After a year of my daily cross-mendips commute I thought I’d start recording the ‘lovely’ Somerset weather I enjoy on the way to work. It’s always a bit of a challenge so by noting it down I thought I’d get some perspective into just how much of a challenge.
Today’s pre-Chrimbo weather consisted of slightly damp roads and plenty of fog. Driving up through the Combe was different today as the 350Z was in for a service so I got to drive a Nissan Note. It was less driving and more a process of charting a course in the good ship Note. Performance was none-to-speak-of and cornering a bit like a football.
It’s a happy day when a product you wished for is delivered, and for free!
One such app I’ve been hankering for is a Sonos Controller for the iPhone. Our Sonos system is our favourite gadget in the house and even with 2 controllers there’s always times when you need to skip a track and the controller is downstairs. From today the iPhone app store has the Sonos Controller for download, sweet!
Confluence is my favourite wiki product, having used it for a couple of years at clients and also with the free personal version. Although it’s a great application there is one issue, the price… implementing it in smaller dev shops is just not viable so I have been looking around for a suitable replacement.
Xwiki caught my eye on http://www.wikimatrix.org/ and I’ve been trialling it for a week or so. Downsides are it’s a java based solution but once you get over that it does a very good job. Proper user, group and space funcionality complement the very impressive wysiwyg editor. So far so good… will update how it pans out in the long term.
If Atlassian provided a small company license that was affordable it would be good but they obviously don’t care for that market and only focus on the Entreprise users, shame.
Colleagues who have to endure my sense of humour also have to enjoy my appreciation of Nant, the .net developer’s best friend. Recently I’ve been using it to build databases during CruiseControl.net builds to enable a very complicated upgrade project to progress with some degree of order. Nanting the database build using Ruby on Rails style migrations is a great way to tie code builds to database builds. I’ll dig out the generic nant script for reference as it’s a very handy technique. So what can’t you Nant? Well, not a lot and that’s my point… if it moves, automate it. The only thing distracting me from my enjoyment of Nant is Watir, another cracking product which I’m using all day every day to drive my web application testing… now if I can only hook up Watir with Nant.
So I’ve still got 2 phones in my pockets, a trusty Blackberry 8800 for calendar, email, tasks and notes… and my iPhone for calls, web browsing via safari, music, youtube browsing. I’ve been loving using the iPhone but just needed that OTA (over the air) integration with my calendar and contacts to let me leave the Blackberry at home… it will be a sad day as I’m quite attached to Blackberries, using an 8800 and previously toting a 7290 around the world without a hitch. Still, as I get better on the iPhone keyboard I just need instant email, calendar, and contacts to slim down my gadget carrying requirements. To my delight the iPhone SDK roadmap presentation has brought all my needs into one iPhone update, I’m now counting down the days until I get that full ota hookup my Exchange server.
So I’ve had a cms project called Firework in progress for a number of years. We use this CMS for our 2 main websites, WDC and Wakeboard UK.
Originally we used ASP with Sql Server and MySql, we then migrated onto ASP.NET with SqlServer, and most recently we have switched to Ruby on Rails. This switch was born out of the requirement to reduce after-hours programming, and to increase the enjoyment of any such coding I get to do. Ruby on Rails gives you a certain freedom to cut code without the overheads of ASP.NET, and with that freedom comes fun
I’ve finally got round to setting up the Firework homepage after wrestling with setting up an Ubuntu VPS for the purpose configuring Apache, MySql, Ruby, Gems etc from scratch… ah the joys of deployment.
See what you think and any suggestions on Firework tweaks are most welcome.
I’m now the proud owner of a European iPhone after purchasing one on launch night from an O2 shop in Bristol. I didn’t fancy queing too much so grabbed a sandwich from M&S and sat on a bench near the less popular O2 shop tucked away down the end of the pedestrian area.
The O2 shop in the heated shopping centre had at least 10 people lined up but the one I was at only had a couple of people loitering around outside… doors opened just before the alotted time so I got in out of the cold and played with one of the demo iPhones before purchasing one as soon as they would let me. The O2 staff were very happy and helpfull, much to my surprise, and it was a bit like being in an Apple shop without all the hi-fives…
I’ve now had a couple of days to play with the phone and love it, it’s just a fantastic product and I’m already at the stage where I’m enjoying browsing the web and watching youtube clips without really thinking about the steps to get there… it just works and in a stylish and funky way. My Wakeboard.com website renders well though I’m thinking a bit of tweaking for the iPhone Safari browser would improve things and reduce the zooming you’d need to do. The forums also render fine if you go to widescreen mode by tipping the iPhone on it’s side. Wifi hookup is brilliant as you only enter your wifi key once and the iphone auto connects whenever you are in range. Not had a chance to test edge much but will do this week when I’m on the bus and wandering around town.
Keyboard wise I’m still a bit dubious as to whether the iPhone soft keyboard will match the speed I can use on my Blackberry but it does appear better than I expected so far so time will tell on that one.
Today the Nokia N81 and the Nokia Music Store launched Now the handset and store are public I can post up a few handy howtos to help out any other N81 owners out there.
In general the handset is pretty funky with super fast wifi, pretty fast 3g and a clear and powerful sounding media player. I love the quick hookup to wifi around town and the very capable browser. Downloading tracks from the Nokia Music Store is a snap and I was getting a single downloaded and play ing within 20-30 seconds on 3G whilst waiting for the bus.
One of the first things I did with the handset was to switch off the browser security warnings which slow you down when switching between secure and unsecure pages. It’s obviously handy to know this in case you are buying online but you generally know to check for a secure link on private and checkout pages so I prefer a few less clicks in general use over warnings every https switch. Your choice might be to stick with the warnings all the time for best security but if not here’s how to reduce the clickage.
Step 1: Open up the browser
Step 2: Navigate through the menu to:
Browser - Options - General - Security Warnings
Then set the Security Warnings to: Hide
Job done!
Please note:
This blog entry and all others posted on Nevill.net are the opinions of myself and not Nokia or any of my other clients. I’m posting using the blogging guidlines that Nokia suggest, more on my about page.
So the fiirst 2 macs upgraded without a hitch, my macbook and my father’s mac mini.
Mac number 3 didn’t however… The upgrade portion went fine but when it rebooted it appeared to pause with a blue screen with a cursor. A quick google returned a couple of forum postings and an official Apple help page suggesting a full ‘Archive and Install’ or a quick dip into the command line and the removal of a few dodgy APE files. I went for the second option and this resolved the issue, with a reboot presenting Leopard in all it’s glory.
The dodgy files were related to a preference pane utility which I must have put on there over the years… I guess it would have been nice for the install to warn about them but it was only a matter of minutes to retrofix the problem so no real harm.
One thing to note is that the Apple help page suggests the rm -rf followed by the long fullname of the files… I would recommend actually browsing to the file locations first before deleting them from their parent directories. This just reduces the risk of you nailing the wrong files if you mistype the rm command.
First impressions of Leopard are great, love the stacks and the improved finder. Coverflow is also a great way to work out what docs contain and I like the easier to navigate tree views.. Are the folders bigger? Maybe they just seam easier to click.
Other than that I’ll be looking forward to finding out the other bits as I use it… wonder how
