Rui CarmoUpdate: Due to the increased popularity the site has enjoyed during the last couple of days, I've turned on Coral caching for all the site images. It doesn't help, however, that idiots such as these guys are directly referencing images on my site instead of, like me, storing a local copy of them (and I do it in such a way that it preserves credit for the original image source, too). So please bear with me, and consider donating towards a bandwidth upgrade.
Overslept. Arrived at the office just in time to kick a switch port into commission, wade through e-mail, re-draft a portion of my presentation (re-scheduled for next Monday). Did some research, got into one of the typical bureaucratic tussles of a big corporation - resolved amicably, but eating up some of my time.
Despite the support I've been getting, I am starting to become extremely annoyed with the whole iMac G5 order saga. I only realized how much when I caught myself jumping from wondering if there were updated Wi-Fi drivers to run Fedora on my Toshiba laptop to wondering how easy it would be to get hold of HP's new 22" monitor here in Portugal.
Then I remembered the hassle involved in running Linux on a daily basis, and sobered up. Still, I'm not happy with this at all, and it's starting to get to me.
Calling FNAC's Colombo store is still impossible - I gave up in disgust when the canned music changed to "Bridge Over Troubled Water", 12:40 into the last call (yes, I know, it's just tasteless).
On with the news:
- OpenVMS lives. The only OS that not only keeps running while you smash half of a cluster with an axe, but also makes a credible attempt at working when you start on the other half. Of course I gave it up ages ago. The axe, I mean.
- And so does Amiga OS, apparently. Of all the legacy fan stuff floating out there, the Amiga is the one I could never understand.
- Windows users who'd like a neat, iPhoto-like way to manage their photos should try out Picasa 2.0, which is actually usable this time around. Still, it feels somewhat uneven and gimmicky here and there. The timeline featurette is a prime example of runaway, useless and rather confusing eyecandy (Flickr's little Flash "organizr" is much better in that regard), but browsing and categorizing five years of photos, illustrations and web page GIFs I have on my work laptop was a quick and enjoyable experience. Until, of course, I started dragging photos around to re-file them in other folders - having this close a mapping between a visible photo library and the filesystem is just begging for trouble...
- It looks like both Evolution and Beagle are being ported to Windows. I can't say it's a bad idea, but I'll wait until they're actually rated as usable to pass judgment (of course "usable" in the Open Source world is a debatable concept, and Evolution is a bit... er... kinky to say the least, but I'm willing to give them a chance). And, incidentally, this would provide Novell with a relatively decent GroupWise client, for a change.
- More North American patent nonsense, as the Canadian government asks for a re-hearing on the Blackberry patent rulings.
- The Economist tries to write some sense into the Wi-Fi standards story. Not going to happen, old chap.
And, finally, a nice overview of handset sales, done by the pros.