woowoowoo – Page 26

about 100 metres…

For me, one of the high points of Australian television entertainment was The Games, and one of the high points of that series was episode 4, series 1, Robbo and the 100 metres. Even reading the script cracks me up (the particular scene starts around page 5), but at the risk of providing a spoiler to those who haven’t come across it before, the premise of the episode centers around a 100 metre track that is about 100 metres… well, 94 metres to be exact. It’s just too ludicrous to be real, which is why it’s so side-splittingly funny.

JOHN: But what you’re telling me is the 100-metre track is about 100 metres long.

Too ludicrous? well, you would have thought so, that is, until last weekend when they held the Melbourne marathon. Seems like the Marathon and Half Marathon were the prescribed distance, but someone played fast and loose with accuracy when it came to the 5km. and 10km. events, but to quote Dallas O’Brien, the event director: the 5km and 10km courses were not measured to the same exacting standards“, and “perhaps we should have highlighted the fact that they weren’t 100 per cent accurate”.

Not 100% ? How about 84% ?? because that would have been about right, yes the 5km. route was only 4.2km! Now, most runners are pretty aware of how fast and far they’ve run – these things tend to be important. Many carry personal GPS devices and can tell you within a few metres just how far they’ve run. Pity the organisers didn’t apply the same rigour: “The five and 10 were both measured by a bike computer. We got them as close as we could.”. This is, of course, complete rubbish and a totally lame excuse. It took me no more than 5 minutes with Google maps to trace the route and get exactly the same answer as the runners got. The 10km route was not quite so far off – but at 9.4km (exactly the same percentage error as the fictional 100m track), you can bet it got some people excited about personal best times before the true horror dawned on them.

A little message for Mr. O’Brien, either get a new battery for that bike computer, or pump up the tyres, but don’t, in future, take people for idiots… did you think they wouldn’t notice?

and the winner is…

For a few years now, Web Directions conference has incorporated The McFarlane Prize, which recognises excellence in web development.

Although a relatively small prize, it is hotly contested, peer reviewed and any sites that are shortlisted (let alone those that win), have achieved very high levels of excellence in coding, usability, design and accessibility (that’s all together, not categories!). It is truly an achievement and I encourage people to visit the McFarlane site and view some of the entries.

Usually, the contenders are relatively small sites from well controlled environments. Not to take anything away from their achievements, but it’s tempting to think such accolades are beyond the reach of large and diverse organisations. Well, this year’s prize winner put paid to that assumption.

Swinburne University of Technology took out the main prize. For those of us in the know about how difficult it is to pull together a university website this is an achievement that ranks alongside climbing Everest, cycling the Nullarbor and completing the Hawaii Ironman.

They deserve: 1) a huge pat on the back and 2) five minutes of your time to visit their site and check what makes it tick.

flat out

Been an interesting few weeks. On September 4, I went in for minor knee surgery – should have been a few days of discomfort and then a few weeks of steady recovery and I’d be back, better than ever… well, that was the idea. Don’t know what went wrong, but it involved lots of swelling and pain, and a couple of unscheduled nights in hospital. In the scheme of things it’s still pretty minor stuff – even though three weeks later, I’m still on crutches, I am slowly getting better and there shouldn’t be any permanent problems. What has been interesting though, is the stuff I’ve learned on the way.

1) You get helpless real fast! When things go wrong, they go wrong quickly. One minute you’re tracking OK and the next, you’re doped up with morphine, unable to move around independently and incapable of doing anything more than watch TV. Don’t ever imagine you won’t end up there: very confronting.

2) Life on crutches is hard! Every day you walk around town you’ll see people with mobility problems. There are people on crutches, with walking sticks, in wheelchairs. It’s commonplace – so much so that I know I take it for granted that they’re doing OK, sure it’s inconvenient, but it can be done. That was until I tried to get off a tram for the first time the other day. It is a long way down when you’ve got a bung leg and only a pair of crutches to stop you! Around about then I began to appreciate just how terrifying it must be for all those people, particularly the older ones, who don’t have the greatest balance or have some other problem. Trams, stairs, crossing busy roads, doors that want to squash you, even just an uneven footpath – all these things present incredible obstacles that I never have given a thought to in my daily life. So next time you see someone with a walking stick, just make sure they don’t need a hand with anything. It might be a minute’s inconvenience for you, but nothing like what they face every minute of every day.

