Showing posts with label opinion. Show all posts
Showing posts with label opinion. Show all posts

Friday, January 25, 2008

Top 5 Videoclips

Gonçalo Viana got this meme type of thing going on were you are supposed to list your 5 favourite video clips, and since it was an open invitation I decided to take him on. Kinda. I made a point of choosing only one clip by artist (or else this would have been a NIN only party) ,also I had to love the song itself and finally they should be listed in no special order.

And the winners are:

Tool - AEnema


Einstürzende Neubauten - Sabrina


Nine Inch Nails - Closer


Recoil - Strange Hours


Queens of The Stone Age - Go With The Flow

Tuesday, January 22, 2008

O Meo é maior que o teu (1).

A boa noticia é que, após quatro meses, já tenho TV e Net e Telefone. Mais propriamente adquiri o serviço Meo, o triple play da moda. Obrigado á CML e a PT por terem unido esforços e tirado o prédio onde moro da idade das trevas.

A oferta prometia, até porque as medições indicam que disponho dos 16 Mb de ligação, que seria o valor recomendado, mas na verdade apresenta algumas falhas. Nem todas elas relacionadas com o débito de rede. Não nos devemos esquecer que se trata de um produto algo novo no mercado e talvez daqui a uns tempos a qualidade melhore. Só podemos esperar.

Decidi fazer a minha própria critica ao produto uma vez que parece quase impossivel encontrar informação isenta e com algum espirito critico sobre o Meo, a menos que contem com um post ocasional de um empregado do Sapo, ou aquele flog do "omeumeo" que parece ter sido inventado pelo mesmo tipo do segredo vodafone, porque me parece algo..hummm fake. As minhas desculpas se de facto houver um blogger anónimo que avisa a "malta" para problemas com a facturação.

Para dourar a pilula incluo também alguns comentários sobre a qualidade do "networking stack" do Leopard porque dizem que um mal nunca vem só ;o)

- A oferta de canais disponiveis no serviço 30+10 (penso que é o base) é virtualmente igual aos de todos os outros operadores no mercado. Incluido no pacote vem, no entanto, um canal em HD sem qualquer programação de interesse mas que ainda assim vale a pena ver pela qualidade da imagem. Isto, claro, se tiverem uma TV com capacidade para tal.

- A qualidade do router é simpatica. Aparentemente o Leopard é que não gosta muito do wireless porque quando abro o Mail e o Safari em simultâneo, regra geral, perco a ligação. E a imagem da TV. Aborrecidito no minimo.

Pior mesmo é que qualquer site que eu tenha tentado visitar aquando do erro deixa de ficar acessivél, pois mesmo após reabrir o Safari, ou abrir um browser diferente, ou mesmo re-iniciar a maquina (old habits) continuo a receber uma página de "Resolution Successful"...Nota mental: Redefinir o conceito de "Success".

Para resolver a situação é preciso fazer uma limpeza ao cache do felino mais tosco da familia. Já agora, e antes que perguntem.... dscacheutil -flushcache

- Por defeito, ou seja, quando o técnico instalador sai da casa do cliente, a rede wireless faz broadcast do SSID apesar de contar apenas com WEP como medida de segurança. Para alterar estes "pormenores" basta abrir um browser, depois de autenticado na rede, e ir a http:\\home .Ou então http://ip-do-router/xslt?PAGE=J46&THISPAGE=J01&NEXTPAGE=J46 se gostarem de ver mais opções no menu. :o)


- A box com o disco rigido é barulhenta até quando está em stand-by o que me parece estranho, mas segundo o suporte técnico é assim mesmo. A segunda box já não é tão barulhenta, mas também não tem um disco lá dentro, não é?

- A funcionalidade de agendar a gravação de conteudos é desaproveitada porque, como se sabe, raramente a programação dos canais é mantida, pelo que o mais normal será perderem uns minutos do programa. De resto é algo inovador. Se bem que parece que me lembro de em tempos ter havido uns leitores de vhs que também faziam isso.

