Blog the Barclays...
Welcome to the Barclays Blogging (or Weblogs) - where our thoughts on events and such can be published. If you want to know more about blogging, click here.
Monday, August 06, 2007
August has arrived and brought the summer's best weather with it.
Saturday was absolutely beautiful in the garden - why I then decided it'd be a good idea to hack 2 feet off our hedge at the front is beyond me. Picking one of the warmest days of the year to do the heaviest task of the year is not clever.
Anyway, with August, comes the run-up to the rugby season, and this year, the Rugby World Cup.
The Scotland team are out and about in Scotland training - St Andrews and the like, no doubt getting some golf in too. Which, for many of them is just as well, given the war between the SRU and Edinburgh Rugby that's broke out. The ER guys cannot use Murrayfield any more as, according to a statement by the SRU, Edinburgh Rugby that's broke out. The ER have terminated their "operating agreement" and have been asked to vacate the premises. Just the run-up to a World Cup we were looking for - way to go guys.
PC World announced that they're to produce an "eco-computer" partly made of wood. I'm no expert, but I'm not sure that's a good idea guys.
It's going to be much smaller than a standard tower system and uses a number of laptop parts in the build to ensure that performance is not compromised. Hmm, let me think: a small computer; no fan; laptop parts; internal power pack - blimey, it's a Mac mini :-))
Go to the far east and you're bound to find some bizarre stories. Thai police that break minor rules like being late, park in the wrong place or accidentally throw a detainee down the stairs will have to wear a "Hello Kitty" armband while in the office. Although a great idea, perhaps it should be extended to outside the police station. Have them walking the streets with their Miffy-branded truncheons and what not - we'll see how tough they are on crime dressed like that!
.: posted by Ali 3:01 PM
Monday, July 30, 2007
I've been a fan of David Pogue for a while - having bought a few of his books on Mac OSX and the like. His style of writing in his books and newspaper column is very easy and has been invaluable to me in times of Mac-meltdown.
Anyway, I didn't relaise that in addition to the New York Times column, he also produced a regular video column too. And some of them are excellent - mixing a tech knowledge of geek proportions with a tongue-in-cheekiness unusual in a techie. My favourite so far is "iPhone: the Musical".
.: posted by Ali 2:43 PM
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Just back from France and feeling fully refreshed!
2 weeks in the variable Normandy climate was only dampened by the drive back in which we got caught up in the floods in and around Gloucester, Worcester, Hereford, Stratford, Oxford Warwick, Heathrow and most of the M25 - which I think acts as a run-off from all arable farmland outside the nation's capital, providing a cool place to swim should drivers get sick of sitting motionless in their cars for extended periods.
Of course, we wouldn't have been there had it not been for our desire to fight our way across the country to visit my wife's mother and her husband, and to drop Jamie off at a local activity centre for the week in the aptly-named hamlet of Hole in the Wall.
15 hours of travel from across continental Europe, finished in Kenilworth, Warwickshire. And, many, many thanks to the lovely lady in the Whatley Hall Hotel, Banbury (of ride-cock-horse fame - that's Banbury, not the lovely lady) who, although didn't have a room for us - did phone round and identify the De Montford Hotel as a place for us to finally rest for the night.
Anyway, we hacked our way across England to Ledbury on Saturday and spent a rather more relaxing 24-hours there before making our way north and out of harm's way.
Great to be back though - and determined to keep up a more regular blog.
.: posted by Ali 2:27 PM
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
What a pain in the arse! Migrating to a Google Account on Blogger is a nightmare.
Maybe it's an Apple thing, but that's enough to send anyone off to find another way of communicating with the world!
Anyway, clearly Google's ambition of world domination is one step closer as they take over another online service. Goodness knows they're having loads of success with YouTube the news today was full of stories of the $1bn (what's the smiley for a pinky in the corner of the mouth, Dr Evil type" billion?). Way to go guys!
"Guys" - there's an expression I don't use much, so why now? I'm not impressed with the insidious Americanisms spreading into the UK, it's inevitable I suppose; but at 40 years old, I'm in that grump-old state - so I can happily rail against anything.
In an attempt to "get down with the kids" at work today, someone called something "wack". I hope in jest, but still not sure. I was interested in the etymology of this word so went searching on the internet; and boy, did it come up trumps. Welcome to Urban Dictionary - I'm not sure whether this is a wiki-type site yet, having only just found it today, but a lot of people seem to be adding their own definitions of "urban language".
