One of the strengths of the Author-it is the help and support that members of the Author-it User Group provide to each other. But it occurred to me a lot of this useful information is lost and buried in the mountain messages and not captured anywhere. I also thought that it would be useful to have a repository of this great information.

So I have created a wiki to try and capture this information.

The wiki is at http://aitwiki.hamishblunck.com/

I encourage you to add your tips and tricks, your how-to’s, or if you find a great post about Author-it on the web, link to it. Or if you ask a question on the list and you get a useful reply or solution, add it to the wiki.

You will need to register to add or edit content, but anyone can view it.

I guess it is also a bit of a social experiment. Can a group dominated by professional communicators create and maintain a useable wiki? :)

There are also only two guidelines that I would ask people to follow:

• Do not post opinions of the product (praise or criticism).
• Do keep the tone professional; treat it like your own documentation.

Although not the latest version, you can get SnagIt 7.2.5 for free:

1. Download the trial version of v7.2.5 from here.
2. Get your key here.
3. After you install it and run it for the first time, click the Unlock link when the SnagIt Message Centre is displayed.

Thanks to Confessions of a freeware junkie for the tip off.

The x-rays after Nick's car accident last year were pretty horrific. The x-rays after his operation to meccano his elbow and bones back together were both horrific and intriguing. Nick had an idea that the x-rays would make an interesting piece of art - and the results are below. I was a bit apprehensive before I saw the finished product, but it does look good, primarily because it is not immediately obvious what the image is. What do you think?

Book: The Unknown Terrorist

Author: Richard Flanagan

Synopsis: Pole dancer, ‘The Doll’, is just trying to set herself up with a better life, but is inadvertently caught up and put in the centre of a terrorist plot in Sydney. She becomes the focus of the nation as facts are twisted and discarded in the quest for a good news story and the means for political ends.

Review: A classic tale of a person’s struggle to prove their innocence - in this story against the backdrop of terrorism paranoia. Unfortunately, this tale is somewhat not entirely fiction in recent Australian history (a la Mohamed Haneef) and the role of the media and authorities is not entirely unbelievable. At times the media snippets and overheard conversations are not convincingly ‘Australian’ – although who knows how Sydney-siders would react. A good commentary about our obsession with consumerism, money, and fear. With the GFC now overshadowing terrorism it feels a bit outdated – but a good reflection of Australia at the beginning of this century.

A related OMG, head-shaking moment.

This tip shows how you can use Publishing Profiles and an after publish batch file to rename the publishing folder with a unique name - the current date and time.

Create the Batch File

Create a text called rename_dir.bat and save it in a central location, for example, C:\Program Files\Author-it 5\Data\Templates. Paste the following commands in the text file and save it:

@echo off

for /f "tokens=2 delims=/- " %%f in ('date /t') do (set dd=%%f)

for /f "tokens=3 delims=/- " %%g in ('date /t') do (set mm=%%g)

for /f "tokens=4 delims=/- " %%k in ('date /t') do (set yy=%%k)

for /f "tokens=1 delims=/: " %%h in ('time /t') do (set hh=%%h)

for /f "tokens=2 delims=/: " %%m in ('time /t') do (set mm=%%m)

set foldername=%yy%-%mm%-%dd%_%hh%-%mm%

rename %1 %foldername%

Set Up Publishing Profile to Call Batch File

Add an "After Publishing" Command Line action to the Publishing Profile that calls the batch file, as shown below.

ANZAC Day (25 April) was a beautiful day in Brisbane; maybe our last Summer day of the season. We spent the day celebrating Nick's nephew's birthday at Shorncliffe. Some photos here.

Also, they have painted some new street art at Mitchelton. Not complete yet, but bright and happy.

Today, I competed in my first triathlon. It was the Gatorade Queensland Triathlon down at Raby Bay here in Brisbane. It was only a short course - 400m swim, 15km ride, and 4km run - but it took it out of me. Each leg in its own right would not normally have been a problem for me, but the transition was really hard. Just after you had got a comfortable pace with the swim, you would switch muscle groups, and start the bike ride. Then half way through the bike ride, you would get your rhythm, and then you would have to change to the run leg.

My final time was 1:00:55, which I was pretty pleased with. Today was more about getting experience and enjoying it than competing seriously.

Would definitely like to do it again.

I look a bit pained in the following picture, but it wasn't *that* bad.

Our usual gathering of Queensland Tech Writers at a location in the City (actual venue TBA).

Refreshments are kindly being sponsored by Author-it. As part of the sponsorship, Author-it would like to do a small presentation to the group. The plan is to meet in a boardroom somewhere for the presentation, then adjourn to a local bar.

Register your intent to come here.

Look forward to seeing you there.