The full technical specification for the car are here. But in short, 77kw and 250Nm from 1.500 r/min, not bad for a 1.6 Diesel. Options, factory fitted panoramic sunroof, mud flaps and 3rd party tow bar. Colour: White.

I have never written a review for a car, simply because I fondly believe that one needs to use any item for more then 10 minutes to review it objectively. It’s been over a 1500 kilometres and a few hours. It’s been driven on open roads and bumper to bumper traffic alike. And, more importantly, I use it everyday.

The things that makes the car nice:

• The 6.9 L/100km in heavy traffic was a surprise, particularly with the fact hat is is very new.
• It is relatively confortable, the cabin is spacious and there is perceived quality that is expected of a more luxury manufacturer.
• The panoramic sunroof is really nicely done.
• The steering wheel radio/Bluetooth telephone controls, though I believe it should be standard on all cars.
• A nice touch is the Hill Hold Assist which will hold your car for a time sufficient to release the clutch and pull off and not roll back.
• I also found the Cruise Control very accurate and efficient, I think long trips must be a joy because of it.
• Forgot to close your windows or sunroof and left the car, press and hold the lock button on the key and voila. It closes and locks up the car tight.

There are also missing items from the menu at the price the car goes at I would expect, these are not even optional, maybe I just miss them from my Peugeot:

• Auto headlights
• Climate control
• Auto windscreen wipers

Now there are issues that bug me with the car but generally it’s been a good experience, so what bugs me? Or am I just nit-picking?

• The key remote control, that press twice to open all doors gets the better of me.
• The clutch action, in traffic you tend to use the clutch a lot, I know I do not always take my foot off and I should, however there are times in bumper traffic where the stop and go is such that you don’t. I drove another 2 POLOs to check this and they all do the same, there is a irritating vibration coming through the clutch pedal when you foot just lies on it, with or without the gear engaged.
• The mud flaps keep touching the floor in many situation, the car is generally too low.

I think that I’ll wrap it off now and give another report later in it’s life.

PS: For my photography friends, I will try to shoot it better, I am looking for a location and weather to do so.

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The past few months have been rather interesting, I moved to a new job as a senior developer in the Media 24 group and found life rather odd, I was on the same project a few years ago and he I am back, though not with the same company. So far so good, good people and good atmosphere, I could not ask for better at this time.

Disaster strikes, though. My old Nissan Almera, with 350,000 km on the clock, broke down on various occasions as I started my new job. It could not have be at a worst time. So, my wife and I decided that it was time for a new car. It had to be fuel efficient, compact, reliable, affordable and comfortable. That left us with a very few choices, Renault and Peugeot (and Citroen by association) were out of the running and we wanted a diesel, this was not negotiable. Eventually, we opted for the VW Polo 1.6 TDI. I must say that the first 100kms were a revelation, the car is very comfortable, I would even say it borders luxury without the price tag. Many of it’s features are expected of far more “premium” manufactures, the cruise control just works, the air conditioner is the same, though the latter is not controlled, and it has traction control. Traction control! WOW. But I’ll report on it more deeply once it has done far more than the mere 100 kms.

So what are the new ideas? Well, soon. December is around the corner and so is “The rude frenchman”, another one of my wacky ideas that had to happen, and more photographs, reviews,…

Related posts:

1. New Year’s resolutions
2. Aggghhhh…

I have not traveled, outside of my work, in a while now. Even less travel involving, well truth be told, no accommodation booking. We did not book because we will follow the flowers, we hope. Merely, we are off to the fabled flowers of the Namaqualand with a short stop in Cape Town. We decided to take our flight through Lanseria International Airport as opposed to the monstrous and complicated O.R.Tambo International Airport.

It’s a quiet start to what will turn out to be an adventure. 2 cameras, 2 photographers, 1 camper, 14 days and nowhere to go, everywhere to go. Just the way it should be.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

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Studio photography is a challenge for me at the best of times, mostly because in a studio, I have total control of everything and that bugs me. Maybe, it’s the fear associated with having full control and that means that if it goes wrong you can only blame yourself.

Enters Richard Ashburner, my guest blogger of last, that day I had a migraine and had taken something for it. The unfortunate side effects are that I loose the ability to show emotions, not advisable on the first time you meet a client. The first half hour was filled with explanations of the plan for his future and his vision, exiting stuff (and Me as unemotional as a brick in a pond). Then we stepped into my lair and we shot a couple of test wilts chatting. Setup the strobes, setup angles and power, setup the camera and behold magic…

Richard Ashburner (30) is first and foremost a magician, followed by the other roles life requires. This is what makes him so interesting to talk with and photograph. He started playing with magic at about eight years old and hasn’t stopped, becoming an adept magician with a vision. Ashburner’s enthusiasm for pure illusion is fascinating.

Ashburner first read about David Blaine’s work about ten years ago and from that moment starting exploring the boundaries of how far he could stretch himself and the boundaries of magic. Richard’s favourite form of magic takes place in public places and on the streets, he says “People are amazed by magic on the street, they wonder about the reality of the magic they experience in a public space versus that of a theatre where the perception is that the illusions are rigged. I love seeing the surprise on their faces as the realisation of what they are seeing registers in their minds.”

