Blowing in the wind

It used to be the case that on 'recycling day', as I walk to work on a windy day, I'd see lots of bags of recyleable materials blowing down the streets, onto the fields and generally causing more problems than putting them in landfill. After quitely grumbling about them for a year or so, I'm really pleased that the council has replaced them with good strong plastic boxes with lids for sorting and separating the recycling.

After a few weeks of using the boxes, I can say that they are excellent and far better then the old system. Horray!

All we need now is to switch from a 2-weekly landfill rubbish collection to a 3-weekly one, with recycling collected every week and I'll start to feel like recycling is really important.

It would be good too if it became cheaper for businesses to recycle than to landfill....

On another note, Elvington (and nearby) residents, have a look at this fantastic opportunity: Alpha in Elvington.

New Blog on Embedded Timing

At work, we're launching a new blog on on-target timing analysis.

Topics will include anything related to embedded software verification, timing analysis, software optimization or other topics that come up from time to time.

You might even find an article or two written my me on there.

http://www.RapitaSystems.com/blog

New computer

After months of looking for a new phone to replace my much loved miniature Panasonic mobile phone, I have finally made a choice. I started looking for something small that makes phone calls and ended up buying a new computer that also has communication facilities.

I thought of getting an iPhone, but the impracticality of programming it freely would probably drive away the last remnants of my technical background. My new computer is Android based so it should be properly programmable!

So, I'm getting used to my nice new HTC Desire. The device came wrapped in plastic bearing a warning me to remove it from my pants before sitting down. Not a good start!

Anyway, I've got the essentials working (wifi, ssh, http, smtp, radio 4), and a few non-essentials (social networking) but I've still not actually made a phonecall. That's probably for advanced users only. 

If only I could find the command line I might be totally comfortable using it. 

Still no HTML

Many years ago, there were some standards set out for the language of the web: "HTML".

The idea is simple: if you define the language then everyone who writes it and everyone who reads it will understand each other. 

There were several good tools (mostly released free of charge) written to at least check that the HTML that you write is at least syntactically correct. That is, in non-technical language, when computers talk to each other, the computers use the same words and sentence structures so that they can understand each other.

So, why then in 2010 do big banks, with their massive budgets still skip the simplest of requirements+tests on their on-line banking and not stick to the standards, littering their HTML with obvious errors that are apparent on any browser (except perhaps the one that the web programmer happened to use)?

Doggy Bag

There's a lovely little bit of woodland near my office, with a footpath through it. I make a point of waking through it when going to and from the office - a bit of piece and quiet between the fast pace at work and home.

Lots of other people walk through that strip of Eden too; it's a regular for people walking dogs or simply taking a short-cut.

Unfortunately, there seem to be a lot of plastic bags in it...nothing too unusual about that perhaps, but these plastic bags are full of dog poo!

Why oh why does [at least one of] the regular dog walkers "scoop" and then leave the plastic bag of dejecta on the path? It's not like there isn't a suitable bin at the end of the footpath, only 30 metres away from the growing pile!

What possible reason can there be for it? If you're man enough to do the hard bit and pick it up, surely you can carry it?

Collatz Conjecture

Today was a very low productivity day in the IT industry. 

All around the world, computer scientists, engineers, mathematicians and every other kind of geek simultaneously stopped work in a flawed attempt to prove one of the most confusing, troubling, and hard problems - the Collatz Conjecture - all because of a cartoon on the internet.

I was going to end with an estimate of the number of hours spent (twice as many as yesterday and third as much as tomorrow, blah blah blah), but quite frankly, I felt lonely.

Stone age banking

For some reason, you can't do payments or transfers from our business Euro account using internet banking.

"Well, it would have been really useful...it's on the feedback form that we gave you years ago."

...

"At least we can do telephone banking..."

"err, actually that won't work either."

"Well, then I suppose we'll have to continue walking two directors/signatories down to the bank at lunchtime...Can I have the form to fill in in our office, so that we don't have do deal with all the account details down the details at the counter? Hey we might even be able to get all the signatures done in the office too!

"You don't have a form for that? I see.

"Oh and you've changed your policy. If we want to do that then we have to go into the main branch in York...I see.

"So, we've got all that money in our account and cannot get it out without driving two directors into the city?"

"You could always write a letter to the bank asking them to make a payment for you. That should work."

Anyone else feel like we're going backwards CBSH?

Milk of kindness gone stale

In the communal fridge at work, there is an unopened bottle of milk with a "use by" date of 2 weeks ago. Attached to the bottle is a note "Sorry, one of my visitors used your milk by mistake so I replaced it".

What a kind caring place we work in.

It's just a pity that they didn't write which company's milk they were replacing. No one has dared to touch the new bottle in case it wasn't their milk.

It tickled me, that's all.

Bells and bees

This afternoon, I spent a happy few hours cleaning a belfry. It's a very tiny tower, only about 3 or 4 square metres. There are four floors including the ground floor. I only managed to clean the ringing room (first floor) today, and a little bit of tidy up of the clock chamber (2nd floor). It was really quire filthy. I feel like I've vacuum cleaned away hundreds of years of cobwebs, sandstone dust and bees...

Most of the mess happened to be thousands upon thousands of dead bees. Apparently, some years they swarm into the top of the tower, live there for a bit then die during the winter. I'm not looking forward doing any maintenance in the bell chamber (top floor) during the summer.

So, now we have a belfry that people can go in without overalls. So, what's the next step? Ringable bells?

Smell Gas?

I've reported four (suspected) gas leaks in the road/pavement recently.  

It's quite easy to report them (after you have plucked up the courage to ring the "Gas Emergency Services" on a number ending in 999). What if they weren't really gas leaks...I hope there's no such charge as "wasting gasboard's time".

Outside, gas disperses so easily that the smell is quite faint. I wasn't sure if the smell was gas, or just a pretty flower or exhaust fumes.

I saw that they did dig up the road in at least one of the places I reported it, but that's the only feedback I got. It would be nice if they would give me a ring or write to just say "you were right, they were really gas leaks, oh and thanks". The lack of response makes me wonder if my nose is imagining things.

All four leaks were in busy streets and must have been passed by thousands of people. I've been noticing a faint smell of gas for months myself before reporting it.

If the gas companies really do care about gas leaks, there are two simple things they could do:

1. In their marketing for the gas "emergency" number, make it clear that you can call this number to report a leak, even if you don't think it's a life threatening emergency. 
2. Tell the people that report the leaks whether or not the leak was confirmed. Just tell me whether the smell was real or my imagination!

This is of course in contrast to Yorkshire water who did phone me up after reporting a water leak to confirm that it was a leak and thank me for reporting it.

Social Network

I have never tweeted, yet I have stacked up 40 followers. When you can't be bothered to even log in to block/delete the ones that are spam/pron ..it is time to close the account. I'm sure that the 37 won't miss me.

I log into facebook about once a month. I feel out of the loop.

I still use RSS lots; I keep up with some good blogs that way.

I might write here more frequently. A timely resolution.

Any the bathroom is about finished. Only the floor to tidy up and the hallway wall to fix.