Category: Rants

Using Silverlight

~ rbonini

Not that I’ve used Expression Blend 2 to create anything fancy. I’ve done a two page test Slideshow in a quick feasibility study with regard to one of my pet projects.

Then I had to deal with the hosting. I’m using Sliverlight Streaming to deliver the applications to my webpages (via an Iframe, I belive).

It took a while to figure out how to upload the pages so that the service could understand what was supposed to happen with the application. then it took a wee bit longer to understand how to integrate the provided code on to my ASP.net page.

But I got it working, in the end 🙂 .

Now that I know it works, I have a few ideas.

And now I have to go and actually build the thing….

PS. If you get Error 2252 while running your application make sure that the path from your xaml file to the dll is correct. Took me a while to figure that one out. I find that its usually the simplest things that stump you 🙂 .

How True

~ rbonini

I’ve just read this post from Jeff Atwood:

I believe there’s a healthy balance all programmers need to establish, somewhere between…

  1. Locking yourself away in a private office and having an intimate dialog with a compiler about your program.
  2. Getting out in public and having an open dialog with other human beings about your program.

If you didn’t catch the humor there, it had to do with the “intimate dialog with a compiler” bit 🙂 .

Funny things are often true. Hold that thought.

So this bit had me chuckling:

Most programmers are introverts, so they don’t usually need any encouragement to run off and spend time alone with their computer. They do it naturally. Left to their own devices, that’s all they’d ever do. I don’t blame them; computers are a lot more rational than people. That’s what attracts most of us to the field. But it is possible to go too far in the other direction, too. It’s much rarer, because it bucks the natural introversion of most software developers, but it does happen. Take me, for example. Sometimes I worry that I spend more time talking about programming than actually programming.

 

Natural introvert. Hmmm. Remarkable timing on Jeff’s part. I was telling myself  just the other day how much more comfortable it is to talk to a C++ compiler….

Jeff spends the rest of his post urging the rest of us to stop talking about implementing features and implement them. I’m as guilty of this as the next programmer/developer, so I’d better get a move on.

WHS Update: Dell Customer Service

~ rbonini ~ 2 Comments

Well, yesterday I ordered  1Gb in new memory for my Windows Home Server from Dell. I intend to install a Tv Card and SageTv and get more bang for my buck out of said server, thus the new memory.

Since I was lazy, I originally got a Dell PowerEdge SC440 for Whs to run on.

However, the memory I ordered yesterday was/is incompatible with the SC440 (this being despite the fact that I went to Memory Upgrades for the SC440 on Dell’s Website). So Dell Helpfully called to inform me of the fact.

Within minutes, the old order was canceled and the new order submitted and the earth once again revolved on its axis. Easy as pie.

Well, not quite. The new memory is not quite twice the original amount I paid- once again blowing the budget out of the water.

Nevertheless – congratulations to Dell.

So I’ll need to wait slightly longer than anticipated for the TV card.

I’ve not decided between:

Hauppauge WinTV-NOVA-T 500 – Dual Digital Freeview TV tuner

and 

Hauppauge WinTV HVR4000 – True HD TV tuner – Quad mode (Analogue, Digital, Satellite both DVB-S and HD DVB-S2)

(For those outwith the British Isles, Freeview is our version of free-to-air digital TV)

In typical fashion, the first is half the price of the second.

Not exactly Media Centre Edition, but the whole idea here is to the extend functionality of the Server – which spends most of its day idiling (truth be told, its only really busy between noon and 3pm when it backs the pcs up and SyncToy moves files to to the server). Though, Ill have to fiddle around with the backup times once the Sage is Installed.

And second, the Current PVR is hopelessly deluged with recordings that are usually watched weeks later (its only got 100GB of space).

And third, finally, I’d rather keep the recordings for than delete the everytime the space runs out.

I’ll keep you posted.

And kudos to Dell, again. for their customer service (and I don’t really mind the extra costs as a result 🙂 )

iPhone Hacks: What Will Apple Do?

~ rbonini ~ 1 Comment

Despite the clear lack of a SDK, intrepid iPhone hackers err developers haven’t stopped churning out thier stuff. Here’s a small list from todays TUAW RSS feed:

This posses an interesting dilemma for Apple. Since all this stuff clearly isn’t intended to be done, Apple can either crack down on it by having hacked iPhones simply stop working( a la Microsoft) or they can go Google’s way and turn a blind eye.

