Month: April 2006

I was quite impressed with the MODs use of technology as the Army climb Mount Everest. Blog, Google Earth position tracking, podcasts, rss… they’ve really pulled out all the web 2.0 stops on this one!

I’ve just installed rsync on my windows workstation to copy files from my linux server, but it seems to be using 100% of the CPU on the windows machine compared to about 2% on the Linux box. One thing that did help a bit was to use the –whole-file option, this seemed to treble the transfer rate and reduce the CPU use a few percent. See this article about Lee.org » Using Cygwin, Rsync, SSH and the internet to backup XP computer for further information.

If, like me, delicious is your favourite social bookmarks site, and you want to integrate it more tightly in to your firefox web browser with an extension, but you keep loosing the web page where to find said extension, then fret no more, because it is here del.icio.us/help/firefox/extension.

Whether you are a bull or a bear, it’s hard to dispute the fact that house prices are at an astronomical level. The number of first time buyers has fallen to near-record lows, and developers are building more flats than anything else even though only 3% of people aspire to live in one. Discuss key issues like these on this House Price Wiki.

If you get an “azureus disk write error” where it complains the file is being used by another process, then check this out: How To Fix the Azureus “File Close Fails” Errors. It turns out it is Google Desktop locking the files.

We were thinking of replacing the patio door to our back garden at home with a bifolding door. It’s quite amazing how much wider the opening is with these, and they look pretty smart too. If you are interested, have a look at this bifold doors wiki for further information.

Today, Google announced the launch of the Google Maps API Version 2. So what does this mean, other than the fact that Google is solidifying its position as a serious maps provider? Well quite a lot actually! Apparently version 2 has smaller javascript code, more satellite zoom levels, a new overview map tool, documented custom map controls and types, less memory leaks, debugging tools and even a new GLatLng class so that you don’t have to flip the lattitude and longitudes to construct a geographic point. Thanks Google! If only the UK ordnance survey could be as innovative as you…

I just downloaded Sky’s new “Sky by Broadband” (that lets you watch movies and sports on your computer) but unfortunately for me the install program crashed half way through saying:

Error 1722: There is a problem with this windows install package. A program ran as part of the setup did not finish as expected.

Anyway, to cut a long story short I fixed it by going to http://www.kontiki.com/ and then clicking the “Get it” link just below the “View Webcast” bit. This installs kontikis delivery manager manually on your computer. After that you can re-run the Sky By Broadband setup file and it should work. NB: you must visit kontiki.com in Internet Explorer, as the delivery manager won’t install from firefox.