John Topley's Weblog
About JohnThe story so far…If you've not already gathered, my name is John Topley and this is my website. I grew up in Lincoln in the East Anglia region of England, although I now live some two hundred miles further south, in Hampshire. I moved to be with my partner and to make a career developing software. I've been in full–time work since 1994, doing administrative work in local government for a number of years and more recently, working as a computer programmer for the Civil Service. My first computer was a Sinclair ZX Spectrum (the rubber key one!), which my Dad bought in 1982 and which I loved dearly. I've been involved with PCs since about the same time as I started work. Although I did some programming using BASIC on my Spectrum and at school, it wasn't until I started using Borland Delphi in 1996 that I realised that I actually really enjoyed programming and wouldn't mind getting paid to do it. Since then I've also programmed in Smalltalk, Java, Visual Basic, Microsoft Access, SQL and HTML, as well as dipping my toe into C#. I started off developing small utility programs that I needed and now find myself learning how to develop enterprise software with J2EE. When not sat in front of a computer screen I like music, travelling, walking, eating out, reading, digital photography, thinking and sleeping, but not necessarily in that order! About This Site
This site is my weblog, so I guess that makes me a blogger! I'll be using this site to record my random thoughts on various subjects but mainly computing, so if that bores you to tears then you probably won't find much here. The idea of having a blog was inspired by coming across Joel Spolsky's site, where I ended up spending several hours reading through his complete article archive. I've had a website before—a few years ago—but just couldn't find the time to update it often enough to keep it interesting. As everyone knows, a site's only as good as its last update. The breakthrough that's enabling me to do better this time, is that I've discovered CityDesk content management software. The design of this site was inspired by John Conner's excellent blog, which I definitely recommend. My site wouldn't have been possible without John's help – he's responsible for the server–side code behind the comments system and the contact page, as well as the monthly article calendar and he also recommended a hosting provider. For more information on what powers this site, see the About and Backend pages of John's website. When I was wracking my brains thinking about what my website should be like, I came up with the idea of backing up my brain on the Web. In other words, building a knowledge base of things that I've learned over the years. It's as much for me as anyone else, so whenever I can't remember how to do something, I know that I can come to my knowledge base and get the answer. I wanted my website to be a beacon of good design, which is why it's taken me a lot of effort and design to produce, in spite of the convenience of using a content management system. I've tried to make things as accessible as possible, using the guidelines from Dive into Accessibility. Although unfortunately I wasn't able to follow all of the guidelines, I do believe that I've produced a site that's more accessible than the majority on the Web. See the accessibility statement below for full details. Accessibility StatementThis is the official accessibility statement for John Topley's Weblog. If you have any questions or comments, please contact me. Access KeysMost browsers support jumping to specific links by typing keys defined on the website. On Windows you can press Alt + the access key. On the Macintosh, press Control + the access key. All pages on this site define the following access keys:
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Visual Design
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