- A possibilidade de ver os incorrigiveis directa e gratuitamente na TV. Adorei! Parabéns! Se a resolução pudesse ser um pouco melhor ficava perfeito.

- O Video On Demand, apesar de me parecer uma boa ideia ainda não experimentei. Mas gostei de ver a possibilidade de alugar conteudos para adulto. Poderá evitar alguns constrangimentos aos mais timidos... ou "torrent impaired".

Adicionalmente, o Meo oferece um filme por mês para atrair os clientes a este serviço tipo videoclube. Mas, para já, a oferta pareceu-me fraca. Será uma questão de mentalidade, mas não vou experimentar um serviço (mesmo gratuito) se a oferta não me apela minimamente. Quem pensou esta estratégia de marketing espera, certamente, apelar á palavra mais querida do português médio (Grátis) não receando uma certa conotação com a má qualidade do conteudo disponibilizado.

Quanto a limitações técnicas incompreensiveis, até agora, só encontrei duas:
- Desbloquear conteudos para adultos de forma definitiva. Não dá.
Se estiverem a ver o Family Guy e a Megan (Ils son fous ces americains) decidir ter sexo na orelha para preservar a virgindade até ao casamento vão ter de imaginar a cena... a menos que tenham o comando á mão e se lembrem do código de desbloqueio. E mesmo que procedam ao desbloqueio, mas mudem de canal, terão de passar pelo mesmo noutra ocasião em que desejem ver conteudos igualmente chocantes.



Ah... se meter sangue e tripas por todo o lado não há problema. Sexo é que não. Mas isso são contas de outro rosario...

- Durante a gravação de um programa, a segunda box tem de estar sintonizada no canal que está a ser gravado. Esquisito. A box principal deveria poder tratar disso sozinha, não? Será o Windows CE a fazer essa gestão?
Mas giro mesmo é ver a mensagem de aviso que o software apresenta. Lamentavélmente não tenho um screen shot á mão, mas assim que tiver faço o update a este post. Se lerem o aviso ficam mais confusos do que se não o lerem e carregarem na opção que permite continuar a ver o canal...

Tirando isso, e como diriam os Garotos Podres, tudo bem.

1-Ok, este deve ser o pior titulo de um post de todos os tempos. Mas hei, fica como uma homenagem á MyBrand (aqueles do Allgarve e do logo da EDP que diziam ter sido roubado de algum lado) que fizeram aqui um optimo trabalho.

Friday, December 21, 2007

Krav Maga

At the last Prt.sc dinner I was talking about how cool Krav Maga was and how I thought everyone should learn it when I realized that only Andreia knew what the hell I was talking about.


Well, Krav Maga is a personal defense system which originated from Israeli self defense technics and was developed by Imi Lichtenfeld during World War II. The name in hebrew means Combat (Krav) Contact (Maga) which pretty much sums up what's it's objective is... Close, or contact, combat.

Despite it's origin, or maybe because of it, this method now serves as combat training for major armed forces (the SEALS are a notable example) as well as police forces around the world.

If you're in Portugal, you can go to the Portuguese Krav Maga Federation site, or follow this blog to know more about this self defense technique and were you can learn it (by the way, I highly recommend you trying to catch a Paulo Pereira's class). If you're not, and most *my* visitors tend not to be, well try googling for your local Federation or start here.

Here is a little demo Richard Douieb gave at Bercy's International Martial Arts Festival in 2003. Enjoy.


P.S : kudos go out to eduardo, who at 8, is the best student I ever had.

Wednesday, December 05, 2007

Leopard Tech Talks

Last monday we've had the first Leopard Tech Talk in Lisbon, but much to my regret I didn't made it.

That's not at all unexpected since I'm having so many "shitty work days (tm)" but what's surprising me the most is that even with such a loyal and committed Mac fan base here, I haven't read a single post or e-mail about it.

Did anyone go? What was it like?

Thursday, November 29, 2007

5 Favorite Movies? Hum... You bet!

I've been seeing a couple of bloggers posting about their favourite movies of all time, and I felt like doing my own "best of" list. The principle is easy: name your 5 favorite films of all time, say something about them and if possible link to their official site or something.
I've also added a couple more rules: Wait until every other blogger in the world have done their own list; Try not to judge their intellect on how bad their choices generally where.

