Even compared to my usual crazy of this country, the past month and a bit has been off the scale. To the point where I have not been able to keep up with the personal emails or usual phone calls. Sorry about that if I have overlooked you…..
I hope that things will settle down a little when I get back.
Get back?
Yes, we (Opto 22) are launching our Energy Monitoring solution at a trade show next week in Santa Clara.
Myself, Benson and Arun are going up for most of the week. (We leave Monday and get home late Thursday night).
Its my first trade show, so I am pretty interested to see how it all goes together.
So, yes, it means that I might not be able to post a picture each day while I am gone, but I will take my camera and be sure and take at least a few photos a day.
Look for them when I get back.
Kinder.
While driving to work (listening to the AM band) I heard something that I wish I had time to check out and see how accurate it is…. Apparently there is a push to raise the age of kindergarten kids here in the USA from 4 to 5. The reason? The reporter said that since kindergarten has become more about standardized testing, the younger kids are having trouble couping with it…. Wow. Mind you, if my experience of life here in the USA is anything to go by (which its not), I can believe it. They really do teach the kids to be go-go-go from an early age here…… Sad.
Web browsers.
Its a pain the butt having so many different standards. What works on the iphone does not work on the Android is my biggest gripe this time.
They both claim to use webkit, but their implementation is very different. Not only but also, the iphone browser supports scalable vector graphics (SVG), but the Android does not.
I’m not entirely sure that HTML 5 is going to sort it out either.
One thing is for sure, the smart phone / portable computer area is hotting up with the whole Apple/Google/Microsoft rivalry. Which is sort of a good thing for us all.
Facebook.
I am not on facebook for a few reasons. The biggest reason that I am happy to share with you is because that the site is just awful to both look at and use.
I look over Freddys shoulder and shudder. How in the world it ever became so popular is a feat that even the Apple marketing department must be in awe of.
It’s very clunky, convoluted and cluttered interface is just painful to use….. But I digress…. I wanted to mention that I have noticed (even with how busy I have been, which is saying how much this has been pushed over here) how much press facebook is getting over its privacy settings….. all 127 of them. It would seem that the dogs breakfast their main user interface is extends into their settings…..
Of course the other thing that is coming out in droves is all the stories about how people are getting knocked back on jobs or fired from jobs based on what they are saying on facebook.
I was bemused to hear (on AM again…. loving that band) that even the courts are now using facebook… How? They are looking up jurors for major court cases and seeing if there is anything about the person in there that might sway the case or make them unsuitable to sit on the jury. Also banks are doing the same thing before they lend any money to the person. While these were the only two mentioned on the program, I can only assume that this sort of thing must be going on like crazy in a wide range of areas.
The difference is being clearly made that some things are accepted as public, this blog for example, while some things are assumed to be private. Facebook chats and postings for example. The problem is that because of a large range of reasons, right from the poor interface, to facebook don’t want you to have your posts private so they can make money off selling your thoughts, what you say on facebook thinking that it is private is often public with out you knowing.
Bottom line of the lawyer that was being interviewed, if you put it on the net, its up to you to ensure that its private or public, not some third party (like facebook). Oh, and lastly, if you decided that you want out of facebook, please Google how to really shut your account down…. Its not that easy it by the sounds of it…..
(Side thought; I know I am often very selective about what I say on this blog, I am wondering if I should keep it going, or if its going to bite me somehow in the future……)
Computers.
I have gone back to Linux for the moment, but of course all the things that caused the Windows7 blip last week remain.
I did some Googling around and it seems that Ubuntu Studio changed a great many things under the bonnet (hood to you yanks).
Thus I am thinking of tossing that and going to just straight Ubuntu 10.04. It is their latest long term support version, so I will get at least 3 years from it.
We are going to try and standardize on 10.04 Server at work for the Energy platform, so it would be good to be all on the same page there as well.
By the sounds of it, a great many of my problems (CD burning, sharing drives and sound on YouTube) should go away with that version.
Not only but also, my good mate Gary has given me some multi-CPU hope by telling me about a virtual computer platform that he has been using.
By the sounds of it, I should be able to run Ubuntu and Windows side by side and gain all the benefits from each with out the infighting that I saw a few weeks back.
The one question that needs to be answered before I can start down that path is if the virtual machine will let Linux see the underlying hardware of the host computer. Gary is running some tests for me to answer that question. I really hope that it works as it sounds like the perfect solution for me….. Using the right tool for the job!
Ok, well, there are a few other things on my mind, but thats enough for now.
Will try and tweet (micro blog) while I am away, so look for it on the top left –> –^ and see yas when I get back.
Chow for now.
