RobiNZ CAD Blog

Kiva and RobiNZ Blog team milestones

The video shows what Kiva microloans are about and some of the proceeds* from this blog are allocated to a Kiva Lending Team. 2013 was a big year for Kiva and closed with a significant milestone for the blog team. Thanks for your support 10,000 times over. Kiva Lending Team: RobiNZ Blog A team since Dec 10, 2008 This team shows loans funded from Supplier Donations, TypePad crediting hosting costs and additional Advert income. The 'Amount Loaned' is a total of donated funds + reinvested loan repayments. * The balance goes towards one off donations to other Charitable organizations. Read more →

2013 Blogging Highlights

Another year has flown by and it is 2014. Time to look back at 2013 from a bloggy (not just CAD) perspective: Best Blog Event: For me the event of the year, blog’wise, was the Revit Technology Conference. It was an inspiring mix of education, inspiration, meeting new folks (many Kiwis from out of town) and reunions. I didn’t get to Autodesk University this year but RTC meant some of the notable AU speakers came to me. Also notable that it was ‘at home’, Auckland, but also a new experience. The evening dinner was in an Auckland venue I’ve known... Read more →

9th Anniversary!

March 31st means it is blog’iversary time again. I find it hard to believe nine years have flown by since that first tentative post. To everyone, everywhere, thanks for visiting, reading and subscribing! Statistics: Last year broke the million visit mark and in spite of reduced posting from me this year, this is a hobby!, visits held up. Visits & Subscribers: The weekly “blog beat” is fairly constant apart from a blip caused by over 300 visits to one post, of only two I made, in April. In spite of RSS and feed technology not being talked about much and,... Read more →

Thoughts on the demise of Google Reader

Google are killing Reader, their RSS feed aggregator: Official Blog: A second spring of cleaning “We launched Google Reader in 2005 in an effort to make it easy for people to discover and keep tabs on their favorite websites. While the product has a loyal following, over the years usage has declined. So, on July 1, 2013, we will retire Google Reader.” Who cares about RSS? I do! Google cite declining Reader use and I wonder if Twitter and Facebook have killed RSS? While I use both, tolerating Facebook and loving Twitter, I still use RSS in the way I... Read more →

Windows Live Writer - Changing the Drafts/Recent Posts folder location

I’ve been using Windows Live Writer to create drafts for this blog for several years. The, recently decommissioned, Mesh/Live Mesh sync service to enabled me to blog from my PC or Netbook. When I fired up Windows Live Writer all the post drafts, images and other resources would be identical. SkyDrive, nearly but not quite Mesh Microsoft SkyDrive is the Mesh replacement. It is nicely integrated in Windows 8/Office 13 but it has one (for me) crucial missing feature. Mesh allowed you to sync any folder, anywhere, to any chosen location on the other machine. I could use Mesh to... Read more →

2012 Blogging Highlights

Wow, where did 2012 go? Months flew past like weeks and now it’s nearly is 2013*. Time to look back at the past year from a (not just CAD) blog perspective: Best Blog Event: Usually it is Autodesk University but I didn’t get there this year. However, I did see some of it on-line. It was a bit strange to watch the keynote, on the netbook, in bed at about 05:00am NZ time! I enjoyed the virtual event, enhanced by the live Twitter stream which accompanied it, but it wasn’t quite like being there! Although I haven’t blogged about it... Read more →

CAD Notes Batik

One of the most amazing aspects of this whole “blogging thing” is the unexpected connections it brings. Primarily this has been meeting, both virtually and in person, some amazing people like the subject of this post. Way back in March 2010 Edwin Prakoso ran an AutoCAD Tips competition on his CAD Notes blog. He asked me to help judge it and I was happy to do so. A short time later an unexpected gift arrived in the form of a lovely piece of Batik art. After much procrastination — my weakness — the work is now framed and on display... Read more →

About the new look blog

See the details behind the current bioluminescent theme here Read more →

A new look for RobiNZ CAD Blog, a very natural glow!

A few weeks ago I mentioned I was considering a redesign for the blog. At the time I made a few tweaks as realised a new ‘look’ would take more time than I had to spare. A few months ago I was one of many who helped crowd fund a “Evolution in Action” science project. The aim is serious, studying bacterial genetic evolution to help combat disease, but one of the fun rewards provided a new blog logo and inspired the theme. Siouxsie Wiles is a microbiologist, bioluminescence enthusiast (with very pink hair!) and “Infectious Thoughts” science blogger who heads... Read more →

AutoCAD Exchange (ed) for AutoCAD Facebook, but not for me

Coincidence is a strange thing. Last night I was playing around with some new TypePad Blog Themes and considering a major re-design. While that may happen it will take a while so I decided a quick “makeover” was needed. Although the design hasn’t changed I have reviewed the sidebars and cleared out some dated content. Most of that was easy, Technorati code (remember them?), some dead links to blogs which have fallen off the web and generic search boxes I doubt anybody ever used. One item I looked at and wondered about was the AutoCAD Exchange panel (left). It was... Read more →