Plans2Reality

Writing for PDF

Most technical documents today are distributed as PDF, not as hard copy. This leads to a question: are you writing for PDF?

Writing for PDF means taking advantage of the assumption that the user will either view on-line or print on a laser printer. Many of the conventions of bookbinding make little sense when documents are laser-printed - the idea of different right and left pages, for example.

You can take it a step further, of course - PDF allows you to embed hot links to other places in the document, and to web locations.

You can also embed video and audio files. This is of particular use if your product has video or audio capabilities. As the old writer's maxim puts it: show, don't tell.

Think about your audience's intended use of your document - then write for PDF.

Photovoltaic Panels, Part One

Here at Plans2Reality World Headquarters we have been evaluating various solar technologies with an eye to getting our electricity bill down a little bit. Of course, we could just buy a system from a local contractor on a turnkey basis, but where's the fun in that?  ;-)

Market research led us to the usual vendors of traditional silicon flat panels, but also to another company with a novel idea: Solyndra. (http://www.solyndra.com)  

These guys make what looks like a giant barbeque grill. It's a bunch of tubes, each about an inch in diameter and about 36 inches long. Each tube is itself a PV panel. Forty of them in a row makes the grill.

They are designed expressly to be place on the flat roofs common to most large commercial buildings. Think of the roof of you average big-box store, or for that matter about 95% of the buildings here in Silicon Valley.

The panels sit on little legs, but they aren't tilted. You just carpet the roof with them and wire them up. Clever idea, huh?

More to come.

Electronica 2008 - LEDs for Home Illumination

After a bit of a gap tending to business, it's time for more on Electronica - specifically LEDs for home illumination. First, the bad news: most industry insiders don't see LEDs in residential applications for three years or so. LEDs aren't really much more power-efficient than CFLs, but they cost a lot more per lumen.

Now, there is a role for LEDs - Christmas lights are an excellent example, and other specialty applications where you need light in a small area, or where heat is an issue.

The most interesting wrinkle are the vendors who are offering LED lamps packaged in tubes that fit fluorescent lights - that is, the typical 48 inch tube, with pins on the end. Here at Plans2Reality we plan to test some of these, and we will let you know how they more.

More to come.