This young man is going places… magically. Watch this space, he has something big happening early next year.
To speak to Richard about amazing you, contact him on 071 303 4936

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

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From guest writer and magician: Richard Ashburner 

I love Magic. I always have. I’m not talking about spells but illusions and sleight of hand.

I find that these days when a Magician performs it becomes about how he did it and not about the performance art itself. In today’s modern society very few people believe in ‘real’ Magic; so therefore when seeing a Magician most people see it as a challenge to try to expose the art of the trick and he becomes a walking puzzle.

I have had many discussions with Magicians about this and all of them say it is unethical to claim that your powers are ‘real’. Instead you should tell your audience that we are all capable of doing magic with some training and knowledge of where to find the secrets.

This, I’m afraid, weakens the allure and art of magic to a point where people think to themselves “I could do that if I knew the secret; it must be easy; let me try and expose how he does it”. Sadly Magicians become a novelty act and nothing more.

Uri Geller in my opinion is the only ‘true’ Magician of our time. He openly claims his powers are real and even had the guts to let a group of scientists do experiments on him with truly remarkable results.

These scientists from the Stanford Research Institute were immediately criticized by Magicians all over the globe; but mostly by a Magician who goes by the name of James Randii. He has been out for Geller’s blood since Geller gained popularity and has repeatedly tried to debunk Geller as a fraud and claims his methods are fraudulent, saying it’s ethically wrong to claim supernatural powers.

He has said many times that there were no Magicians amongst the scientists at the institute and only a Magician can spot fakery. In his words “the least educated Magician can fool the most educated scientist”

He then went on to host lectures where he supposedly ‘exposed’ Geller’s methods. I say ‘supposedly’ because although he can duplicate all of Geller’s feats; he cannot claim that his methods are the same because quite simply – he can’t prove it.

Now here is my question: can Randii call himself a true Magician if he is giving away secrets that puts food on Magicians tables – he claims it is in the name of ethics. I think not. He is breaking the cardinal rule of Magic; don’t tell the secrets of magic. That makes him the worst kind of Magician there is because he sucks all the mystery out of a good family entertainment.

Whether or not Geller is using trickery is beside the point. He remains in character and true to Magic itself. That’s the point isn’t it? Making people believe in Magic?

Magic gives people hope that there’s more to life than what they can see and even if they don’t believe that at least it transports them away from reality and into possibility, even if just for a short time. Where’s the harm in that?

I do agree with Randii that it’s dangerous to tell people you can cure illness using Magic – faith healers being an example – but Geller isn’t harming anyone by bending a spoon; and if mining companies want to pay him to find minerals it remains their choice.

Randii claims that it’s dangerous because people who believe Geller will go to him with their problems and their money. Would Randii say the same of a medical doctor who happened to bend spoons as a way of relaxing her client at first meeting? What is the harm in giving people decent advice? I am pretty sure that Geller if told about a medical problem would advise that the person go to a doctor. Not once in all the material I have researched about Geller, did he claimed that he could heal the sick. He did say that the mind is a very powerful tool that can be used as an aid to getting better. Is that any different from what new agers or even medical doctors are saying? If there was a personal problem bothering someone he would offer encouragement and tell people to believe in themselves. I think more people should be as encouraging as Geller.

John Edward is another example. Randii claims that telling people he can talk to their dead loved ones is very unethical. Once again I have to ask; who is getting hurt? Edward is a very good cold reader and if that helps people to get closure on a death then he’s doing more good than harm. Some people believe Edward’s ability is real and it makes them happy to believe it. Why defeat hope. What will we replace it with?

Randii has done a lot of good when it comes to exposing fake healers who hurt people and that is a truly noble cause. I just think he should use care using the sword of ethics and pause once in a while instead of placing everything and anyone who thinks differently to him in a guillotine. Slow down, pause, allow people to enjoy again if it doesn’t hurt anyone before everybody becomes too jaded to enjoy anything.

In my opinion Magic is supposed to challenge what people believe. It spoils it when it becomes a puzzle. Today people think a good Magician is one whose puzzles remain un-solved; how sad.

A few hundred years ago a man called Reginald Scott printed a book called ‘the discovery of witchcraft’ in this book he explains sleight of hand and trickery. According to some Magicians this was the first ever book of its kind.

An important thing to remember is that it was not written to teach people how to become Magicians; instead it was written to stop people from burning witches at the stake. It was a craze back then to condemn people who did things that seemed impossible to death. Generally humans are very afraid of the unknown. Magic; even if it was making a coin disappear; was ‘real’ back then and secrets were very closely guarded.

David Blaine walks on to the scene and he’s an immediate success; why? Simply, it’s because he works on the street. People think it’s impossible to set anything up outside in such close proximity to other people. Therefore they start to question if it’s really trickery or not. That is the whole point and that is why he is a success. He has provoked debate.

