I actually thought that I was over the jet lag, having had a couple of decent nights sleep but apparently not.
I woke at 3am this morning with severe sugar cravings (yay for Coca-Cola in the mini-bar) and having spent an hour reading Reddit and a further hour attempting to sync my Garmin FR 310xt by USB cable (you can’t), I’m still awake.
My alarm is going to go off in one hour when I’m supposed to be out for a run – I think I’ll push that back by thirty minutes.

I’m in Switzerland because I had to help one of our channel partners talk to a large swiss bank about email security.
Tomorrow I fly out to Dubai, UAE, to talk to our  sales force in the Middle East area about Symantecs security strategy.
I’m imagining the contrast will be crazy and not just a cultural thing but temperature wise more-so.

It was -3c this morning when I went for a run.  It has been snowing for most of the day too.
In Dubai it’s currently 8am and is already 20c.

After Dubai, it’s Amsterdam and Brussels for the same Symantec security strategy discussions.
By the time I get back home on February 5th, I’ll have been to 6 foreign countries in just over 3 weeks and have renewed my spg.com gold membership for 2012 .
This is a new record.

Flight time to Dubai is around 6 hours, maybe I’ll come up with something interesting to write about on here - Maybe I’ll just take a nap…..

//ian

No related posts.

Today, after using it to reboot my router (via its web interface which is only accessible from my LAN) the logmein.com website kept reporting that the connection to the client was timing out or being disconnected.  I couldn’t get the damn thing to connect up at all.

Luckily, I can actually SSH to the Mac Mini remotely too.  So, in order to reset the logmein client, run this from the terminal:

1.  cd /Library/Application\ Support/LogMeIn/update
2.  ./preupdate
3. sudo ./postupdate

That’ll unload and reload the client completely, freeing up any timed out resources.

Related posts:

1. Cisco VPN Client on OSX
2. VMWare Fusion and network bridging
3. Remote Mac access, without VNC

Well, looks like I’ve finally sorted this one out.  I don’t know if it’s the inclusion of new functionality in v2 or v3 of VMF but after doing the below, I’ve not seen the problem occur for a couple of months now.  I can still easily reproduce this issue so I’m guessing it’s some kind of defect in the adaptor autodetect code [or a problem with my config somewhere].

To reproduce the problem, firstly the environment:

1. My MBP is connected to a wireless network only, running WPA2.
2. I’m running VMWare Fusion 3.0.2 (232708) on OS X 10.6.2 (Although this occurred on VMF v1 and v2 as well as OS X 10.5).
3. The VM is Windows 7 Ultimate (although this occurred with Win XP also).

Here is a screenshot of the VM network settings that cause the error message “The network bridge on device /dev/vmnet0 is not running”:

Choosing auto-detect breaks bridge networking every single time.
Fortunately the workaround is very simple.  Setting it to use a specific network adaptor fixes the problem immediately.

The down side to setting the specific adaptor is that when I’m in an environment without wireless and I need to use ethernet, I have to remember to change it in here.  I know that’s not a serious problem but it is irritating when I realise my MSN client has been disconnected for hours.

There have been a bunch of people commenting on the older post and it’s actually now my ‘most hit’ entry (finally overtaking the Outlook 12 beta one) so hopefully this will be of use to some people.

//ian

[Update: March 12th 2010 17:00ish]  Well, I got an @ from @VMWareFusion this afternoon saying “@ianmcshane BTW, we tried to repro this internally with your steps and it works just fine for us. There is something else missing here.”

So I guess YMMV but selecting the specific adaptor has certainly allowed my VM images to run in bridge mode.

Related posts:

1. VMWare Fusion and network bridging
2. Laptop consolidation

Now, the first thing to keep me interested in something is for it to be a challenge.
I wasn’t super fit by any stretch but neither was I super unfit and I simply found the early stages too easy.  So on January 11th I started at week 5 and it didn’t take long to rediscover that I really enjoy running.
I get to listen to some awesome music, run a quite pretty coastal route and of course there is the “runners high” which gets better and better each time I beat a previous record.
The progressive nature of the c25k program really worked well for me. I need to see results or I get bored quickly. Seeing my distance and times increase with each session (I use Runkeeper to track my stats) was the best motivation I’ve ever encountered.
I’m finding it incredibly difficult to take rest days and I’m always reading online articles about training schedules, methods and crazy success stories (this is my favourite coach to IronMan one).

On February 20th, I completed the final 30 minute Couch to 5k session and could consider myself a “c25k graduate” (I promise not to use that phrase again).

