Why I Drink Coffee (Almost) Every Morning

With a busy work schedule, a longer than average commute and an active after-work life, I, like many of you, am consistently running on fumes. I wake up each morning before sunrise and before my feet even touch the ground, I’m already mentally compiling lists of all the things I need to tackle for the day just to keep up with my ever growing “to-dos”. Whether it’s a week day or a weekend, the pace doesn’t seem to slow. And to be fair, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I wouldn’t know what to do with myself if I remained idle and I take pride in all of the things I’m able to accomplish by keeping myself always on the move.

While on the GO train the other morning though (that’s the commuter train I take into the city for work each day) I realized something I hadn’t thought about before. While sipping in my first mouthful of coffee for the day I realized that I drink coffee every morning religiously not because of the caffeine jolt it gives me (I’m unfortunately passed this point of caffeine having much effect on me physiologically), but because of what it represents in my day. My coffee time represents 30 minutes I give myself for undistracted, personal reflection. And I also realized that this 30 minutes is hand-down one of the things I look forward to each morning – one of my most cherished gifts if you will.

Now it may sound like if I only grant myself these 30 minutes for deep reflection that I may spend these 30 minutes toiling over complex work or personal problems that need resolve; and yes sometimes I do if that’s what is consuming my thoughts. But most days I guiltlessly just spend the 30 minutes thinking about things that inspire me, things I’ve read recently in an article but didn’t yet have a chance to form an opinion on, places I’d like to travel to someday, or my ultimate favorite, deeply concentrating on the people and the environment around me so as to try and notice all the sights, sounds and smells associated with where I am. It feels great to ground myself each morning in the “now”, and without concerted effort spending time thinking about things that come and go from my mind without forcing any particular thought over another.

It feels kind of weird to reflect on reflecting, but if you’re like me with a go-go-go schedule, I think it’s important to a) take the time to give back to yourself personally and b) to notice when you do this so you can feel how great you feel and then consciously make a commitment to continue on with this habit no matter what curve balls get thrown your way. So with my new found wisdom I want to challenge every reader. I dare you to give in to yourself and take a step back from your hectic schedule every single day by doing some little thing that brings you happiness. It may not be a 30 minute coffee-assisted personal reflection period like I have chosen, it may instead be a walk with your dog or a shower with your music blaring so loud it blocks out your spouse. But make that habit and take the time every day to give back to yourself. And when you’re doing whatever it is that recharges your battery or fills your cup (sorry but I love corny puns), take a second to notice the gift you’ve just given yourself, that is before realizing you’re late yet again to drop off your kids for school.

How Far Can the Human Eye See?

The Earth's surface curves out of sight at a distance of 3.1 miles, or 5 kilometers. But our visual acuity extends far beyond the horizon. If Earth were flat, or if you were standing atop a mountain surveying a larger-than-usual patch of the planet, you could perceive bright lights hundreds of miles distant. On a dark night, you could even see a candle flame flickering up to 30 mi. (48 km) away.

How far the human eye can see depends on how many particles of light, or photons, a distant object emits. The farthest object visible with the naked eye is the Andromeda galaxy, located an astonishing 2.6 million light-years from Earth. The galaxy's 1 trillion stars collectively emit enough light for a few thousand photons to hit each square centimeter of Earth every second; on a dark night, that's plenty to excite our retinas.


Back in 1941, the vision scientist Selig Hecht and his colleagues at Columbia University made what is still considered a reliable measurement of the "absolute threshold" of vision —  the minimum number of photons that must strike our retinas in order to elicit an awareness of visual perception. The experiment probed the threshold under ideal conditions: study participants' eyes were given time to adapt to total darkness, the flash of light acting as a stimulus had a (blue-green) wavelength of 510 nanometers, to which our eyes are most sensitive, and this light was aimed at the periphery of the retina, which is richest in light-detecting rod cells.

Pseudo-classes

A CSS pseudo-class is a keyword added to selectors that specifies a special state of the element to be selected. For example :hover will apply a style when the user hovers over the element specified by the selector.

Pseudo-classes, together with pseudo-elements, let you apply a style to an element not only in relation to the content of the document tree, but also in relation to external factors like the history of the navigator (:visited, for example), the status of its content (like :checked on some form elements), or the position of the mouse (like :hover which lets you know if the mouse is over an element or not).

selector:pseudo-class {
  property: value;

} 

Pseudo-classes

:active
:checked
:default
:dir()
:disabled
:empty
:enabled
:first
:first-child
:first-of-type
:fullscreen
:focus
:hover
:indeterminate
:in-range
:invalid
:lang()
:last-child
:last-of-type
:left
:link
:not()
:nth-child()
:nth-last-child()
:nth-last-of-type()
:nth-of-type()
:only-child
:only-of-type
:optional
:out-of-range
:read-only
:read-write
:required
:right
:root
:scope
:target
:valid

:visited

Ten ways to build a brand for your small business

Branding is just as important for small businesses as it is for big names. Indeed, many corporate brands try to look more like small firms in order to appeal to consumers that prefer to support independent brands. Dan Einzg of agency Mystery explains how to develop your own brand identity

1.   Start by defining your brand.

Review the product or service your business offers, pinpoint the space in the market it occupies and research the emotive and rational needs and concerns of your customers. Your brand character should promote your business, connect with your customer base and differentiate you in the market.

