Project Communication

So I think most people have had some experience with the failures of communications in companies. I think this image comically depicts how most people feel about how communication works inside the company they work in. I found the image at: http://www.linuxkungfu.org/images/fun/geek/project.jpg

Sandboxie - Safety, Security

Tired of dealing with rogue software, spyware and malware?
Tired of spending countless hours removing unsolicited software?
Try Sandboxie.

That's what's on the front page of sandboxie.com, the latest in "online protection" technology. From what I've heard the software lives up to it's claim, and it fulfills the basis of it's name, a sandbox.

After discussing it with a work colleague, we couldn't help but notice the software has potential outside of the security context. Trial applications are bound to work forever. Just wipe the sandbox when the trial runs out, and viola you're at the beginning of your trial again! Anyway, I definitely do not encourage or condone performing any activity that is illegal.

The only thing I see missing is, well, a Mac OS X version!

Stealing Credit (Dilbert Comic)

Sneak peak at Ctrl-Alt-Del Season 2

iLocker - Your locker on the Internet

So my Thursday night went something like this:

1. Bored...


2. I should make a website.


3. What's something that doesn't exist that I could use?


4. Aha!


5. *coding*

Then at about 5.30AM out popped iLocker.

I've obviously done some refinement today, but iLocker in it's first beta version is ready for the world. This small and simple website will let you create and open 'lockers'.

Lockers being: a compartment for storing personal possessions; usually secure or locked.

Lockers on iLocker are text boxes which can contain a large amount of text. When you create a locker your text is encrypted using one of numerous encryption methods using your password hash as a key. We also store a hash of your password to verify your password, but I should note that this hash is not the same hash used as the key to your data, so no I cannot decrypt your data myself. Only you, the beholder of the password can access your locker.

The Matrix: Life how we see it vs Life how it is.

In 1999, The Matrix hit the big screen. As viewers sat, perplexed by the blinking green cursor in the top left of the screen, they watched a story unfold like no other they had seen before.

The Matrix was new: A block-buster action movie, sure, but not just a block-buster. The Matrix captured numerous philosophical ideas and presented them in a way to almost teases us. Ideas that seemed so real, and yet couldn't be grasped. For many, this is the nature of philosophy.

Anyway, so the reason I'm writing this is I found the image below. It captures the essence of what The Matrix is, the point it was making about life how we see it, and life how it is. I believe this idea can be transferred onto the real reality, our real lives because the life that we see everyday, is not life how it is. We interpret everything, we add meaning to everything, we create the life we see prompted by the life that is. Believing of course that the life we see is the life that is.

So what does this mean? Are we living a lie? Probably... But if we're living a lie, believing it fully, and have no power to discover what we do not see, where does that leave us. I suppose it leaves us in no better, or worse, place than we started, except now we know reality may not be how we see it. If we consider there are indeed facts, facts describing events in space and time, then our interpretations are merely meaning we've added. We create problems when we forget where the facts end and the interpretations begin. It is then that we can no longer distinguish between life how it is, and life how we see it.

Returning to The Matrix, it revealed that the interpretation was in-fact a lie, the interpretation was a lie, a lie covering a horrible truth. In reality though, our interpretations commonly create horrible truths, covering innocent or meaningless events...

Viewing life as a story line (an insight into CAD's Choose-Your-Own-Adventure side story)

I am an avid reader of the Ctrl-Alt-Del comic, and for the past few comics Tim Buckley has been providing his readers with a Choose-Your-Own Adventure side story with Ethan and Zeke (two main characters) exploring space and what-not. Readers could vote on what Ethan would do in the next comic, which of course could cause "fame and fortune" or death.

The adventure ended on Monday and Tim posted the entire story tree showing all the different paths our decisions as readers would have taken us. As I read the story tree I found myself in awe as I realised the impact the small decisions Ethan (or us) made a huge difference to what happened to him and the universe. This spawned an insight into my own life: the small decisions I make everyday have the same sort of impact on my life, and on the people in my life, AND on the people NOT in my life.

Now I'm not going to start analysing the way I walk to work to see if it results in my, or someone else's death or anything like that. But I feel like I have become one step closer to being in-touch with the universe, fascinated by how it all fits together.

