A Clean Internet Cafe
I’ve used Internet cafes all over the world from Morocco to Istanbul and from Naples to the Gambia.
There are certain characteristics that they all share; cigarette and other smoke, filth, surly operators and crap machines. Except possibly the one in Marrakech, which was kept spotless by a headscarfed and hennaed young lady of impeccable manners, who found it uncanny that my web site had pictures of me on it.
But this one, the Keystone Cafe, just up from King’s Cross Station has none of those nasty characteristics. The machine is a bog-standard Dell and even my typing isn’t that bad. Saying that I just hit the dreaded Windows key and got into a mess.
The Shambles of the Regional Fire Control Centres
NuLabor wanted to bring in a set of nine reginal control centres for the fire services across the country to replace 46 control rooms. That was the theory, but read this article in The Daily Telegraph, which details the shambles. The buildings are ready, but the software is not, so they are just standing idle and costing about £1.5 million a month.
I was alerted to this by an article on the BBC local news about the unused centre at Waterbeach. The new government is now saying that councils can opt out of the new centres. In a way, that is compounding the problem.
Surely, one of the main reasons for having a network of identical centres, is that this woulds mean that if say an operator had to move say to another part of the country, they could then be reemployed if necessary at another centre without retraining. I once met a doctor, whose wife was an ambulance controller. When he had moved to Cambridge, she had taken a year to be retrained because all the systems were different. That is rediculous, as we need standard systems for fire, police and ambulance all over the UK. I have heard reliable reports of Chief Constables, who want the best system money can buy, as long as no other force has it.
It should be one size that fits all! As an aside here, when we designed Artemis, there was essentially one system, that could manage projects ofd all sizes. You just specified it with bigger discs and more terminals for larger projects. But then we knew how to design systems properly so they worked. When I see the words government and computer system, because of my bad eyesight, I always read it as a gravy train to disaster.
So these fire control centres should be got up and running as soon as possible and if they are late then the contractors should be liable for the losses. I suspect though, that that is impossible, as the idiot who specified the system and wrote the contract forgot to put in a penalty clause. He or she should be fired! But they won’t be!
Yorkshire Loan Company
I’m not sure how these loan scams work, but I suspect they ask you for lots of up front fees and then charge you an exhorbitant interest rate. So there’s nothing unusual there.
24 Charlton Drive,
London, Glos GL53 8ES, UK.
Registration Number- PZ5407728.
License Number- 442874
Phone No:+447045705331
Fax: +448702885031Looking for a loan, borrow between £20,000 to £20,000,000.00.There’s no decision with a Decision Loan – considering we are able to help people. Our interest rates are some of the lowest in the business. Our friendly staff will handle your loan application without you having any problem.
It’s never been easier to apply to Easy Loans and arrange a loan to extend your house, buy a holiday home, get a new car or simply pay off all your existing debts. Remember, if you have previously been declined for a loan contact us today with the below information:
Full Names:
Country Of Resident:
Valid Cell Phone Number:
Age:Greetings,
Yorkshire Management
A few points :-
- Look for a start at the address, which says that London is in Gloucestershire.
- And then the phone number is one of those high cost 0704 numbers, which you should never phone.
- Licence is spelt the American way with an s.
- The consumer credit licence number may be valid and could relate to an outfit called 1-Click credit.com. Their site has the same Gloucestershire address, but no phone number or an e-mail address. I wouldn’t use them either for that reason.
So ignore ithis scam.
UAE to Ban Some Blackberry Services
I’ve never used a Blackberry, but I can understand why people do! I also didn’t know that they use their own method of encription for e-mail, which I would asume makes it fairly secure. Now according to the BBC, the UAE wants to ban these sort of services, because they can’t read e-mail sent between the devices.
It strikes me that if the UAE wants to be a business and holiday centre of choice, that this would not appeal to those, who they would wish to attract.
The Definitive Stroke-Friendly Keyboard Driver Specification
I have had further thoughts on this and one of my late son’s best friends has sent me an e-mail, describing the programming techniques that need to be employed. Unfortunately, his company don’t have the time to write the driver.
The objective is to write a driver similar to the one that comes with the Microsoft Wireless Comfort Keyboard 5000, which allows certain keystrokes to be disabled. The driver version is 6.0.6002.18005. When you install this driver it gives more details about the files involved.
But the ability to disable keystrokes needs to be extended.
- Microsoft allows you to disable a lot of keys, but I want to disable, such as control, Shift, Windows and Alt.
- In fact, I would like to be able to disable both left and right control and shift keys independently, as I sometimes find it easier to give up on my left hand completely and say do Shift-O, by spanning my right hand.
- I would also like to allow certain pairs of keys, like Control-C and Control-V, as I use them extensively to cut and paste.
- I think the Microsoft driver allows various profile of keystrokes to be setup, so that should be retained, so that if two users use the same machine, their optimum keystroke settings can be used.
There is an alternative approach to this driver, that I am investigating. The Microsoft Driver must store the list of key reassignments in the Registry. If I could find out how they do this, then I could write a Visual Basic 6 program to adjust that instead. That would in some ways be my preferred solution.