So, having said this, here it goes but in no special order:

* Animatrix
The whole series. All 9 episodes. Loved them and I honestly think it was the best thing coming out from the matrix.


* Fight Club
Pure genious. The book is great, but Edward Norton and Brad Pitt together are better. Let anarchy rule!


* Ghost In The Shell
This one actually changed my life. Very seminal. And the artwork is so inspiring.


*American History X
Again Edward Norton with a great role as a repenting skinhead. Both entertaining and touching. The scene that shows Edward's character grinning as he gets arrested after murdering a man is so scary it definitely makes up for the predictable finale.


* Natural Born Killers
This is how a legend is born. Although Tarantino didn't direct this film, it was is big success as he was the writer. Best Soundtrack ever, courtesy of Mr. Reznor.


* Trainspotting
Here I must concede that the movie lacks in comparison to the book. Still a great movie with a message that changed my mind about what I wanted out of life.
"Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television". Check, check, check and... check.


* Deconstructing Harry
Definitely one of Master Allen's masterworks. If you don't laugh trough it, you may be brain-dead and not realize it.


*Brother
Takeshi Kitano, or Beat Kitano as he referes to himself writes, plays and is the meanest yakuza in the world. Ever.

Wednesday, November 28, 2007

A movie with substance

Every so often I get to see a film that touches me.

It happened recently with shortbus which made me laugh hysterically and this weekend again with Control, a film by the photographer Anton Corbijn.

Corbijn's previous experience with a camera was best known as a music video clip director, with some great bands like Depeche Mode and Red Hot Chili Peppers (Give it away know!) unless that is, you happened to catch his short film "Some YoYo Stuff", about one of Reznor's favorite artists, Captain Beefheart.

I could go on and on about how much Joy Division meant for me or how I and Glen Matlock both got expelled from would-be great bands for dancing to a different beat, but that ain't too much to the point.

The film in it self is heart touching as it tries to properly tell the story of Ian Curtis' Division rise and early demise, and as it would be expected from Corbijn's previous body of work, how the photography is amazing. That isn't my point either.

My point is this: If you have a heart go see this movie and feel it being touched from a distance by a genius.

Thursday, November 15, 2007

Half backed apple

Ok, so the portuguese version of Apple Store is up, some might say not a minute too soon, but not me.

I mean, either Apple entered the Web 2.0 bandwagon of "release soon, release often" or someone should get their ass kicked. What the hell is up with this 3 language web page?

Do you speek Spanporglish? I didn't bother looking any further. That was quite enough for me.

Tuesday, October 09, 2007

Freedom (I still think this is the end of the record industry)


08 october 2007: big news
hello everyone. i've waited a long time to be able to make the
following announcement: as of right now nine inch nails is a totally
free agent, free of any recording contract with any label. i have
been under recording contracts for 18 years and have watched the
business radically mutate from one thing to something inherently very
different and it gives me great pleasure to be able to finally have a
direct relationship with the audience as i see fit and appropriate.
look for some announcements in the near future regarding 2008.
exciting times, indeed.
posted by trent reznor at 10:45 am.


More information on the usual place

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

::1

This is my new home. I won it in a City contest.





As another geek has said before, the only hard thing to do when moving to a new 127.0.0.1 (or ::1 in IPv6) is dealing with the gas company. What a bunch of pricks!

Well, anyways you're always ...

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

tiananmen e o "massacre" de berlin. em perspectiva


Fez esta semana anos que estudantes e outros bebados se juntaram numa manifestação sem precedentes na praça de Tiananmen para gritar pelo benfica e lutar pela democracia na china. Também fez anos a Angelina Jolie, mais merecedora de manifestações e apelos, mas muito menos interessante enquanto fenomeno social.