I’ll never forget hearing people talk the day after his first TV special. They would say something along the lines of “ he levitated right on a side-walk surrounded by people! Is he the real deal?” That was the start of his very lucrative career shrouded in debate and awe – the whole point of the art of magic! He made people question if it was real or not and I think that is the point most Magicians miss.

People want to believe in magic. Perhaps we should let them.

For a while I was also completely against psychics; mediums and people who claimed supernatural power. I thought that they were using my art and passion to deceive and take advantage of people. It took me many years to realize that Magic cannot be called an art if it’s nothing more than a puzzle. The art of anything is changing people’s perceptions and viewpoints; not hiding a solution by stacking it under the “wrong” label. Perhaps it would be kinder not to treat people as idiots and allow them to decide for themselves.

Much respect to Geller; he has guts and vision.

Much respect to Blaine; he understands Magic.

They both know what the public and Magic needs.

To the critics out there – sour grapes.

Originally posted here.

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In my last post I chatted about the uses I found for my iPad, some expected some not, however there is conditions attached, you need the software to be able to carry out these activities. Some of the required software comes preinstalled on the iPad and are part of iOS the rest will have to be downloaded and sometimes paid for.

This is my list  of software for “The inevitable 20 uses of the iPad…”

1. Show my photography portfolio to potential client and works to clients.
   Photos is the native application on the iPad and is far sufficient for my purpose.
2. Email
   Again, Mail is the native application on the iPad and is far sufficient for my purpose.
3. Alarm clock
   That’s a little tougher, I use Living Earth for this purpose.
4. Recording and taking notes in meeting.
   I use Audiotorium for long meetings and Evernotes for quick ones both sync to the cloud (Audiotorium uses Dropbox).
5. Reading ebooks.
   Bluefire Reader because it reads epub and PDF including those with DRM and it has a night mode.
6. Browsing the Internet for information.
   Well Firefox is not available for the I pad so we are stuck with Safari.
7. Watching ASP.NET MVC video tutorials.
   Wait ain’t the tutorial using the Microsoft codec? They are but VLC does the trick, it will decode just about anything you through at it. Unfortunately, it has been removed from the app store.
8. Watching photography video tutorials.
   App store, these tutorials are all found in the app store from various photographers.
9. Reading my RSS feeds.
   Reeder does a good job of syncing my Google Reader account and caching it locally.
10. Listening to music.
    The iPod application, obviously.
11. Getting the weather forecast.
    Both Living Earth and AccuWeather do a good job of keeping me informed, I just hope that these will be enhanced with iOS 5 so I do not need to open them to get the weather.
12. Keeping a to do list.
    I use Evernotes, I have tried others but iOS 5 is coming with Reminders, let us see… 
13. Keeping notes.
    Quick notes are best done with Evernotes and it syncs with my laptop and iPhone.
     
14. SKYPING friends and colleges into audio conferences.
    SKYPE, the only issue is that SKYPE is built for the iPhone, but it works fine on the iPad.
15. Facebook.
    I tried a few apps and eventually settled on a paid app called MyPad+ after testing MyPad
16. Mind mapping.
    MindNode because it’s compatible and it works.
17. Keeping track of my car’s fuel consumption.
    Numbers, the Apple’s spread sheet and it works with Microsoft Office too.
18. Billing clients.
    MiniBooks is an iPhone interface for Freshbooks, I have not found an iPad one yet. 
19. Navigation via GPS
    TomTom South Africa, so far the better of the lot even if it’s still is an iPhone app and has not grown to iPad.
20. Writing blog entries.
    BlogPress or http://blogpressapp.com/ is really nice and interfaces well with WordPress, now bring a full HTML editor and I will be really over the moon.

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I know it’s a strange title but a true one…

I am not going to bore you with how incredible the iPad 1 is, even if it is, or how I wander how I lived without it, even if there is some truth to it. I am though going to list the uses I found for it in the last week in no specific order and let you decide for yourself.

1. Show my photography portfolio to potential client and works to clients.
2. Email, a place for my all email accounts in 1 portable place.
3. Alarm clock, yep it wakes me up too, too bad it does not make coffee.
4. Recording and taking notes in meeting.
5. Reading ebooks.
6. Browsing the Internet for information.
7. Watching ASP.NET MVC video tutorials.
8. Watching photography video tutorials.
9. Reading my RSS feeds.
10. Listening to music.
11. Getting the weather forecast.
12. Keeping a to do list.
13. Keeping notes.
14. SKYPING friends and colleges into audio conferences.
15. Facebook.
16. Mind mapping.
17. Keeping track of my car’s fuel consumption.
18. Billing clients.
19. Navigation via GPS
20. Write this blog entry.

And that was this week, imagine next week…

In case you wandered it also has some irritations but let me live that for a future post.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad.

Location:Swartgoud St,Johannesburg South,South Africa

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I do not rave about products often but there are a few well worth looking into, if you are in need of a synchronised world across devices (PC, Pads, Laptops and phones) and on the move or just starting a new venture.

