pyxellate

Pyx: a container or chest; Pixel: The basic unit of the composition of an image on a television screen, computer monitor, or similar display; Pixelated: pertaining to a printed image which has been digitized; visible as a pattern of pixels; Pyxellate: a simple container for thoughts, observations, images and ideas.

Sunday, February 27, 2005

No freedom of choice with Windows XP SP2 update

"Windows XP systems configured to auto update will be unable to prevent the downloading of service pack 2 from April 12 onwards, according to information available from Microsoft" (Sydney Morning Herald, February 23rd). Microsoft will force users of Windows XP to update their operating system. They will have no choice and will be unable to "prevent the change". This company is an example of megalomania. Consumers forced to accept change. No choice. This is unbelievable. Time to change to another operating system. Get a Mac or switch to Linux. More.

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Singapore February 2005 Day Seven

I walked around Mount Sophia, Mackenzie Road and Short Street area of Singapore taking photographs. I often went through Mackenzie Road in a taxi and I had promised myself I would photograph some of the old buildings there. A bypasser advised that I should walk around the Sophia Road area.



The flight home was better than the flight to but as always there was a bunch of thoughtless, noisy imbeciles who do not realise that the majority of passengers want to sleep when it is 4:30AM in the morning. Well, I got that off my chest. Last time I fly British Airways by choice.

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Saturday, February 26, 2005

Singapore February 2005 Day Six

I conducted my last workshop yesterday. Digital Still Photography. It went well and I am sure the participants picked up some skills. There were participants from other workshops present yesterday. It was a pleasure to see them again.



Afterwards Daniel, Vivien, Sharon, Paul, Woan Ling, Alan, Daniel's son, Jonathan, and I went to Tiffany's at the Furama Hotel for dinner. We ate well and we laughed well. I was exhausted by the end of the night and I crashed at the hotel.

Flying home today. British Airways. Can't have all the luck. Hope this red-eye flight is not that bad. Today I will do some shopping and take a few photographs.

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Thursday, February 24, 2005

Singapore February 2005 Day Four

The second workshop was a great experience. The venue was packed and it was full on the whole time. I dispensed with the presentation... summarised the main points on butcher's paper and focused on the illustrative examples, the curriculum integration components and the fact that the tool must match the task if the application of technology in the classroom is to succeed. A number of the particpants are captured below.



I will have dinner in Chinatown tonight.

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Safari does not force refresh the proxy

Safari presented a mystery to me today. Look at my two emails to Dave, David, Siva and Phil and the explanation below:

"Dear all,

How are you all? Safari, Firefox and caches, etc. I have reset Safari, emptied the caches for both and even forcibly emptied the caches from the library. But tell me why... If I type "www.larkin.net.au" into the location bar I get a completely different (updated) page to the one I get when I type "www.larkin.net.au/index.html". I get the latest page when I add index.html. But, with respect to other pages I get the older page when I add "index.html" to the url in the address bar. Is Safari over caching? Is it the proxy server? Is it safari's memory? What is it? I am mystified. Does not happen in IE or on a PC. Any ideas?
Cheers
John"

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"Dear all,

Further on this... Running Cocktail, etc, makes no difference. Is the file stored in RAM? Restarting the machine made no difference. If one adds index.html to the url you get a different page. Why?
Cheers
John"

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Dave's informative reply:

"Hi Guys,
Unfortunately Safari is unable to force refresh a proxy server -- It has no 'super refresh' (option-refresh) like most other browsers. I have flagged this with some Apple Developers who claimed it would be looked at with the last Safari update, but I don't think it is resolved yet.
Actually Windows IE can be just as bad as Mac IE (which is a dead product). On Windows IE, you hold the shift key while clicking refresh to force the proxy to reload. Other variables include the type of proxy server too. Almost all Mac browsers other than Safari will super refresh or the refresh itself forced the proxy -- but still not Safari.
So until Apple do fix this, we really need a second browser to occasionally use as needed. Oh, in a classroom where kids publish web pages, only ONE computer is needed to 'force the refresh' (of the server). Once the server has 'got' the new page, others will get the same. Adding .html can be a once off request, but does NOT FIX the problem.
Regards..David"
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and Siva's nice addendum!

"Hey Johhny boy,
What David has written sounds right. I find that in 40% of the time, I may have to type ctrl-R furiously a few times before I see a refresh. 5% of the time, it never seems to change and I switch over to Firefox or Camino. They are more responsive and usually a better idea to use when you are doing this a lot. Suspect besides Safari's inabilities, the server or its distance may be a factor because on most days, its magnificent and all's well. It's a much better idea to view changes locally until 100% satisfied before upload the pages - somehow I never do this.
Cheerio!
Siva"

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Wednesday, February 23, 2005

Singapore February 2005 Days Two and Three

Took a taxi to NTU. The driver was nice and I have arranged for him to pick me up each morning. He drops his kids off at a school near the hotel so he does not charge me a booking fee. That is excellent service!