3) Accessibility matters. I was once surprised during a conversation with an architect who was bemoaning the cost of complying with disabled access regulations. Coming from a web development background I was familiar with the extra care that was required to ensure compliance with disability legislation. It’s much the same in concrete as it is in html… it takes a little more time, but the benefits are for all. Now that I’ve been on the other side of this, temporarily disabled, and I’ve seen just how daunting it can be when an environment is not well designed. What makes my blood boil though, is that there are still plenty of people (in my organisation and elsewhere), who commission, manage and build websites that don’t comply with accessibility legislation. The arrogance is breathtaking: as if it isn’t hard enough just getting by day to day with a disability, there are people out there who think it isn’t worth the effort to make life for these people just a little easier. I’m just going to have to take a bit more of a mongrel attitude with me when I return to work!

no comfort in being right…

I have mentioned before now that I’m a bit of a weather nerd – like to think I know what’s going on. So when I asked the question earlier last year about our changing weather patterns, I was already pretty sure I knew the answer. Things have changed.

Sadly, it seems that I am not alone in noticing this, and other much more careful and methodical observers have been crunching the numbers to come up with much firmer and more credible answers… according to the report in The Age today, the CSIRO have confirmed that “the subtropical ridge has become more intense. It is getting bigger and stronger and that is pushing the rainstorms further south”.

This sobering news comes only a few weeks after ANU released An Atlas of the Global Water Cycle, a publication intended to give the lay person access to the detailed and complex information that global climate scientists have gathered and projected through computer modeling. It may well be intended for relatively easy consumption, but it’s till a complex and detailed document, and I’m afraid I glazed over a bit, but from the hundreds of charts and projections, there was one undisputed outcome – the south of Australia is going to continue to get drier and the far north will get wetter.

If I was to allow myself one more pessimistic observation, it would be that the Victorian Government will not heed this latest research and will push ahead with its breathtakingly stupid ‘North – South Pipeline’ which plans to divert water from the Goulburn River to Melbourne’s catchments. As if anyone could ignore the demise of Lake Eildon – the pollies should be forced to view that famous historical documentary, “The Castle” and observe that once upon a time Bonnie Doon was a place where you could launch a boat and catch a fish. Alas, like Bud Tingwell (the lawyer, Lawrence Hammill), Bonnie Doon’s waterfront is no longer with us. Miles and miles of grassy plain now stretch out from the disused boat ramp, and skiiers on their way to the (similarly vanishing) snowfields of Mount Buller wonder why there needs to be such a high bridge over a tiny, dry creek bed. The serenity, the whiff of 2-stroke, and the hope of a break in the drought, have long since gone.

We urgently need to use our water smarter. I don’t really blame the government for panicking and opting for the unimaginative quick fix of a desal plant – as flawed as it is, they have a responsibility to keep the city’s supply from drying up and with storages at around 25% you need to start looking at worst case scenarios. However, it’s pretty clear that better conservation, stormwater harvesting, and water recycling are the only long-term solutions. It’s time to move on this.

looks like spam, smells like spam…

So, come on Google – mark it as spam!

Does that screengrab look like spam to you? Sure looks like spam to me, and I’ve been dutifully marking dozens like it as spam each day for weeks, but still they arrive. Come on google, how hard can they be to spot?

bingo bingo bingo!!!

OK, been away for a little while – had a WONDERFUL holiday – sorry to anyone who expected me to blog while I was away… that was just not going to happen! Still, now I’m back and there’s no excuse, so here’s the first installment of a few retrospective travel posts – hope you enjoy them!