If you'd like to read the Choose-Your-Own Adventure story yourself, start here. The story tree can be found on Ctrl-Alt-Del's website.

EEE PC 900 Australian Release Date

So I'm in love with the Asus EEE PC. I don't have one though, so I've been hanging out for a release date of the EEE PC 900. According to this forum the Australian release will be in May. Now, I don't know how true this is because he doesn't reference anything!!!!! But I will be hoping that it is out in May. But on the other hand, it won't have the Atom processor which will increase the battery life of the laptop. In Asus' rush to get the new 8.9" laptop to market to beat the rest of competitors, the processor is still the same as the one from the 701. According to techradar the Atom will probably show it's head around June. Problem is that the Atom may not be a faster processor!! What should I do? Wait for the Atom processor or grab the eee pc 900 as soon as it hits shelves? I'm leaning towards the Atom, what do you think I should do?

Community Service to pay off HECS Debt

So a bit of background about the way higher education works in Australia. If you go to uni you can choose to not pay your uni fees upfront and that becomes a HECS (Higher Education Contribution Scheme) debt. Although now I think it's called HELP (Higher Education Loan Program)... someone had a sense of humour to change that. The idea is that if you don't get a job which earns more than $35,000 per year (I think that's the right number), then you never have to pay a cent back to the government. Once you start earning that much each year then your employer will take more tax out of your pay which goes towards your HECS debt. Then at the end of the financial year it won't be so bad to see the bill for your tax.

Soooooo.... the point to this blog post is that in the 2020 Summit that Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had on the weekend, brought up an idea that students should be able to repay their HECS debt by performing Community Service!!! I think this idea is brilliant. I think it will bring the students closer to the community, have a better understanding of what impacts communities and the needs that are out there, because these students are going to be the future, so it's important that we understand these things. Also, I'm sure that each community needs any hand that they can get. It will also work in the favour of those who are lower income earners too. It doesn't sound like it will be a compulsary thing, and that it will just be an option, but I think it's a BRILLIANT option. This is the Sydney Morning Herald Article I read it in: Over to you, Mr Rudd in the second paragraph.

I really think this is great, I was a bit worried to start with because I have no idea on the financial ramifications this would cause the government, but I read in this article at the Herald Sun that it would be only to repay part of their debt, not the whole debt, so I think it is definitely a good option for students. I'm really interested to hear what other people's thoughts are on this idea, I believe it is truely brilliant. Please leave a comment on the pros and cons you think this idea has.

Everyday Life

The video says it all so I'll say no more.

Cool Bowling Tricks

These guys have skills!

Best Server Error Message EVER!

So are you sick of going to a website to find out it's down and there's a very boring run-of-the-mill error? Well, fear not! Virgin Money have the awesomest server error I've seen yet. Check out the image below!

Web hosts website get's stolen

You know how you get those notices from your bank telling you to watch out, there are fake websites out there getting your bank details.

Today my wife found a website that had copied one of my websites, hostinggang.com, the website for HostingGANG. By copied, I mean they had downloaded the HTML, the images, made a couple of minor changes then published it, even leaving in part of my logo on the site.

I've sent them an email requesting they take the site down, and cease to steal the site content and layout.

Mine: hostinggang.com

Theirs: montevity.com/...

This is the WHOIS data for montevity.com:


After doing further research, I discovered this hosting company called Optimus Web (optimusweb.com) is registered by the same guy...All a bit dodgy I think.

If a programming language was a boat...

So my friend linked me to this post about "If a programming language was a boat...". Interesting title I thought, and hence I read it. I really liked the comment about php and the picture for html is perfect!!!

http://compsci.ca/blog/if-a-programming-language-was-a-boat/

PHP (Original photo by permanently scatterbrained)

HTML (Original photo by ascendeddaniel)

Environmental Reality Check

I'm all for anything environmental which is proven to actually be better for the environment, and I'm also all for reducing the damage we do to the environment, but sometimes I just get frustrated by peoples naive assumption on a lot of 'environmentally friendly' solutions, that are in-fact no better than what they're replacing.

Guess this is why I enjoyed this comic...
(Click image for the full image)