From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 9.15am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Poster

Hi
I opened the screen door yesterday and my cat got out and has been missing since then so I was wondering if you are not to busy you could make a poster for me. It has to be A4 and I will photocopy it and put it around my suburb this afternoon.

This is the only photo of her I have she answers to the name Missy and is black and white and about 8 months old. missing on Harper street and my phone number.
Thanks Shan.
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 9.26am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Poster

Dear Shannon,
That is shocking news. Luckily I was sitting down when I read your email and not half way up a ladder or tree. How are you holding up? I am surprised you managed to attend work at all what with thinking about Missy out there cold, frightened and alone… possibly lying on the side of the road, her back legs squashed by a vehicle, calling out "Shannon, where are you?"
Although I have two clients expecting completed work this afternoon, I will, of course, drop everything and do whatever it takes to facilitate the speedy return of Missy.
Regards, David.

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 9.37am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Poster

yeah ok thanks. I know you dont like cats but I am really worried about mine. I have to leave at 1pm today.
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 10.17am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Poster

Dear Shannon,
I never said I don’t like cats. Once, having been invited to a party, I went clothes shopping beforehand and bought a pair of expensive G-Star boots. They were two sizes too small but I wanted them so badly I figured I could just wear them without socks and cut my toenails very short. As the party was only a few blocks from my place, I decided to walk. After the first block, I lost all feeling in my feet. Arriving at the party, I stumbled into a guy named Steven, spilling Malibu & coke onto his white Wham ‘Choose Life’ t-shirt, and he punched me. An hour or so after the incident, Steven sat down in a chair already occupied by a cat. The surprised cat clawed and snarled causing Steven to leap out of the chair, slip on a rug and strike his forehead onto the corner of a speaker; resulting in a two inch open gash. In its shock, the cat also defecated, leaving Steven with a foul stain down the back of his beige cargo pants. I liked that cat.
Attached poster as requested.
Regards, David.

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 10.24am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

yeah thats not what I was looking for at all. it looks like a movie and how come the photo of Missy is so small?
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 10.28am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

Dear Shannon,
It’s a design thing. The cat is lost in the negative space.
Regards, David.

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 10.33am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

Thats just stupid. Can you do it properly please? I am extremely emotional over this and was up all night in tears. you seem to think it is funny. Can you make the photo bigger please and fix the text and do it in colour please. Thanks.
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 10.46am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

Dear Shannon,
Having worked with designers for a few years now, I would have assumed you understood, despite our vague suggestions otherwise, we do not welcome constructive criticism. I don’t come downstairs and tell you how to send text messages, log onto Facebook and look out of the window. I am willing to overlook this faux pas due to you no doubt being preoccupied with thoughts of Missy attempting to make her way home across busy intersections or being trapped in a drain as it slowly fills with water. I spent three days down a well once but that was just for fun.
I have amended and attached the poster as per your instructions.
Regards, David.

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 10.59am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

This is worse than the other one. can you make it so it shows the whole photo of Missy and delete the stupid text that says missing missy off it? I just want it to say Lost.

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 11.14am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 11.21am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Poster

yeah can you do the poster or not? I just want a photo and the word lost and the telephone number and when and where she was lost and her name. Not like a movie poster or anything stupid. I have to leave early today. If it was your cat I would help you. Thanks.

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 11.32am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Awww

Dear Shannon,
I don’t have a cat. I once agreed to look after a friend’s cat for a week but after he dropped it off at my apartment and explained the concept of kitty litter, I kept the cat in a closed cardboard box in the shed and forgot about it. If I wanted to feed something and clean faeces, I wouldn’t have put my mother in that home after her stroke. A week later, when my friend came to collect his cat, I pretended that I was not home and mailed the box to him. Apparently I failed to put enough stamps on the package and he had to collect it from the post office and pay eighteen dollars. He still goes on about that sometimes, people need to learn to let go.
I have attached the amended version of your poster as per your detailed instructions.
Regards, David.