1. Google Apps, a cloud based business solution, premium paid service is available.
   As a start-up it allows you to have 10 Gmail boxes (7GB+), Google Calendars, Google Site, Google Docs, Google Contacts for free on your own domain.
   It has some limitations in it’s free form but it will do fine for a few years.
   Works with any device with a browser, has apps or functionality for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, BlackBerry
2. DropBox, a free hard drive in the cloud, premium paid service is available.
   The basic version is 2GB of space and by inviting friends that do not have Dropbox yet, you get and extra 250mb per accepted request.
   It’s a great way to save those critical documents and Dropbox is compatible this a multitude of devices and software packages, the big thing is it synchronize the files on it’s own, I don’t have to think about it.  
   Works with any device with a browser, has apps or functionality for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, BlackBerry
3. Evernote, free notes in the cloud, premium paid service is available.
   Not as heavy as DropBox and with a totally different purpose, the basic (free) version gives you 60MB.
   I found it a great replacement to Microsoft’s OneNote, the later being limited to Windows (in most forms). I found the Notebook approach of OneNote very friendly and wished it was available across all my devices with synchronisation. It took me a while to find a worthy replacement but EverNote is it. No more looking for where I put that note. (I sound like a sales rep now)
   Works with any device with a browser, has apps or functionality for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, BlackBerry.
4. Flickr, free photograph repository and sharing in the cloud, premium paid service is available.
   Still the best photo sharing site around, and it’s free unless you want to go pro and have unlimited space.
   Most of my publishable work is on Flickr not all is my best but I use it as my repository. I can mark photos private or limited access and it has full copyrights support.
   Works with any device with a browser, has apps or functionality for Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPhone, iPad, Android, BlackBerry.
5. Skype, free phone and messaging.
   I know that they have had a few serious issues lately but let us stay honest, they are still the best.
   Works with most devices (well at least all devices I own), Windows, Mac OS X, Linux, iPhone, iPad,…

There is another cloud based service I’d like to add, FreshBooks as with the others premium paid service is available.
It’s an online invoicing, Time Tracking and Billing system.
FreshBooks also integrates directly with Google Apps which make life easier.
I am new to it but so far it’s been great. 3 clients for free. And it has mobile apps too, I run it off my iPhone.

This last one is not so much for business then for information, Google Reader is an RSS aggregator in the cloud with many sync apps for a variety of platforms. 
Create your own newspaper, I did and did I mention it was free and accessible via any browsers?

All in all, these a are bunch of useful cloud based applications to make life a little simpler, no more worry about loosing that all important data.

Now I am looking for a viable online backup solution that will work with South African bandwidth.

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Firstly I would like to dispel any misconceptions you may have, I have a day job, I am a web application architect. Worst yet, I am versed on the Microsoft platform, particularly ASP.NET. So why talk and own a MacBook Pro?

The original idea was to separate my work from my photography, after all Macs have the reputation of handling media better then PC. Is it true, though? In my experience, the answer is no. Surprised? I was.

The Mac difference is not only in the hardware, it’s in the software and more precisely in the operating system. My previous statement holds true when running Windows on a Mac. Switch to Mac OS X (Snow Leopard) and life changes for the different for the better or worst. All of a sudden it is faster with, well, about anything but mostly media. I must not forget to tell you that with Windows 7 x64 the longevity of the MacBook Pro is about 3.5 to 4 hours whereas with Mac OS X you are looking at the better of 8 hours, standing record being at 11 hours, though I was not working on it permanently.

I have the 13-inch version and though admittedly the screen is small it is sharp and very usable at 1280 by 800. It’s enough to make small adjustments on photos but that is where it stops. I then hookup the 24-inch monitor and life is better and I can carry on editing. Plug in in an external monitor does take an adaptor, what is that all about? There is only 1 port out for the display and it’s an Apple display port, my pet peeve.

So what is so amazing about this machine? Try this, get on a plane at 5:30 in the morning and use your laptop for an hour only to realize that you left the power supply (charger) back at the office. Catastrophe, you have a full day’s work ahead of you at a client. So you arrive at your client and hook up your 3G modem, the fear is increasing that the battery will not make the day with the USB modem attached, so you dim the screen to minimum viewable and switch off the illuminated keyboard. You do further confortable hours of work. Would like to add that the machine was never shutdown, it had gone into sleep mode a few times though.

Talking of illuminated keyboards this is always a nice touch on a laptop. It comes in handy in various situations particularly when traveling in a plane or working in a relatively dark place. Both my MacBook and my Dell have one and I could no longer live without it. Since I am on the subject of keyboards, the Apple keyboard layout and shortcut keys have been the hardest part of my transition, not OS X as one may have thought.

OS X is intuitive enough to get used to, though I miss some of Windows functionality, Window snapping is one of these. However, one gets used to OS X’s ways.

Mouse pads, track pads, I have always hated them. The Mac multi touch track pad is efficient though rather different it’s PC counterpart. Firstly, it is truly multi touch, it also takes a little time to remember that double tap is not a click, with the Mac a click is a press of the pad.

