Shocking news - nicely displayed

Animated Christchurch Quake Map

Wearable Desire

I am here

Remember: Nothing says 'thank you for your blog' like buying me a present. ;)

You don't have to be insane to be a progammer...

Excellent cautionary tale with very  useful pointers.
If you code professionally I reccomend this post.



Common Programmer Health Problems

I find many programmers seem to ignore their body's physical state when they're coding, most likely due to the intense concentration required. I'm hoping other people could benefit by simply understanding a few health related problems programming has almost caused me or caused many other people I know, and how I avoided them.

What I do want to cover are a set of particular problems programmers have from their daily profession. These are just simple really obvious things that for some reason programmers don't realize aren't supposed to be happening:

 

• Pain in your wrists from Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI).
• Problems with your eyes from staring at moving print for extended periods.
• Back problems from poor posture, especially in the lower back and upper shoulders.
• Bowel and urinary issues from not crapping and pissing when you should.
• Dehydration from drinking too much caffeine and not enough water.
• Problems with hemorrhoids and the prostate for guys from sitting too much. Yep, I'm gonna go there.
• Vitamin D deficiency from lack of sunshine.
• Sleeping disorders from staying up late and drinking too much coffee.
• General stiffness and soreness from a lack of stretching in general.

And you think YOUR sysadmin is a control freak.

Ex-San Francisco network admin gets four-year sentence

Childs defended his actions during a long court trial, saying that he was only doing his job, and that his supervisor, Department of Technology and Information Services chief operations officer Richard Robinson, was unqualified to have access to the passwords. Childs eventually handed over the passwords to San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom.

Because the mayor is more technically qualified???

Prosecutors characterised the former network administrator as a power hungry control freak who couldn't be managed.

You think?

Childs may also have to cover the city's US$900,000 bill, spent on trying to regain control of its network.

One wonders at the policy of allowing one employee to power to 'own' an entire network. Does San Francisco lack a bus service? (as in what if they were run over by a bus)
Either way, this super-ego is better off not controlling something do important.

SQL injection fun

Barcode Attacks

Why not try it at you favorite supermarket today.

Google search - No region

My machine (in NZ) is connected via proxy in Australia or on occaison in the UK.
By default going to google.com will redirect (based on my current proxy) to the regional sites google.com.au or google.com.uk. by using the following URL I am redirected to google.com without redirection.

www.google.com/ncr

NCR = no country redirect

I discovered this here

This could be good or catastrophic

(Emphasis Mine)
Microsoft patents anatomically correct avatars: "Accurate avatars will facilitate online honesty"

"The new systems include provisions for sensing physical data (via pedometers, cameras, or health information repositories like Microsoft HealthVault) psychological characteristics (including levels of alertness or mood changes) and even demographic information like "education level, geographic location, age, sex, intelligence quotient, socioeconomic class, occupation, marital/relationship status, religious belief, political affiliation, etc."

"Physical data that reflect a degree of health of the real person can be linked to rewards of capabilities of a gaming avatar, an amount of time budgeted to play, or a visible indication," reads the summary. "Thereby, people are encouraged to exercise."

I think I am scared by the implications of this - only time will tell.
I can see evil lurking. Can You?

Finally we are catching up with plumbers and builders

Cash offer sees Citrix staff bring their own computers to work

The company initiated an employee-owned IT programme earlier this year. Citrix offers $US2,000 to employees to buy their own work/home PC under the scheme, dubbed ‘Bring Your Own Computer (BYOC)’. The stipulation: The computer must have a minimum three-year support and maintenance contract.

BTW yes I do think I can choose my own PC better than a head office IT person. As long as this is an annual 'tools allowance' I would be the first to sign up.

An amazing way to look at world stats - nice UX

GapMinder

Excellent resource on Cancer

BBC NEWS | Health | Cancer: The facts

One in three of us will be diagnosed with cancer during our life.

marriage advice for IT peeps

CIO > Why (some) IT people's marriages are from hell

With the right type of communication, and by taking small, proactive measures to demonstrate that they're thinking about their spouses, IT leaders can have happier, more satisfying marriages, says a psychoanalyst turned life coach.

Elegant solution for juggling windows

WinSplit Revolution: "WinSplit Revolution is a small utility which allows you to easily organize your open windows by tiling, resizing and positioning them to make the best use of your desktop real estate."

WinSplit Revolution is freeware. Some Rights Reserved.

What’s your favorite “programmer” cartoon?

What’s your favorite “programmer” cartoon?

New to computing? Have a friend/parent wanting to become digital? - try this!

Digital Literacy Curriculum Original Version XP/Office 2003

Digital Literacy Curriculum II Vista/Office 2007

Cut 8 wires and see what happens

Bruce Perens - A Cyber-Attack on an American City

The city of Morgan Hill and parts of three counties lost 911 service, cellular mobile telephone communications, land-line telephone, DSL internet and private networks, central station fire and burglar alarms, ATMs, credit card terminals, and monitoring of critical utilities. In addition, resources that should not have failed, like the local hospital's internal computer network, proved to be dependent on external resources, leaving the hospital with a "paper system" for the day.

The rest of the article is very interesting.

I Speak Geek

Scott Hanselman's Computer Zen - FizzBin - The Technical Support Secret Handshake:

Walk on by...

Map here

I will wave at you from my desk :D

Get married or you're fired

NZ Herald Blog:

Employees at a major state-owned company in Iran have been told to marry by September or face being fired.

works for me.

The problem with time travel.

Wikihistory: "International Association of Time Travelers"

UserVoice

UserVoice: "Harness the Wisdom of your crowd"