September 1, 2009 by Brad.

Thanks to everyone who came out for “Arts on the Avenue” in Ladysmith on Sunday. The weather was awesome and we think more people came through than ever before. For our part, we sold some stuff and we met a lot of very nice people, many of whom signed up for pottery classes and took printing brochures and business cards. What more could one ask?

Thanks again!

We look forward to seeing everyone again next year!

Cheers!

Brad & Peggy

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April 20, 2009 by Brad.

Do you use different video players? Have you noticed there seems to be no consistency in the use of (or even the existence of) keyboard shortcuts?

For example, what’s the keyboard shortcut for “Pause” on your player? In some cases, it’s “spacebar”, in other cases it is “p” and in yet other cases (Apple QuickTime), clicking in the window will pause the player. In the case of Microsoft Windows Media Player, it is “Ctrl-S”.

Would it be possible for the player developers to establish a standard for the most common functions, such as pause/resume, fast forward, next chapter, etc? Wouldn’t we all appreciate this?

Personally, I like the approach taken in WinDVD in which letter keys are assigned functions related to the letter, e.g.

F - fast forward / stop fast forward, resume playback    

R - fast reverse (rewind) / stop rewind, resume playback

and function keys are assigned related functions, e.g. 

PgUp - previous chapterPgDn - next chapter  

Spacebar - pause / resume playback    

I particularly like “Spacebar” for pause / resume playback because it is perhaps the mostly frequently used function and the spacebar is the largest key on the typical keyboard.

What’s with the multi-key combinations in Microsoft Windows Media Player, e.g. Ctrl-S and Ctrl-Shift-F? Most keyboards have about 100 keys, so it hardly seems necessary to use multi-key combinations. Why not just assign each key a dedicated function? It should be feasible to map just about every conceiveable function to its own key. Tsk, tsk.

If you think about how these players are used, you can see why single keys are important. In my case, I use a laptop in the TV room to playback recorded TV programs on a large screen TV. I don’t want to be fumbling with multi-key combinations when skipping commercials.

So developers, could we please have a standard on this? Thanks.

What are your thoughts? 

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December 24, 2008 by Brad.

We live on Vancouver Island in arguably the warmest climate in Canada. We don’t get much snow, but 2008 will probably go down as a record year. We found out today, for example, that Victoria has the deepest snowpack (41 cm) of the 50 major urban centres in Canada. We might not have quite that much snow here in Saltair, which is about 70 km NW of Victoria on the opposite side of the island, but there was enough accumulation on our deck that we couldn’t find our Bose 251 outdoor speakers.

But we could hear them! By following the sound while shovelling a path to our hot tub, we were able to uncover them, still playing in all their fine weatherproof Boseness.

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November 5, 2008 by Brad.

NOTICE

Our studio and gallery will be closed from Tuesday, November 11, 2008 to Thursday, November 20, 2008 inclusive. We will re-open at 11:00am on Friday, November 21, 2008.

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November 1, 2008 by Brad.

Greetings and thanks for dropping in. If you’re looking for the latest news, events, schedules and ramblings by Peggy and Brad at Turning Point Arts, then you’ve definitely come to the right place.

Cheers!

Peggy & Brad

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