2.   When building your brand, think of it as a person.

Every one of us is an individual whose character is made up of beliefs, values and purposes that define who we are and who we connect with. Our personality determines how we behave in different situations, how we dress and what we say. Of course for people it's intuitive and it's rare that you even consider what your own character is, but when you're building a brand it's vital to have that understanding.

3.   Consider what is driving your business.

What does it believe in, what is its purpose and who are its brand heroes. These things can help establish your emotive brand positioning and inform the identity and character for brand communications.

4.   Aim to build long-term relationships with your customers.

Don’t dress up your offering and raise expectations that result in broken promises, create trust with honest branding — be clear who your company is and be true to the values that drive it every day.

5.   Speak to your customers with a consistent tone of voice.

It will help reinforce the business’ character and clarify its offering so customers are aware exactly what to expect from the product or service.

6.   Don't repeat the same message in the same way over and over again. 

Alternatively, aim to make your key messages work together to build a coherent identity. 

7.   Don’t try to mimic the look of chains or big brands.

Try and carve out your own distinctive identity. There is a big consumer trend towards independent establishments, and several chains are in fact trying to mimic an independent feel to capture some of that market. Truly independent operators can leverage their status to attract customers who are looking for something more original and authentic, that aligns with how feel about themselves.

8.   Be innovative, bold and daring – stand for something you believe in.

Big brands are encumbered by large layers of bureaucracy, preventing them from being flexible and reacting to the ever-changing needs of their customers. Those layers of decision-makers can make it hard for them to be daring with their branding.

9.   Always consider your branding when communicating with customers.

Don't lose your pride or dilute your brand positioning with indiscriminate discounting. Try offering more, rather than slashing prices. Promotions are an opportunity to reinforce your brand mission.

10.  The old way of stamping your logo on everything won't cut it.

The future of branding is fluid and engaging — respect your customers' intelligence by not giving everything away up front. Generate some intrigue and allow them to unearth more about your brand for themselves. This is the way to foster ambassadors who revel in telling other people what they have discovered.

Google's New Interface: Just Tell It What To Do

Google used to tell you how to do something. Now, it’ll just do it for you.

In the last week, the company has added two small but important features to their famous search bar. You can type "find my phone" and Google will locate it on a map (and offer to call it); you can also type "send directions" and an interface will appear to beam directions to your phone.

No, neither of these functions is going to change the world overnight—especially as you’ll need an Android phone connected to your Google account for them to appear. But when you place them next to previously added mobile features—like being able to ID a song, set an alarm, or create a reminder using the search bar—and look at them in the context of the last 16 years of Google search, it feels a lot more like the evolution of search interface than a pair of random features.

For more...

Microsoft Invents A Better Way To Sense Hand Gestures

HANDPOSE PROMISES THE HOLY GRAIL OF MOTION DETECTION: FAST, ACCURATE HAND RECOGNITION.

Imagine strapping on a virtual reality headset, then using your hands to pick up a sword and swing it around your head. Imagine a hazard team able to defuse a complicated bomb from a mile away, just by controlling a robot's hand as effortlessly as your own. Imagine painting a picture on your computer just by waving a brush in front of your screen. Or, if you prefer, imagine using a computer like in Minority Report, whisking away pages and files just by grabbing them with your hands. 

Using the Handpose software, the first thing a user does is scan his or her hand by holding it up in front of the Kinect to create a 3-D model. In the lab, the process currently takes about a second, which is less than it takes an iPhone Touch ID sensor to accurately measure your fingerprint. Once the system has created a 3-D model of your hand, Handpose allows you to control it on the screen in real-time, at around 30 frames per second. From there, you can use the on-screen hand as if it was a doppelganger of your own.

more....

More Control over Text Decoration

Text can have multiple decorations

a {

  text-decoration: underline overline;

}

See the text-decoration entry in the Almanac. More specifically, this is adding multiple values to the text-decoration-line subproperty.

You can change the color of the decoration

The default for the color of the decoration lines is the same as the color of the text. But you can change that:

a {

  text-decoration-color: #f06d06;

}

Check out the text-decoration-color entry in the Almanac.

a {

  text-decoration-style: wavy;

}

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