Perversely, Apple will get more consumer attention and popularity at the cost of a potential showdown with AT&T ( who are obviously the very bad guys behind the draconian lockdown of said mobile device 😉 ).

So the question is: What will Apple Do??

Update: TUAW Asks the same Question:

the iPhone apps are arriving en masse. So far the list includes tools like a working Apache we server, python, shell — and a pile of associated binaries like ls, rm, echo, csh, and tsh — and while these might not be terribly thrilling for Joe everyday user, they are a pretty kicking start. We could start to see all manner of fun stuff arriving in the coming weeks, unless, of course, Apple pulls the plug via an update. Again, we won’t link to the goods, but a wee bit of searching should get you on your way

PS3 Firmware Update

~ rbonini ~ 2 Comments

I’m not lucky enough to own a PS3 yet, but the Firmware updates are coming thick and fast. Version 1.9 has been released. it follows 1.81 and 1.82, both from last month. I’ve never seen updates come out so fast for such a “new” machine.

Sony has embraced the digital age and is racing to catch up with Microsoft and its Xbox Live service.

Not only that, but they are actively taking feedback from the public through Playstation.Blog.

All I can say is that this round of The Console Wars will be fought with Value Added Content over Networks, suggested  by Loyal Gamers intent on the world domination of their console.  And I don’t mean the Wii 🙂 .

The Echo Chamber

~ rbonini

I read this post from Shel Holtz last night suggesting that the Blogosphere is akin to an echo chamber. At this point I’d like to congratulate Google for NOT including search with Google Reader since I had to go looking for this post manually from my long list of feeds, which wasn’t easy – but I digress.

So, bearing in mind that I’m doing some echoing myself here:

One of the dominant criticisms of the blogosphere is that bloggers just write about what other bloggers have written about; it’s nothing more than a huge echo chamber.

I’ll give you an example of said effect. last week, Windows Home Server was released to manufacturing. I got virtually the same post from the WHS Team Blog, We got Served, Ms Home Server Blog and Ramblings of a Home Server Tester. And by the way, they all arrived in my feed reader at the same time.

Shel argues that The Echo Chamber Effect is nonsense:

I don’t buy the echo-chamber argument. Based on the 10% rule, which suggests that 10% of a blog’s (or Wikipedia’s or any other collaborative property’s) readers contribute to the content, that leaves 90% who are passive consumers of the content.

 

And gives an example:

read a blog called Brand to be Determined. Many of you—readers of this blog—probably don’t. So when I point you to a resource I learned about on Brand to be Determined, you’re getting information you probably wouldn’t have otherwise received.

Take Facebook as an example.

The tech blogoshpere has run amok with Facebook posts (A Google custom search of my 140 subscriptions gives me 1500 posts, a Google blog search gives me 437,000 posts).  Facebook has been analyzed from every conceivable angle, probably several times over.

So if I now write a post echoing Scoble and a few others, do I add value to the conversation, or noise? 

Googlemail Hacks

~ rbonini

Lifehacker helpfully has a top ten list of Googlemail hacks.

Now, by my count, there are 3 Windows (read IE) hacks. Only 3. This seriously has me considering switching back to Firefox as my main browser.

Besides the fact that Firefox has a huge amount of flexibility from RSS readers to Sports tickers, its the fact that the web application itself can be hacked (I know, “hacked” sounds bad since we consider hacking to result in digital damage). All of these “hacks” are genuine improvements to Googlemail:

  • Check multiple accounts with Gmail Manager (Firefox)
  • Gmail Encryption (Firefox)
  • Saved Searches (Firefox)
  • Drag and drop attachment upload (Firefox)
  • GmailDrive file manager (Mac/Windows/Firefox)

Lifehacker comments that:

From the get-go Google’s stayed out of developers’ way and turned a blind eye to unofficial Gmail add-ons, even ones that may very well violate its terms of service. Smart move: Google’s high tolerance for third-party apps have only helped Gmail win the hearts of power users and tweakers everywhere.

and I agree. if only IE devs had the same attitude.