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 11.47am
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Awww

Thats not my cat. where did you get that picture from? That cat is orange. I gave you a photo of my cat.
From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 11.58am
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Awww

I know, but that one is cute. As Missy has quite possibly met any one of several violent ends, it is possible you might get a better cat out of this. If anybody calls and says "I haven’t seen your orange cat but I did find a black and white one with its hind legs run over by a car, do you want it?" you can politely decline and save yourself a costly veterinarian bill.
I knew someone who had a basset hound that had its hind legs removed after an accident and it had to walk around with one of those little buggies with wheels. If it had been my dog I would have asked for all its legs to be removed and replaced with wheels and had a remote control installed. I could charge neighbourhood kids for rides and enter it in races. If I did the same with a horse I could drive it to work. I would call it Steven.
Regards, David.

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 12.07pm
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Awww

Please just use the photo I gave you.

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 12.22pm
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Awww

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 12.34pm
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Awww

I didnt say there was a reward. I dont have $2000 dollars. What did you even put that there for? Apart from that it is perfect can you please remove the reward bit. Thanks Shan.

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 12.42pm
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Awww

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 12.51pm
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Awww

Can you just please take the reward bit off altogether? I have to leave in ten minutes and I still have to make photocopies of it.

From: David Thorne
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 12.56pm
To: Shannon Walkley
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Awww

From: Shannon Walkley
Date: Monday 21 June 2010 1.03pm
To: David Thorne
Subject: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Awww

Fine. That will have to do.

–

Everybody has been getting in on the band wagon. Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Rackspace and so on.

Now the downside to the industry is that companies who buy cloud storage are going to be spending much less with the traditional storage vendors such as HDS, EMC and NetApps. So the traditional storage vendors are doing one of two things. There are those who are taking the FUD route. Warning you that your data in the cloud may not be secure. What if your data connections go down? What SLA can the cloud supplier really offer? What if the cloud supplier goes out of business? You get the idea.

But the cloud storage vendors are quick to point out that they offer comprehensive SLAs and that they are big and stable companies and the risk of them going bust is small.

EMC is one such supplier who has been selling it’s Atmos cloud based storage solution to all who will buy it on the back of the big company credentials and solid SLAs.

So when EMC suddenly decided to pull the plug on Atmos last week, you have to question their motives!

Existing customers will now have to go through the pain of migrating what could be huge volumes of data, off Atmos and onto a new cloud storage platform. In some cases a company may even be forced to invest in a new SAN (and I am sure the EMC rep will be along very soon to help them do this) as they will have lost all trust in cloud storage from any vendor.

But if EMC can do this, what is to stop Microsoft or Rackspace or one of any number of small providers doing the same?

So any organisation looking at cloud based storage will now no doubt stop and rethink this decision. Is the risk just too high?

In some cases the answer will be yes and they will invest in traditional onsite SANs just like they always did.

In any case, EMC has now successfully cast a level of fear, uncertainty and doubt (FUD)  into the cloud storage market place which is going to impact take up of these services and drive the sales of onsite SANs back up again. The cynic in me has to question if Atmos has all been one big campaign to damage the cloud based storage market in the first place. After all, one of the main companies to gain from this would be EMC themselves and that just feels wrong.

On the outskirts of Spalding in Lincolnshire, as you drive along the A16 you may just see a small sign post to the Pinchbeck Engine Museum. I must admit that since moving to the area 4 years ago, we have passed that sign many times and every time we have said that we must pop in for a look.

So here is the history part.

Not that long ago, somebody thought it would be a good idea to drain the Fens (they are in the east of England) for farming. A similar thing also took place in Holland and it is by no coincidence that this area is known as South Holland.

So drains were dug and water was drained and something unexpected happened. As the land dried out, it sank. The result was that the fields around the drains ended up being below the water level and of course, water cannot flow up hill.

