Author: Gareth Saunders

I’m Gareth J M Saunders, 50 years old, 6′ 4″, father of 3 boys (including twins). Enneagram type FOUR and introvert (INFP), I am a non-stipendiary priest in the Scottish Episcopal Church, I sing with the NYCGB alumni choir, play guitar, play mahjong, write, draw and laugh… Scrum master at Safeguard Global; latterly at Sky and Vision/Cegedim. Former web architect and agile project manager at the University of St Andrews and previously warden at Agnes Blackadder Hall.

Coming soon… Chrome extension for the SEC digital calendar

Chrome extension to display the current Scottish Episcopal Church feast day information in a popup window

This weekend’s coding challenege was to create a simple Chrome browser extension that would enable me to click a button to display the SEC Digital Calendar website in a popup window on the toolbar.

Thankfully, the Chrome Developers documentation is pretty good and really got me off to a good start.

Continue reading Coming soon… Chrome extension for the SEC digital calendar

DevToys—an open-source Swiss army knife for developers

DevToys

DevToys is like a Swiss Army knife for software and web developers to help with everyday development tasks such as comparing and converting text and images, testing RegEx, formatting JSON and XML data, compressing images, etc.

It is available for free for Windows from the Microsoft Store.

I wish I’d had this years ago.

Continue reading DevToys—an open-source Swiss army knife for developers

How to check for inclusivity biases in Microsoft Word

Did you know that Microsoft Word in Microsoft 365 can check for the following inclusivity biases?

  • Age bias
  • Cultural bias
  • Ethnic slurs
  • Gender bias
  • Gender-neutral pronouns
  • Gender-specific language
  • Racial bias
  • Sexual orientation bias
  • Socioeconomic bias

Here is how to activate these settings.

Continue reading How to check for inclusivity biases in Microsoft Word

Steve Vai—”Teeth of the Hydra”

Released on 1 April 2022, a new song from guitar virtuoso Steve Vai, “Teeth of the Hydra” from the forthcoming album Inviolate.

This is extraordinary, but what else would you expect from Frank Zappa’s former guitarist?

And just how heavy is that three-neck guitar? It comprises a 12-string guitar, a 7-string guitar and a 4-string bass, with a whole bunch of onboard gadgetry including what looks like three vacuum tubes.