Freemen Scrolls!

Review

2007-01-19T03:17:00.000+09:00

Long time no post.
Review of the past 2 months:

Broke up with my long term girlfriend at the end of Nov. My mistake, but can't change the past ;)
Dropped a bunch of weight and getting back into sport (I'm almost as fit as I was when I was 11! :)
Re-building habits in my life to be the best I can be. Books, CD's from the business support system...learning Vietnamese...among other things.

Getting back to roots in IT, really surrounding myself with it. Sir Technology is growing, and I'm building the infrastructure with that, and it's fun. I've just finished looking at reviews of various OS. Sun's ZFS architecture looks cool, like software RAID, but the file systems are virtual and so don't need to be redefined to take advantage of added drive space - just add it on the fly, and the file system gets access to it straight away (cool). Doesn't look like solaris x86 performance is quite up to Linux performance yet (Apache / MySQL are about 5% slower in Solaris 10), but it will make a good NFS / Samba file server.

Also, AmigoOS is back!!!! Version 4 is around, somewhere, though I couldn't figure out how to obtain a copy of it from the website. I love the microkernel architecture, gels with RISC nicely, and I've always loved that. RISC / CISC have sort of merged now days, but the ideaology is still there: design your chip as simple as possible so that you can concentrate on streamlining execution rather than redesigning your chip.

Haiku is also coming along nicely for a desktop OS on low end hardware (e.g. Pentium 2's). Like Linux...but a little more user friendly (at least, BeOS was). E/OS looks cool as well, I love the idea of embedding emulation into the OS so you don't have to install additional software. Just one OS :) Don't think it's production ready for people who are computer illiterate yet though.

Thats it for me, off to Summer Conference on the weekend, I'll take lots of pics and come back and post them all!! :)

- James

FEEC 2006

2006-10-25T20:53:00.000+08:00

Well FEC was now 2 weeks ago so I thought I'd post the photos, get some fire in your belly again!

Hah, and that's just in money paid out for incentives...the bonus money would have been a loottttttttt more than that. I'll have some of that thanks! ;)

Bert Gulick & Co. Bert is the one in the bright red shirt. I guess when you make as much money as he does, you really can wear whatever you want!! (just kidding Bert! :)

Pat Mesiti - Back to talk to us again Pat?? This guy moves fast, but then he is pretty small hehe :)

Watch'a doin' with all those girls Jordan - pick one and settle already! :)

As above, but on the other side of the stage is the rest of the guys -- time to migrate perhaps fellas ? :)

Did I forget to mention that we had a catwalk show while we were there? Well we did, and it was good, and we cheered lots, although I think those models would make better cheerleaders than us!

Craig & Anna Deane. He's thinner than I thought he would be. With Bert being sort of larger-than-life, I thought the more money you make, the bigger man you are - now we know anyone can build this business. Lets do it, and get some of that bonus money!

Corporate Uni?

2006-10-10T07:56:00.000+08:00

I was thinking yesterday, about how if you learn a skill and don't use it, you lose (forget) it. I think this has been one of the major benefits that an apprenticeship has over a university degree. For some reason though, many employers still favour university graduates. I understand that completing a university degree demonstrates commitment to a task, but would 3-5 years not be better spent learning skills that we remember?

For hard-diciplines, such as Law and Medecine, this is exactly what happens. You are taught the knowledge that you are required to know in order to legal matters (for example), and much of the course is demonstrating that you have a grasp of the principles and are capable of justifying a point of view legally.

Lets contrast that to a BA or BCom. In my BA, I've touched on everything from Accounting, to Strategising; From Finance to Law. Now a BA is designed to be generic. But people who do a BCom specialize in one field - this is where most of our Accountants, Financial Officers etc come from. In this case, why is there so much time spent on erroneous information they do not directly use? If you wanted your Finance department to have a "reasonable" knowledge of accounting, send them to a seminar at your own expense! That way, they will learn information they use straight away. By learning it at the 1st year uni level, by the time we graduate, we've forgotten it anyway, and have to relearn it at your expense again!

Perhaps university would benefit from being more generic, shorter courses (i.e. just the 1 year), and when you choose a "major" or dicipline (depending on what course you are studying, same thing though), you actually work with a company in that industry who trains you for that field. Civil Engineers would do generic maths and physics in the first year, then spend 3 years honing that theory in the field with people who know what is going to be used and what is not!

One day, I'll start a corporation that does this :)

Ideas Man!

2006-10-08T11:05:00.000+08:00

Wow, read enough books that encourage the mind, and you come up with random ideas. At work today, and just thought: it would be cool if when you search for something on google.com , if it had the ability to summarize the page...intelligently, not like MS Word Autosummarize (where the summary is non-sensical). There are just too many words on the internet, and no one has time to sift through them all! An automated tool would fit right into Google's toolbase.

