The pundits on zdnet are flooding us with “news” on Windows Blue to no end - Microsoft’s marketing department is doing overtime buying hope for disappointed Windows 8 users.

Wait until dark, dark as where MS should put anything related to Metro into.

I have used professionally anything from Win 3.1, 95, Me, NT, 2000, XP and Vista and was happy with it (err, please exclude Me). I forgave it to not offer a shell like bash/csh/tcsh because they all did a wonderful job to what the have been designed for and what the user expected… (To give credit to Win 7: good friends assured me that it is indeed the logical step to go from XP via Vista with keeping only the best of them)

Windows 8 might do what it is designed for, but fails on the user expectation. I have a Nokia 920 and I keep it ONLY because the camera is so good. The OS is (almost) unbearable. If I was a phone “power-user” it would have been sent back to Amazon immediately. Usability is unspeakable - I use it in parallel a HTC Sensation and I catch myself using this older phone (smaller, inferior screen) instead of my shiny new 920: Because every single piece of software sucks. I haven’t found a single app for WP 8 that comes even close to the Android equivalent. Anyway, the camera on this phone is really good, so good that I even forgive the blind monkey who programmed its software, which subtracts 10 points of the possible quality of the hardware. 

I use a Nikon D800e as my principal imaging device - if the firmware was that bad as in the 920 I would exchange it with a D90 without compensation without any hesitation. This is how bad it is. Don’t tell me Nokia sucks, MS bought themselves into it, my N8 beats this “software” by a mile

Back to “real Windows 8″

I know, I suck at UI design. I know because I recognize poor design when I look at mine, but from MS I expected better. If everything is such a FU like I produce, why buying an OS? First in W8 is Metro.

After you found a way to show a desktop. Finally your 27″ screen makes sense …. until you open Skype. The preinstalled Skype switches to the Metro app, you have to be almost an detective to find the download to the desktop app - I really spend hours to explain it to engineers who got trapped on the skype site. 

Why you need Skype on the desktop?  For example to talk with a workmate about a pdf you both have just received - f?#k pdfs also open as a Metro app, so uninstall this as well and replace it with the normal Adobe Reader (I am wondering if installing the full Adobe suite will do this automatically or if each “final preview” will throw you back to the tiles). Two nowdays essential apps “fubar” - in literal sense. 

It might be that many users are fine with this, but please Microsoft: If this is the case, please rethink your version policy: Make W8RT for tablets that nobody will use after seeing an iPad/Nexus device (sales ~ 0). Make a Win 8 classic edition (sales unknown, ask marketing to get wrong estimates) and a Win8 XP edition for those how actually use a computer and know what it is good for (sales >>> OSX).

Currently Microsft only offers the first two choices, thus I have to get a Mac (Lightroom doesn’t run on Linux…) when my 4 year old Vista machine goes south - I will pay happily $1000 for overpriced Apple hardware before I will spend $0 on using Win 8 on a machine I pay for.

OK, this is a rant, a rant of someone who directly accounted for 5-digit direct sales for MS and 6-digits indirect sales. Correct that, some of the organizations I had in mind already switched to Linux, I can’t go there, I am (still) a faithful Adobe customer (Adobe, how long do you thing I will go through the pain of using 2nd or 3rd rate OSes?)

PS: Solaris Rules! (no irony)  

I recently added a Synology 411 NAS to my gear. Running in RAID 5 to have a good compromise between data safety and speed.

As easy as it is to set up such a NAS, to get it work in simple home network with full performance is less trivial.

My internet access is via a Netgear modem/switch. Sleak device that works perfectly with my 100Mbit fiber connection (thanks numericable).

Problem: Such switches are 100MB only, so the NAS attached via this switch tops out at 10Mbyte/sec - disappointing.

Solution: Get a Gigabit switch. I opted for a Netgear GS 605 which supports 9K Jumbo frames. So I cabled the modem, the NAS and my computer to the switch. Then I activated Jumbo frames 9k on my network card and on the NAS. Much better speed, around 35MByte/sec.

