2007 is the centenary of the Scout Movement. 100 years ago in 1907, Scouting started with an experimental camp held on Brownsea Island in Dorset led by war veteran Lord Robert Baden-Powell. Prompted by his famous book “Scouting for Boys” published in 1908, Scout groups were set up throughout the country, and quickly expanded to other parts of the British Empire.

In 1920 the first World Scout Jamboree was held in 1920 at Olympia in London and was an inside exhibition of Scouting. The second, held four years later held in Copenhagen was the first international Scout camp which set the tradition of Scout Jamborees.

Today Scouting has twenty-five million members world-wide (not counting Guides) and is still growing. Approximately four million of those are from the United States, the largest single Scout Association. There are 155 countries with internationally recognised National Scout Organisations. There are more than 28 million Scouts, youth and adults, boys and girls in 216 countries and territories. More information on the history of Scouting can be found on Scoutbase UK.

This year, being the centenary of Scouting there are numerous events being held worldwide to celebrate the largest organisation for young people in the world. The largest event will be the 21st World Jamboree held in Chelmsford, Essex, UK. The World Scout Jamboree will be a gathering of Scouts from around the world for 12 days from 27 July to 8 August.

Please sign this petition to the UK Government to increase the awareness of the centenary of Scouting.

Just found an interesting site that tells you some fun facts about the day you were born. According to it, I was born on a Sunday 7,545 days ago in the Chinese year of the tiger and the Egyptian month of Mesore. I share my birthday with Marilyn Monroe, Alanis Morissette and Bob Monkhouse (never heard of the other apparently famous people). Want to know useless stuff about your birthday? Of course you do, check it out.

There is an article on the BBC at the moment about moving our times in line with Europe, moving them forward an hour. According to the article, “the UK would cut crime, boost tourism, improve health and reduce accidents, according to House of Commons research.”

I would just like to register my disgust at this awful suggestion. There is no way I can believe having an ‘extra hour’ of light a day will stop 450 deaths a year. I don’t know about everyone else, but I have headlights on my car for night driving.

The whole world bases its times on UTC. UTC is the world standard time. If Europe wants to be on the same time as Britain, they can change!

Another big argument is the costs of doing business between Britain and Europe because of the time differences. I personally don’t see how +1 hour is going to make much difference. What about those who do business between Britain and USA or the far east? Do they want the them to change their time systems aswell?

Stop wasting your time Government and come up with some useful suggestions for once!

[edit] Looks like they ran out of time.

Just finished upgrading my blog to the latest version of Wordpress, which was released two days ago. Some notable features include spell checking for posts, updated spam catcher and much more efficient database code. Hopefully you should notice the whole site loads a lot quicker now due to these database optimisations, it seems to from my end anyway. Aaron Brazell has written “10 Things You Should Know About WordPress 2.1″ with even more details on the changes that come with WordPress 2.1.

I’ve also updated the feed URL due to some fixes and also I think it looks better. My new feed URL is http://henrycleaver.co.uk/feed/

Enjoy!

What are these strange keys on my keyboard for, I hear you ask. Keys such as the Pause / Break key, Scroll Lock and `? They all have roots in the history of computing, most even have some obscure use today. There is an interesing article which explains the origin of these keys.

“Men of vision designed this wonderful machine, men of passion built her, and, I hope that it will be said, men of skill and daring flew her” (Capt. Adrian Thompson, Concorde Pilot Last Heathrow - New York Flight)

Very moving video!

Just seen an announcement on the Fedora devel list (no, I don’t subscribe to it, I saw it on Slashdot) that there will be no more Fedora Core. Starting with Fedora 7, there will be no distinction between Fedora Core and Extras, all packages will be managed in one single repository. Fedora 7 is currently scheduled for general release on 26th April 2007. Doesn’t seem long ago I updated to Core 6.

Digg has just directed me to the blog of a guy who’s new year’s resolution is to drink 365 different beers in the year, and provide a short review of each one. Quite interesting.

Just found my timetable for next semester on Webct. It looks just as I expected - Monday 9-2, Tuesday 12-2, Thursday 2-5, so thats an average of 10 hours a week lectures. Not bad! Also means I officially get Wednesdays off this time round aswell as Fridays. I start back next Monday, so I’ve got this week to try to get all the work finished. I have five assorted things to do for next Wednesday!