After all, there isn’t anything that a good Visual Basic 6 programmer can’t do! Microsoft know this and still use it to get themselves out of big holes. Otherwise, why would they have spent millions of dollars making sure that all Visual Basic 6 programs work on Vista and Windows 7? Not for charity for old farts like me!
I have made a bit of progress in this approach in that I have found where the Registry stores the settings. It is detailed on this web site.
The Power of the Internet
Wikileaks disclosure of what is really happening in Afghanistan and Iraq, may be embarrassing for those in politics, that think they know better, but it just shows the real power of the Internet.
So now if you have something important, that others might see as news, you can broadcast it with impunity and others can’t really stop you.
I am all for freedom of speech, so that if I want to say something like a certain footballer is complete rubbish, then I should have the right to say that. I have certain important topics that I want to speak out on like capital punishment, justice and injustice in certain countries, including the UK, religion, the environment etc. I feel I have the right to post on anything given that I don’t say something that is wrong, scientically incorrect, commercially sensitive or vindictive.
We will be seeing more leaks like these on the war and governments and companies, will have to get used to the fact, that some of their controversial documents will be posted by those who disagree with their policies. They will not be able to stop it!
The solution though is in their own hands.
Not by applying some draconian rules for their staff, but by performing sensible policies and actions in the first place.
As an example, let’s take the BP oil spill in the Gulf. Internal documents might show that engineers warned of the problem and suggested various actions, that were ignored by the company, their sub-contractors and government agencies. I’ve worked in factories, where such documents have existed and been ignored with fatal consequences.
A leaked document might have saved those lives.
Another Annoying Keystroke
When I blog, I use a lot of shrieks, as my father would have called them! Or exclamation marks as you would call them!
But if I hit Control-!, I get everything reformatted large. Is this a WordPress or Windows shortcut?
It is so infuriating! Especially as when I hit Control-Z to correct my mistake, I lose everything I have typed.
My typing seems to be getting better though, but it would be nice to have the new keyboard driver.
Saying Sorry
Camilla Cavendish hit the nail firmly on the head with her piece entitled Just say sorry, I promise I won’t sue you! in yesterday’s Times.
It makes a lot of difference and is so easy, especially with new technology. For instance, why not have a Sorry, your points are noted signature in your Outlook setup, so when someone e-mails you with a complaint about a late train, you can at least get the start of the reply right.
I recently made a complaint to O2 about the non-performance of the courier swapping a mobile phone. I Got a proper letter starting with a sorry, going through the problems with the courier and then ending with a thank you.
In fact, as they had my e-mail address, they didn’t actually need to write, so they obviously thought about their response.
i’ve also had an apology from my John Lewis Partnership card about the non-delivery of vouchers, as they are having troubles with the supplier. That came with 500 extra points.
So perhaps things are getting better.
I know that when I bump into people on the street because of my bad visibility because of the strokes I have had, I more often than not get a sorry in return. Often before I’ve spoken!
I hope so!
Let’s Have Some Simple Computing!
I am getting more and more fed up with computing.
A few days ago, I went back to the computer in my office, that hosts my favourite computing language, Visual Basic 6. How refreshing to use something that was designed for sensible and sane people to use? It doesn’t lead you down blind avenues, that have been dreamed up by nerds in Seattle or Mumbai, who have phDs in computing, but no experience of life.
Here are a few things that are annoying me at present.
- The keyboard driver still hasn’t materialised.
- Google maps used to be simple, but now it’s been loaded with so many features, that I don’t need, it doesn’t do the simple trhings quickly enough. For instance, I’ve just booked a B & B in Middlesbrough and want to print a map, which shows the route from the station. It doesn’t seem to drag like it used to after typing in the post code.
- Internet Explorer 8 greets me with a screen, which asks me if I’d like a tour of the new features. There is no button, to say, that I’m competent and would you please stop wasting my time.
- Java anf Flash always want to update themselves, but I don’t do this, as Java updates have caused me problems in the past. There is no way to say no!
- HP always want to check my computer. It works, so please leave it alone.
- Microsoft are always wanting me to use Bing. Why would I want to deal with a dead crooner? Does he sing you the results of the search?
I could go on, but I have better things to do!
Legal Highs
I don’t like drugs;prescription, legal or otherwise. I am on three drugs at the moment, warfarin to thin my blood, statins to stop my blood clotting and some tablets to reduce my hay fever. In a perfect society that is three too many.
There has been a report today about how dubious legal highs manufactured in China, sold on the Internet are now taken by millions of people.
Are people really that stupid to take such a substance?
I just typed “Legal Highs” into Google and I could easily buy enough dope to make an elephant fly!
The government is trying to find a way to ban them, but how do you ban something, when you don’t know what it is?
Somehow we must educate people that taking illegal substances and tobacco doesn’t do your health any good.
I also have read that Raoul Moat was a steriod abuser. Did that have any affect on his character and what he did? This article poses that question and provides a few answers.
The Anonymous Widower 