Using both Mac and PC, OS X and Windows, I often get asked which one I prefer; my answer is always the same, for what purpose? Each have their own strength and weaknesses, I choose the one I need for the purpose I require it for. My MacBook Pro I use it for photography and other multimedia as well as when I need to be independent of electricity for long periods, however I would not use it for Microsoft development. For the later I will use my Dell after all it makes since to use a Microsoft based machine for Microsoft based development.

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Another friend of mine, Kevin Naicker as joined the blogging institution, he will be blogging about technology, photography, technology miniaturization and a whole lot more I am sure. So go over to his blog at http://kevinnaicker.blogspot.com and welcome him.  

His first entry is entitled “Going Mobile Quickly” 

We wish him the best in his blogging efforts.

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My interview with “South Africans You Should Know” host Michelle Ashburner is now live here. And may I say it was pleasant and easy.

Thanks Michelle.

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One thing that came with my MacBook Pro was iLife, it contains a bunch of tools to do photo management and basic editing (iPhoto) to write music (Garage Band). One of the tools that interested me was iMovie a video editor.

iMovie, much like the rest of the suite and OS X, is very intuitive. Easy to get, easy to use until… I own a SONY Cyber-Shot DSC-HX5V, it is on the list of compatible cameras for iMovie but what I found is disturbing. I took you the SD card from the camera and put it in my card reader as I do for my photographs. To my surprise, I got a message telling me that no compatible files where found, though I could see it. Admittedly, it was greyed out. I could not import this file. Than it came to me, the camera is compatible, what if the file was not? So I connected my camera with the USB to my MacBook Pro and behold, I successfully imported the video, it even picked it up by itself. Great or not.

You see I have a bunch of videos done with this camera on my hard drive, how do I import those? MTS files are not recognised as valid video files by iMovie (I even tried to rename it), so now what Apple? Do I have to put them back on the camera to import them? That would just be silly!

I will keep you updated.

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I have been very busy of late from my day job to doing some advanced photography and helping out a few friends.

One in particular stands out, simply because through the hardship of her life she has found time to share her passion of South Africans and thus South Africa with all that will listen with her podcast. Her site may be simple and that would be my fault for I am trying not to deter from the message; with all it’s faults, South Africa is a great place to live and South Africans should be proud of their achievements not matter who they are or where they come from. I am not born a South African but I can assure you I am South African to the core and I say South Africans like Michelle should stand up and be proud.

Michelle has invited me to an interview on South Africans You Should Meet which will tentatively air on the 23rd of March, though the interview itself is scheduled for early next month, let me say it’s an honour.

I will be chatting to Michelle about photography in South Africa and who knows what else. She has already interviewed a few South Africans and her site is booming, so maybe go and meet some South Africans.

You can meet Michelle at South Africans You Should Meet and be sure to leave her a note of encouragement as you are at it. And maybe you know South Africans we should meet, tell her about them.

If 1 element can change the perception of a simple photograph of a desert, why should one person not change the perception of a country?

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Don’t mistaken me I like OS X, mostly, it’s fast, I mean really fast and it comes with a lot built in. The power management is just incredible, I can get up to 8 hours out of my MacBook Pro.

Unfortunately, not all is rosy, I wish I could say that OS X was better then Windows 7 but in all honesty it’s generally on par. It is stronger in certain aspect, responsiveness, power management and media manipulation, however it falls short on others. For example, I have downloaded near 3GB of updates in 1 month, even the infamous Windows Vista did not reach that. That represents 2 bundled updates (I gather that Microsoft would call that “Service Packs”) and a few patches for printers (that I still cannot get to work).

Now for the really ugly, each time I install one of these update bundles it seems it corrupts the installation and I have to fix it with disk utilities that only seems to work from the installation disk. Is this is not done OS X does not boot, what’s up with that?

So is it better than Microsoft Windows 7, I my opinion for daily life definitively not. However for specialised application like photo/video/audio manipulation it definitively is, even with the quirks.

If you intend to go MAC there is one more thing you might want to research first… Is there software for the intended use and the cost of it.

The real question is will Apple fix these issues in Mac OS X Lion?

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I am not big on “New Year’s Resolutions” but this year is a little different. Last year was a bad year, I mean a really bad year. I need to change that.

Resolutions (in no particular order):

1. Start making serious money out of my photography by the end of this year!
2. Post more photographs.
3. Blog twice a week as opposed to the current once, that would be at least 1 blog entry on each of my blogs (www.onlyinsouthafrica.com and www.theaspnetguy.com) or 2 entries on one.
4. Make time to go and photograph more often.
5. Learn and/or master the following techniques:
1. HDR (Tone Mapping)
2. Location portrait photography with and without flashes
3. Studio photography
4. Street photography
5. Lensbaby photography
6. Landscape photography (Panoramas with an SLR)
6. More macro photography, I actually enjoy that.
7. Learn to put work in working hours so I can do all the above.
8. Improve “Only in South Africa” by adding functionality and ease of use.