And so pumps were installed. At first they were wind driven and then steam took over once the steam engine was invented. Today these pumps are electric and are all over the east of England.

The Pinchbeck Engine Museum is one of the few surviving steam pumps and whilst it has now been replaced by modern electric pumps, it has been preserved.

The museum seems to operate little or no advertising and I have yet to meet anybody else who has been there. Indeed a quick look at the visitors book suggests that you will not be queuing to get in at any time which is a shame as this is a genuinely interesting attraction.

So upon arrival in the empty car park, the pump house is located in impeccably kept grounds with a nice picnic area. As we got out of the car we were met by Ken who personally showed the three of us around the museum explaining to us what everything was, how it worked and the history behind it.

Essentially the Pinchbeck Engine is a large steam engine that drives a large water wheel that then lifts the water up into the river and it has all been really well preserved

So overall, we were on site for about an hour. Entrance was free of charge (although there is a donation box) and it was a genuinely interesting and informative day out.

So if you are in the area (the A16 is a popular route to the East coast) then why not stop by? You will be glad you did.

There are a load more photos in my photo album which you can find here.

Pinchbeck Engine Museum On Bing Maps

£40,000 per year (£10,000 per year more than a fully qualified nurse)? No

A 35 hour working week? No

43 days per year paid annual leave? No

Free travel for you and your family? No

A union who will do everything in it’s power to protect your job at the expense of your passengers? No

How about the small matter that on the Central Line and Victoria Line, the trains don’t actually need drivers at all!!!

That’s right. The trains are computer controlled and do not need a driver at all however because the unions have such a vested interest in making the London Tube profitable in keeping their members in jobs, TFL are still forced to put drivers in these trains.

So what do they do during their 35 hour week and when they are not on holiday or strike?

They operate the doors!

Whilst I am not convinced I agree with “everything” she says, it certainly gets the old grey matter going.

What do you think?

We’re adding broadband connections to our televisions, our phones, our reading devices and our game consoles these days, to the point that we expect such connections in almost everything we own. But while connectivity is awesome 90 percent of the time, it’s also scary because it can turn what were once private habits such as reading a book or answering email into something social — in some cases, without us knowing. It also allows advertisers to … Read More

via GigaOM

Enjoy

When creating a cartoon like Pokemon, The Simpsons or Looney Toons, it's probably safe to say that the artists don't think much about the cranial structure of Bugs Bunny or the internal mechanisms behind Bulbasaur's vine shooting when putting pen to paper. Luckily for us, there are plenty of artists out there with the talent and humor to put their knowledge of real-life anatomy to work in the world of fantasy. Below are 16 examples of real-life a … Read More

via

Pacman. 30 years old and still chasing ghosts.

You really must go to the Google home page and click on “Insert Coin” because it will be gone tomorrow

So previously, I found that Microsoft Live Mesh did that job. It had a client for Windows, Mac and Windows Mobile as well as a web portal. I could add any folder on any device to my “Mesh” and it would sync with all other devices in the Mesh in near real time.

In reality that meant that if I took a photo with the camera on my phone, in a matter of seconds, that photo had been copied back to my desktop onto my web based storage.

The only thing I did not like however was that Mesh had another feature. It allowed you to connect via the internet to any other machine in the Mesh and create a remote desktop session giving you full control over the remote machine. This was not something that could be switched off in the software (although a registry hack soon killed the feature for me).

But now I have moved to Android and I cannot find a replacement. Mesh does not have an Android client and I have yet to find anything else that does 2 way sync.

I have tried Zumodrive, SugarSync, DropBox and others but they all have 2 distinct downfalls.

1. I cannot add existing folders on my desktop into the sync. I can only sync files that are inside the applications own folders

2. I cannot add any folders on my mobile device to the sync

This is very much a 1 way sync process and very frustrating. Indeed with some of these applications, they do not sync with the phone at all. Instead when you click on the file you want to open, you have to wait for that file to download off the server. This has 2 downsides.