We were very worried about Swine Flu. Not catching it, but being forcibly quarantined because of suspected contact with it. We already knew it was a mild flu, because our daughter had, a fortnight earlier, had a confirmed case and had recovered within days. No, paranoia was definitely our biggest fear, especially during our two night stopover in Hong Kong.

This fear snapped into sharp reality almost as soon as we arrived… we were walking up one of the labyrinthine ramps in Hong Kong airport, somewhere between disembarking and baggage collection when we found ourselves being checked on an heat-sensitive camera. Imagine my horror when the girl watching the screen leaps up, gesturing to her offsider, and shouting “bingo bingo bingo!!!”, and she was pointing… at ME! Yes, I was stopped mid stream and taken aside because apparently I was giving off more heat than everyone else. I’m sure they thought they’d caught a live one. Hard to say, but I choose to believe she was crestfallen when an in-ear thermometer check revealed the heat went no more than skin deep. Survived round one!

Next hurdle, the taxi from the station to our hotel. Very friendly and happy local with only a very little english. Seemed quite animated when we told him we were heading for the Metropark Wanchai, a lot of misunderstanding before we finally realise what he’s trying to tell us. The Metropark had just reopened after being sealed off with all guests in quarantine for a week! What can you say? We just hoped Swine Flu was a bit like lightning in never striking twice in the same spot. Sure enough, the hotel was adorned with photos and newspaper articles describing the events of the prior week. Looks like they made the best of a bad situation. Glad we weren’t there!

By this time, we were quite used to face masks. I’d say about a third of the people on the street were wearing them. Even the hosties on the plane were wearing them! It was all a bit disconcerting. In true Hong Kong fashion though, this was not seen as a downside, but a business opportunity – they were for sale everywhere – in bulk!

The other side effect of the war on Swine Flu was an almost religious cleaning regime. Hong Kong people seem to be very civic minded already – cleaning up after their dogs – holding handrails – keeping clear of the edge… there are reminders everywhere, but hygiene was the new fashion. There were public advertisements, television spots. The one we really liked though was the notices in many public places to the effect of “This button (door handle|toilet seat|etc.) is disinfected four times daily”, accompanied by an army of helpful and motivated hygiene enforcers. It was great!

google street view car in austria

Yes, on a recent holiday in beautiful Austria, the nerd in me became very excited to see in the right lane of the motorway up ahead a little red Opel with a big black camera on top.

Yep, streetview is definitely on the way to Austria and I’m hoping there’ll be a photo of me taking this photo. Such nerdery!

this weekend we ate!

Every weekend it seems we end up eating… rather a lot. This weekend was longer than usual and so we’ve eaten rather more than usual! Here’s a few highlights.

Sunday breakfast: superb batch of blueberry muffins – buttermilk makes them so moist and soft!

Sunday evening: Moussaka – haven’t made it for years, but it was a beauty. The eggplants at La Manna were smooth, dark and glossy, so I just did it simple and straight. Will definitely revisit that before the winter is out. After loosening my belt a stop we had dessert – Rachel was inspired by Masterchef and turned out a sticky date pudding that would have had the other contestants running home weeping!

Monday brunch with friends at GingerLee, I had poached eggs with field mushriim, avocado and coriander… excellent! All perfectly cooked and delicious, but the real highlight was the coffee: smooth, rich and full of flavour without a hint of bitterness.

It was a wickedly wintry day, but we braved the elements for a good long walk along the Maribyrnong river – ending up, mostly out of curiosity, at Gary Mehigan’s Boathouse for a coffee. I was surprised how much of a ‘family’ restaurant it was… chippies and pizza on many tables. Still, we placed our orders for tea and coffee and settled down to watch the weather pound the windows while we waited… and waited, and waited! Actually, my coffee came quite promptly, but it took 20+ minutes for the tea to arrive. Tea bag + hot water – obviously a difficult dish to get to the table. Meantime, I had just about choked on my coffee which tasted like it had been beaten with a burnt stick. I didn’t expect it to live up to GingerLee’s delicious brew, but this was burnt and over extracted – undrinkable! I don’t like to complain, but when I mentioned this to the waitress, she was simply charming and immediately offered another coffee, which, when it came was a huge improvement. Just goes to show, even the judges aren’t immune to slip ups in the kitchen, but their staff certainly know how to deal with them.

watching my bandwidth…

Like most people who have broadband, my account doesn’t have excess charges, just ‘shaping’ – dropping back to crawling ‘dial-up’ speeds until the end of the billing period. It is just horrible and I really do my very best to avoid it.