Not the end of the story: With these settings I wasn’t able to connect to facebook anymore, all browsers timed out. Facebook doesn’t like big frames. So to access FB I would have to deactivate Jumbo Frames again… Jumbo Frames might also impair performance of VoIP, etc. - the normal internet connection is set for MTUs of 1500 or even lower.

Solution: Get a second network card. If your computer already has a Gigabit Ethernet which supports 9K Jumbo Frames, get the cheapest you can find. The new card will become the internet gateway.

After installing the new card, connectit directly to the modem/router. This is important, because it will then run in 100MB mode. This will make Windows prefer the 1GB card if it can resolve a peer via that connection.

With this connection I got over 65MByte/sec from the NAS - good.

Last tuning step: Make sure that the GB connection will not be used for internet connections: Go the properties of the GB connection and select the IPv4 compenent and open its properties. Select using a fixed IP and enter an address like 192.168.0.201 and no default gateway. 201 is outside the DHCP range I configured in my router.

Now everything works as expected, hope this is helpful for you

Not serious, but there seems to be a bug in the view count which can be exploited:

1. Go to Google translate 
2. Set source language to the language you use on a photo page on Flickr
3. Set target language to something different
4. Paste the URL of your photo page in the into the input field
5. Clicke Translate
6. Click refresh as many times you want - each click seems to be counted as two views

I discovered this in my stats where a completely boring shot appeared with 30+ views

I haven’t looked very closely, but if anyone know how to report this to flickr, please let me know.

This is an old one (rooted in the 40ies) Kelly’s 14 Rules

Well in a nutshell, there are The Agilists (and as they are very smart people they already noticed themselves)

Anyway, I came across these rules by some pointless surfing and was struck by the resemblance and the difference to what I know about Agile. So I began dissecting them in my mind and to help myself putting some order into it - and to share it with you - I am writing something down

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Oh je - ein Betriebssystem ohne Browser.

Es ist nicht Microsofts böser Wille, was hätten sie den tun sollen ALLE Browser mitliefern oder über ein Bootstrap-Menü anbieten - schwer möglich, da sie mit Sicherheit irgendeinen Exoten vergessen würden und die anderen über den Listenplatz prozessieren würden wie Politiker vor einer Wahl.

Ah, ein randomisiertes Menü - natürlich nicht mit gewichteten Wahrscheinlichkeiten (Browser mit hohem Marktanteil werden tendeziell nach vorne gestellt), weil das ja  bestehende Verhältnisse befördern würde.

Ich  mache mir allerdings wirklich Sorgen über den Präzedenzfall, denn dieses Verfahren schafft. Windows 8 dann ohne “Explorer”, damit “Norton Commander” wieder mehr Kunden findet? Keine Firewall mehr, sodass die vage Hoffnung der User kaufe eine andere die Ausbreitung von Trojanern fördert?

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 The Google AppEngine opens up for Java. Python is a great language, but still a nice-language (compared to Java). A light-weight alternative to host Jav-applications in the cloud.

What some might have guessed is now official?: Twitter is doing its heavy lifting with Scala We don’t have to feel bad anymore to do write statically typed code:-)

Wieviel Millionen MP3s und Filme “getauscht” werden ist unerheblich, man kann auch darüber streiten, ob kostenlose Downloads gar den Konsum von Bezahlmedien stimulieren.

Dennoch, Regierungen - wohl auch unter dem Druck der Lobbiesten der Medienindustrie versuchen Gesetze wie IPRED und Hadopi zu installieren, die in ihren Auswirkungen auf die Meinungs- und Informationsfreiheit mehr als fragwürdig sind.

Hadopi geht noch etwas weiter als IPRED: Wer dreimal beim downloaden erwischt wird bekommt eine Internetsperre (Hausarrest). Dabei gilt die Verfolgung der IP-Adresse, also ist jeder für die Sicherung seines WiFi-Routers verantwortlich, oder er akzeptiert eine Schnüffelprogramm der französischen Regierung zu installieren! Das Gesetz heisst übrigens “Gesetz zum Schutz des Internets und der Kreativität” und pikanterweise wird die Überwachung privaten Organisation der Medienindustrie überlassen. Niemand hat das Recht zu erfahren welche Daten an diese Organisationen übermittelt werden und aufgrund welchen “illegalen Aktes” eine Sperre ausgesprochen wird.