1. If I am out and about, I am reliant on using the 3G data connection on my phone which can be expensive

2. If I am out of coverage, I cannot get the file at all.

To me, this is not file synchronisation at all.

Now the worse thing is that Mesh is nearing the end of it’s life. With the next release of the Windows Live web applications we are going to see Windows Live Sync and Windows Live Mesh merge with Windows Live SkyDrive. This should be a good thing but what do we think the odds are of a client for non Windows mobile devices?

So I am stuck.

I can’t sync files off my mobile device easily and can’t sync files onto my mobile device to be used offline later.

Whilst I am sure there must be an app for that, I can’t find it so any clues?

So Blackberry also does all of this and if I were to ask for one, my company would give me one is a flash but whilst the Blackberry is a great messaging device, as a phone, it falls a long way short.

So over the years I have had an iMate JamIn, a HTC S710 and a HTC S740. All of which I have been really happy with but it is time for a change.

So the iPhone is still ruled out. Whilst the interface is nice, it is a closed system. By this I mean that I can’t just install a bit of software as I please. I have to go via the iTunes store which only contains software “approved” by Apple. Hence the stories in the news around them not allowing Google Talk, Adobe Flash and so on. On top of this, whilst it will sync with Exchange, it does not honour the security settings (indeed there are reports of it actually lying to Exchange on the security front just to get a connection) and the encryption and security on the device are poor at best.

Of course for many users, none of this matters and lets be fair, the iPhone is not being sold as a business phone so maybe I am being over critical.

Windows Mobile on the other hand has none of the above problems.

BUT

It is starting to get long in the tooth and there is a new version out later this year. To their credit HTC have done a great job with their HTC Sense overlay which makes Windows Mobile soooo much better plus there is no guarantee that then Windows Mobile 7 comes out, it will not have the same problems as the iPhone.

So this brings me onto Android. The infamous Google operating system.

When I have looked at this in the past, the MS Exchange support has been bad. Really really bad. The Android forums are full or people complaining how it simply does not play. But with the recent 2.1 build, the reports have changed. Indeed at least one review said that the Exchange experience was even better than Windows Mobile!

So after a lot of checking, testing, reading and so on, Android seemed to fit the bill. And this happened at the same time HTC launched their new HTC Desire handset. The temptation was strong.

And then last week when I was teetering on the edge of ordering, somebody came into the office who actually had a Desire in their hands raving about how nice it was. Add to this that he had an iPhone before hand, this was praise indeed.

So I had a play, tested it with various things (including the bluetooth in my Car) and I was sold.

So having had the phone a few days, and remembering this is my primary business phone, is it any good?

With Microsoft Exchange over ActiveSync, it just works. Push email, Calendar, Contacts all behave exactly how they should. It also obeys all the Exchange security policies including remote wipe.

With my BMW Bluetooth setup (which can be fussy at the best of times) again everything works.

With Google Apps, as you would expect on a Google phone, faultless however there is one gotcha on this one.

As Google users will know, with Google Apps, you end up with 2 Google accounts. Your Apps account that gives you email, docs, calendar etc and a second account for things like Google Maps, Reader, News, Photos and other Google services. Now Google have said that they will allow you to use your Apps login for all of these services later in the year but for now you need 2.

So when you set up your Android phone, it will take the first Google account you enter as the primary account and use it for maps, reader and so on. You cannot change this even when you add your second Google account details. So whatever you do, add your none Google Apps account details FIRST and then add your Google Apps details. Fail to do this and you will have to wipe your phone and start again.

So beyond this, what is the phone like?

The screen is fantastic and with a 1Ghz CPU the phone is very very quick even with loads of stuff going on. It is also very clever with WiFi, connecting whenever a signal is available. Oddly however where on my old phone, leaving WiFi on would kill the battery in a couple of hours, this is not the case and I can leave this turned on 24×7.

