February 2004 Archives
Their clothes are truly shit. Do not under any circumstances buy their T-Shirts, after a few washes you'll be lucky if they fit the gnomes in the garden.
What is it with Course work. They tell you that if you don't hand in tidy work then you're screwed. I only wish this worked both ways.
So far I have had dealings with a lot of coursework in my time and trying to read the notes left by the tutors is like trying to decipher a doctors prescription. I know they may have a lot to mark but if they want us to hand in tidy work they could at least have the courtesy to do the same.
This would be funny if it wans't so bloody common. For those of you not using the latest and greatest IE browser point yourself at the following link,
http://www.odeon.co.uk/
I refuse to provide a clickable link to this site on grounds of gross incompetence on their part. This has got to be one of the worst large commercial sites I have seen.
Someone took so much offence to the site they have taken the time to provide their own version and it is very good. Alternative Odeon Website
I have absolutely no doubt that the techs that built the Odeon site are more than capable and could build a browsable website.
This then begs the questions:
Who! made the decision to prevent non IE browsers access to it?
and
Are they still working there and if so why?
I am currently investigating the WebGUI Content Management System at the moment. We want to cut down on the amount of editing that we need to do because we seem to have a lot of applications in the queue to develop and the editing is taking up too much time. There are various other reasons but I won't go into those.
The website says that it is hard to install but this is nonsense it was fairly straight forward once I decided to use MySQL. I have only scratched the surface of it at the moment but it looks quite capable, I tried to get it into Postgres but had no success, there were various errors all reported as log files having the wrong permissions but a quick look in the logs showed me it was dodgy SQL.
Being a Postgres advocate/diehard I would have preferred to use it but considering its not a supported platform and we are not trying to run Amazon then MySQL will do the job.
If it turn out to be easy to use I might just use it on my own websites.
I managed to get FOP, XALAN, Java and everything else I need to start creating my resume in pdf. Thank god for apt.
I did a little bit of it tonight in HR-XML or at least in a miniature subset of it. The results can be found on my resume page near the top there should be some links to the HR-XML file and the XSLT I was using to generate the pdf. Do not take this stuff seriously it took me an hour of blurry eyed fiddling to do it so it is by no means looking good.
I do intend do the resume builder for the recruitment ratings website so watch this space. I should have this and everything else done in the next few years.
Since I am spending a lot of time using FOP and XSLT at work at the moment I am going to resurect an old project that I started for my agency ratings site. I basically want to provide a tool that generates a CV in pdf format from an XML file. I know of the project on sourceforge and I tried to contact them but got no reply, they are not using HR-XML which is what I want to use because some other clever bugger will be doing all the hard work of looking after the standard. They are using their own XML Resume Library Standard. If you are interested in this sort of thing visit them, their project is mature and they are doing a good job.
I have several reasons for doing my own:
1. It is more practice for work.
2. It is a hook for my website.
3. I have put it off long enough.
Ideally I would like to build a nice Java Applet and I had actually started one but that all went pear shaped. Java GUI's are a bit too involved for the amount of time I am able to devote to the project this time so it will be all Perl.
My intentions are to provide a basic page where you fill in your details and then generate the pdf in the style of your choice (there will only be one style to start with ;-). Due to lack of time it will be fairly basic and based on my own CV. Like all my other projects if I ever get the time I will finish it, Hah.
Take all this with a pinch of salt!
No one likes Spam, or should I say I have never met anyone who likes spam. I for one am not to fond of it in any of its forms. Whether it in bark or in binary I really don't care, spam is spam is spam. Sometimes it makes me mad and sometimes, like today I get a bit philosophical.
I am sure that most of you agree, the people who are to blame are the ones who send it out in droves, I cannot really debate that. However, it does cause me some distress to know that the main reason we have spam is because there is a market for it. If there was no market then we would still get some but not in the proportions we are getting it today.
To have a market that pays for the equipment and bandwidth that is required to run operations like these then the market must be of a substantial size. This leads me to several conclusions about the state of our society and what could be done to reduce the problem. We need to remove the market!
I have come to the following conclusions on what could be done to reduce Spam.
Penis Enlargements and Vagina Reductions (PE and VR):
Since we live in a politically correct society I think it only fair that if men get PE's for free women should be allowed VR's for free as well, therefore.