I went to tell Google about this, only to find they don't have a way to submit ideas to them! So I thought I'd blog it instead, maybe someone out there will feel inspired to write some software that does it anyway :)

Settle Now = Settled For Life

2006-09-21T01:41:00.000+08:00

One of the big problems I think I'm encountering on my way up the wealth tree, is the fact that I was brought up with the philosphy of making-do.

Lets take the example of computers, since I'm a geek. Wanna play a new game, but the comp is old. Time to upgrade right? Wrong, squeeze more power out of the existing machine, and lower the settings in the game.

Lets translate that into real life. I want to break a million in business revenue before 2010. Translation: Put pressure on existing business resources, and lower the dream from $1M to, say, $500,000. Something tells me that is not going to work so well.

Napoleon Hill, in Think And Grow Rich, states the concept of burning all bridges to our current situation. This should force our direction to what we desire (if done right). Of course, if you refuse to go forward, then you're stuck, heh.

I think he has a point though. Of course he has a point, he made a lot of money from writing it. He's not the first person I've heard / read this from though. It's still scary :/

Go Nomads! :)

Best Celebrity Smiles :)

2006-09-20T00:53:00.000+08:00

Ok I thought I'd start an impulse list of the best smiles I see in flicks. You know, the ones that don't look fake :)

First up is my girlfriend. Of course, she's my celebrity, which is even better :)

But next up, Kate Bosworth, from Blue Crush / Win A Date With Ted Hamilton. I think it's the high cheek bones that make me like this one heh.

I'll post more when it occurs to me ;)

Perth Maps For Palm

2006-08-30T08:36:00.000+08:00

Well after getting my Palm TX, I wanted to use it as a portable map for Perth, Australia. After reading a bit about GPS, it sounded pretty easy. Get a nice Bluetooth GPS unit, and the software will plot routes for me. Awesome :)

Unfortunately, GPS software for the Palm is not exactly easy to come by. In fact, there are only a couple of companies who do it. Of those companies, I could only find 2 for Australia. One looked ok, but not available for for Perth. The other was raster map based, so you can't really zoom. I don't want to pay for that!

Even the raster maps were not available for Perth! So, rather than pay for something that is not yet produced, we can use what's already out there: whereis.com.au. If you get the map for the area you want, view the printable image, then you can download that to your PDA. Easy, and works for Perth :)

Palm TX Buzz / Hum

2006-08-23T22:41:00.000+08:00

Long time since my last post!
Well I just upgraded my PDA to a Palm T|X, and it's nice :)
When I got it however, the unit seemed to emit a high pitch buzz / humming noise. Apparently it's the pixel clock on the screen. You can get a free app that fixes it called WhineHack . At least, it fixed the problem on my unit!

Ohio USA

2006-07-29T10:14:00.000+08:00

Oh, and I woke up today after dreaming that I jumped a plane to Ohio with an open ticket. I think it's time I holidayed in the US of A for a while ;)

Warcraft 3 & CD's

2006-07-29T09:12:00.000+08:00

I found an awesome way to listen to CD's the other day...Just turn down the volume in Warcraft 3! I have trouble listening to CD's without actually actively doing anything, and if I do anything that requires concentration, then I don't pay attention to the CD playing hehe.

Lately I've been playing a lot of Tower Defence (TD), especially one called Cube. It's touted as 'the most technically advanced TD'. I'm not sure about that, but it certainly is fun :)
Theres a whole bunch of other good TD's available in this TD map-pack .

Winter Conference 2006!

2006-07-24T04:34:00.000+08:00

Wow, what an awesome function! I tell you what guys, the more the merrier for sure at a function :)
Heres some pics of the people and the highlights. Because of the lighting, I had to individually adjust the whitebalance on all afterwords (and downsample), so if they are small / discolored slightly then you'll just have to fill in the blank with your memory!

The function hall itself. We were early, so we got front row seats! That blur is Mr Ian Sinclair, respect!

Some of the boys just setting up before the function starts

Mr Pin, getting recognized, and preparing to move onto the next pin!

Gee, that looks like a man getting ready to make some money, recognize! ;)

Faster than a camera shutter, and way more entertaining than a uni assignment the night before it's due, Pat Mesiti (WOO!)

Pat is definately a very excitable character...

...Especially where props are involved!

Lunchtime, with the going-Silver group!

Definately a man in the know here!

Good times - just wait until Hawaii boys!

Rob, looking like he's dissapointed about not going Diamond fast enough - Don't worry, we'll all get there Rob!

Jordan, showing Winston where there bling is at with 'the ring' (I'm pretty sure Winston already knows though!!!)