Add to that a one month trip to a place I have either never been or have not been in a long time.

That is it!

Happy New Year too all. 
May it be healthy, happy and fruitful.

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Coming from a 100% Microsoft world Mac OS X is not exactly what I expected, nor is the machine.

For one, the whole machine fells very different, the keyboard has these strange characters on it and some keys are missing. The user interface is very different, not only in look but also in function. For example “closing” using the “X” does not terminate the running software, instead it put’s it to sleep in the dock.

Speed is also different, it seems more responsive, I suspect a lot of the software is preloaded or cached to achieve these speeds. Also surprising is the machine’s longevity, at most I can get a 2 and a half hours from my Dell XPS 16 with similar specs. The MacBook has already done 5 hours and was reporting another 4 to go. Again, I suspect very intensive power management. And another surprise, it does not heat up as much as I expected, my lap is not cooking.

The best part of the transition, not that I will stop using my Dell / Windows laptop, is that all my favourite software is available on the Mac like Firefox, Lightroom, Skype even MSN and Office (Word, Excel). It does make my life easier albeit in the case of the Microsoft software it’s not the same, in fact I would say that it’s a scale down version of Office on the PC.

Time will tell but so far it’s been a positive experience.

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If you visited my site in the last few days you would of noticed that Only in South Africa was missing. Goddady moved my hosting to a new server without resetting the DNS, which as a matter of interest they host! That simply resulted in my site vanishing. To add insult to injury not only is their support shocking but I had missing content and content I deleted month ago reappearing.

Bottom line, we are back and contemplating the launch of www.mondayville.net!

Related posts:

1. Service disruption

Odd title I know, it just that it’s been a hard, very hard, 2 weeks. I have had no time to even open my camera bag, let alone shoot with the LensBaby. So forgive me for not posting some photographs, how-to’s or experiences. Tomorrow is another day, maybe I will find some time, I can only hope. Maybe I’ll even find some inspiration… I saw a rainbow today and went “awesome” and carried on walking, that is bad, very bad.

Related posts:

1. A new job, a new car and new ideas.
2. I am still alive
3. New Year’s resolutions

Blogs are a wonderful way to keep informed and learn something, I find that most bloggers are top the point and try to keep the posts as short as possible which makes it easy to read.

Here are some of the photography related blogs I follow in no particular order:

• Chase Jarvis
• Joseph Linaschke
• Frederick Van Johnson
• Joe McNally
• Moose Peterson
• Mostly Lisa
• Scott Bourne
• Rick Sammon
• Syl Arena
• The Digital Photo Experience
• This Week in Photo
• Stuck In Customs
• Vincent Laforet

Related posts:

1. New Year’s resolutions
2. Site News
3. Podcasts I listen to…

I drive about 2 hours in traffic Monday to Friday and how constructive is it? If it was not for my iPhone (or previously my iPod), it would have been total a waste of time. So how did I remedy that? I listen to podcasts and learn.

Podcasts are a good way to pass the “down” time and learn something new, give it a try.

Here is a list of my favourite photography related podcasts in order of preference:

1. This week in Photography – iTunes
2. Photofocus – iTunes
3. Typical Shutterbug Podcast – iTunes
4. Camera Dojo – iTunes

Enjoy

Related posts:

1. New Year’s resolutions
2. Blogs I read
3. A new job, a new car and new ideas.

As advertised, I am doing so major changes to onlyinsouthafrica.com so Please be patient. Should you have any suggestions please go to  the Contact Us page to drop me a mail.

Related posts:

1. Web Site trouble
2. Information – Feed changes

I don’t like blogging about technical stuff on this blog and even less about PHP and MySQL after all, if you have read my other blog www.theaspnetguy.com you would know that I am a Microsoft developer, enough said.

Even though, I run 90% on my personal sites on WordPress, why? Well because it’s dead easy, create a database then a folder point your DNS and voila. Most Linux host make it even easier with an install option but I like getting my hands dirty.

One thing I used to do was to have a virtual machine with Windows Server installed and configured PHP and MySQL so I could try stuff. And that bring me to my first issue, I search for a step by step installation for hours some years back and eventually found one that made sense…  Go to http://www.trainsignaltraining.com/installing-wordpress-on-iis7/2008-10-06/ it may not be resent but I have never failed an installation thanks to them.

Now onto my Godaddy problem, installing WordPress on Godaddy is easy enough but customising the permalinks was impossible since Godaddy’s Windows hosting did not support it, until now. So, why talk about TrainSignalTraining? Because they have an excellent post on “IIS7: URL Rewrite Extension on Windows Server 2008” which led me to a post called Enabling Pretty Permalinks in WordPress and voila…

So does it work?

I started writing this article before I tried, so imagine my surprise when this happened:

It says: Permalink structure updated. Remove write access on web.config file now!

And it works!

This brings me to my last statement of today, I am working on a new version of Only in South Africa .com. I will publish it’s location in the near future.

No related posts.