Spent the first couple of hours at NTU chatting to colleagues and some of the other presenters. Everyone is working hard. During the day I attended Daniel Churchill's workshop on Learning Objects. It was very interesting. I have some material that I can share with my colleagues downunder.

I met some of the participants for my own workshops and I asked them what did they expect. Our expectations were different so I spent most of Monday night and Tuesday morning making changes. The presentation worked well and the added hands-on component was a blessing.

After that I went back to the hotel and then into town. Finally tracked down the beautiful re-issues of David Live and Stage by Bowie in the HMV store in the Heeren Centre on the corner of Orchard Road and Cairnhill Road. Met a friend at Orchard MRT and had dinner at Bukit Batok followed by durian in Geylang. The durian stall is illustrated below. Click on the image for more.

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Monday, February 21, 2005

Singapore February 2005 Day One

Did some shopping this morning. Shirts, CD-Rs, a MP3 player with voice recording ability and a new Rolling Stones CD. I was hoping the re-issues of Bowie's live albums, David Live and Stage, would be available but I did not have any luck.



Later I went across to Chinatown to have some cold drinks, watch the world go by and eat dinner. Saw a lion dance, took some time lapse photography of the Chinese New Year street decorations and returned to the hotel.

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Sunday, February 20, 2005

Singapore February 2005 and hailstorm back home

I am back in Singapore to conduct some presentations and workshops at Nanyang Technological University. The presentations and workshops focus upon digital media, web publishing and curriculum integration in a nutshell. I have started a photoblog to record the time here.



The flight was horrible. Very bad turbulence from the thunderstorm in Sydney and clear air turbulence all the way to South Australia. No food or drink for about three hours. We all had to stay very put.

This will be the last time I fly British Airways. They were brusque, undiplomatic and the attendants are not a scratch on the wonderful Singapore Airline attendants. The entire toilet seat fell off when I went to use it. Bangers and mash for tea. :)

Meanwhile, back home in Australia there was a hailstorm and Shao Ping, my wonderful wife, emailed this image to myself:

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Thursday, February 10, 2005

4WDs, SUVs and their ilk under fire in the UK and elsewhere

Saw this article in the Straits Times Interactive (Feb 10th, 2005), 'Keep off-road cars off the road'. The journalist reported on moves in France, Sweden, Italy, California and the UK to curtail the impact of these large, overbearing vehicles in terms of emissions and nuisance value. Such a joy to read this story! The story reported on large 4WD vehicles such as the Land Rovers and Land Cruisers. It is such a welcome relief to learn that there are organistaions that are concerned about the impact of large 4WD recreational off-road vehicles on normal urban environments.

I read that the Alliance Against Urban 4x4s has been established in the UK to combat the menace that is urban 4X4s. They also have the support of Friends of the Earth in the UK and Transport 2000 among many others. There is, of course, New Zealand and Australia's unofficial anti-SUV (4X4) website, noSUV.org.

Cyclists clearly do not like 4WD vehicles either. See forum articles one and two.

Nothing irritates me more than a 4WD on my tail with headlights reminiscent of a semi-trailer boring a hole in the back of my head and searing my eyes with their intensity. Turning at any intersection with a 4WD adjacent to you is a nightmare. They are a nuisance around schools when parents collect their children. They pose visibility problems. They have centre of gravity problems. They roll over easily. The 4WD vehicles equipped with bull-bars are also seemingly guaranteed to kill anything or anyone with which they come into contact.

Some 4WD drivers seem to believe they can break all the road rules by virtue of their "superiority". A large white 4WD with a registration plate reminiscent of PK3O3O recently overtook my vehicle, going up a hill, around a curve and across double yellow lines only to have to brake heavily to miss an elderly pedestrian returning from a shopping trip. Why do urban dwellers buy these off-road vehicles? Spotless 4WD vehicles are a wonder. Do they ever go off road?

What was that line taken from the Gallipoli WW1 movie about military officers on horseback who feel they are more superior to the rest of the troops because their own arses are higher off the ground? Same applies to many 4x4 drivers it seems.

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Saturday, February 05, 2005

Crikey

Crikey. Bringing down governments since 1999. Well, this independent news service has just been sold. It was always worth a look to check out the archives.

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