Everyone qualifies for a PE/VR on their 18th birthday which can be deferred. When I mean everyone I really mean that. If a man has his penis enlarged and gets married his wife can then use her PE to increase her husbands to the required size. This works both ways, the man can also transfer his VR to his wife. For those men blessed with HUGE appendages then they can swap their enlargement option for an ensmallment one, this option is also open to their wives. So an exceptionally tight lady can have hers enlarged.
A Viagra a day helps you stand tall and play:
We should all receive one Viagra a day as well as receiving it in tap water the same way we get flouride. The tablet can be sold if you are single or have a broken arm or hand otherwise it must be taken.
Taking these two measures together we would effectively combat a lot of the spam in circulation today. Think about it!
Viagra is free --- No more market
We all have huge cocks and tight fannies ---- No more market
These two simple changes would have the following knock on affect.
If everyone was always at it then the last thing we would be wanting to do is go browse porn ---- No more market.
Now all I need to do is to figure out how to stop the rest of the spam.
This is mad. When someone is called Richard the name can sometimes be shortened to Dick. Can you imagine my ammusement when I found this site (On Dave Barry's blog).
I was just browsing around today and I noticed the following link.
If Architects Had To Work Like Web Designers..
There is a lot of truth in this article, although I would extend it to developers in general. How many times have you heard "Blame IT".
When someone asks a developer to create something or comes up with a design spec invariably it is wishy washy crap. When the developer complains that there is not enough information they will get looked at funny and told that it is there job to do this sort of thing.
Another favourite is being told to use your common sense. "Danger, Will Robinson! Danger!", using common sense to decide how something should operate or look when it is not really the developers decision how something should operate or look is a path fraught with danger.
You can't take shit and make roses but we are always expected to. Next time you decide to point the finger at the developers ask yourself "Did you give them what they needed?".
Having just had a rant about the dodgy techniques employed by some advertising agencies I had an idea.
Lets suppose that there is a website dedicated to highlighting techniques used by advertisers with the advertisers names etc. If a lot of bloggers decided to then link to that site the page rank of the site would increase for that particular incident. The worse the incident the more bloggers will feel the need to link to the story which in turn increases the likelihood that the story will be seen by more poeple.
What this means is, if agencies or any other body decide to employ methods that are not particluarly friendly in nature then there is a good chance it will come to the attention of this website and they will get named. When lot of links are inbound to the site then the rank for this negative page will climb higher in the search engines which will hopefull discourage more of the same.
Unfortunately this is not really going to work for real spammers who really don't care if their name is dragged through the dirt. It would only really work if the people we where naming had an investment "In their Good Name" which limits its usefulness since most of the scum employing these tactics don't care.
I just noticed a link in my weblog that goes something like this.
206.65.72.35 - - [21/Feb/2004:04:20:47 +0000] "HEAD /blog/ HTTP/1.0" 200 0 "http://www.blog.johnkerry.com" "StarProse Referrer Advertising System 2004" 0 www.thingthong.co.uk
What is this. A quick search on google led me to an explanation, Basically this guy John Kerry (Running for President) has either employed an advertising agency which are using unscrupulous means to get his named mentioned in every Web server log in the planet OR one of his unscrupulous rivals is doing it to upset every web administrator and searh engine tech on the planet OR some deranged individual has done it, god knows why.
I am not too sure which of the three I would believe out of the above since I imagine they are all as likely as each other.
What I will say is this. If John Kerry has stooped low enough to employ these tactics for self promotion then don't vote for John Kerry. If it was one of his rivals that stooped this low to sully his name in connection with these tactics then don't vote for John Kerry's rivals.
I was messing around with RSS again and I noticed another possible use for it. There seems to be a lot of abuse on the comments facilty and I was thinking about ways that this could be reduced. One way I though of was to build a database of IP address's that are banned from using the comments facilty. This is not actually a very good way to do it due to DHCP and various other hacks that can be used to circumvent whatever we do. While playing around I built the following
RSS file of Banned IP address's.
There are a lost of things that could be done to make this a much more comprehensive list and I am sure I could come up with a simple script to parse the file and insert it into the banned IP list in moveable type (I have not checked this). It would rely on good editing and weeding which is something I have not got the time to do. It would also rely on a trust network of some desrcription to add and remove IP address's from the list.
