Saturday, January 28, 2006
- Article looking at why robot technology doesn't seem to have taken off as noticeably as IT
- Wowsers! Research suggests as many as 1 in 12 men in Ireland carry the genes of Niall of the Nine Hostages...
Friday, January 27, 2006
BBC News article on the dilemma faced by 'the international community' over Hamas.
The US government claims to want democracy to spread across the Middle East. So... A political party convincingly wins an election in the Middle East, and the US government responds by demanding that said political party change various core elements of the manifesto on which it was elected. Huh? What bizarre new sense of the word democracy is this?
If the citizens of a country vote for a party you don't like, that's their choice. Don't go blaming the party for standing for election. If you don't like it, blame the voters.
The US government claims to want democracy to spread across the Middle East. So... A political party convincingly wins an election in the Middle East, and the US government responds by demanding that said political party change various core elements of the manifesto on which it was elected. Huh? What bizarre new sense of the word democracy is this?
If the citizens of a country vote for a party you don't like, that's their choice. Don't go blaming the party for standing for election. If you don't like it, blame the voters.
- The update channel for Firefox (and, I think, Thunderbird too) can be set to 'beta' or 'release' with a very simple edit to a prefs file
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
- The Carbon Trust, which helps firms develop low-emission technologies, has urged the government to increase support for wave and tidal concepts. Wave and tidal power could provide a fifth of the UK's electricity needs, according to their report.
- Scientists have discovered the smallest known fish on record in the peat swamps of the Indonesian island of Sumatra.
Saturday, January 21, 2006
Stuff in my head
Discovered I can't use get_browser() because browscap is at too high a level for ini_set() (and I don't have access to php.ini because it's a shared server). Arse. I'll either have to carry on with phpSniff, or knock up a function of my own.
I put my black leather coat up for auction on eBay. It sold for £67.43 (exc. delivery) which seemed a tad better than a poke in the eye with a blunt cheese. How wrong I was, dear Reader. The winning bidder was some tit of a Yank who clearly thinks 'will only ship in the UK' means that I'll be happy to send a large heavy box by airmail to Philadelphia for £4.97. Since said Tit has completely ignored my attempts to contact him over the past few days, I've now offered the item to the second-placed bidder (fortunately only a couple of quid lower). Arse.
Some friends of my dad's have decided that they want to get a computer (having never used one before in their lives!). Rather than have them get ripped off at PCWorld, I've volunteered to build them a system. My budget is around about a grand. The challenge is to give them a setup that does exactly what they want, but which won't be scary in any way. I'd love to use Linux as the OS, but I fear that, although open-source has made great strides in user-friendliness over the past five years, it's probably still to scary for the complete novice. It'll be fun!
I put my black leather coat up for auction on eBay. It sold for £67.43 (exc. delivery) which seemed a tad better than a poke in the eye with a blunt cheese. How wrong I was, dear Reader. The winning bidder was some tit of a Yank who clearly thinks 'will only ship in the UK' means that I'll be happy to send a large heavy box by airmail to Philadelphia for £4.97. Since said Tit has completely ignored my attempts to contact him over the past few days, I've now offered the item to the second-placed bidder (fortunately only a couple of quid lower). Arse.
Some friends of my dad's have decided that they want to get a computer (having never used one before in their lives!). Rather than have them get ripped off at PCWorld, I've volunteered to build them a system. My budget is around about a grand. The challenge is to give them a setup that does exactly what they want, but which won't be scary in any way. I'd love to use Linux as the OS, but I fear that, although open-source has made great strides in user-friendliness over the past five years, it's probably still to scary for the complete novice. It'll be fun!
Thursday, January 19, 2006
- Until now I've been using phpSniff for browser/OS detection on joncoe.me.uk. I'm going to try using PHP's own get_browser() function instead, since that ought to be a lot more efficient. This chap kindly provides up-to-date browscap.ini files.
Saturday, January 07, 2006
- A group at the US National Cancer Institute has published the results of a study into the ancestral relationships of the cat family
- Because their sweet-receptor genes are faulty... Glad mine aren't!
Monday, January 02, 2006
Happy New Year!
Despite the oddness of the number (2006=2*17*59), I think this is going to be a good year. Wedding preparations will be the main focus for the first quarter. Still quite a bit to organise (and pay for!). I'm going to be measured up for a suit today (courtesy of pater).
Do I have any resolutions? Perhaps to learn Arabic this year. I think the prospect of a trip to Syria or Dubai (now that I can respectably meet the in-laws) will get me going with the language.
Despite the oddness of the number (2006=2*17*59), I think this is going to be a good year. Wedding preparations will be the main focus for the first quarter. Still quite a bit to organise (and pay for!). I'm going to be measured up for a suit today (courtesy of pater).
Do I have any resolutions? Perhaps to learn Arabic this year. I think the prospect of a trip to Syria or Dubai (now that I can respectably meet the in-laws) will get me going with the language.