So "wack" is:
Lame, sorry ass, aint even legit.
This stuff is brilliant.
I found "yoink" listed too. One of my favourite words - taken from a Simpson's episode.
An exclamation that, when uttered in conjunction with taking an object, immediately transfers ownership from the original owner to the person using the word regardless of previous property rights.
Anyway, not for the first time, I've said that this is what the www is all about. You can keep you multi-billion dollar YouTube enterprises (incidentally, saying "you tube" to someone in Scotland is not advised), just give me more of this random stuff.
Example of random stuff - thanks to Martin Young in the office for this one!
We were talking of old sweets, the ones you used to get in proper sweet shops and generally lamenting the decline of old fashioned standards, when he forwards a link to www.aquarterof.co.uk - this is just gold dust. I don't have a sweet tooth, but I reckon I'll be ordering some of my favourites.
Most likely I'll end up with a sore stomach to go with the aforementioned pain in the arse!
.: posted by Ali 8:21 PM
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Congratulations to Tom and Kathryn who, by now, should be successfully hitched!!
All the best to the happy couple.
Nic and I are looking forward to having a wee drink with you tonight at the reception. See you soon and have a great honeymoon.
.: posted by Ali 5:02 PM
Wednesday, August 02, 2006
Talk about your erratic posting! Another long spell offline and I'm trying to get back on the bloghorse again.
Loads happening here. Moved House. Jamie's got a new school. Anna's getting ready for pre-school nursery - it's all go I tell you.
Holidays coming up - we're off to Florida soon - and all hoping that the great weather in Scotland is mirrored over there (in fact, FL today is 88F - feels like 93F) :-o
And what of my beloved Apple - they've been busy too after launching the Intel Macs. Not for Apple the "bing, bong, bong, bing" of Intel Inside - oh no. They're happy to cut the rip out of PCs by stereotyping the Mac and PC in their most recent Get a Mac ads.
It's a little dangerous to compartmentalise both sides of the computer market, although I'm sure that more Apple users align with the company's vision of them, than perhaps our PC cousins do with their representation.
Clearly 'PC' is really a crack at Windows and Microsoft rather than Dell or Hewlett Packard, but Apple's always been about being the underdog. I hope it doesn't backfire given that the target for Appleites seems to be Windows virtualisation on the Mac. Not the "separate-system constant-restarting" of Boot Camp, currently being shipped by Apple in MacOS 10.4 (Tiger). But more the "open-Windows-apps-and-Mac-apps-side-by-side" type virtualisation like Wine.
I toyed with the idea of switching a while ago - but glad I didn't. Looks like the cross-platform game is beginning to hot up.
.: posted by Ali 4:26 PM
Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Hoots mon, it's a braw bricht moonlit nicht the nicht !!
Yes indeed, happy birthday Robert Burns, most famous of Scottish poets.
Today is the day when all true Scots eat haggis, neeps and tatties; drink a dram of the 'water of life'; and quote poems and sonnets which none of us understand.
Now, that's a party :-D
So, if yer aff tae a Rabbie hootenanny, era poem fur ye!
To a Haggis...
Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face,
Great chieftain o' the pudding-race!
Aboon them a' yet tak your place,
Painch, tripe, or thairm:
Weel are ye wordy o'a grace
As lang's my arm.
The groaning trencher there ye fill,
Your hurdies like a distant hill,
Your pin was help to mend a mill
In time o'need,
While thro' your pores the dews distil
Like amber bead.
His knife see rustic Labour dight,
An' cut you up wi' ready sleight,
Trenching your gushing entrails bright,
Like ony ditch;
And then, O what a glorious sight,
Warm-reekin', rich!
Then, horn for horn, they stretch an' strive:
Deil tak the hindmost! on they drive,
Till a' their weel-swall'd kytes belyve
Are bent like drums;
Then auld Guidman, maist like to rive,
Bethankit! hums.
Is there that owre his French ragout
Or olio that wad staw a sow,
Or fricassee wad make her spew
Wi' perfect sconner,
Looks down wi' sneering, scornfu' view
On sic a dinner?
Poor devil! see him owre his trash,
As feckles as wither'd rash,
His spindle shank, a guid whip-lash;
His nieve a nit;
Thro' blody flood or field to dash,
O how unfit!