Three days ago, I went out for my longest run in probably 15 years. I ran just a couple of hundred yards shy of 10km in 1hr 5mins.
You can’t imagine how pleased I was with that.
Now, I know that is certainly no earth shattering pace but now I at least have a target and unofficial PB to chase down.

As I pulled out of last years event, I’m already registered for the 2010 Great South Run in October.  I also signed up for the Marwell Wildlife 10k at the end of May, giving me 10 weeks or so to work towards a sub-1hr time.

No related posts.

Unfortunately, I’m cursed with the same name as a fairly famous actor so, aside from a domain lost due to a massive fail by a UK based DNS host, I’ve not been able to get a name based domain.  Until now.

My existing and rather poorly updated blog domain (http://blog.maccarocks.com) is going to be retired.  I have quite a few fairly popular posts on there so I’ve done my best to migrate them here and hopefully Dreamhost will mirror correctly to keep the old URLs all working.

No related posts.

Is it the ‘F you I won’t do what you tell me’ element?  I’m not sticking anything to The Man with this, really.  No-one is – except for RATM swearing on Radio 5.  I see a lot of people putting that line to mean everyone saying “hey, F you Cowell”.  I don’t think that’s true at all.  If that were the case, there some more relevant tracks in RATMs back catalogue – infect I think Take The Power Back would have given a more obvious call to action.

Either that or someone will stumble across it on wikipedia..

This started as a comment on Pauls post at Blog On The Motorway but escalated to a full on post of my own.

Firstly, I don’t watch usually watch X-Factor.  Of course, I’ve been at friends houses when it’s on but I don’t watch it of my own accord.
Secondly, I don’t listen to the radio in the UK (other than the occasional Planet Rock and Kerrang) and thus have little interest in what track is number one and even smaller awareness of what is being played all the time.
Thirdly, Christmas number ones, as far back as I can remember (with the exception of Cliff Richard), have been these so called ‘novelty’ records.  I can’t remember specific examples but I’m sure there was a Mr Blobby one or some form of celebrity rehashed Christmas carol.

I do tire of hearing about X-Factor all the live long day but it’s easy to tune out/block Facebook friends/stop following tweeters/ignore people.

So, why am I so interested in getting stopping some most-likely-to-be-a-one-hit-wonder kid getting to number one?

Is it the ‘F you I won’t do what you tell me’ element?  I’m not sticking anything to The Man with this, really.  No-one is – except for RATM swearing on Radio 5.  I see a lot of people putting that line to mean everyone saying “hey, F you Cowell”.  I don’t think that’s true at all.  If that were the case, there some more relevant tracks in RATMs back catalogue – infect I think Take The Power Back would have given a more obvious call to action.

Is it the ‘F Simon Cowell, he’s a C..’ element?  Nope.  Does anyone really think this is going to stop X-Factor next year or mean that Mr C will have to sell one of his myriad houses?  Of course not.

Is it because I don’t want some kid to get rich off of the back of some crappy TV show?  Ridiculous, he’s already going to have made a fortune and this whole deal is only going to make things more lucrative for him.  I doubt more than 10% (very conservative number) of RATM purchases were originally going to buy the X-factor single.

The whole thing is interesting to me from a social and technological view point - Virul campaigns have been around for years but this is different.

This was started by one ordinary guy, not some big brand with a marketing budget and some scenster in-charge.  Some chap who created a Facebook group most likely for a laugh amongst his friends.  I’ll bet he didn’t think “I’m really gonna go out on a limb to stop this X-Factor guy, whatever it takes”.  Let’s be honest here, he hasn’t done much at all.  Don’t get me wrong, everything starts somewhere but let’s not put this up as some one man crusade to stop the tyranny of a televised talent show.

Of course, it’s not the first time this kind of thing has happened.  Crowd-sourcing is really taking off in a huge way - news sites like Reddit and Digg, software companies using it to aid their development roadmaps, even news agencies use Twitter to track breaking news in real time.

That’s why it’s interesting.  However, ordinarily, I wouldn’t have bothered getting involved with this but the fact that this kind of unimportant ‘battle’ can also be used to motivate people to donate to charity made me change my mind.
Last Friday, they’d raised almost £2k for Shelter.  Today, the current total is over £50k with gift aid.

Am I going to listen to the chart show this weekend?  No way, at least not on purpose.

Am I really going to be annoyed/interested if X-Factor kid is number one?  Not at all.

Of course, it would be very cool for kids to get exposed to (via the radio friendly version ) some decent musicianship for a change.  Maybe they’ll even pay heed to some of the causes that RATM have campaigned for over the years.  Honestly though, I’m really not bothered about the outcome.