Em Rostock esta semana houve (uma vez mais) confrontos numa manifestação organizada como protesto anti-globalização, o que prova que quase vinte anos depois e a quase meio mundo de distancia, um pais moderno e democratico também consegue atiçar a policia sobre jovens manifestantes e tudo em nome da defesa daquilo em que acreditam. Se não é a ordem e disciplina chinesa, então que seja a democracia capitalista ocidental.


Este semana morreu um blogger, um fotografo, um amigo, um professor, um ser humano de fazer corar de humildade qualquer palerma que se ache com alguma piada ou que julgue perceber alguma coisa sobre alguma coisa.

Não há ninguem que tenha frequentado o IADE (ou que conheça alguém que tenha frequentado o IADE) que não tenha ouvido falar do Prof. Roberto.

A sua perda é irreparavel, mais de 600 comentários no seu ultimo post e a multidão no seu velório ontem á noite dão-me razão. Muitos mais nunca o esquecerão.

morabeza roberto!

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

i can't do what???

09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0

or if you prefer...

0x09F911029D74E35BD84156C5635688C0

Sunday, April 29, 2007

On job offers and career management (edited)

Recently i've been reading a fellow *'s musings on job searching and expectations and focus on career management, and although I mostly agree with his opinions and objectives, I can't stop but wondering if I (or most people, for that matter) can afford to be as straightforward as he seems to be.

In my career, and up until some 6 months ago, I've been mostly involved with Microsoft products and technologies. I've developed, administrated and and maintained applications, databases, systems and networks. However, Linux and Open Source in general have been my hobby and, i dare say, passion for the last 8 years or so. Cutting a long story short, in a Windows world I'm (somewhat) highly valued, but in a Unix\Linux context, I'm bound to be considered a junior staff member for a couple of years more.

Now, if the job title doesn't really bother me, the difference in wage is staggering. Enough to make me consider a jump back.

All this is only important when I'm faced with a difficult decision like I am right now.

I've managed to get a good deal of respect and appreciation on my current job, I've been involved with some very interesting technologies and have been given the chance to use Open Source technologies and am currently in the process of finishing up my first professional (cof...cof...) Ruby on Rails application, but the wage is ridiculous.

On the other hand, I have an offer to get back to a development only a sysadmin only position, but using .Net and other mostly Microsoft technologies. The pay is good, the challenge is well, challenging and the work environment as far as I could gather so far is very good. On the downside there will be plenty of grey suits and ties in my future. And a senior colleague who thinks rails is amateurish. But the boss says I can use whatever technologies I see fit to get the job done. And they both actually read my resume. And want _me_ to work for them.

Well, as you might have guessed the wage is the only thing that's making me consider the change, and the love for open technologies the only thing thats keeping me back.

In a ideal scenario I would refuse the change hands down, but these are not ideal times, so I'll have to sleep on it and hope for the strength to make the best decision.

Well things change quickly when you let them. There was a sysadmin position available too, and although I refused the developer job, I'll most likely be accepting the later. Stay tuned....

If only we had known earlier...

As seen on The freedom blog...

"Linux hackers! They aren’t smart enough to scare Bill Gates… and they certainly aren’t smart enough to scare Jesus. Did you know that He protects this website too? I prayed it, and it happened! All attacks rebuffed! All sin kept far from these pages.
Thank you Lord!"

By the way, did you know that if you use Ubuntu Christian Edition you can stop daemons with the command "Exorcize!" ? And that you can use "bless" whenever a program fails to start? Just beware not to issue a "chmod 666" , or you'll go to hell!!

Oh @wathever, forgive them, for they are funny. Seriously, I thought that sarcasm was beyond americans.

Thursday, April 26, 2007

What caught my eye this week

Brand of the year:


Google, witch you know already so I wont link to their site, was recognized this week as the the world's top-ranked brand.

In only 10 years, Google's Sergey and Lary managed to top decades old brands such as General Electric, Coca-Cola or even IBM.