But mark the Rustic, haggis-fed,
The trembling earth resounds his tread.
Clap in his walie nieve a blade,
He'll mak it whissle;
An' legs an' arms, an' hands will sned,
Like taps o' trissle.
Ye Pow'rs, wha mak mankind your care,
And dish them out their bill o' fare,
Auld Scotland wants nae skinking ware
That jaups in luggies;
But, if ye wish her gratefu' prayer
Gie her a haggis!
.: posted by Ali 9:24 AM
Friday, January 13, 2006
It would seem that Apple CEO's "halo effect" theory about how the iPod is the route into all sorts of other areas, and that it will inevitably drive the public towards Apple products, is at least coming partially true.
The AAPL stock price continues to rise - trading at its highest level;
Forbes.com saying that Apple are likely to outperform for years;
Sales of Apple computers (not including iPods) is also at levels not seen for many years (1.25m Computers, 14m iPods in the most recent quarter);
...and now, Levi Strauss announces that it's making a pair of jeans which will control your iPod. A Press Release the new iJeans "seamlessly integrate iPod plug and play technology giving music enthusiasts the most innovative and fashionable way to enjoy music on the go".
OK, Levis aren't the first to supply garments to be part of your iLife, Burton put out a snowboarder jacket a couple of years ago - but it is quite an achievement for Apple;
Christopher Ive, head product designer of the iPod and iMac was awarded a CBE for his efforts.
Apple have come along way in the last few years, can they keep it up?
.: posted by Ali 5:42 PM
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
Happy New Year!!
I never tire of these, welcome to January...
January 2 is Run Up the Flagpole and See if Anybody Salutes It Day
January 3 is Festival of Sleep Day
January 4 is Trivia Day and Humiliation Day
January 10 is Peculiar People Day
January 11 is National Step in a Puddle and Splash Your Friend Day
January 12 is Feast of Fabulous Wild Men Day
January 16 is Hot and Spicy Food International Day and National Nothing Day
January 22 is National Answer Your Cat's Question Day
January 24 is Eskimo Pie Patent Day
January 28 is National Kazoo Day, Clash Day, Rattle Snake Round-Up Day
.: posted by Ali 9:28 AM
Wednesday, December 28, 2005
Hello. After about 5 months off from blogging - I thought that it might be appropriate to get back on the Reindeer with a Christmas offering.
SANTA CLAUS: An Engineer's Perspective
I.
There are approximately two billion children (persons under 18) in the world. However, since Santa does not visit children of Muslim, Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist religions, this reduces the workload for Christmas night to 15% of the total, or 378 million (according to the Population Reference Bureau). At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per house hold, that comes to 108 million homes, presuming that there is at least one good child in each.
II.
Santa has about 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical).
This works out to 967.7 visits per second.
This is to say that for each Christian household with a good child, Santa has around 1/1000th of a second to park the sleigh, hop out, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left for him, get back up the chimney, jump into the sleigh and get on to the next house.
Assuming that each of these 108 million stops is evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false, but will accept for the purposes of our calculations), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household; a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting bathroom stops or breaks. This means Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second --- 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second, and a conventional reindeer can run (at best) 15 miles per hour.
III.
The payload of the sleigh adds another interesting element.
Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized Lego set (two pounds), the sleigh is carrying over 500 thousand tons, not counting Santa himself. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds.
Even granting that the "flying" reindeer could pull ten times the normal amount, the job can't be done with eight or even nine of them--Santa would need 360,000 of them.
This increases the payload, not counting the weight of the sleigh, another 54,000 tons, or roughly seven times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the ship, not the monarch).
IV.
600,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second crates enormous air resistance--this would heat up the reindeer in the same fashion as a spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer would absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy per second each. In short, they would burst into flames almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team would be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second, or right about the time Santa reached the fifth house on his trip.
Not that it matters, however, since Santa, as a result of accelerating from a dead stop 650 mps in .001 seconds, would subjected to centrifugal forces of 17,500 g's.
A 250 pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of the sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force, instantly crushing his bones and organs and reducing him to a quivering blob of pink goo.
V.
Therefore, if Santa does exist, he's dead now.
OK, not exactly full of the Christmas spirit, but interesting nevertheless.
.: posted by Ali 9:50 AM
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