SF writer photographs lightning strinking tree...

Marc Laidlaw is a very, very lucky man indeed. To be that close to a lightning strike, and to capture this image...

Introducing Service Oriented Architectures

Some of you may well have heard me rant about why service oriented architectures are the best thing since sliced bread for the IT industry.

Here's a long piece on the subject which goes a long way to explaining my views, and how businesses can think about implementing them. I wrote it for DNJ Online, an excellent online developer publication, and it will also appear in different form in Grey Matter's Hardcopy.

Enjoy.

Useful Windows GMail tools

For anyone using GMail and Windows, pop along to Mark Lyon's excellent GMail tools page.

There you'll find delights like his tool for uploading all your mail to GMail (along with full instructions), along with pointers to tools like "Pop Goes The GMail", and "YoSucker".

(thanks to marypcb for the link)

Five years of feline and juvenile female...

...and so it's time for the "Cat and Girl Fifth Anniversary Clip Show Spectacular"! Along with "The Making Of Cat and Girl".

It's like a DVD special edition of your favourite web comic.

(Hah! Bet you'd thought I'd given up linking to C&G!)

Great...

Someone is sending spam using my bofh.org.uk email address.

Do they know what a BOFH does? Now, where did I put that LART...

Meme time!

Memetic infection from swisstone

Ask me something you think you should know about me. Something that could be obvious, but you have no idea about. Then post this in your own lj and find out what people don't know about you.

More on that bed...

...that I moblogged over the weekend. You can find pictures of it here...

"...forged iron design fashioned by blacksmiths over hot coals. The solid iron straps and posts are designed to look like belts and have buckles and stitches adding to the authentic look. A design reminiscent of past military campaigns or the nostalgia of horse drawn carriages."