Fairerweise muss man sagen, dass das Gesetz auch gewisse Verpflichtungen für die Medienindustrie im Bezug auf digitale Veröffentlichungen beinhaltet (DVD in 4 Monaten nach Filmstart, etc.), allerdings ohne Sanktionen zu definieren…

Nun werden viele nicht davon ab lassen wollen ihre amerikanischen Soaps im Original sehen zu wollen ohne auf die grauslich synchronisierte (ich lebe in Frankreich) Fernsehausstrahlungen zu warten (isch habe gar keine Fernseher, Madame) oder gar 70€ für ein paar DVDs zu bezahlen die ein Jahr später erscheint. Desweiteren mag man sich kaum noch im Internet bewegen, wenn man nicht weiss wer alles mitliest.

Die Macher von PirateBay haben daher IPREDator ersonnen, ein VPN-service der es unmöglich macht einen Download einer realen IP zuzuordnen. Verfolgende Behörden/Organisationen können dann nur noch mit einem blossem Verdacht eine Hausdurchsuchung mit Beschlagnahme der Computer beantragen - was wohl in den meisten Fällen als unverhältnismässig abgelehnt werden wird.

Ironie der Geschichte: IPREDator is kostenpflichting (5€/Monat), schliesslich muss die Infrastruktur und Bandbreite irgendwie bezahlt werden, also wird jemand an diesen Gesetzen verdienen und mit Sicherheit wird ein guter Teil der Kunden Urheberrechtsverletzer sein. Also kreieren IPRED & Co ein Geschäftsmodell auf der Basis von “illegalen Downloads”.

Man schätzt 7-60 Millionen Euro die als Kosten für die frz. Internetprovider entstehen, wieviel die Hadopi-Behörde verschlingen wird, die bis zu 3000 Warnungen und 1000 Sperren täglich aussprechen soll staht noch in den Sternen

Haven’t found anything on the net, and HP support page isn’t helpful…

The situation: The status of the local connection shows 10Mbit/s as does the networl tab of the task-manager.

1. As always, get the new latest drivers.
2. Create a restore point unless you like the walk on the wild side
3. After the install finishes the Task Manager shows 1Gbit/s -disconnected
4. Deactivate the network card in the device manager
5. Activate it

Now you should get the full speed (100Mbit in my case)

After a Windows update it insists on a restart, very annoying if you want to finish something first.

So you click “Restart Later”

But it comes back every few minutes (Vista allows there a more elaborate reaction).

By accident I found a way to get rid of it:

• Open TaskManager
• find explorer.exe process
• click End Process
• confirm the warning
• File->New Task
• enter “explorer”
• OK

Windows starts a new  explorer and every is as before, but it “forgets” to remind you to restart … nice “bug” in XP SP2 (haven’t tried it with SP3, yet)

Sorry I have to get loose a rant

Both “tools” are complete crap. If you are just one inch off the line - nothing works and you find yourself working from workaround to workaround (because you discover another bug/limitation)

Nexus is perhaps the worst part - they are now at beta 5.1 or already 5.2  when I finished writing this. They keep adding features instead of making the 1.0 stable.  This is all but professional. La merde bien epaisse qui pue. I have never seen any open source project that uses a M$ tactic before - well, we never stop learning, do we?

Maven itself, yes if all is is standard Maven it might work, but beware to  have something that is not following the Maven “standard” - it becomes an “usine à gaz”.   There are too many caveats, limitations to make it usable for anything that is a bit more complicated - ever had a task that creates more than one artifact? - have fun to  use all of them without intermediate artifacts where dependency mangement is - well nightmare is an euphemism for that.

Sorry, these two are not for me - if you like looking at meaningless logs and masturbate on them, feel free to give it a try.

</rant>