We’ve had a laptop on order since early July (paid for then I believe) & they have just put the delivery date back to November. Taking Moore’s Law as computer performance doubling every 18 months we can assume it’s going  to be less than state of the art by the time it arrives. Obviously it would have been quicker and cheaper to buy from ebay, at this rate second hand from ebay would have been more up to date.

That’s from DELL by the way, just in case you were thinking of placing an order (DELL in case you missed it). The other half dozen bits of kit ordered at the same time did turn up within just a few weeks of the order (speedy - relatively) but in 3 different deliveries. They can afford to waste money on carriers with the cash they are making on our laptop.

The Today prog had an article on allergies in which they talked about how it made lives difficult and in some circumstances could be life threatening. As I understand it there are 20+ deaths every year in the UK alone (could be a lot more *).

Saxondale - how good is that program? I’ve only managed to catch the last couple of weeks of this series but it is gooooood. Last week I was spooked by one of his mannerisms as I thought “oh I forgotten he did that” and then “or is it him that does that or xxxxxx?” He is astoundingly like someone I work with.

This week I was just inordinately pleased to hear chunks of Argus by Wishbone Ash being played throughout the program. 70’s classic rock - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hg6zqejXvqI

And a sitcom where the hero doesn’t lose every week is such a rarity I was working on writing one myself!

Saxondales views on DJ’s

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMPc4Q3AHcQ&mode=related&search=

Everyone in the office is watching the football (women’s world cup

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/match_of_the_day/default.stm

and click watch if there is a match on)

The trouble is we are all getting different feed rates - yesterday was OK I was ahead but today I am a good 10 seconds behind. So as they are placing the ball for the free kick / corner / … I get to hear “ooo” or “rubbish” as others in the office see the resultant shot - which rather ruins the suspense.

If you’re interested using Real Player seems to give you a few seconds on Media Player but I can’t get real player on my second monitor and I am trying to do some work so I need my primary monitor to look at code on.

Actually my monitors are the other way round - surely Real Player isn’t only working on my secondary monitor? I’ll investigate further.

My daughter (the one off to uni) had to do a presentation to The Rotary Club after they sponsored her on a training course. She has been working long hours so there is some excuse for still working on it the evening before it was to be presented at a breakfast meeting. However, as she was stressy, tired and ill and I was also was tired (I’ve not been working long hours, just watching too much Heroes catch up) so we started rowing before we even got load it on my laptop. I was keen to show her how the laptop worked, she had better things to do and “you just click a button”. Eventually we did load it - via a USB key as she a) hadn’t bothered to put it on a shared area of the drive and b) had nicked the network cable to copy music onto the PC she’s taking to uni. It didn’t work.

I spent some time showing her how to setup and use the twin head facilities - using the monitor from her uni PC. However, I couldn’t get a preview and slide screen to work in Open Office and as I didn’t have a network cable I couldn’t google. So we gave up on that and ran it on duplicate screens. The animations didn’t work. Mutter, mutter “told you open office was crap” etc. Saved it from Open Office & tried again - no good. Saved it from Power Point as a slide show, still no good. Discussed re-doing it all in Open Office), much muttering, installed Power Point, still no animations. Oh, it’s a old file… So if you’re wondering Open Office does the animations fine and imports them fine just as long as you use a version of the presentation that has them in. (There a couple it doesn’t support I believe but they are best not used anyway.)

Anyway it’s all working so she can do a test run and then to bed - but the uni PC needs turning off and we’ve borrowed the monitor and I’m using it to test Open Office. The power switch will instigate a shut down but that’s not needed as she pulls the mains out anyway. “You just get a blue screen that you ignore”. I’m sure she got an A in ICT A level - what do they teach them?

