tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-69843702012-02-02T11:11:32.071+13:00Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.comBlogger281100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-4439207803727025352010-10-28T08:30:00.006+13:002010-10-28T15:20:55.434+13:00

Monster produces high-end audio cable. In the HDMI range even their basic cables run to hundreds of dollars, so I was taken aback to see the top of the range Monster M2000 for sale on Trade Me at $50.A bit of digging turned up Monster Cable’s Counterfeit Site.Here's one of the cables for sale by PGX on Trade Me (who seems to be making a business of this):And here's a sample of the fake goods from

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-11610915742481258172010-08-25T13:00:00.003+12:002010-08-25T13:06:59.135+12:00

Facebook is a useful site: it’s easy to connect with friends and family and keep abreast of their lives. It’s an easy place to make a home page. But it could be so much more, and I can’t get past some of their deep-seated issues. I haven’t quit but I have curtailed my usage (though I was only logging in every few days anyway).There’s room for improvement on the site experience itself but the

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-75058899279317330172009-08-22T12:14:00.005+12:002009-09-02T15:32:12.113+12:00

I’m used to the normal ‘Internet background radiation’ of hackers/bots scanning the common ports on my router (SSH, VNC, etc.) but recently I’ve noticed scans of multiple ports from IPs registered to Google.e.g., I'm getting a few thousand a day of these:[INFO] Sat Aug 22 11:43:44 2009 Blocked incoming TCP packet from 66.102.7.191:80 to xxx:47414 as ACK received but there is no active connection[

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-76765426186632347272009-08-02T14:01:00.005+12:002009-08-02T14:19:18.688+12:00

Trying to access BD-Live on my Blu-ray player. This is an unhelpful error message from The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor (2008) that had me wondering where the error was:Trying with Men in Black (1997) was much more informative and though not 100% correct put me on the right track—I needed to insert a memory stick:And after all that BD-Live was a big disappointment: the sparse amount of

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-47614339148879505412009-01-17T09:22:00.006+13:002009-01-17T09:29:18.231+13:00

An FYI on AppleScript and FileMaker 10:In FileMaker Pro 9 Advanced the application id was ‘com.filemaker.pro.advanced’. In FileMaker Pro 10 Advanced it’s now ‘com.filemaker.client.advanced’.If you remove FM9A from your system, opening scripts which contain the old address ‘tell application id "com.filemaker.pro.advanced"’ will fail with ‘Unable to read the file because the script is not editable

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-64616327126875613892008-07-03T06:55:00.000+12:002008-07-03T07:04:34.727+12:00

If you want to reward a child, give them your praise and not a sweet. This can be hard but remember:Your praise is valuable.By giving a sweet you are devaluing your praise (both to the child and yourself): they will learn to seek sweets and not praise.By making sweets something to work hard for you are increasing their perceived value.The child will learn to expect a sweet when they’ve done

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-75986742256960722472008-06-01T08:48:00.000+12:002008-06-01T08:49:42.320+12:00

On trying to identify buildings for an upcoming trip in Google Earth I was struck with the obvious thought: when are businesses going to start making themselves identifiable from the air—for instance with signage painted on the roof?

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-82415525550469505612007-09-04T07:08:00.000+12:002007-09-04T07:12:38.868+12:00

From the Radio New Zealand News site this morning:Independent testing for formaldehyde on a range of clothes has shown undetectable levels of the chemical.