I am still getting into the concept of Apps and can see there are thousands in the market place but so far, this thing is very impressive. Just like the phones I have had before hand, IT JUST WORKS.

So give me a week or so to use this thing in anger but so far I cannot think or a reason not to recommend it and even the iPhone users think so. High praise indeed

We flew out yesterday morning on a very early flight from Heathrow (because we will not be stopped by a silly ash cloud) and arrived around 10:30 local time where we dived straight into the sessions.

So both yesterday and today have been spread between time spent in various seminars and sessions and time spent speaking to a number of vendors and subject matter experts in the exhibition area.

So what’s new?

Superdome Launch

Well a big event was the launch of the new HP SuperDome servers. To a lot of people, this really is a big deal and will change the way they do things. It certainly looks impressive and I can see the attraction. It’s just a shame that it does not fit the needs of the customers I tend to work with. Having said that, one of my colleagues from internal IT is here and he seems really excited by it so I may see one in a data centre near me soon.

So other points that stood out for me where the new Intel Xenon chips that now have additional instruction sets to hardware accelerate encryption. With a lot of talk about borderless networks (remember I was banging on about this back in 2007), this could really help make that a reality.

The plenary keynote sessions were also very good this year. All too often these feel too much like a sales pitch but this year, whilst of course there was a large dose of self promotion, we have some very interesting speakers.

The keynotes were hosted by Mark Jeffries who kept the pace up and was entertaining in his own right. We had some interesting talks from Intel and HP on what the data centre might look like in 2020 and at the end of today’s session had a fascinating talk from Dr Robert Ballard who is an Oceanographer and was responsible for finding the Titanic and the Bismarck to name but two. He gave a fantastic insight into the world he works in under the oceans which are still largely unchartered.

He also talked to us about the technology he is using today to further marine exploration and how it is changing the way he works.

In the past, he might spend 2 hours descending to the ocean floor in a submarine, spend 2 hours exploring and then spend 2 more hours getting back to the surface. In reality this limited exploration time to just 2 hours a day.

Today using high speed communication links, he is sending down a submarine that is unmanned so can stay down on the ocean floor for much longer periods of time. The key difference here however is that his command and control centre is not on the ship on the surface. Instead all the data is sent via satellite back to a number of centres around the globe so that when something interesting is found, they can get the leading subject matter expert to that centre in under an hour and then give that person full control of the robot on the ocean floor. In addition all this data is also being pumped over high speed pipes to schools and other academic locations in the US where children can see all this going on in real time.

Dr Ballard used the term Electronic Travel. He might not physically on the ocean floor but his spirit is there and he can see and do everything he could do if he was there in person. We are today in a place where the technology exists to take our “spirit” somewhere else without leaving our chair. Yes this is building on the idea of remote working and has mirrors in medicine where doctors are now operating on patients half way around the world using fast connections and robots but again this is another application where the technology we have right here and right now is changing the world and peoples lives.

Steve Wozniak On Stage

Finally today saw another keynote, this time from Steve Wozniak (yes that Steve Wozniak) talking about Fusion IO (a company he is now working for) who are doing some really clever stuff around solid state storages. Instead of making solid state disks that look just like normal hard drives, Fusion IO is working on attaching this very fast and low power storage directly to the bus in the server delivering order of magnitude performance gains in the process.

And at the end of that session a draw took place where Steve handed out a number of personally signed copies of his Autobiography (iWoz) before heading off into the sunset on his Segway and yours truly was one of the winners so happy days.

So it’s now the end of the day and we have seen and heard lots and lots.

The weather here in Frankfurt is stunning and I am sure we will be heading out for some of that German hospitality tonight.

I will post back at the end of the show as I am sure there will be much more to report after tomorrow.

In the meantime, the Twitter Hash Tag for this event is #HPTAW and more info of the event itself is over at www.hp.com/go/tw2010