Repeat after me: I will get to Hawaii I will get to Hawaii I will get to Hawaii (or as Rob says "aooouuu-oouuuu-aaaaa"!)

Ian, taking all the glory in this shot!

It's that thug, Peter Shack, demonstrating to us all how to break legs (he's been doing that for years though!)

When we get to Hawaii next year, I just know that you'll BOTH be smiling!!

The Broad's, doing what they do best - helping us (feel privilages to learn from the best guys)!

This is Barry Pragt...

...And this is a close up of the novelty cheque (which is backed by a real one) - how do you like them apples!!!

Peter explaining to us the meaning of the Cup. I don't remember Pauline saying anything here, but hey, someone has to stand next to Peter and look pretty! :)

Give me a big Ferris Beuler "Awwwwwwwww yeaaaaahhh!" - that'll be our group winning that next year guys! :)

Winston and Joy, styling it up!

Hah, I told you Pat was really there, now you have to believe me! :)

Rob, and two other members of his family - can you spot them! :)

The fabulously wealthy Julie Swaffield!

This is at the end, when Pauline was saying things she shouldn't - gotta' love Sanguines! And of course Peter, the melencholy, is in the background doing the Mona Lisa thing on me... ;)

Mac Ads - Parody

2006-07-20T00:23:00.000+08:00

Along the same theme of the previous post, I found a parado of the Mac Ads (released before the current ads). So, faithful Google Video gives us the web-friendly video!

Apple Ads - Parody

Mac Ads

2006-07-19T20:45:00.000+08:00

I read about the Mac ads that have been on TV in the USA today. So I googled them. Not surprisingly, apple.com provides them...in Quicktime format! Geez, not everyone wants to install proprietary software.

So I headed on over to Google Video and searched for Mac Ads. Hey presto, flash movies of the mac ads!

I think they're in prtty good tasted. Here are the links to Google Video for each one, in alphabetical order ;)

Better

ILife

Networking

Out Of The Box

Restarting

Touche`

Viruses

Wall Street Journal

ID4

2006-07-19T01:34:00.000+08:00

Well I just finished watching ID4 (again). I haven't watched if for about 4 years. I must say, the acting in it was pretty...attrocious ;)
Will Smith definately has the best lines. I don't think any lines in The Day After Tomorrow could touch the part where he is complaining about having to drag the alien around in his parachute :)
All in all, nice SFX, but The Day After Tomorrow beats it on that angle. I guess thats what 8 years of SFX progression does. It's nice to see the progression in two similar themed movies. ID4 is more humourous though, less serious than The Day After Tomorrow . Always good for a change!

Friends Reuinuted (.com.au)

2006-07-15T09:05:00.000+08:00

Well I just listed myself on friendsreuinuted.com.au - I thought it'd eat up a few minutes while I was waiting for an email to come through. I tell you what, it's strange to see your ex-girlfriend listed on there. Not because it brings back memories (there arn't that many), but simply because of what everyone used to tell me. It's a mythical name, "Remember xxxx??". How can I forget, when you keep reminding me :)

Download The Internet?

2006-07-14T19:05:00.000+08:00

Just saw this on W3Schools . Having worked in IT Helpdesk, I find it amusing :)
For anyone who doesn't understand: clicking the image will NOT download the internet!

Edit: This Blogger template is a fixed width...I actually had to resize the image by hand. Now it's hardly readable :/
I'll have to change the template soon(ish) I think...

Expect Scripting

2006-07-10T17:32:00.000+08:00

I attempted expect scripting for the first time today. I must say, if I used it more, I'd be writing a complete tutorial to it. I had trouble finding a good, verbose, tutorial on it. As it is, I'll just post a (working) version of my scp script that uses expect to automate the process:

#!/usr/bin/expect --
set localfile [lindex $argv 0]
set timeout 30
spawn /usr/bin/scp $localfile user@host:~remotedir

expect {
"password:" {
send "mypass\r"
interact
} "yes/no)?" {
send "yes\r"
set timeout -1
} timeout {
exit
} eof {
exit
}
}

What this does, is take an argument off the command line as the local file, and copies it to the remote server as hard coded in the file. I wanted to keep it simple, but the two things I wanted to point other that I had (a little) trouble finding are:

1. To access command line variables, it's kind of funky. So you will want to declare normal local variables at initialization like:
set localfile [lindex $argv 0]
With $argv 0 being the first argument. I couldn't get this to work with the C-style $argv[0] - it causes a syntax error.

2. When you are spawning a command that actually does something and prints information to the screen, you need to tell expect to interact. Otherwise, it will just quit after performing the operations you tell it to explicitly.