Entering a realm occupied by only a few other companies whose brand became a synonym with their product (think Gillette) Google is an example of entrepreneurship. If you doubt it, you can always google it up. :o)

Blog of the month:


Following a tip from a new friend I've been enthusiastically reading a blog from a fellow rubyist. It's called Ruby on Windows, and as you might guess it's about using Ruby as a scripting and automation tool on MS Windows OSs. It provides some great examples and code samples witch got me thinking about replacing my vb scripts at work.

This is a great example of how to integrate an open technology with a closed system.

Tuesday, April 17, 2007

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Long time no see

I was forced to observe the shutdown day for over a week (not really, but i'll get back to that) because my Macbook died on me.

It's never a good experience to be away from your mac, but to deal with the Apple support around here one must be prepared for the worst.

From telling me that the customer service guy wouldn't reply my e-mails because he had personal problems (hey that's funny,i have a personal problem too! MY MAC IS BROKEN! what a coincidence) to taking some 20 phone calls to finally get some answers (I have witnesses. And they're still laughing) i've seen it all with these guys.

If we consider that a large part of Apple sales come from mac owners showing off the “superior hardware and the user experience a mac gets you” to their friends and coworkers (I myself am responsible for at least 4 switchers over the past 6 months), one should expect a better level of emphasis on customer satisfaction right?

Thankfully I still have my trusty Asus laptop that managed to deliver the daily fix of web surfing, and getting most of my work done so I really didn't had to be offline for so long. I was just too negative to write anything useful.

Anyway the XVI Jornadas de Informática an event hosted at UBI went by, and this year at least I heard something about what happened there. In Ruby in Portuguese website there are even some of the presentations given there available for download.

My humble 2 cents however would be to manage to get some more publicity before it happens.

While on the subject of great events happening in this little
fascist square of dirt by the sea, the fifth national encounter on Open Technologies will be happening in Lisbon on the 19th, and although the organization is hosted by Sybase and seems to be very professional and extremely interesting, my favorite Solaris Admin - slash -Farmer boy already managed to find a bug on the event page.

Also, today I'm going to my first Perl Mongers tech meeting and I'm hopping that I'll be able to learn something from those guys, 'cos the Perl I know wouldn't move the proverbial mountain.

Friday, March 16, 2007

30 (+10) reasons to switch

This is a post i thought i'd never write. It's not that i don't find the discussion fascinating, but that in my experience people (read: non geeks) seldomly need (or want) to change their OS.

Better yet, most people don't use an OS, they use a set of applications. But if the same applications are either cross platform or platform agnostic, then it might make sense to discuss the possibility of switching.

I'm doing it now because i saw a post earlier this week about reasons to change to Linux, and the whole thing got me going. I really don't think my opinion will make you change your mind, but it _does_ come from a someone who is a Windows specialist, a Mac fan-boy and a Linux geek (all me, at different times).

Oh, and this is my first post from TextMate!

10 reasons to use Windows
- It comes pre-installed with ~80% of the PCs sold worldwide;
- You don't know what a driver is (except if its behind a wheel) and couldn't care less;
- Most software is written for Windows, all new technology (Blue Ray; HDVD; DRM) is made for Windows;
- You can go to chat rooms, use file sharing software, visit google and read from Windows;
- You don't know how exciting it is for a script kiddie to see what files you have on your "My Documents" folder;
- You mostly play games, but don't have a games console;
- You don't know that there _are_ other OSs that you could use;
- You use your computer as an electric typewriter with a monitor. What is an OS anyway?;
- You can't afford a Mac, and Linux doesn't offer you the trust of a big corporation behind it;
- You are a VB, XBase, .Net and\ or a MSSQL pro;


10 reasons to use Linux or other *NIX OSs
- You are curious by nature;
- You know a little bit about computers, but want to know more;
- You are a programmer, a security or systems expert, or any other sort of Hacker (or want to be one);
- You can't afford a Mac, and Windows isn't configurable enough;
- You laugh at something like "rm -rf /usr/bin/laden" or you understand the sentence "thank @Divinity I had that shell script to change my MOTD with events from calendar.* or I would have missed LISP's birthday last wednesday";
- Somebody shown you what Beryl, XGL or E17 can do. And now everything else fades in comparison;
- You saw a video on youtube of a guy playing around on a touch screen and flipping windows with his thumbs;
- You believe in Open Source ideals;
- You are a security \ privacy junkie;
- You have DVDs from more that one region or you can't stand the idea behind DRM;