However, I spent £0.99 and a did a good deed in donating to charity to be a very small part of something both interesting, useful and certainly something that will be a kind of folklore in geek history - Well, at least there’s a good chance someone will stumble across it on wikipedia in years to come..

I can also hope that RATM will follow this all up with a UK tour next year!

No related posts.

This week, both Sony and Microsoft released updates to their consoles adding Facebook (both vendors) and Twitter (X360 only) integration.  Whilst both platforms have different levels of integration, the same problem is common to both vendors – IT’S A PAIN IN THE ASS TO TYPE ON A CONTROLLER!

Yes, yes, yes, both the PS3 and X360 controllers have mini-keyboard add-ons available but that still makes it only slightly more useable than an old school mobile phone. I guess you can also use a USB keyboard if you really want too…
When I was checking out the X360 integration and my inner monologue was moaning about this problem, it suddenly dawned on me that I was thinking about the whole integration thing in the wrong way….

I DON’T actually want to use console based Facebook or Twitter in the same way I do on my computer.
I’m not interested in communicating directly FROM my console TO Facebook or Twitter.  If I’m online on either console, I’m likely to be too busy fragging enemies or searching for treasure than watching for a tweet reply or checking out how long someone’s baby slept for last night.
I just want to let people know what I’m playing, when I’m playing and how they can join in the fun.

My IDEAL Social Network -> Console world looks like this:

1. Cross-platform support (PSN->XBL).
2. Selectively post updates to my friends relating to game status.
3. Identify and consolidate contacts.
4. A new type of friends list for the ‘Outer Circle’ (Friends of friends).  Facebook has had this idea for a while.
5. Ability to ‘prefer’ my different circles of friends in online play.

Let me step back for a moment to give some context to my thoughts.  I own both a X360 and a PS3 and posted a few weeks ago about the dilemma of choosing games between platforms.  I prefer the PS3 technology for the Blu-Ray player and native HDMI output but I prefer the X360 for gaming due to the level of maturity (in a tech sense, not the average user age ) of the Xbox Live (XBL) network vs Playstation Network (PSN).
I currently have 2 (two) contacts on PSN who I have NEVER seen online.  In contrast, I can turn my X360 on at almost any time and will see at least one of my twenty or so friends online playing something.  I don’t mean a ‘friend’ in the Myspace sense of the word either – actual people who I have actually met and am actually friends with.
Now, I know for a fact that at least 4 of my XBL contacts have a PS3.  All for the same reason as me, the Blu-ray player.  I only bought my PS3 because I had some amazon vouchers from work and because it was the only Blu-Ray player that I KNEW would continue to get firmware updates if standards changed over the next year or 2.
The main hook on the console front is that the XBL is simply much more advanced than PSN.  It’s just easier and more fun to play online with Xbox 360..

To get  back on track, let’s look at the new Facebook Integration.
Whilst both platforms now have a native Facebook integration, one is an order of magnitude better than the other.

PS3: Post your purchases to your FB timeline, Post your Trophy acquisition updates to your timeline.
X360: Full FB application on Dashboard, update status, read newsfeeds (split per your actual FB feeds), photos, find XBL users on FB, find FB users on your XBL friends list.

PSN appears to have missed the point completely and just adds a ‘check box’ item to it’s platform.

Uploaded with plasq‘s Skitch!

Yes, it’s all well and good posting updates to my timeline bragging about how I just completed *this* level or got *this* trophy or achievement but that doesn’t actually add any value, except for the distain of those who’s newsfeed I’m polluting.
I want to use social networks to expand my gaming experience, not just shout about it.

Using Facebook, XBL can now feasibly work out who I know and who my ‘friends of a friends’ are and use this ‘trusted reputation’ information to have an extended gaming circle.  You could go so far as to start mixing this into a reputation based friends list – “I know this guy very well and he’s very unlikely to have idiot friends on here so let’s add them to a second friends list”.  Kind of like the way LinkedIn shows how many ‘degrees’ you are from someone else.
For example, when playing, Modern Warefare 2 or FIFA 2010 online, I’d much rather play with people who aren’t likely to be racist, sweary, 14 year old douche bags – or at least be given an option to do so. Currently on XBL, you can ‘rate’ people you’ve played against online to prefer or not prefer them in the future.  The trouble with this is that you have to experience playing with these fools before you could block them.
Anyhow, I digress – This kind of online matchup doesn’t exist today but XBL is a ways closer to my utopia than the PS3 version is.