As you all may have noticed I have been blogging less, there are various reasons why but the most important have been my endeavour to start a new Web and Business development company and I have also been busy with another dream of mine, a photography studio. And so was born Pascal Photography Studio as the title suggests, it was inevitable, it had to happen one day and it has. I have been busy with the site and it’s far from finished but I have begun as usual using WordPress and this time my base theme is Picture Perfect theme by Wayne. I still have a lot of work. As of today, all photographic equipment and tips or even techniques will be cross-posted from there so to find out more on what my offerings are head over to Pascal Photography Studio and watch it develop, pun intended.

So what will happen to Only in South Africa? Pretty much nothing I will be restarting the “Photo of the Day” soon and maybe even more, as for the rest well since it will be cross-posted you will still be able to enjoy to goodness (or awfulness) of my thoughts on equipment, techniques, software, suppliers and more.

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So what is the hype with this iPhone thing anyways?
I mean it just another mobile phone, right?
Yes it is and the iPhone 3GS does a wonderful job at being just that a phone but, unlike most of my previous smartphones, it has an edge…
You see it’s a computer in your hand with an operating system that works, unlike my previous Microsoft Mobile phones it does not freeze and 99% of the application that I want work, no fidgiting, no wasted time, it just works.
And yes not all the application are free but the care and quality is generaly better than it’s Windows Mobile platform conterpart, so far.

And to proove my point, this was all writen on an iPhone 3GS in under 15 minutes!

More on the iPhone’s use in photography soon.

Related posts:

1. Living with a MacBook Pro

Firstly, Season’s Greeting to all.

I know I have been absent since the 1st of December of last year, I apologise but let me explain…

Firstly, I was retrenched by mutual consent with my company, I had not done much in a while and did not feel I was adding any value, so it was decided that since I did not fit anywhere else I would take a volunteery retrenchment and go on my marry way, all this before Christmas. For a while there, I got a little depressed but I have been trough worst and picked myself up and continued actively looking for a new job. That did not go well either, it felt more like I was being tested like a kid out of school then anything else and to be honest most of my prospective employers were looking for code monkeys, I am a Senior Developer / Architect, note the “developer” part. A developer is a solution provider not what I call a code monkey or a programmer whom just types away and hopes that the BRS is correct. So my job hunting efforts came to an abrupt end. I’d still like to thank Kirstin Garland and Jason Pretorius for all their effort, guys I know you did your best. I got depressed again…

So where from here?

Well, that was the hard choice, become a code monkey and be on antidepressants all my life or take a leap of faith?

I took a leap of faith, I have a fair severance package so why not open my own Web Development House? One that focuses on SOHO to small businesses I could bring a lot to the table, more than web sites I have learned so much about how to make use of the web to enhance businesses why not merge both skills into one and create a company that offers not websites but rather a way to improve businesses using the web as a medium, after all I have been doing it for more that 10 years for small businesses to large corporate. So, an old dream of mine was born, Panache Web and Business Development. We will start operating mid January and oddly enough my first client is my old company, which in many ways is great.

Unfortunately, my woes did not stop at being retrenched…

My camera, a Canon EOS 400D, attempted a dare devil swim in the dog bath along with my flying laptop. My dog, an Alaskan Malamute, decided that whilst I was outside with him it would be a great time to give me a big hug, the results were less 1 SLR and less 1 laptop. Thanks to Outsurance that was sorted rather fast and efficiently.

I replaced my Canon EOS 400D with, dare I say it, the mighty Canon EOS 7D, if you have been following me on Twitter you would know what I initially thought of the 7D, it’s like going from a bicycle with training wheels (the 400D) to a superbike (the 7D). My head is still trying to adjust, I’ll talk more about the mighty 7D in another post, hopefully with some image samples. to tell the truth, I have read the manual cover to cover twice and I am about to do it again but enough about the incredible 7D… I have also decided to take some photography courses starting at the end of the month trough to March, I would like to open a small studio and my skill set though not bad for a junior amateur is nothing compared to what I will need to have a studio, but there will be more about that in the coming month too.

Lastly, I have replaced my laptop, an HP Pavilion dv6000 series with, no not an Apple Notebook as I originally thought since the Apple did not have my requirement for my development work (in .NET) so I did some research and voila I am the proud owner of a Dell Studio XPS 16 and all I’ll say is, wow. It sorted out both my development and photographic requirements in one go (not to mention it’s gaming abilities). The only two issues with it are it’s weight, it’s really heavy, and the HD screen, yep you read right it has a 1920 by 1080 native resolution on a 16.1 inch screen, you need a magnifying glass to read the screen. OK it’s also an advantage most of the time, pair it with a 24 inch HD screen and problem solved, yes it can handle it and so much more…

So there is the story so far… More to come soon…

Related posts:

1. Site News

For those whom contacted me about missing the “photo of the day”, thank you. It seems that more people were missing it than I expected. And I apologize profusely. I will try to resume in the next coming weeks, definitively after the 9th of October though. Even though I though a few whale photographs would appease you, so check it out in the next few days.

