Dan’s Online Diary 

# 31.3.04 by Dan
Google have recently changed their user interface slightly.
More lo-tech, nice and simple, uncluttered - excellent.

# 30.3.04 by Dan
When PHP was first developed, it was an acronym for Personal Home Page tools. But it got rehashed and extensified, and the new developers of PHP thought that the term 'personal' was too restrictive. So PHP now stands for PHP: Hypertext Preprocessor.
Another shining example of a recursive acronym is GNU, which is an acronym for GNU's Not Unix.

So, in light of all this, I have decided to change my name from Dan, to the acronym Dan, which stands for Dan's Acronymic Name.

# 29.3.04 by Dan
I have nothing of real note to impart to you this fine day.

Magnetic poetry is cool. I like the little slogan they have on the boxes they come in - 'Better poetry through refrigeration'.
Excellent stuff.

Geeks may want to check this out.

# 27.3.04 by Dan
This is just a quick post to show Anita how it all works!!

# 25.3.04 by Dan
I was pleasantly surprised yesterday when Michelle said to me that she really enjoyed her first experience with public transport.
With me studying in Otara, her working in the city, and us only having one car, transport is tricky at times, and Michelle decided she would take the busto work yesterday.
Today, however, was a different story. I recieved a text message from Michelle at about 7:00 this morning to say that her bus had broken down on the motorway at Greenlane, and that they were waiting for another one to come from Papakura.
Isn't that such a shame? Another tale of woe from our much maligned public transport system, and another disillusioned bus rider.

I'm concerned that I might not find it easy to get a new job once I finish my studies in June/July. I don't really see my future as a Lotus Notes administrator/developer, but I have three years solid experience in that area. Anything else I do will be a starting from scratch. Ah well.

# 23.3.04 by Dan
I received emailness from Phil Parker, who has put together this online dictionary, has included some of my photographs in a number of the definitions. You may notice that some of the images are used more than once, but of course, thats even better!

# 22.3.04 by Dan
I have a plan. Be it foolish or not, I am yet to determine.
I now know of several people/organisations who have, or would like to have a website. I myself would like to have a server for testing and implementing stuff, such as my blog, and other things.
Hosting with support for PHP and mySQL and so forth is not cheap, and you're putting your stuff on someone elses server, which doesn't allow for quite as much flexability as one would like.
So, I'd like to get myself a permanent connection to the internet with a fixed IP address, that I might host my own stuff. Hosting of other peoples stuff would be required in order to pay for the connection, but that would only give me more experience, and a bigger portfolio.
So that is my plan.

Hands up who's read Orwell's 1984?

# 17.3.04 by Dan
A chap in my class was telling jokes, albeit rather poor ones. But what was really funny was after he had told a few without quite the desired reaction, he said "Well, one day I'll become a comedian, and then you won't be laughing!".

# 15.3.04 by Dan
    Here is a list of cameras I have:
  • Canon s50
  • Agfa Jsolette bellows 120
  • Kodak Retina III viewfinder
  • a 35mm AF compact with zoom - I lent it to my brother or sister years ago, and I can't even remember what brand it is.

    Here is a list of cameras I would like to have:
  • Cosina CX-2 (with the CX-M underwater case would be nice)
  • Olympus XA and/or XA-4 macro (nice 28mm lens)
  • Lomo LC-A (cleverly marketed, hence over-priced, but still a very unique camera)
  • Minox 35 (GT or GL or whatever)
  • Kiev 35A
  • a cheap medium format colour of some description
  • Pentax K1000 (or similar) with an assortment of lenses and filters
  • Canon EOS 300D

# 11.3.04 by Dan
... its, like, Thursday, and I've not posted since, like, Monday! <checks temperature>

The Trade and Exchange have upgraded their website just today.

I've learnt that if you're searching really hard for something on the interweb, try searching for a misspelling of the thing you're searching for. For example, if you're looking for Minox cameras in the Trade and Exchange or on trademe.co.nz, having searched for 'minox', it often pays to search also for 'minnox'.

I've nearly accidently bought two cameras this week. I was bidding for them on trademe.co.nz and I nearly won. I was outbid for yesterday's Olympus XA with A11 flash in just the last ten minutes of the auction, which was a relief. I mean, I would have loved the camera, but I just don't have the spare pingers, since I be, like, studying, and the mortgage has us in, like, a death grip.

Studying at home is distracting, especially when there is food, classic car magazines, a classic car, and a playful kitten.

I'm downloading the free version of Borland JBuilder X, so I can scribble me some apps.

Two people went away via aeroplane for ten days on Sunday, and then someone went home via aeroplane to the other side of the world on Tuesday, and then some people went to Hawaii via aeroplane for ten days this morning, and then someone else is going home via aeroplane to the other side of the world this afternoon.
There is a lot of sky flying going on.

Oh, and don't forget, I will still send you free photos of whatever you want!

So, whats up with all you chaps and chapesses?

# 8.3.04 by Dan
Weddings are great.
Another family started - another brick in the wall of society.

Lots of organising and stuff last week - I didn't get much time to blog or study, so this week will hopefully be lots of both.
But first, to study.

# 4.3.04 by Dan
An article in our local community newspaper, the Manukau Courier, made my day : the Papatoetoe Community Board is reintroducing the Papatoetoe service medal.
The Papatoetoe City Council was amalgamated with Manukau in 1989, making the medal somewhat obselete, but the Papatoetoe Community Board have found the original design for the medal, and are going to remake the as per the original and award them as recognition for outstanding community service.
I think the move to reintroduce this award is great; we need to recognise those in who make and effort to improve our communities. Down with that ridiculous 'tall poppy syndrome' (or whatever you want to call it) that plagues our post-modernised society, and up with personal responisibilty, and recognition of community service.
Why don't each of the other Community Boards in our city do the same? And if some of them already do, why is the fact not more widely acknowledged?

Corina Huber (my wife's sister) and Martin Eldershaw are getting married on Saturday. We've just been down at the church setting things up - rehearsal is tonight.

# 3.3.04 by Dan
I kicked butt in my Distributed Computing lab this morning. I wrote some Java code that untilised Remote Method Invocation(RMI). The application consisted of a client and a server. The client asked for the user for two numbers, and then sent them to the server application residing on another machine, which performed the arithmetic, and sent the result back to the client. Fun fun fun!

I've said this before and I'll no doubt say it again : I don't read enough stuff. How people find the time to sit down and read, I don't know, but I'd like to find out.

# 1.3.04 by Dan
The blog is waning. I guess I feel less inclined to get on the net since I've only got a dial-up connection. Which is unbelievably frustrating, having gotten used to the 10Mb pipe at work.

I'm still feeling a bit odd - I haven't got used to this studying-but-not-working thing.
I'm beginning my research project - I'm going to be looking into the evaluation and benchmarking of Content Management Systems.

Anyway - back to the study. I'll try and blog more and better soon.
Ciao.