Author: 1

talking just a little bit too loud.

Apple confessions of a pixel pusher

Roughly drafted writes about Apple and it’s ProApps. And the future of them. It feels that the author uses just a few to many arguments. I think that not all is well in the Pro Apps world of Apple. Nobody knows. Neither do I. That’s the Apple way, and that is part of the problem: You can not manage the communication around Pro Apps like you do for the next iPod.

Apple announced Aperture 2. I neither used Aperture-1 nor Lighroom. But I talked to people who did. Aperture was (an / another) example for Apples inability to come up with Pro Applications on it’s own. You just can’t in that vacuum that the super tight Apple communication rules dictate. Apple has money and brilliant engineers and the best intentions. But that’s not enough. You have to have an open dialog with your Pro clients. Pushing updates that claim “enhancements and bug fixes” and do not give any more detail is simply unacceptible for Pro Applications.

hitting on the ugly girl

economy internet M$ technology

It really must suck to be Microsoft these days. Their attempt to buy Yahoo for more money that they actually have was a desperate move to begin with. And now they even got rejected. Who know that Yahoo! of all companies had choices. In this whole M$ bid media frenzy everybody seem to have forgotten about the layoff story that Yahoo had coming out. Yahoo is ailing. But they seem to have decided that they rather disolve like AOL or Netscape than to be part of would have been the worst merger in the history of Internet companies. Hitting on the ugly girl, since you think you have a chance is bad enough. Getting rejected leaves you with a little less than nothing. Not that I would know anything about that.

obama

politics

After 04 I thought I would not care about the elections again. But that would actually mean letting Bush win for the third time. Regardless how odd and wrong it was to let that happen twice, it should not repeat again. It probably is always worth trying to make the world a better place. So I officially endorse Obama here. Mrs. Clinton is just this years Kerry. And we all know how well Hermann Munster worked. America can vote for the better president. It has done so in the past. Not particularly this century. But -honestly- the choices were not to great either. Bush, Kerry and Gore. 2 or less sylables in a name are simply not enough.

the day google had won, for good

history internet technology

Microsoft tries to buy Yahoo. For 46 billion dollars. 4 short years ago they would have had that kind of money in cash. And then some. Cursorly googling around it seems that M$ cash reserve has melted down to 29 billion. So they would need to raise money to buy Yahoo. They would get eyeballs and visitors. But then what? The technology running Yahoo is completely free of any Microsoft stuff. Yahoo has been actively supporting things like javascript libraries and other open source related items. Will Microsoft run now Unix servers? They have to, or they will kill Yahoo in the attempt to transfer it to their technology base. Yahoo had years to grow. It’s a start up with 15,000 people. Give or take a thousand that needs to get layed of. Or not.

Microsoft used to be the biggest software company in the world. By numbers as well as in the minds of the people. IBM used to be the biggest computer company. Microsoft can consider itself very lucky if it will do as well as IBM does right in a couple of years. Once Gates had left nothing really worked any longer. People will say that. Maybe Bill wants to pull off a Steve, and come back one day?

Google lost two competitors today: Yahoo and Microsoft will be absent from any innovation for a long time while they try to figure to integrate what they have. Maybe in 2009 they emerge with an ok conglomerate of what they were in 2007. Allot of time to get new things going for Google.

postfix: can’t create user output file

internet linux technology

people alerted me that they got an email bounce saying:

Final-Recipient: rfc822; andreas@interdubs.com
Original-Recipient: rfc822; andreas@andreaswacker.com
Action: failed
Status: 5.0.0
Diagnostic-Code: X-Postfix; can't create user output file

it turned out that my local mail file that I keep as a backup was bigger than 1000 Megabyte. Seems to be that postfix (or whichever program delivers the mail locally to /var/spool/mail) does not like to write to files that are bigger than that number. Scary the file grew to that size within one year.

php and tripple quotes

technology

It turns out that using mysql_real_escape_string on import_request_variables you end up with tripple quotes. That’s the problem with hacks instead of fixes: They leave a slight taste of problems. And room for people to inject some stuff.

dataflow

technology

Technology can be implemented like this or that

PC power connectors

technology

A very nice and helpful overview of PC Power Connectors.

and of course it does not work

technology

I am with my Bank since ten years. And I like them. They are small, and I am not inclined to give my money to Wamu or BoA.

Now they changed their online banking system. Or, let’s say they tried to. Problem is: it does not work. The instructions are poor and the idea of choosing from 16 animal images is pathetic. But the biggest problem is, that it simply does not work:


Usernames are required for login, however, username registration is currently unavailable.
We apologize for the inconvenience and ask that you try again later.

And, of course, there is no email address to maybe tell them. Waiting till the sun rises over the US. Awaiting some interesting support conversations.

The range between broken and working on the internet is quiet huge I must say.
As is the range of problems facing. I am sure my Bank could be helped rather quickly with a person that could think for 3 minutes straight, but other problems seem to be more involved to me. Danger would ensue if the people “making” the software for my bank would have any say or influence on how the Internet does work.

Update: The system changed it’s mind and does now “work”. Which means that looking at my account takes now two minutes instead of 20 seconds. More time to get something to wipe away those tears that will fill my eyes …

cinmizer

technology

Stereo?