Obviously the best way to avoid it is to keep a close eye on your usage. Easier said than done, my ISP usage page is behind a login and they don’t have an easy way of keeping an eye on it, so short of visiting a really boring page on a regular basis, there’s no easy way of keeping track. Enter the wonderful NetUsage Firefox plugin, which has helped me ration my bandwidth down to the last day on a couple of occasions.

So, when I changed my plan and NetUsage encountered some sort of error, I was a little disappointed. A week or so of checking the ISP page convinced me that this was a situation that had to be resolved. I checked the documentation for NetUsage – tried (I really did!) to understand how it worked – then gave up and emailed the author… this was a Sunday afternoon.

A couple of emails to and fro and by Sunday evening, the author has emailed me a patched version of the plugin which worked perfectly – amazing reponse. I am delighted to once again be able to monitor my usage at a glance – actually, mostly my daughter’s usage – streaming trashy US soaps!!

Nooooooooooo!!!

One of my favourite blogs ever has just been discontinued due to management interference.
Bah, humbug!

OVI store – a competitor?

Nokia today launched it’s OVI store, an attempt by the company to jump on the tidal wave of success that is the Apple Store (along with about a half a dozen other imitators). Many industry pundits are touting it as some sort of competitor, but I’m afraid that’s an uphill battle, and one they’re never going to win – not by a long shot!

This is not necessarily a bad thing, and the success of OVI store should not be judged against Apple’s App Store, instead the success of OVI store should be judged on how well it serves the market that is Nokia mobile phones… a group of hardware far more diverse than anything Apple has to deal with!

Being a Nokia owner myself (can’t afford an iPhone and detest the G1 hardware!), I hopped onto this new store for a look around. Nice simple interface, quickly got me browsing apps that suit my hardware – applause for the use of html/css instead of flash – obviously this is driven by the need to work on the browser in their phones, but a nice touch anyway.

Unfortunately, it all fell apart when I saw the prices! Who are they kidding? A game like Touch Physics on the iPhone costs $3.99 and gives hours of gorgeous, fluid gameplay. Games on my Nokia feel pathetic by comparison, yet on OVI store I’m being asked to fork over between $6.60 and $12 for crummy games that bore me after 5 minutes! Then there’s some ‘City Guide’ travel apps which are (probably not) selling for over $30! They want $16 for a twitter client?!? You have got to be joking!! Who is making these pricing decisions?

Lonely Planet city guides at least represent fair value at $8. Weirdly, this compares favourably to the same guide on the App Store, which can be had for $18.99. Perhaps this is an acknowledgement of the distinctly poorer user experience offered by Nokia’s hardware… who knows?

commbank goes mobile

netbank mobile home I don’t know exactly when they released this, but the Commonwealth bank have just gone mobile with both a mobile and an iPhone app. I’ve just had a poke around the site on my nokia 6120 and it’s excellent. Does everything I need smoothly and easily – they deserve a big thumbs up. If there are problems, I haven’t spotted them yet.

Updated…

OK – in the office now, and have had a shot on the iPod Touch. There’s good and bad, first the bad.

A link on the commbank home page points to: Netbank via your mobile, which is an entirely flash driven page. If you have an iPhone/iPod, this is a complete dead end. There is no way around it. EPIC FAIL!

If you are lucky, you will realise that there is a direct route at: http://www.netbank.com.au/mobile/, which seems to be a ‘sniffer’ that redirects you to the appropriate mobile version. If you are on an iPod or iPhone, the site is excellent – smooth and seamless, however no more functionality than the mobile phone version, just the gloss you expect from an ‘i’ site.