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-77589381677995121012007-07-16T10:06:00.000+12:002007-07-16T10:38:08.720+12:00

Windows PowerShell, previously Microsoft Shell or MSH (codenamed Monad) is an extensible command line interface (CLI) shell and scripting language product developed by Microsoft.—WikipediaPowerShell provides ‘easy’ access to Windows via a command line, and can be used for many things. I wanted to find the total disk space and amount free which we can do like this:get-wmiobject -class win32_

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-2496284175947649012007-07-13T19:31:00.000+12:002007-07-13T19:39:43.862+12:00

Somebody asked me what made a SAS data warehouse programmer different from a normal SAS programmer—was it the amount of SAS knowledge I had?The short answer was no, it’s all about experience. Here’s a rough longer answer based on my data warehousing experience at 4 different organisations:Strong base SAS and macro is essential, this is what the majority of data warehouse jobs use.Also important

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-51986778719571915162007-07-07T14:10:00.000+12:002007-07-07T14:15:29.903+12:00

You have not stumbled into Narnia—don’t believe the trailer.This is a coming of age movie, and as that succeeds well. However it is NOT a fantasy movie as portrayed in the trailer: the fantasy elements only make up about 10 minutes of movie time. Take your pre-teens, not your younger kids looking for a good fantasy.

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-37743498006091677462007-06-20T19:55:00.000+12:002007-06-20T20:11:47.854+12:00

A couple of years ago I wrote a SAS program to convert a Gutenberg text of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland to an iPod eBook (iStory).The SAS program takes the Gutenberg text file, combines hard lines into paragraphs, extracts the chapter numbers and names, and splits the whole lot into pages by chapter. It then generates a preface, table of contents, and puts Prev/Contents/Next on all the

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-8306736631871506072007-06-04T20:31:00.000+12:002007-06-04T20:38:53.443+12:00

I needed to burn a DVD at a slow speed for a project I’m working on—the DVD will be used as the master for some 3,500 copies so quality is important. The factory said the slower the burn the better the recording, that you can actually see the difference on the DVD surface when burning at higher speeds, and that a DVD burnt at high speeds may work OK in some computers but malfunction in others.

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-52493937396825175352007-06-04T18:02:00.000+12:002007-06-04T20:43:35.056+12:00

A number of the rental DVDs we’re taking home are now coming with that obnoxious ‘You wouldn’t steal a car’ ad which can’t be skipped.It’s infuriating to have some movie company override my ability to control a disc I have bought or rented. It’s offensive to have an ad before the menu accusing me of piracy.If I download a movie from a file-sharing network (I don’t usually) there’s no copy

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-58826547062972968092007-06-04T11:01:00.000+12:002007-06-05T07:29:16.872+12:00

Robert Schofield of Wellington was recently convicted of importing DVDs involving urophilia into New Zealand (seemingly for his own use).11 DVDs seems like a lot, and the guy seems to have exacerbated his fine (and maybe the new’s interest) by fighting the court and censorship office, but…1. Likes and dislikes aside, why is the state involved in what consenting adults do in the bedroom? Why does

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-2752977486585744872007-05-02T08:18:00.001+12:002007-06-02T14:38:10.620+12:00

Normally I enjoy working with FileMaker, but on a recent project struck a number of serious issues with QuickTime container fields in a database.Crash with Audio FileIf you insert a QuickTime music file into a container field (or have a calculated container field pointing to an external file), then FileMaker will crash. Sometimes when you insert the file, sometimes when you start playing, and

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-90228984770724605382007-04-22T17:34:00.000+12:002007-04-22T17:48:36.760+12:00

I recently generated a cross-platform runtime for a client who runs both Windows and OS X. Here’s some notes on the process:Generate runtime on OS XGenerate runtime on Windows with same bindkeyCombine two resulting directories:.USR will be duplicated (one is redundant).exe had sticky bit set resulting in ‘One or more items have special permissions and cannot be copied.’ (permissions -rwxr-Sr--,

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1164856422352399812006-11-30T16:12:00.000+13:002007-06-02T14:08:22.010+12:00

It looks like there’s an endemic problem using solar hot water panels in Wellington—it would appear there’s too much salt in our air, which is corroding the panels.Gary Moller has discovered and published findings in his blog:http://healthandlifestyle.co.nz/solarpanel/It’s hard to see through the glass, but this is what our Solahart Black Chrome XII looks like after 6 years:‘Corrosion’ should

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1151020188194339582006-06-23T11:08:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:48:03.318+12:00