Lets Face It

~ rbonini

Om Malik takes a look at Facebook histeria:

Take Bay Partners as an example. A sedate venture fund that typically invests in semiconductor companies and infrastructure start-ups has started a new effort that invests exclusively in Facebook applications. The right applicants can get anywhere from $25,000 to $250,000 as an investment for their applications.

The collateral of this project, imaginatively dubbed App Factory, is interesting, cringe-worthy reading filled with clichĂ©s like “application entrepreneurs” and “affect adoption, virality, and usage.” Here is just a nugget of wisdom from the press release announcing this new funding strategy. 

 A fully baked business model is also not a requirement, as long as there are reasonable theories and approaches that can be explored together.

Putting my newly acquired Hebrew Yiddish skills to use, I say, Oy-vey!

Are we looking at another dot com bubble?

Shel Isreal asks the same question, in connection to Ning:

But Michael Arrington says that it’s first external financing round was $44 million and that the company’s post-money value is $214  million. This scares me.  It scares me because I cannot conceive of any possible argument that this company is worth nearly a quarter billion dollars. Even considering the value of Marc’s personal brand, the upside expectation seems to me to defy reality.

I am a survivor of the Great Dotcom Bubble. I remember hearing company valuations that seemed silly or worse to me, and I recall being shouted at because “I just didn’t get it.” What I did get was bubble splatter all over my nice PR guy suit, and then a nice long rest from work.

The Ning valuation scares me. I just don’t get it. I hope someone else does

Well? Are We?

Update:  AppFactory Q&A here

My Take on DRM

~ rbonini

OK, DRM is the ugly duckling of technology. No one likes it. And the reason is that it comes between us and our media.

Now I don’t mean coming between you and sharing your library over the Internet. That’s clearly a violation of copyright, among rather a lot else.  For the uninitiated in this argument, Scott Adams explains:

But obviously there has to be a limit. After I published my first best-selling book, The Dilbert Principle, within days it had been illegally scanned and was widely available on the Internet for free. Technically speaking, it wasn’t theft. But I still lost something. I (and my publisher) lost the ability to decide if, when, and how to publish as an e-book. You can’t compete with “free and immediate.”

From a legal standpoint, taking a creator’s right to control distribution of his art is not “theft.” It’s just “taking something that used to legally belong to someone else and making it your own.”

 

Fair enough? Ok.

However when media is bought (DVD’s, CD’s) its ours to watch in any way we see fit. usually this means popping a DVD into the drive to watch, either on your PC or HDTV.

For music I generally rip all my CD’s the moment I get them and keep them on my server. that way I can listen to my tracks from any TV within my house. I don’t do sharing (Scott Adams and his theory of cognitive dissonance to the contrary).

My point is that we should be able to do the same with DVD’s. Let me rip my collection to my server and watch them on any network PC.

Ahh, I hear you say, there is no guarantee that said DVD’s and music won’t find their way on to the Internet. True. This gets to the meat of my argument ,err, post.

DRM is too restrictive in the sense that it prevents even legitimate use of DVD’s. Lets change DRM from a content-oriented perspective to a network- oriented perspective. DRM should be focused on ensuring that content that has been ripped for legitimate use does not find its way out the home network.

Content owners fail to distinguish between ripping for legitimate use and ripping with malicious intent.

To implement such a network-oriented DRM, an arbitrary standard is required. The standard cannot be biased to  individual Studio’s or Record Labels.

The standard should define

  • a technical means of ensuring that copyrighted data is identified as it travels through the network
  • a technical means of determining the ultimate destination of packets of copyrighted data as they are requested over a network
  • a technical means of ensuring that copyrighted data is stopped either at the gateway or at its source (see above)
  • a technical means of identifying data across the various formats in general use

As far as an actual implementation of such a system, the technology is already there. Microsoft’s WMA format already supports allowing media to play only when there is a license installed. The licensing system simply has to be extended to cover the whole network.

How about a licensing server, then? The receiving media player simply checks the the packets of data and queries the server to ensure that its allowed to play the file/packet.

I’m sure Linksys and the rest of the router manufacturers will get in on the game and build checking routines into their gateways and routers.

As far as determining the destination at the beginning of a file copy operation, its up to Microsoft and Apple to implement this at the OS level.

Once the means to ensure that the spirit of the law is enforced is in place, then we can think about a law change (even here in the UK DVD ripping is a bit of a gray area).