Twitter Integration

Given that Twitter is almost entirely designed as a one-way, one-to-many, communication medium (“What are you doing” versus “What do you want to talk about”) there is pretty little scope for this integration to be useful.
Other than letting my followers know that “Ian is playing this game” and “Ian just got his ass kicked”, how else can it be useful?
No, really.  That’s an actual question for you.
I can’t think of anything other than bragging rights.

Perhaps Playstation got it right this time by avoiding a native integration and leaving it up to the game developers to use Twitter ala Uncharted2 – Twitter is best used for self promotion after all.

So, what’s my point?

Well, integrating with the current or next fad or phenomenon just for the sake of it isn’t enough.  Also, trying to create a NEW one hasn’t worked favourably for Sony either – how is Playstation Home doing?
There is so much potential and power behind the social web and ideas like crowd-sourcing but both console vendor focus just seems to be in the wrong place right now.
For a typically closed door company, whom people berate for not listening to customers (which is B.S by the way) and whom people love to hate, Microsoft are surprisingly open with the X360 and XBL.
Don’t take my word for it, follow @MajorNelson (Director of Programming, Xbox Live) and compare that to the impersonal PSN and Playstation twitter accounts and blogs.  Just another reason why I find XBL warm and friendly and PSN cold and boring.

You can find me on Twitter as @IanMcShane and on PSN and XBL as maccarocks.

Related posts:

1. X360 or PS3?

Stand out tracks from the night for me:

Ricky Warwick – Wild & Wonderful (orig – The Almighty)
Ricky Warwick – Jesus Loves You (orig – The Almighty)
Ricky Warwick – The Arms of Belfast Town
Therapy? – Stories
Therapy? – Diane
Therapy? – Opal Mantra

The lighting at The Wedgewood Rooms was pretty harsh again, lots of red and green everywhere.  Still, I got a few good pictures which you can see at http://www.mygigpics.com.

//ian

Related posts:

1. [Gig Pics] The Wildhearts @ Portsmouth Wedgewood Rooms

It’s not all doom and gloom, there are of course many titles available right now.  At least I was able to get a sample chapter of “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”

I got the notification that my Amazon Kindle order shipped today, with delivery expected in a couple of days.
In my excitement, I hopped over to the Kindle book store (accessed via Amazon.com as opposed to the .co.uk) to queue up some books and previews ready for its arrival.
It’s accurate to say that I’m left a little deflated and disappointed by the titles that are unavailable for UK buyers right now.  This could make for an interesting couple of days worth of tech news.

I  was initially surprised to find that there isn’t an obvious way to see any of the popular Best Sellers listings, be it NY Times or perhaps anything else localised for the UK.  All I could do was list _all_ of the Kindle books and sort by ‘Best Selling’.
Top of the list was Glenn Beck with “Arguing with Idiots”.  Maybe I should know more about him but other than him being on FOX and maybe talk radio, I don’t.  I decided to get queue up the “sample” of his book anyway.
BTW the list price of this book for Kindle is $13.79 (or £8.44) including VAT & international wireless delivery via Whispernet.  Match that against the Digital List Price and Print List Price of $29.99, as well as Amazons price for the Hardcover ($16.47) that’s a pretty decent saving.
Scrolling down the list, there wasn’t really anything on their Best Selling list that took my fancy.

I remembered that Dan Brown had a book out recently and thought I’d grab the sample of that too.  Unfortunately, it seems that none of his books are available on Kindle.  Let’s clarify that, none of his books are available on Kindle for UK customers.

The explanation from Amazon is “Due to copyright restrictions, certain Kindle Titles are not available everywhere.”
I bet this is going to become a talking point as Kindles are shipped around the world.

I decided to go through the New York Times best seller list (http://www.nytimes.com/pages/books/bestseller) for Hardcover Fiction:

1. THE LOST SYMBOL, by Dan Brown
2. A TOUCH OF DEAD, by Charlaine Harris
3. THE HELP, by Kathryn Stockett
4. THE PROFESSIONAL, by Robert B. Parker
5. THE LAST SONG, by Nicholas Sparks

Oh dear, only one of the top 5 is currently available to UK buyers, The Help by Kathryn Stockett.

Perhaps the local market would be better so I went through the UK Sunday Times best sellers list for paper backs (http://tinyurl.com/d9av7f):

1. Cross Country, by James Patterson
2. The Gift, by Cecelia Ahern
3. The Private Patient, by PD James
4. Once In a Lifetime, by Cathy Kelly
5. Arctic Drift, by Clive and Dirk Cussler

Again, only one of the top 5 were available to UK buyers – The Gift by Cecelia Ahern, not my cup of tea at all.