This morning, 7:30 the phone rings. “Can’t get it to work. Won’t show the slides”. Mutter, mutter “what’s on the projector?” “just blue”. Turns out the projector is so designed as to unplug itself when standing at certain angles “they usually get someone to hold it”. All sorted. 9:30 phone rings, “it didn’t work”. Having set it up they went for breakfast - bad move, the laptop went to sleep and it doesn’t like waking up . Now I come to think about it this happened to me first time I met my latest boss, I just waffled for the several minutes whilst it powered down and back up. The problem being that powering it down while the presentation is open tends to leave it locked / knackered. She had to waffle whilst Rotarians tried to figure out what was happening “This is a very old laptop…”

So, lessons learnt for presentations:

a) Never rely on the technology - some printed thumbnails of the slides / a script would have helped as a backup

b) Don’t piss off the techies - as we nearly weren’t speaking to each other she’d have found it harder to get as far as she did (in this case it would have saved some time and had the same result mind you)

c) Don’t blame the tools - Open Office wasn’t to blame

d) Use things you trust - Open Office wasn’t to blame but because we blamed it we wasted a lot of time

e) It always takes longer than you think to set up

f) Don’t use cheap / old kit off ebay - unless you have to and then make sure you know what you’re doing!

g) Be clear in your requests - “Have we got a laptop I can use for the presentation?” Yes, “Have we got a reliable laptop with Power Point?” Apparently not.

Comparisons between Northern Rock & Mary Poppins (the kids wanting their 2d (2p for youngsters) back starting a run on the bank) are abounding but where are the comparisons to It’s a Wonderful Life when Jimmy Stewart explains why people shouldn’t ask for all their money when it’s invested in people’s houses?

If everyone takes their money out how can the bank function? But if I had money in there I’d want it out because while there is the smallest question of its being lost why leave it there? Or more to the point why should I leave it there - obviously everyone else should

Surely it has got to be worth Northern Rock offering a bonus to anyone who leaves their money with them. While it’s a 1,000,000 to 1 that the money will be lost why should I take even a 1,000,000 to 1 chance unless there’s a return. Even a 1%bonus is worth a 1,000,000 to 1 risk (I guess technically a .000011% bonus is worth it). Yes it would cost the bank but surely losing all their investors is costing even more?

I’ve been setting up a machine for my daughter to take to university and have been looking at what to install. She’ll need some form of Office package. Obviously I have access (not Access) to all kinds of software but without legal licences for her to use. I was encouraging her to use Open Office (as I do at home) but apart from it being that little bit different she is put off by the name “open” doesn’t that mean other people can change it? I don’t want my work open to others. Did I mention she was going to university? She isn’t really as stupid as that comment makes her sound. Anyway the other option (apart from the obvious illegal one and the one that should be obvious but somehow isn’t - ie buying MS Office) is to get a student edition - MS have for years provided cheap licences for students. I have been trying to find out how to get one.

Google “Microsoft student” or “educational” turns up Amazon references to Encarta, the Nation Union of Students site search for Microsoft came up with “how to get a job at MS”. Then, just as I was looking for my Open Office install disks along came http://www.computershopper.co.uk/shopper/news/124820/students-get-office-2007-ultimate-for-39.html

(IT Pro sister mag, I’m sure IT Pro will cover it soon)

The only problem is you need a .ac email which she won’t have until next week. I’m installing the trial version and hopefully she can get the key then.

The advantage to MS is obvious, if they didn’t provide cheap ones students could easily share versions and are not likely to be paying the £400 for a retail one anyway. And it is important that students use your software. In a few years they will be buying and specifying for industry and they’ll want what they know. Cheap copies for students should reap benefits in futre sales.

I’ve installed http://cdburnerxp.se/ for CD/DVD burning (the used DVD burner from ebay came without s/w), http://free.grisoft.com/ for anti virus so all in all it’s been pretty cheap so far.

What someone needs to do is set up a site with a complete set of software for students (or links to). Why the NUS aren’t doing this I don’t know - or maybe I missed it. If you know of one please leave a comment with a link.

Actually a site with profiles (home user, small business, student, silver surfer, gamester, school kids, pre-school) and suggested packages would be a useful - is there one?

http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/124042/privacy-fears-as-facebook-makes-member-listings-public.html

Excuse me but aren’t they only making the listing public (ie available to search engines) if you have your profile set to public - ie anyone can log on to facebook and search for you? And you have a month to ask them not to. If you have your settings to private (people can’t access you from a facebook search) they won’t publish your details(*) to google et al.

They aren’t crossing any privacy lines here, just making it one click easier to find people - you can search from google rather than from facebook.

Have I missed something or is lovely old PC Pro slipping into the Daily Mail “scare stories sell” mode? I do hope not!

(* details - just a link to your facebook entry - no actual information!)

I don’t often read The Door these days (just because it is very American) but this is a good one

http://www.wittenburgdoor.com/newsletter/index.html