10 reasons to use Mac OSX
- You are a creative professional. (And i don't mean those of you who can write a 20 line telnet replacement);
- You are easily influenced by Apple's halo effect or Steve Jobs reality distortion field;
- You want a computer that just works. And looks good enough to turn heads;
- OSX is a UNIX on visual ecstasy (in-joke, i'll explain another day);
- You don't mind using a closed source OS that is based on Open Source and whose OSI model layer 7 (again, in-joke) can be replaced with FOSS variants;
- You would never replace a CPU, motherboard or graphics card on a laptop by yourself;
- It comes pre-installed with ~10% of the PCs sold worldwide, including your own;
- You are really good at Windows (an expert of sorts) but your antivirus spouts messages about Viruses and other threats that try to creep into your PC and you wonder how it's like on the other side;
- No matter how much you tweak Linux (or how much software you put on top of XP for that matter), it still doesn't feel as snappy or look like OSX;
- Your favorite band is putting out GarageBand files of their new album (I'm still excited about that, sorry);


10 reasons not to use a Computer
- you don't work with computers;
- you own a DVD player, a good Stereo, a Cell Phone and Cable TV;
- Your prefer to listen to CDs instead of ripping them;
- No one ever picked up a girl by formatting her hard drive;
- You don't know how people spend so much time writing and reading without touching a single sheet of paper;
- You where the one behind this. You will now pursue a new career;
- You where the one behind this. You will now pursue a new career;
- You like practicing sports that are incompatible with a flat ass;
- You don't own a portable media player apart from an old Walkman;
- Your fingers are too thick for such small keys;

Thursday, March 08, 2007

International Women's Day

Today was the International Women's Day, and all over the world there where men who didn't get their sandwich even if they tried to sudo it. :o)

Actually this is a very important day, since it universally marks the _one_ day where we are supposed to thank women for their efforts in making the world a better place and reflect upon the way we, the society, have been treating them.

In my humble opinion, one day isn't nearly enough. People (read: men) should remind themselves everyday that is wrong to abuse verbally, physically, by actions or by inactions all and every woman.

Hopefully, you'll be thinking that I'm beating a dead horse, since we're a civilized society and all that, and these kinds of discrimination don't happen anymore, so I'm going to share two little stories with you.

My friend Carla, was forced to leave the company she helped create because despite all her recognized (and praised) hard work, the business unit wasn't making much of a profit. And for all the long hours and even some lost nights that she poured into her former employer, all she got was a 0€ severance pay. Why? because her former boss didn't find it necessary to pay her a dime. After all, what was she going to do about it?

Another girl friend whom I cannot name as of yet, has been killing herself slowly trying to do all the graphic design for a company that represents 3 small monthly newspapers all by herself for the past months and she already has been subjected to harassment, lied to, overworked (16 hours work days...on saturdays) and they don't even pay her measly 600 € paycheck on time, but rather some 8 days overdue. Without an apology. Why? Because "nowadays everyone knows how to work with a computer" and "it's so hard to find a job" (these are actual quotes in case your wondering) and besides, what was she going to do about it?

Since this blog is mostly about geeky stuff, I'll say goodby with a lttle tech tip.
If you use Stoplight (a Pref Pane add-on that changes Carbon apps maximize and close buttons behaviour so that they do just that; Fill the screen and exit (Command-Q) an active window) on your Mac and are experiencing crashes on Safari after printing to PDF or if Finder restarts after viewing a slidshow in iPhoto, look no further. Just change Stoplight's setting so that these two apps run in "Mac OS Default". Pronto.

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

On the subject of goodwill

This is not good news for Microsoft. Their latest OS hasn't even begun to make its way into the corporate desktop and already the claims on unbreakable security are a thing of the past.

Or were they ever anything but marketing?

The question I most often hear regarding the transition for the new OS is "Why bother?" To answer this, I made a funny little mental exercise.

