Google's wacky new office in Israel

Google’s offices more than make up for their site’s minimalist design, as we can see from their new fun factory in Tel Aviv, Israel. Google HQ in Israel occupies seven floors of one of the country’s tallest skyscrapers, Electra Tower, and is fitted out with orange trees, slides that connect the floors, pinball machines, epic murals and even an artificial beach. And as we’ve come to expect, Google’s new pad also contains plenty of bean bags, as well as deck chairs and other places to sit besides plain old chairs. Bar stools, for example, as well as arm chairs, sofas, benches and pretty much everything – all in a variety of designs, from the classical to the fluorescent – fill the building.

How to avoid and treat Repetitive Strain Injuries

Bad backs, stiff necks, creaking joints, painful arms – these aren’t just the occupational hazards of working in an office. They’re symptoms of repetitive strain injuries (RSI), or occupational overuse syndrome. Here is a quick guide to the blights of desk-work, and how to avoid and alleviate them.

Is your office like The Office?

The Office USA is one of our all time favourite shows on television, even with the departure of Steve Carell, the humour and characters leave us rolling around the floor in tears of happiness. And while some of the gags and storylines are really "out there" - sometimes, just sometimes we get a peek of something that reminds us of our 9-5 alter ego. Having said that - have a look yourself and let us know who, if any, reminds you of someone at your office.

Some great office gadgets for Secret Santa

Every year offices all over the UK partake in the long held tradition of Secret Santa. Now, this can be a stressful time, what if you get that guy who never speaks to you? Or your boss?? Well here at Office Stuff we think you can never go wrong with some office gadgets. So here is our top 5 list:

iPad Mini: More of the Same – But That’s Not a Problem

The iPad Mini was announced earlier this month by Apple. Naturally, people were pretty excited about the features that would be included in the product. Apple have pretty much always delivered with innovation and small touches that make a big difference.

So, the iPad Mini came out, and everyone was pretty sure that it was just a smaller version of the iPad 2, which was released last year. To be honest, they were right, but why is this a problem?

Great Halloween Activities in Office

Halloween has quickly become the second most popular holiday in America. It’s rubbing off on people in the UK too, who are keen to get in on all of the Halloween traditions the season offers.

Decorations, costumes and sweets are the main staples of the time and, although Halloween is only one day, the few weeks leading up to the night can be just as fun as going out on All Hallows Eve itself.

This year the day falls on a Wednesday, right in the middle of the working week. Chances are parties will be held the weekend before, or after – to coincide with Guy Fawkes night – but there’s no reason not to celebrate it at work. Several ideas you can implement are:

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The Importance of Ergonomics

Most of you out there will be reading this at a computer screen, slouched in some form with one hand on your mouse and the other propping up your head. It’s comfy, right? It’s not great for you though.

Work stations have always been a problem since the traditional ‘desktop’ layout came to be commonplace. The fact is, the work stations that we use just aren’t designed around us and our bodies needs. Give it long enough and you’ll start feeling some tweaks and aches in your lower back and wrists. Leave it too long, it could develop into full blown musculoskeletal disorders. Not a great thing.

3 Things You Need for a Successful Start-Up

Kevin Systrom - Creator of mobile-hit Instagram

Start-ups are all the rage nowadays. From shows like Dragon’s Den, The Apprentice and all the success stories we’ve heard about mobile start-ups like Twitter, Instagram (recently bought for more than $700million) and Angry Birds, we all know that if you get a great idea then you can make a fortune almost overnight and take off in big ways. All it takes is an idea and a bit of hard work right? Not quite. Here are 3 essential things that every start-up CEO needs.

3 More Seriously Cool Offices

We made a post a while back about 3 amazing offices to workin, well here’s 3 more to tantalise you and start bugging your manager for a redesign of your own workspace.

BANK OF MOSCOW

First up, we have the offices for the Bank of Moscow in Kuznetsky Most. Designer Alexey Kuzmin has managed to keep the architectural integrity of a beautiful building and seamlessly integrate modern comfort and design elements. Centred around a hexagonal entrance hall, it leads into a plus and white interior that looks like one of the comfiest place to work.

SKYPE CLOUD 9

Well, maybe the Bank of Moscow is the second plushest place to work. The Skype’s ‘On Cloud 9 in an Historical Brewery’ offices in Stockholm look like the physical embodiment of the company’s software; light, soft and comfy. Designed by PS Arkitektur, the use of rounded shapes and bright colours, as well as some incredibly cool lighting, encourages a far more relaxed feel to the offices and feeds the creativity that the company expects from its employees.

COORDINATION ASIA

The Shanghai offices for the design company Coordination Asia are incredibly suave and elegant. Some might think that they are a bit dark, a bit moody and perhaps not the ideal office environment, but it would be hard to argue that the offices don’t just ooze of great taste and stylishness. Looking more like a rockstar’s apartment than an office, it must be said that Coordination Asia have created a beautiful place to look at, even if working in it isn’t your thing.

5 Portable Apps to Make Your Life Easier

A USB stick is a must-have for anyone working with computers. It’s great for backing-up important files or transferring files to a home PC or laptop. They come in especially handy if you have to use somebody else’s computer. Here are 5 apps to load onto your USB drive in order to make dealing with other computers less of a hassle.

• Opera@USB or Firefox Portable
A life-saving must-have for any USB drive, it means that you will always have your choice of browser in case the foreign computer uses Internet Explorer or another unfamiliar piece of software. It has the added advantage of keeping all of your add-ons and bookmarks stored to the USB, so there’ll be no trouble finding the sites or tools you want to use.

• PdfXchange Viewer
This is another piece of software that means that loading files onto another computer is a piece of cake. A fair amount of computers (especially if shared, for example computers used in presentation rooms) do not have a PDF viewer on them and installing one can take time and become increasingly annoying if you require administrator privilege. This piece of software means that you’ll be able to open any PDF files that you may need in an incredibly well-designed format.

• VLC/KMPlayer
These are multimedia apps that let you play a whole host of videos. It’s a personal choice which to use, as they both mean that you can play media files without having to worry if the foreign computer has the correct codecs installed. VLC has been downloaded over 100 million times, which means it’s pretty solid. KMPlayer has a huge range of features involved though, including video and picture capture, audio sync and subtitles.

• CCleaner
That’s not a typo. This handy little app is a great way to clean up any slow, clogged computers. Mainly to be used by those dealing with computer issues, it can clear gigabytes of rubbish data and tidy up the registry of the computer, resulting in a faster, cleaner and safer computer. Just make sure that you get permission from the computer owner first.

• TruCrypt
TruCrypt is a great security tool that encrypts all of the data on its host USB. This means that if your USB is lost or stolen, which is easy when they’re so small, you can be confident that the information on it remains under wraps. It runs constantly but doesn’t slow down your drive even when decrypting and encrypting in real time.

Kit out your USB with these features and you’ll find that there’s not much you won’t be able to do away from your main PC when you have your trusty USB in hand.