How Big Really

How Big Really

It often becomes a bit easy for us to visualize the size of an area if it is shown relative to something that we are already aware of.

Based on this idea, BBC has launched a new site called Dimensions where you can visualize the scale of important historical places and events by overlaying them on a map of a location that you are already familiar with.



For instance, you can set your city as the starting point for the Great Wall of China to understand how massive it is. Or if you wish to know how much distance did the astronauts walk when they first landed on the moon, simply overlay that area to some familiar neighborhood.

There’s a map of Tora Bora caves in Afghanistan where Laden was thought to be hiding sometime. Once you see that area relative to your own location, you suddenly realize how big it is.

Note: Dimensions is a prototype built by BERG for the BBC. We make no guarantee as to its accuracy, reliability or performance.


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Is it Raining Now in Moscow ?

Want to know if it’s raining in any particular city of the world?




Just go to your browser’s address bar and type IsItRaining.in/{cityname}. For instance, a URL like isitraining.in/moscow will show you the current conditions of Moscow in just one word – Yes or No.

If there are two or more cities with the same name, you can add the name of the State or Country after the name of the city to point to the right one.


Note: The tool is internally powered by Yahoo! Weather and caches results for 30 minutes so it may not give the real-time conditions always.


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How Does a Color-Blind Person See Your Site ?

Try Vischeck on a Webpage

With around 5-8% of males diagnosed colorblind, it is increasingly important for web designers to see how colorblind users on the Internet perceive color combinations.

If you are interested in designing a more accessible website or are curious to experience websites from the eyes of a color blind, a new service called Vischeck will help.

Vischeck will help you see web pages as they appear to people who may be color blind.


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Facebook Pages - Warning

Facebook Pages - Warning

There’s a new kind of ‘scam’ on Facebook that won’t do you any harm but it is likely to embarrass you in public. I have lately seen some of my tech-savvy friends on Facebook fall for such scams and you should be careful as well.



Working of Scam: You land on a unsuspecting Facebook page and there’s a pop-up saying that you need to confirm that you are an adult in order to view the underlying content. You click confirm and the dialog disappears.

Actual Working: The problem is that the ‘pop-up’ you just clicked was not actually a pop-up but some sort of a hidden script that executes itself as soon as you hit the ‘Confirm’ button.

The script, in most cases, will automatically post a link on your Facebook wall thus broadcasting to the world that you just tried visiting an ‘adult’ site. This will almost create a viral effect because now your other friends will be eager to see that page and some of them may fall in the trap as well.


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