What would I do if I was in charge at Microsoft (or at least if they listened to me).

Well, to start with, I would take the number of available versions of Vista down from 7(5?) to only 3.

Vista Corporate Edition (VCE) - Drop the show off (Aero will be turned off by policies on most cases anyway);
Better security and networking. This would eliminate the need for mandatory hardware upgrades in the enterprise and would thus lead to wider embracing by CTOs and CFOs alike.

Vista Media Hub (VMH) - A version with some great visual apparatus, geared towards the home user with basic needs beyond media and internet access.

Aero would be a must, so maybe this could lead to a more reliable hardware certification \ standardization process (much needed IMHO) were Vista Ready meant "Ready to run full specs with full performance".

Vista Gamer (VG) - Recognizing that a vast majority of PC users mostly use their OSs (at home that is) to load and play games, Microsoft should make a version of their newest SO much to the liking of the one that powers their own Xbox 360.(Not necessarily compatible, though that would be a blast).

Networking and Security services striped to a minimum, very compact and hu.. lightweight. Take advantage of the relationships with Hardware Vendors and maximize performance.

Next if my list would be taking better advantage of what comes out of their own labs and projects (label it as beta, if you will) and deliver a companion DVD full of goodies like Photostory (does it still exist?) Expression (even a lite \ demo version) and Photosynth (for VMH).

Also a good option, would be throwing VirtualPC, SQL2005 and Visual Studio Express into a Companion DVD for VCE and finally XNA Game Studio for the Gamer version.

As for the Office suit, i wouldn't touch it (with a long stick).

Eliminate the fabricated need for upgrades (personally I’ll stick with Office XP for as long as I can, or must) and make it compatible with open-document standards for publicity if nothing else.

Finally on the server front. Well this is going to be a biggie... So I'll put it more as a wish list than anything else.

1- Native Support for "foreign" file systems.
2- Show us what WinFS can do. If it turns out not to be all that much adopt ZFS (ouch).
3- U-N-I-X C-O-M-P-A-T-I-B-I-L-I-T-Y L-A-Y-E-R (or SFU done right, or cygwin in a companion CD).
4- Gui-less version. With option for graphic administration from remote desktop or even trough a web browser. This would be a great selling point for Application, Web, DB and File servers. And for low-end servers too.

Ok, so most MSCEs would be left to dry without point and click. But the good ones would adapt, and the best ones won't tell the difference (if it can't be scripted, it can't be done, right?)

Friday, March 02, 2007

A week in song titles

Ramble On Led Zeppelin
BES Photo's winner this year was Daniel Blaufuks, a multimedia artist who also does some photos.

Not surprising at all. As someone way more "in the know" that I noted earlier, this was very likely the worst BES Photo ever.

If you take some time to go around a couple of blogs and Flickr pages, you'l find many talented photographers, but hey, their name isn't Blaufuks or Themlitz or Ideafix or any of the other weird names that seem to be a pre-requisite to enter the competition for Portuguese artists.

By the way, the photo on my blog's title is a self portrait by Kay whom i rank at nr. 2 on my favorite artists list, right after Dali and Trent Reznor (incidentally, if you didn't get this joke, you might be reading the wrong blog) and is here with her consent. The logo underneath it is from the "Art is Resistance" movement.

In Memoriam Rodrigo Leão & Vox Ensemble
I finally managed to give my Macbook a 1G memory upgrade, and it is worth every penny. If your stuck with the default 512 Mb, your missing out. Good does get better.

Simultaneously, a work colleague humped his (newer model) Macbook a full Ghz (to 2G) and notes that the performance improvements are even more noticeable. So todays Haiku is "Grab RAM if you can. OS X surfs graciously in deeper waters".

There There Radiohead
This week on Digg a story gained some momentum again (the original is kind of old) about how 199 out of 200 CS Majors can't program. This just proves that a degree can be a display of educational excellence, but doesn't hint at all on competence.

Dead cat on the line (Diamanda Galas cover)
I had almost forgotten about these...