I’ve recently finished moving a client from FileMaker 7 to a runtime deployment of FileMaker 8. I took the opportunity to rework the solution, which still had much of the pre-7 design.This took around three weeks, with two weeks I thought reasonable to charge for. I’m very pleased with the result, and my client understands the need for a good infrastructure behind the scenes. Main Work of the

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1149452692083949792006-06-05T08:00:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:08:22.010+12:00

I received a link to a very cool web visualisation tool by Sala (although I used the version by Markavian which enables you to click on a dot to see the source tag): this Java applet represents a web page and its elements as coloured dots.It’s a quick way to get a feel for the kind of HTML used (tables, or divs, etc.), the complexity of the page, number of images, and more.My home page is

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1147161987109227092006-05-09T19:51:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:07:01.790+12:00

FileMaker Pro 8 Advanced can only create a runtime for the platform it’s running on. So on my Mac I can only create a Mac runtime, not a Windows one.I think this is a shortcoming which FileMaker Inc. could have easily fixed, but thankfully after some initial work there’s an easy workaround:Find a Windows machine with FMPA.Create a database file. The name of this should be the permanent name of

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1143877271087480752006-04-01T19:40:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:08:22.011+12:00

Even though in its recent demands the US Government only asked for aggregated data, and even though Google initially refused to supply it and the courts supported the privacy of Google’s users, it still made me think about Google tracking the IP address of every search we make.Although there are anonymiser services available, here’s a different approach: simply have a program lay a false trail.

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1143583498013536102006-03-29T10:04:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:42:23.760+12:00

I was on the phone this morning to my ISP trying to find out why the cable modem wasn’t responding (turned out there was a major outage).I was able to reflect, once again, how much I hate speech recognition Interactive Voice Response compared to button pushing.ComparisonStandard ‘button pushing’ IVRVoice recognition IVRWelcome to…Welcome to… I can help you…It’s a computer. It’s not that smart.

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1142053728508438842006-03-11T18:07:00.000+13:002007-06-02T14:20:48.714+12:00

Another example of great vs. shocking customer service:Today my partner bought a new pair of walking shoes from the Shoe Clinic (Willis Street, Wellington, New Zealand).The sales person was obviously knowledgeable, and spent an hour measuring her foot, finding the right pair of shoes, and even cutting insoles to match her orthotics.All just part of the service.On the contrary, we have Radfords (

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1140920474530965272006-02-26T07:49:00.000+13:002007-06-02T14:20:48.715+12:00

I’ve made about 5 orders with CD Baby and received excellent service every time. I love their confirmation e-mail which (in part) reads:A team of 50 employees inspected your CDs and polished them to make sure they were in the best possible condition before mailing.Our packing specialist from Japan lit a candle and a hush fell over the crowd as he put your CDs into the finest gold-lined box that

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1088410849402599012004-06-28T20:18:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:08:22.012+12:00

Shrek 2 was a predictable disappointment for a sequel. Just a Sunday afternoon television love movie with the main characters wearing orge suits. Oh sure, there were some nice scenes, and the kids enjoyed it (stay for the credits for the funniest part of the movie), but the dialog and situations weren’t as funny as the original. Donkey as a horse just looked too bizarre. And hey guys, a few

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1085863728197138012004-05-30T08:47:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:20:48.715+12:00

Oxymoron from a woman seen on a dating site advert: Im smart.

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6984370.post-1084782987819498602004-05-17T20:27:00.000+12:002007-06-02T14:20:48.715+12:00

Have finally obtained non-copy protected CDs of Annie Lennox’s Bare and Bonnie Tyler’s Heart Strings (aka Heart & Soul). I originally ordered these two items from New Zealand’s Real Groovy’s online store and was most disappointed when I read the ‘copy enhancement’ notices on the cases. I have no interest in pirating music. My major gripe with copy-protected CDs is the format has been butchered

Tom Robinsonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10872146193848948813noreply@blogger.com0