What it could be used for is as a list of Possible spam addresses. What I mean is, if you find an IP in this list then check the content of the message or vice versa.
On the other hand you could just take a stroll over to Jay Allens website and sort your spam out that way. I have just installed it and needless to say it was a flawless install. I just hope it does its job as well ;-)
Unfortunately I was unable to make FOSDEM this year. I wanted to go but a new job and Jenny working shifts means that what chance I get to see here I take and she has Saturday and Sunday off. Last years FOSDEM was meant to be a bit of a laugth and I missed it as well.
Got a phone call from a mate last night after 1am.
Harry "Hello!"
Bob, "Hi Harry, where was the 1920 olympics held?"
Harry "I think it was Antwerp"
CLICK.
5 Minutes later
Harry "Hello"
Bob "Hi Harry, Who where the 10 countries recently admitted to the EU"
Harry "You again!"
Harry "Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Poland, the Czech Republic, Cyprus, Hungary and Malta. What do you want to kn....."
CLICK
It was only then I realised that he was in the middle of a quiz in a pub in Ballykelly NI.
I need to have a look at the various styles for MT. I like georgia_blue but it is not that easy on my eyes. I will not be writing my own because I have not got the time so It will be a default css for me. I am going to ask J which she prefers and probably run with that.
I decided to take a night off maths and do something else for a change. I have been meaning to install some type of content management tool for a while to save myself some time and tonight was the night. I decided to install Movable Type so hopefully I will be able to keep a more up to date blog.
First impressions are good, its very easy to use and I have managed to make several entries already. I also managed to transfer my old HTML blog over which was a bore but luckily there was not too much of it.
I also have to thank the person/s who runs www.movablesytle.com for making their style sheets freely available and all they ask for in return is the credit.
I was given the job of creating a pdf using FOP and XSLT yesterday and since I had never used either before to any great degree I had resigned myself to several days of googling but I managed to all but finish it today. It was surprisingly easy to get the bulk of the formatting done but due to FOP's lack of support for widows and orphans the rest will be a bit harder.
I also had a lot of trouble trying to get "analyze-string" to work. I eventualy fudged a regex of my own using "substring" and it seems to do the trick
Maths has started again. I have started M203 and handed in my first peice of coursework today. It looks like an interesting course and I am looking forward to getting stuck into it. It seems to be soaking up an awful lot of my time at the moment.
I suprised Jenny by taking her to London to a concert at the Barbican Concert Hall. We seen the "Valentines Day Love Classics" and we really enjoyed it.
The Programme
Tchaikovsky Waltz from sleeping beauty.
Bizet Carmen Suite
Grieg Paino Concerto in A minor
INTERVAL
Offenbach Orpheus in the Underworld Overture.
Strauss Blue Danube Waltz
Delius The walk to the Paradise Garden
Verdi Prelude to Act 1 from La traviata
Tchaikovsky Swan Lake Suite
It was really good, my favourite piece was by Bizet.
There where a few smiles when the blue danube was played, this was because I had surprised Jenny on her Brithday two years ago by taking her to Vienna we spent some time on the Danube.
All in all it was a good night.
Started my new job today. So I think I might be getting very busy very soon. I am now employed as Assistant Webmaster at the Associaltion of Commonwealth Universities.
The sites that I am involved in are as follows:
ACU
Marshall Scholarship
Observatory
CSFP
All being well there might be a few other things to get my teeth into.
I have just been asked if I am going to go to YAPC 2004 (Belfast) in September. Considering its my home country I am probably going to go. I can also head home and catch up with the family. God knows who else is going to go and I am not really sure what to expect when I get there but the crack should be good.
I have just found out that to travel from Luton to London Kings Cross yearly will cost me about £3000. Is it just me or is this an obscene amount of money to travel 45 miles in a crowded train. I know that the UK train service is in a state but wern't we meant to be trying to encourage the use of public transport. I doubt very much if these prices are going to have people flocking to cram themselves like sardines into a train.
We really need to sort our raliways out. They're part of the backbone of a good economy and with the state ours is in I am suprised we haven't got a trapped disc.
