Archive for April, 2008
Wednesday, April 30th, 2008
I’m helping out a client who are, for the moment, stuck supporting a Windows 98-based software application. In order to at least provide a modicum of fault tolerance, we’ve decided to virtualise the machine using VMWare Server.
In order to test the environment of the clients who will be connecting to the Win98 virtual machine, I created… a virtual machine running Windows XP, with the VMWare Server console installed on it.
All of this, of course, is running on Linux.
The punchline to this configuration is left as an exercise for the reader.
menage a wtf, ubuntu, win98, winxp |
Wednesday, April 30th, 2008
(Business Spectator) Australian Federal Police are investigating at least four more financial services firms with Vanuatu connections for suspected tax evasion and money laundering.Three directors of NSW accounting firm Owen T Daniel & Co (Carol Ab…
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Wednesday, April 30th, 2008
(Theage.com.au) FEDERAL police have extended their investigations of Australian-run financial services firms in Vanuatu, targeting at least three more Port Vila companies for suspected money laundering and tax evasion.The revelations are likely to caus…
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Tuesday, April 29th, 2008
top - 17:08:32 up 43 min, 3 users, load average: 1.33, 27.47, 49.41
49.41?!? – Is that some kind of record?
I finished upgrading to Ubuntu Hairy HardHardy Heron this morning, and everything was working beautifully until I decided to fix it. Now my processor is a trifle, er, abused, and memory use is at the full 2GB with 460MB swap taken as well.
When I run top to see what’s using all the RAM, there’s nothing accounted for. My little system load applet, however, informs me that 93% of it is in use by applications.
I am at the edge, and it is bleeding.
dude, seriouslywtf, wtf |
Tuesday, April 29th, 2008
(Pacific Magazine) Australian police have made one arrest under the banner of Project Wickenby, an international operation to attack abusive tax haven schemes linked to Vanuatu. A West Australian promoter was arrested this morning, and several other pe…
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Tuesday, April 29th, 2008
(The Associated Press) SYDNEY, Australia (AP) — Police have broken up an international money laundering scheme operating in Australia, New Zealand and Vanuatu that involved $93 million and hundreds of people, Australian police said Monday.A 58-year-o…
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Saturday, April 26th, 2008
Over the last few years, investment in Vanuatu has boomed. It’s been estimated that the amount of cash in the economy is increasing by an astounding 150% per year. Compare that with the period between 1990 and 2004, when economic activity grew more slowly than the population.
But for most of the residents of this so-called paradise, little has changed.
Prices have increased somewhat, but curiously many of the more common expenses have not. Bus fares, for example, have not budged even though fuel prices have soared. Consequently, Vanuatu’s minimum wage has about the same buying power today as it had years ago.
That’s not entirely good news….
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Originally published at the Scriptorum. You can comment here or there.
journamalism |
Friday, April 25th, 2008
I have a confession to make. I’m a snob. At least, I am where technology is concerned. Okay, maybe I’m not the type to cross the street when I see someone with last year’s doohickey du jour. But I do notice when your smart phone looks (or acts) like a brick. I can tell at a glance whether your machine is a cutting edge screamer or the technological equivalent of East Germany’s Brabant automobile, legendary for its poor quality.
I like good engineering, good design and efficient performance. In short, I like things that do their job well, whatever that job may be. I like it so much that I hate to settle for less than the best. Not the biggest, necessarily, nor the most expensive. Just the best.
This focus on tools made me lose sight of a couple of important things: First, while doing things perfectly is a commendable ideal, it happens exactly 0% of the time in the real world. Second, Vanuatu is more, er, ‘real world’ than many other places on Earth.
In case you haven’t noticed, I’m a bit of a leftie when it comes to computing. I like to see as much power in the hands of the people as possible. While it’s nice – and often necessary – to rely on services provided by others, I’ve always believed that DIY is the most empowering way to go. So, when the news began to percolate out that Vanuatu would have truly national mobile phone services, I was interested mostly in how that might help the spread of computers into the islands.
What I didn’t consider is that the mobile might actually become the computer.
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Originally published at the Scriptorum. You can comment here or there.
geek, journamalism, soft-core |
Thursday, April 17th, 2008
Let’s forget about technology for a moment. Let’s quit thinking about technology as a contraption that rattles more than it hums, and always alarmingly. Let’s not talk about technology at all.
Let’s talk about people instead.
‘What a piece of work is a man!’ says Hamlet. ‘How noble in reason! How infinite in faculty! In form and moving how express and admirable! In action how like an angel! In apprehension how like a god!’
This speech has always puzzled me, because many of the human beings I know may qualify as a ‘piece of work’, but lack somewhat in the expressive, admirable, angelic and god-like categories. It only follows, therefore, that if humans are less than angelic in their actions, the things they do with technology might likewise be flawed.
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Originally published at the Scriptorum. You can comment here or there.
geek, journamalism, soft-core |
Tuesday, April 15th, 2008
Ethnology of Vanuatu
Uncategorized |