There are at least 3 books on those two lists which I would be tempted with if I was bored at an airport, alas I’m unable to get them to my Kindle right now.
Additionally, I looked for books by Max Brooks (World War Z, Zombie Survival Guide) and found that they aren’t available to me either.  At this point, I’m starting to get serious buyers remorse so I’ve decided to stop looking for the moment.

Of course, let’s not forget that Internation Kindles have only started shipping today.  There is plenty of time in the next 48hrs for Amazon to iron out the copyright issues that they use to explain the titles that aren’t available.
Perhaps they should at least have a ‘notify me/download sample when this title is available’ mechanism, I hope they are working this through now.

It’s not all doom and gloom, there are of course many titles available right now.  At least I was able to get a sample chapter of “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies”

Related posts:

1. Moving to eBooks?

I travel a lot for work and quite often my flights are longer than just a couple of hours.
This means that my MBP battery life isn’t long enough to sustain the entire flight and besides, I don’t often get to fly First Class so space is quite limiting.
I therefore usually carry a book or two in my carry on luggage.  Ranging from business style ones (Crucial Conversations, anyone?) to fiction, they can add substantial weight to my bag.  Not forgetting the expense of course.  If i’m bored at the airport, I’ll check out the bookstore there.  For example, I bought a whopping book from Dublin airport last week which wouldn’t even fit in my bag.

I’ve coveted the Amazon Kindle for a long time now, pretty much since it was released and especially since they launched the Kindle DX earlier this year.  I know I’d need a US mailing address to open a US account and get it delivered but that’s fine.  The only thing that has stopped me getting one yet is that I am concerned at not being able to buy books for it.  I just don’t know if you can purchase books “off Kindle” – i.e buy them on my MBP and transfer them to the Kindle via USB.
The last couple of times I’ve been to the US, I’ve had the Kindle 2 in my ‘shopping basket’ about to hit the “order” button but backed out at the last minute.

Given that, you can imagine my excitement last week when I heard via @derrenbrown that the Kindle was finally being launched outside of the US.  I went straight off to Amazon and pre-ordered, despite the $40 import tax on top of the quoted $279 ordering price.
Now a week has passed since I ordered and now I’m really starting to think this through.  A lot of noise has been made over the last few days about the cost of books to the UK market being higher than the US one.  It’s not that which bothers me so much, I’m more concerned about whether it fits MY purpose, not the markets.  I’ve started to wonder if I’ve just fallen for the media hype.  Other than the Kindle, my other option is the Sony Reader which is available in the UK right now.  It’s also the chosen format for Waterstones.

I need/want to be able to do the following:

1. Carry books with me without over burdening my back/bag.
2. Be able to buy new books instantly over the web and move to reader easily.
3. Read PDFs and Word docs.
4. Occasional annotating and ability to find the notes quickly/easily.

I don’t need web browsing – I have my iPhone when in the UK and my work BlackBerry for when I’m roaming.

Kindle International scores the first 2 but apparently doesn’t fair so well at number 3.
The Sony Reader Touch Edition hits 1,3  and 4 but doesn’t have integrated wireless for instant download.

People have suggested getting the US version of the Kindle DX which has much better PDF support apparently.  However, I think I then lose the wireless aspect.
Now, there is supposedly a new Sony Reader out in December, the Daily Edition.  A larger screen and wireless (3G I think) access to the Sony store are it’s main features.  That could well hit all three of my requirements, if it’s released in the UK.
However, if we are talking about waiting for a new release, the Kindle DX is being touted for a 2010 Q1 release internationally so perhaps I should wait on that one?

Price wise, the Kindle International racks up at ~£218.35 including the import tax and shipping from the US versus £250 for the Sony Reader PRS-600 Touch Edition.  (It doesn’t surprise me that the Sony is more expensive, it’s quite the norm for anything on their brand.)  There is, however, a smaller Sony Pocket Edition at £160 which has fewer features and is basically a bare bones eBook reader.

What am I to do short term?

• Leave my Kindle order and hope that it’s either good enough for my needs or that the market for used Kindles is good in a month or so.
• Go with the cheaper pocket Sony reader and wait for the International DX release or the newer Sony Daily?
• Forget about all of them for the moment and see if this is just a fleeting ‘want’ and not a need?

Let’s see…

Related posts:

1. Amazon international Kindle ships, buyers remorse imminent?