Goodbye, Blogger

There is no such thing as a free lunch according to the saying. Blogger may be free and may like to boast about its exciting improvements, but I'm finally exasperated enough to start transferring all my posting to a 2-minute-website.com service. Requests to Blogger Help for advice have been ignored, photos won't load most of the time (even at 500k) but are rewarded with a "web site not available" message. The Dashboard page loses its top edge so doesn't display text-entry boxes properly, and the response time is at least three times as long as that for my 2-minute-website.com service.

Postings will go on to www.alanmachinwork.net

Good Impressions

The Ulster Folk and Transport Museum at Cultra was established in 1958. The large hillside park contains several exhibition and service buildings and around 50 historic buildings moved from places within the province. Some are well spaced within fields to represent rural communities and others grouped to make the nucleus of a 'town'.

Baird's Print Shop is within one such building, which also contains a newspaper room and a library that came from Andrews Mill in Comber, County Down. The collection of books had been provided for the workers and for any other townspeople who wished to use it.

The print shop has a number of small presses, including the Columbian shown here. Operating with movements like those of an ancient wine press, the hand-powered Columbian employed three men to position, ink and "pull" impressions on paper laid flat on the assembled metal type. To an audience often more used to computer inkjet printers, the demonstrations might appear to show a totally alien world, but of course it was the printed paper like this that spread knowledge and ideas across the land. The historic changes shown in the museum could only come about through the agency of this communications powerhouse.

Traditional and Distinctive History

John McAtasney is the last handlook weaver in Northern Ireland. At the Ulster Folk Museum he can be found at certain times demonstrating damask weaving, making table napkins. He describes to visitors the intricate craft of the weaver and tells of his own, long commitment to the work over several decades.

John works in one of the museum's Open Air buildings which are now part of a growing, reconstructed 'town' which represents Ulster in days gone by. Besides the weaver's workshop there are a printer's shop and a woodworking shop, but elsewhere in the town can be found a police barracks and exhibition about the often dangerous and sometimes divisive life of Northern Ireland's police forces. The story of Ulster is complex and highly charged emotionally. Understanding it is just one way to redress the wrongs of the past and to restore the respect the province deserves.

Titanic tours

Well, after a ... er, titanic struggle, Blogger has let me in again.

Belfast might have been more known for the sectarian troubles between the late 1960s and '90s, but as the home of the Titanic and a lot more besides it has other histories to offer. The slipway and dry dock where the ship was built and completed are easy to see though not to inspect close up. That will probably change as new developments alongside the River Laggan and Belfast Lough take shape. "It was perfectly all right when it left here" said our taxi driver on a Black Cab Tour, reminding us with dry humour that it was an English captain and a Canadian iceberg that did the damage, not poor quality workmanship. Troubles and titans depend on media reporting as part of the process that creates them. Going to see for yourself helps dispell the limited perceptions built by reliance on the media alone, and in the case of this fine city bring home the fact that these days Northern Ireland's future is looking far more positive.

Not For Want of Trying

"The page you are looking for is currently unavailable". Text is possible, pix are not. The Dashboard page visible to users still gives an old message saying what an achievement the new Beta version of Blogger is - just a few problems to solve.

I noticed.

Blogger Still Failing

My last posting was too optimistic. Every day since the entry below was added I have tried posting more, too find "Web site not available". Can't the Dashboard page be more enlightening about what is happening than a vague apology about Outages?

Blogs About Belfast

After some weeks with a Blogjam, Blogger is again accepting photos. The failure to reply to emails requesting help and of Help pages giving no hint of acknowledging the problem was not impressive.

A recent flying visit to Belfast produced a remarkable tour of parts of the city from the Crown Liquor Saloon shown her, via the slipways where the RMS Titanic was built to the political murals on housing estates and finally the Ulster Folk Museum. Given that a few hours as a tourist is not an in-depth understanding of a complex city, the change in the atmosphere since my last visit in 1987 was remarkable. More pix and prose on the way.

Blogger Fails To Work

This is a photo-plus-text blog, but Blogger continues not to accept photos. Since the last posting below all attempts have ended in "web site not available".

There don't appear to be any notes on the Help pages of an issue causing this. An email to Blogger has been ignored.

Is Blogger Beta a failure? Once adopted, you can't change back. It's nearly time for me to close this one down and to transfer the postings to www.alanmachinwork.net which is a reliable web site using the far better service given by www.2-minute-website.com.

Blogger Beta - Problems

At the invitation of Blogger, these pages have been transferred to the new version of Blogger being tested in beta at the moment. Unfortunately for the last 48 hours the photo facility has not been working and currently says that the relevant web pages are not available.

I look forward to the problem being sorted and will again add postings when that is done.

Signs of the Times - AA Phone Box

Where would our transport network be without electronic communications? The moving of people requires the moving of messages. Railways needed the telegraph. Airlines needed radio. Neither got far without the other.

