthemes.com. Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.
Let us know what you think! Over the coming weeks FrogsThemes.com will be launching a Hall of Fame where users of FolioGrid can show off their portfolio of work and theme customisations.
©2006 - 2009 The Floating Frog
