01.Blogs :
RobMiles  
Programming, gadgets and life as a lecturer in a UK university.

December 2004 - Posts

Merry Christmas Everybody
Friday, December 24, 2004 11:01 PM
Just about an hour to go as I write this. Merry Christmas everybody and best wishes for you and yours.
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Advent Puzzle
Thursday, December 23, 2004 11:32 PM
Christmassy puzzle this week. The four weeks up to Christmas are called Advent. In the church there are four candles. On the first Sunday we light one candle in the service , on the second two are lit, and so on as the weeks go by. At the final service
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Through the lens
Wednesday, December 22, 2004 11:22 PM
I've been into photography since I was very young. I remember borrowing books from he library which said that cameras would never be auto focus. Around 25 years ago I got an SLR film camera (which I still have). When digital came along I got little camera
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Scary Broken Internet
Tuesday, December 21, 2004 8:04 PM
Our home internet connection has just come back from being broken. What a scary experience. Number one son had some stuff he wanted to fetch. Number one daughter had to send an email to someone who was going away tomorrow. Me, I wanted to check some emails
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The netcpu board rocks!
Monday, December 20, 2004 9:46 PM
My netcpu board arrived today. A nice FedEx man dropped it off this afternoon. I've spent the evening playing with it and it is lovely. For those of you who haven't heard about this little piece of magic, it is a board around the size of a postage stamp
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Dog Day Afternoon
Monday, December 20, 2004 12:08 PM
We had guests yesterday afternoon and I got the digital dog out. Most interesting. One of the people that came has actually had dogs before and started treating the electronic gizmo just like a real one. I've not seen that reaction before. People that
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Steam Powered .NET
Saturday, December 18, 2004 10:13 PM
Got dad his Christmas present today. When he was younger he spent a lot of time playing around with steam engines. I thought it might be fun to get him a steamroller to play with and so I got this little Mamod engine which looks really sweet. Come Christmas
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Halo Liveliness
Friday, December 17, 2004 7:51 PM
Number one son has come home for christmas. I've turned him loose on XBOX Live with Halo 2. The whole game setup is very impressive. Number one son is doing OK though. And he told me about the way you can link your XBOX gamer tag with your Microsoft Passport
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Thursday Puzzle - Why is yours best?
Thursday, December 16, 2004 10:27 PM
I got this idea from http://www.thespoke.net/MyBlog/ddt/MyBlog.aspx. A very good blog, if a little quiet of late.Not so much a puzzle, as an exercise in salesmanship this week: I take out of my pocket two pound coins and put them on the table. They are
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Embedded .NET
Wednesday, December 15, 2004 9:05 PM
Is it OK to get excited about technology? I'm really excited about the new embedded .NET devices which are just being launched:http://www.dotnetcpu.com/I want one to play with. I was the same about the Smartphone, the Playstation (1 and 2) the XBOX and
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Interview Technique
Tuesday, December 14, 2004 1:49 PM
Found a great blog post on how to handle interviews:http://th-inkwell.blogspot.com/2004_12_01_th-inkwell_archive.htmlFind the post titled "What's Your Weakness?". Oh, and my weakness is chocolate covered brazil nuts.
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Invigilation People
Monday, December 13, 2004 8:38 PM
Did some more invigilation today. The second exam was "The Psychology of Work". One of the questions was:Can computers train people?Well?
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A Light Christmas
Sunday, December 12, 2004 10:29 PM
Put up our christmas tree today. We have got a new one (not, this time, because we lost the old one in the loft - oh no). This one comes in bits. What kind of a designer numbers the fittings EE, FF, X9, AA, BB, CC, YY? We had great fun putting the whole
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XBOX Flat Out Review
Saturday, December 11, 2004 8:59 PM
Many years ago I got a Playstation 1 and had my first taste of "proper" 3D gaming. One of my favourite titles was "Destruction Derby" which, as well as boasting some rather good in game music, allowed me to drive around and smash bits off other
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Open Air Antennas
Friday, December 10, 2004 1:52 PM
I bought a WIFI card for my cheap notebook. I got it off ebay at a knock down price and it works well. Indeed it works very well. For a long time I've been cursing my home network when I use my tablet PC with its internal WIFI card. It was always a bit
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Launched into space
Thursday, December 09, 2004 8:48 PM
I'm presently a triple blogger! I've set up home on a shiny new site on msn spaces. What goes up there will be almost exactly (oh, alright, exactly) what does up on my crazy world blog. I'm going to see how I like the new service and see what I can do
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But what is it?
Thursday, December 09, 2004 8:10 PM
A different style of puzzle this week. I'm posting a picture of a thing I found in my jacket pocket last week. First person to tell me what it is wins:
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Portable Storage
Wednesday, December 08, 2004 11:05 PM
Whilst browsing through ebay I happened accross some external hard disk covers you can pick up for amazingly small prices (and surprisingly high postage). By a bit of strategic bidding I managed to get an enclosure and interface for a 2.5 inch drive for
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Shoot Me Now
Tuesday, December 07, 2004 10:20 PM
I set some questions for the Postgrad Party Quiz which I've just got back from. I thought it would be neat to ask the question:"Name the London Underground station whose name does not contain any letters from the word 'mackeral'" (the answer is St. John's
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University Looking Good
Monday, December 06, 2004 9:07 AM
I took this picture on the way up to my office today. I think autumn suits this place.
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These Things I Have Learned
Sunday, December 05, 2004 10:10 PM
In my lifetime I have learned many things so far including: Use oven gloves when getting things from the oven. When a woman says "It doesn't matter", there is a good chance it does. Objects in the rear view mirror sometimes appear smaller than
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Not Just Writing Programs
Saturday, December 04, 2004 8:12 PM
We had our first open day of the new admissions round today. I was asked the question "What can I do to prepare myself for the course?". This is a tricky one, my advice was that starting to learn to program is always a good plan (and it gives you a taste
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Cheap Comedy
Friday, December 03, 2004 10:38 PM
I've posted this on my other blog, but I thought it might be of interest to Spoke readers. If you want some good, cheap, comedy then take a look at the Monty Python records on Napster (and probably other music download sites as well). They count the entire
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Coin Tossing
Thursday, December 02, 2004 10:57 PM
OK. An easy certificate of undying appreciation for some lucky winner:I toss a coin 10 times. What is the chance that it comes up the same on the third and seventh throw?
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Yay for Acer
Wednesday, December 01, 2004 8:57 PM
Some time back (19th of November) I bought around the cheapest notebook PC I could find. At 499 pounds the Acer looked a good bet. And that is how it turned out. I've added some more memory and it now comfortably outperforms my desktop at work.The only
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A Milestone..and an Apalling Joke
Wednesday, December 01, 2004 7:45 PM
I know I shouldn't go on about this, but then again I am quite proud. Today I hit 10,000 reads. Wahay. As a way of celebrating (and perhaps ensuring that I don't get much further) I present:The scene is the main control room of Cairo Station. The general
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