Over the weekend, Nick Blundell traveled to Ossendrecht, The Netherlands, to teach budding open source developers how to develop powerful websites using the Drupal website framework in a series of hands-on workshops. illuminate iCT specialise in the development of Drupal websites in the for UK non-profit and community sector and were delighted to participate in this event after an invitation from Roel Guldemond, who spotted Illuminate ICT at a workshop of the DrupalCon 2007, Barcelona.

Here's a sneak preview of what our new website will look like.

In the labs, we are working on a new Illuminate ICT website based on the very latest Drupal 6 .  It seems that, having now developed over 100 functionality-rich websites for the Voluntary and Community Sector, we have neglected to improve our own site (there are not enough hours in the day )  The website will showcase the very best of the (open source) website technology that we are making available through our non-profit service to the Sector.  Until now, we have always had a no-compromise approach to website accessibility whilst pioneering web development techniques for our sites, and we will continue with the new stuff in this fashion.

5th November

Featured Software: SyncToy 2.0

For those who take documents home to continue working on them (either on flash drive or laptop), sooner or later will arise the issue of determining which files are actually the latest copy.

Since the 'Resources' section of this site has been recently updated I thought it about time to draw everybody's attention to it!

Direct link

Useful additions include tips for good e-mail etiquette, loads of recommended websites, and updated details of how to keep your PC safe (antivirus, firewall, spam filtering).

12 October 07

I'd like to highlight some useful software tools for the subject of Project Management. This will be of particular relevance to those new to this, for example those that attended the Project Management Workshop at IBM today.

Just upgraded to Office 2007, like it, but find the new Outlook rather slow? Try these suggestions.

Like to share your Outlook calendar with your work colleagues, yet not running on a computer system with a dedicated Windows Server? See here.

24 September

Featured Software: gSyncit

Google's email and calendar service is great (mail.google.com), unfortunately it lacks the ability to link up to Microsoft's Outlook. This can prove a real pain for those already using Outlook but interested in Google's offerings - in effect, it means you need to manually keep two separate calendars updated..... way too much hassle!

Two recently pieces of news of relevance to Windows users in the sector:

1) ActiveVirusShield (the only free AV for the sector) has been discontinued; though all isn't lost for existing users - see here

Employment issues arising out of home working in the voluntary sector.

Introduction

Millions of people in the UK work from home at least one day a week. Employers in the voluntary sector are well placed to make the most of the benefits of this type of flexible working, such as reduced overheads and improved recruitment and retention of staff. However there are new legal challenges for employment and this Guide will examine how employers can benefit from home-working whilst avoiding some of the pitfalls and some of the things they need to think about including in new terms and conditions of employment.