As people took to the car they had to have some kind of means to summon help in an emergency. The Royal Automobile Association and the Automobile Association were set up to help the motorist. In 1911 the AA placed its first roadside telephone kiosk as Ashtead in Surrey. The first 'sentry boxes' had been for patrolmen to shelter in bad weather. They had telephones inside for their use. Soon AA members were able to have their own key to open the roadside boxes in order to use the phone to summon help from their Association. Fire extinguishers and maps were also available inside. Over the years a network sprang up around the country and the RAC followed suit.

In the 1970s the boxes began to be removed, slender post-mounted phone units taking their place. Almost as that happened, the mobile phone revolution was under way and it has meant that even those post-mounted phones have gone. No-one was using the boxes; people who are likely to be AA and RAC members are highly likely to have a mobile, and non-members too, the remainder relying on ordinary public call boxes, though they, too, are slowly on the way out in many locations.

Some 21 wooden AA boxes remain, often listed as being of architectural importance within their particular surroundings, such as the one pictured, seen in the Lake District in 1987.

Informing Communities - Abbey

Whitby Abbey is associated not only with the history of Christianity but also the origins of the story of Dracula, the life of fishermen over the centuries and the early life of Captain James Cook, the explorer. It stands high above the east cliffs at the top of a long, long flight of steps climbed by thousands of tourists and people from the nearby community.

So it has many stories to tell. English Heritage care for the site and organise the interpretation of these stories through a visitor centre and guide books, and also an up-to-the-minute personal digital player. Carried by the visitor who holds an earpiece close to his or her head, the unit replays recorded words and sound effects chosen by the user according to at which point they are standing. Rechargeable batteries and no moving parts mean much more reliable units than the simple cassette players available in the last 1970s. The capital cost might be high, but it's relatively easy to revise messages. The human voice has a strong resonance for the listener. In addition, different languages and messages suitable for different ages can be added quite easily.

Informing Communities - Elephant Seals

Near to San Simeon on the coast of California is a length of beach loved by elephant seals. They come ashore at certain times of the year such as July and August when they moult. These rather forbidding animals lie on the beach, throwing clouds of sand over their backs and occasionally bellowing their opinions to each other.

Drivers along the adjacent highway often stop here as there is a good little parking area. A short walk brings them to a slight drop down to the beach. Round their feet and in and out of fencing run ground squirrels, cheeky little grey animals out to steal any kinds of food they can find. Gulls land on the fence posts, eyeing the proceedings with old fashioned disdain.

Its best for the elephant seals if they are left in peace and visitors stay on the higher level. And its better for the visitors if they don't tangle with the characters down near the shore line, who can get pretty irritated with those pesky tourists. So interpretation panels have been provided explaining who these animals are, what they are doing and how they should be treated - with care. The public gets its questions answered, the fellers on the beach are left in peace, and everyone goes home a little wiser.

Oh, and the ground squirrels probably get a little fatter from anything dropped by the tourists.

Informing Communities - National Pride

Well, not only national but international, and not only pride but understanding. Stockholm's open air museum (with a few touches of zoo thrown in) called Skansen is reckoned one of the first of its kind. Artur Hazelius, who founded it in 1891, had been impressed by the Great Exhibition forty years earlier in London and thought of the idea of a permanent collection of buildings drawn from all over Scandinavia and Finland in order to show visitors what things were like in the old days.

Interpretation panels here were used to explain what was rather than what is (the Cardiff Bay example of an earlier posting was of what will be). This example is graphically neat though a tad dull in its white and grey, and it would be interesting to know how far the average visitor gets through the text before moving on. Some museums and nature centres use 'adult' and 'child' versions of text - it's often kid's versions that get read most - they're usually shorter and more colourful. Interpretation schemes often encompass a visitor or orientation centre, and set of panels, a number of small exhibits to explain detailed points, some guide books and possibly a guided tour or two. And maybe a video, interactive computer screen, audio recording played through headphones, possibly some outdoor theatre with actors ... well, there are lots of interesting methods. Audio systems can play the sounds of war, the songs of birdlife, the clank of machines and the evocative speech of human beings.

Much more fun than looking at a something locked in a glass case with nothing to bring it to life!

Informing Communities - Cardiff Bay

When the City of Cardiff was moving towards creating a barrage across Cardiff bay in order to regenerate the former coal docks area, a special visitor centre was opened. The unusual 'flattened tube on stilts' building housed a model of the proposed bay area showing the various developments, Printed information could be obtained and staff were on hand to help with questions. Though only a temporary unit, the visitor centre became for a while one of the tourist attractions along with the new interactive science centre and industrial museum. Visitor interpretation was used here to describe plans for the future, rather than dwell on the past. There should be more such projects.