Friday, June 27, 2003

 
Googlie

Anyone who's added the Google toolbar to their browser will know that its a rather nice little feature. Well it just got nicer, as a quick click here shows.
Personally I'd rather use Google's "autofill" than Microsoft Passport for saving me typing, any day, because the info stays on my computer, not in the hands of the company whose are to security what Melinda Messenger is to chess.

Wednesday, June 25, 2003

 
Lawyer fest

If you read the IT press you'll have heard about SCO, the current "owners" of Unix who believe IBM (and if you agree with them, pretty much every other OS provider) have somehow infringed their IP. The lawsuit is enormous and could cripple IBM, and damage the whole Linux project.
If this kind of thing is of interest, here is a great article showing another side of it all.

Monday, June 23, 2003

 
Big Brother is tailing you...

According to "location services" company Mobile Commerce:
"All the big four UK mobile phone operators now offer a commercial service so you can send them a telephone number and they will tell you where it is" .
Gulp. I don't remember the box to tick on the contract giving my permission for that.
Data Protection legislation states that tracking cannot be done without consent of a handset owner, apparently. So do they plan to write to me for explicit permission ?
I guess I can guarantee that if Starbucks can have my location info for a few pence, the police won't have to jump through too many hoops either.

But I see a great new business opportunity arising. I will take a short trip of your choosing (you pay my travel expenses) and I will take your mobile phone with me. This will stop your employer, spouse's private investigator etc or whoever, realising where you REALLY spent your day. My rates are very reasonable. I even offer "off the shelf" trips for reduced hourly rates. This way I can make a fortune lugging a suitcase full of mobile phones to the NEC for a tradeshow while 100 handset owners do something else entirely.

Who says the telecoms bubble is bursting ?

Sunday, June 22, 2003

 
Hoaxes R us

The annoying "if you send this email on Microsoft will send you cash" is just one of a large number of annoying hoaxes that waste everyone's time. Most of them are hoaxes about viruses. I usually debunk those in 10 seconds by doing a Google search on some aspect of the "warning" and believing what I read if it is part of a McAfee or Norton information page.
But what really galls me is that so many apparently sensible people forward on these warnings. If there is a new virus, doesn't it occur to my friends that my McAfee program might have heard about it before my non-techie mates ?

 
Getting up to speed

If you want a great website for a bit of informative reading about a few key topics (Fieldbus, FDA validation etc), try the Automation Techies White Paper Pages which has a wealth of short informative articles, all in one place. Plus of course, if you are in the USA it's a great website to find a job. Or would be if the US economy was a bit brighter...

Wednesday, June 18, 2003

 
Lets get something straight !

When I heard that Viagra was helping depleted rare animal species to regain numbers, a strange image sprang to mind. However, as you can read here the story actually makes more sense.

Tuesday, June 17, 2003

 
You nicks

SCO say that Linux, IRIX and AIX (IBM's Unix) all infringe their intellectual property.
So they are suing IBM for $1Bn + a lot of damages. Plus writing to Linux users trying to make out Linux is not on sound intellectual property ground.
Well, one thing is for sure. If the bits of Linux they say infringe really do, the Linux community will replace them with new versions - if there's one thing that the free software community hates, it's a greedy bunch of lawyers. So Linux is a pretty safe bet. Meanwhile, it's a great time to buy Sun shares...

Saturday, June 14, 2003

 
Share a bit

I had something pretty cool described to me yesterday. It's a technology called BitTorrent. Suppose I have a website offering a 500MB file for download. Furthermore, hundreds or maybe thousands of people want to come and download it simultaneously, but I simply don't have a server powerful enough to serve all those people. With BitTorrent, the problem is solved. My website passes different bits of the file to different visitors, and then lets them get the rest of the file from each other. As far as the person doing the downloading is concerned, soon after they start downloading they begin to simultaneously upload data as well. The BitTorrent software takes care of it all, and the server actually "serves" very little data. In fact, if enough people are continuously online trying to get the file, the website eventually stops having to send out any actual data and can just coordinate the huge peer to peer network that has been created. Neat huh ?

Thursday, June 12, 2003

There was a lot of soul searching editorials about man's future in space after the shuttle loss recently. The space race's value as an inspiration to kids was widely touted, but lets be honest, the most involved anyone has really been with the space programme in the last few years was when the unmanned Mars lander was sending back daily stuff via the net. It's space itself and the technology that are cool, not astronauts.
If you need any proof of that, click here to see the first 3 minutes of the recent Delta II rocket launch from the rocket looking back c/o the BBC. (You'll need to have up to date RealPlayer and a pretty fast connection). Just listen to some of the numbers the commentator reels off as the boosters are separating. Simply stunning.
I cannot wait until this lander is sending back pics.

Monday, June 09, 2003

 
Broadbandwagon

Here's a funny one from the BBC Website technology section.
"A company called MyZones is encouraging customers to use wi-fi links to let themselves and any neighbours within range get online via a single net link.
The company will also provide basic tools to ensure that only the people paying for the link get access."
Alternatively people might want just buy the kit and do it themselves (like I did) without someone else taking a cut. Of course I did need tech support, but I got that free from Staples...

 
Why worldwide branding is wrong

We've all heard of amusing stories (probably apocryphal) like how Opel nearly called the Corsa the "Nova" ("doesn't go") in Spain, etc etc. But the key joke in most of these stories is some pun based on different languages. What most people don't realise is that more than language separates us from the residents of some other nations. Check this website and tell me honestly that this could ever happen in England. It's one of the more bizarre things I've ever seen.

STOP PRESS It was the GM and the Chevy Nova and it really happened. Thanks to Laurence Marchini for that.

Thursday, June 05, 2003

 
To infinity and beyond...

Is your company's website all it should be ? Get it checked out with the buzzwordometer . See if you can score more highly than the DTI's website on Manufacturing Strategy - 673 for Suitspeak but only 98 for Geekspeak (i.e. technical info)

 
Ultimate Gadget

If this is not going to cause users to walk into lamposts, I don't know what is.

Sunday, June 01, 2003

 
Bandwidth

This is a heartfelt plea to any one who's ever exported a line drawing in TIFF form from a well known 3D CAD system to email to some poor pleb who doesn't happen to have the same hugely expensive system. Please try the following.
1. Open the TIFF in MS Paint.
2. Save as GIF
3. Marvel at how more than a megabyte has become less than 25K
4. Now you can email it, thanks.

This public information broadcast was brought to you by the National Society Of People Who Sometimes Have To Use Their Mobile Phone As A Modem.

Random musings. No more.

March 2003 ♥ April 2003 ♥ May 2003 ♥ June 2003 ♥ July 2003 ♥ August 2003 ♥ September 2003 ♥ October 2003 ♥ December 2003 ♥ January 2004 ♥