Dennis P. Osorio's Adventures in

Attempting White House Style slideshow using jQuery Cycle plugin

Dposorio — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 21:46:07 +0000

As I mentioned before, I am a big fan of the redesign of whitehouse.gov that happened when Obama was inaugurated. One of the other things I impressed me was its use of a slider on the home page to trumpet featured posts. Because I am in the middle of a building a new website for [...]

Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)

Dposorio — Mon, 22 Feb 2010 15:36:31 +0000

Two versions of the same song, both performed by one of my favorite bands, Sly & the Family Stone. Here is the original. Here is the 2nd version. It’s titled, “Thank You For Talkin’ to Me Africa”

Attempting White House style navigation using jQuery and Superfish

Dposorio — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 02:52:48 +0000

I have been loving the redesign of whitehouse.gov that coincided with Obama’s inauguration since, well, his inauguration. One of the things that impressed me the most is its navigational menu. It is a horizontal, pull-down style menu, but what is most interesting to me is the “mega” nature of the sub-menus. It so happens that [...]

How to schedule automatic scans with free version of Avast! on Windows 7

Dposorio — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 03:03:59 +0000

UPDATE: This post has been rendered moot. Avast now has a scheduler built in! The post will be kept here for those of you who have not upgraded to the latest version. In an earlier post, I detailed “How to schedule automatic scans with free version of Avast! on Vista.” I just tested it out [...]

How to merge data in an Excel or Calc spreadsheet, part two

Dposorio — Sat, 25 Jul 2009 21:04:44 +0000

This post is a continuation of an earlier one detailing how to merge datasets in Excel or OpenOffice’s Calc. A reader, Tina, asked “What if you have more than one column to lookup to get the match value?” This post is a response to that question. A merge of two datasets requires at least one [...]

Using sign-on letters to petition legislators

Dposorio — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 01:32:24 +0000

If you are looking to write a sign-on letter to a legislator that your members and supporters can sign on to, there are several options available. Below are some options I have encountered that allow you to petition legislators. Free hosted petition services The advantages of using a hosted petition service is that it does [...]

How to schedule automatic scans with free version of Avast! on Vista

Dposorio — Sat, 27 Jun 2009 15:55:25 +0000

UPDATE: This post has been rendered moot. Avast now has a scheduler built in! The post will be kept here for those of you who have not upgraded to the latest version. Avast! Home Edition is a free antivirus program. You can read more about it on the Wikipedia entry. The free version can be [...]

A theory for change

Dposorio — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 17:22:19 +0000

Adam Green posted this article on OpenLeft criticizing a mass email he received from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. What was wrong? No where in the email Adam received was there a theory on for why the call to action will have any impact – what he calls a “theory for change.” It didn’t pass [...]

RSS feeds for productivity and outreach

Dposorio — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 04:42:12 +0000

RSS feeds have been around for a long time. My experience with them was limited to adding the NY Times and the BBC as “Live Bookmarks” in Firefox. Slowly, I began to realize that there is more to it than that – a lot more. This is not an exhaustive list of uses for RSS [...]

Organizing using polls and surveys

Dposorio — Fri, 03 Apr 2009 14:51:08 +0000

There are a lot of different reasons why you may want to start a poll (or survey) from the trivial (who is the best James Bond?) to serious (what are your experiences with your health insurer?). Want to collect data for your research? Engage members? Read on. SurveyMonkey and PollDaddy both offer free and paid [...]