IE Table Spacing Kludge

2006-07-07T11:49:00.000+08:00

It took me about 2 hours to work out why my table kept showing a gap underneath it. Wehn you have a 40px image on the corner, then the middle content cell has a background color that extends _below_ the image size, even though you have specified every possible height to 40px, and set all possible spacing to 0px, it is VERY annoying!

I eventually found this: http://www.draac.com/tabletricks.html
Check the first part. Very interesting. A trvial [typical IE]hack but ruins the alignment of my table tags :(

New "Currently Reading" Panel

2006-07-06T01:41:00.000+08:00

The other day I created a module that shows what I'm currently reading, and how long I've been reading each book for on the sidebar. If you click on the book title / author, it does a Google "I'm Feeling Lucky" search. I'm _hoping_ the page it brings up will be about the relevenet subject... ;)

Corsair am Win!

2006-07-05T00:20:00.000+08:00

Wooho! Last night my RMA'd Corsair memory stick arrived! Now, finally, I can operate with 1G of memory again. VMWare w/ Windows 2003 is certainly not the ideal software to be running on a system with only 512MB of RAM :/

The best part about it, is that they only took about a week to get to me! Well, I think 1 week to get it to them, which means 1 week to get to me. Total time without my old [broken] Corsair stick: 14 days. The look on my face when I realise UPS deliver to Perth, Western Australia: Priceless! :)

I must say though, the Corsair lifetime guarentee is fantastic. I didn't have any problems getting an RMA. I think I'll be buying memory from them again...Visit the Corsair homepage. Although it doesn't look the best, rest assured it's because they put all their efforts into giving better service than anyone else (no really).

'Our' Rules

2006-07-04T00:01:00.000+08:00

On the weekend I received one of those typical joke emails, this one a parody of girls 'rules' for guys - the parody being that it was guys 'rules' for girls. There was a line in it that I believe is very truthful, for everyone:

You can either ask us to do something
Or tell us how you want it done.
Not both.
If you already know best how to do it, just do it yourself.

The Secret Diary of a Blog Aged 4.07 Days

2006-07-03T01:18:00.000+08:00

I hope someone actually understands the joke in the title of this one ;)

I haven't managed to blog every day. And I think I have tried. It's simply a lot harder than I thought to actually make time to do it, on a daily basis. Kudos to those who do manage it. It's not so much a time consuming exercise, as a timely exercise i.e. it doesn't take long, but you have to make _some_ time :)

Additionally, I have now finished Season 3 of Babylon 5. The only comment I have, is that you can really see the advancement of the CGI. A much more liberal and effective use. Hence more ship based space battles :)

Late Night B5

2006-07-01T11:30:00.000+08:00

Why is it that bugs have the most inconvenient time to land in my drink. Whenever I get up to refill my glass and actually pay attention there's nothing there. The moment I lapse, *poff*, a fluffy bug for me to cough on :/

Oh well. At least I've completed another site template. It's not live yet, else I'd post the link (maybe ;). That, and the fact that B5 3x10 had the most interesting firefights to date. B5 joins a military coup heh. More later after some sleep...

B5 (S3)

2006-06-30T08:06:00.000+08:00

Up to episode 3x05 of Babylon 5 now, and this has got be be one of the funniest EP's yet. It made me think it was a video game. You can be the Centari, the Minbari, or the Humans. When you make alliances, you get access to better ship technology and new economies. And as you get further along in the game, you get the change to make contact with the 'old ones' and then you get some cool weapons hehe. Maybe I should actually play some games, instead of just imagining the...nah! :)

B5

2006-06-29T18:17:00.000+08:00

This morning I finished watching season 2 of Babylon 5. The last episode was pretty good, you finally get to see a ship-to-ship shooting war. Reminds me of the first few episodes of Battlestar Galactica (new) :)
B5 is sort of like a cross between that (Battlestar Galactica) and Star Trek Deep Space 9. It's mainly station based (DS9) but faster paced (like BSG). The first half of season 1 is kind of boring ...but it's necessary to explain whats going on.
I usually watch it when I'm doing something else at the same time (read: blogging ;)

GMT this!

2006-06-28T08:49:00.000+08:00

Blogger thinks that when I tell it I'm in Perth, it means GMT -8:00. I've fixed it now...on both blogs. I've had this problem before, with auto timezone applications...or maybe I'm just imagining things...Or maybe a conspiracy to change our timezone without us realizing!!! ;)

Genesis

2006-06-27T09:37:00.000+08:00

Hah, lift off! With a blog, I'll finally be able to distinguish between news posts for my proper site, and general rant that I write ;)
I'm not sure how much to write though...I think this will take a little bit of getting used to hrm. Oh well, practice makes perfect, I'll just hit it as hard as I can for a couple of weeks, put as many posts up...and hope a habit develops. Otherwise, it'll be months between posts!
Well I'll expand on this later (no really, I will! :).