geek

Recently I upgraded my phone to a Nokia N81. I set up my Zyb account, and sync'd my contacts, and realised that I could not schedule syncs like I had with my SE w810i. Until this morning, when Russell pointed out on IRC that there was a tool for that exact thing: Swim is a utility for automatic periodic synchronization of data with internet servers. It is part of the opensource project called Bergemot. The only hurdle is that you have to get the SIS file signed by the Open Signed Online and when you install it you are presented with a warning that your phone may turn into a lump of metal because you are using Software In Development. Works fine for me though.

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In a week we are moving houses. We have a list of things that need to be sorted before we move. So, one of the things on the list is moving our phone line/ADSL. I have a one price ADSL from cybersmart so I can take advantage of their Night Rider plan. Little did I know, paying for our ADSL portion from another supplier was something Telkom Just Couldn't Handle during a transfer.

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Yesterday I posted about how a local web company recently sold the work of a well known, local, independent web professional. What they did broke netiquette, ethics, and definitely copyright law. Much geek froth and outrage occurred, and a tiny storm broke out on the internet. I jumped on the bandwagon with my post because:

1. I have SIWOTI syndrome
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I was excited this morning when I read on Green Cars about Optimal energy's re-designed website. They recently launched their electric car the 'Joule'. Except when I clicked through to the optimal energy site it looked awfully familiar. Apparently this didn't escape Damien Du Toit (the owner of the coda identity).

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So, I have been on teh internets for a while, I have been a member of many mailinglists, chatted on irc, etc. etc. So maybe I have a more attuned sense of the social norms of the internet. Years ago a bunch of script kiddies had a mailing list called KiDDiESoc, KiDDiESoc was great, at it's peak it had traffic in the region of 100 messages per day. Between maybe 15 people. Many of these messages were what can only be called spam. Spam and baggy pantsing. We had arguments about top, bottom, and inline posting.

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I have a little theory I have been working on, it is probably dead obvious to some people, but it only crystalised in my head relatively recently. I have had a few ideas in my time (so far none have made it to the real world), and in mentally stepping through these ideas I have started to refine my methods of evaluating an idea. One of the mental tests I have been using recently is:

Does this idea:

1. Help some business/cross section of people do what they do, more efficiently/economically?
2. Would the technology associated to my idea help me act more efficiently in an environment of competition?
3. Or, does this idea earn me income by facilitating other people earning income

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Because I am on the internet, and because the apps I use offer statistics, I figure I would share some of them, feel free to do the same, if you feel the urge.

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Hi, I have a demonstrably repeatable problem which keeps cropping up at around 7:30am every morning (and at other sporadic times). So far, as best as I can understand, the problem is triggered by putting the ProNutro in my breakfast bowl (I have tried multiple bowls and still have the same show-stopper). Once I have added the ProNutro I add the milk, but I can only estimate how much I need, based on how much ProNutro I have put in. I assume everything is alright, because the bowl holds the milk and powder correctly, there is no visible overflow.

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I recently upgraded to Ubuntu 8.04 (Hardy Heron). I was pleasantly surprised when Firefox 3 greeted me as the default browser, but then hit a few speed bumps. Being a web developer I constantly use tools like firebug and MeasureIt. Unfortunately, until Firefox 3 is widespread (and released), many extensions don't work (there are hacks, but they come with problems).

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Hi,

The improvements to internet banking have some bugs, it seems.

I have had the experience twice now during "once off payments" that I get an error of "Internet banking is currently unavailable" when I go through with a transaction. It seems to be related to sending payment confirmations. It is bad behaviour because the transaction goes through, but the user (me) does not get a valid indication the payment has succeeded until a notification (sms, or email) comes through, or manually checks if there is a mention on the account transacted from/to.

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