And now a bit about me in the past month, firstly I have been rather busy at work and to be totally honest it has not been all rosy on that front, .

I also had a 5 day trip to hospital, thanks to a alleged spider that may have thought I was it’s next meal, I think it’s eyes were far bigger than it’s stomach.

After that I did an amazing shoot at an Indian dance concert, I hope to publish some of those photos and a few tricks I learned shortly.

Today I am in Hermanus and was at the Whale festival though the weather got the better of us, we came back soaked… But I got some whales breaching never the less… I’ll try again tomorrow, oh yeah.

No related posts.

I live in Johannesburg and rain is something that is always welcomed. Johannesburg is one of those Mega-Cities that should not exist, you see it’s built in an area that has no natural water, so all of it has to be imported, so if it was not for the abundance of gold… Here we live in a semi-desert, rain is seasonal, we have natural rivers but they are also seasonal.

All of this to say that I was planning to do some sunrise / sunset HDR tests and some polarising filter test this weekend and it’s not going to happen.

So instead I’ll enjoy the cool weather, min 6 max 10 Celsius and the rain.

EDIT:
I have subsequently read that snow is also expected in the “high lying” areas. I am now going back to bed!!!

See News24 for more

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Just to inform you that there are some RSS changes. I implemented Google AdSence for feeds a while back, what I failed to consider is the fact that my feeds were set to “summary only” which I certainly would find unfair, so as of today, the feeds will contain the full article with photos. Should you have a problem with anything please do not hesitate to drop me a word in the comments here below.

Related posts:

1. I am still alive

Unfortunately these things happen and unfortunately I was not aware of it so since Sunday the 14th this site has been off line due to an unexpected error after an automated upgrade to WordPress 2.7. I still blame GoDaddy but I have restored a previous version and I am up again.

As far as the Photo of the Day concerned they should all be up again by tonight.

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I feel the need to clarify my stance towards Social Networks, I hate them, really I do. But in this day and age if you are not on Facebook, LinkedIn and something like Digg or Technocrati you are no one. I do believe in blogs and by the nature of it Twitter, neither are “blocked” to a subscription system of sorts, so to me it is far friendlier, I only login to Facebook and LinkedIn when I get a mail telling me there are messages.

So you may ask how are my Facebook and LinkedIn accounts so active, its bacause both of my accounts are linked to both my Blogs RSS, Twitter and Flickr accounts and that is my kung-fu.

I update Twitter with TweetDeck and my websites with Windows Live Writer, both are stable and now Tweedeck also pulls info from Facebook, check them out.

Unfortunately “Social Networks” are a necessary evil in my life, so I live with it.

No related posts.

Warning: This review contains spoilers.

Released: 2009

Go to IMDb page

Information © IMDb.com

Angels & Demons

Tom Hanks, Ayelet Zurer, Pierfrancesco Favino, Armin Mueller-Stahl, David Pasquesi, Victor Alfieri,

Let’s be honest, conspiracy theories again? Not quiet. I expected the whole DaVinci Code again and it was not to be.

I found DaVinci Code interesting but long and tedious, I am also tired of the whole “Conspiracy Theory” thing. Angels & Demons is not about that. It’s a good solid thriller that will keep you wondering the entire movie. It’s well written, well acted and well directed. It will give you a wonderful, action packed, suspense filled 2 hours and odd, where nothing is what it seems and everything is a clue.

I also enjoyed the locations and visualisation of the whole story. I hope the next one is of the same calibre. I do not want to say more than that.

Go and enjoy it.

Related posts:

1. Movie Review: Star Trek

Warning: This review contains spoilers.  

Released: 2009

Go to IMDb page

Information © IMDb.com

Star Trek

Chris Pine, Leonard Nimoy, Bruce Greenwood, Zoe Saldana, John Cho, Ben Cross,

I was looking forward to seeing what J.J. Abrams would do with Star Trek, after all his previous endeavours are good and his latest “Fringe” is definitively first good contender to the X-Files.  

The movie is certainly action packed from the 1st minute and keeps you on the edge of your seat the whole 127 minutes. If you disregard the “Star Trek” history it’s a very good and entertaining sci-fi movie. Unfortunately for me the movie theatre I went to to see it had a damaged reel and horrible sound but I still enjoyed it.

The story is well written, it does not discard the original time line of Star Trek as much as rewrites it, in the original timeline James T. Kirk’s father sees him graduating, I have no knowledge to the romantic involvement of  Uhura and Spock and nor Vulcan or Romulus are destroyed. But in good Star Trek tradition a demonic time traveller changes all of that. I must also admit that the choice of actors worried me a little but each played their part well enough.

So go watch it and if you are a Star Trek fan give it the break it deserves.

Related posts:

1. Movie Review: Angels and Demons

I have herd many times that Teleconverter are useless, they take away too much from the lens native abilities. I agree that they do take away a lot, but I also believe that the Canon EF 2x II Extender has a place in my camera bag. Think of the price of an entry level 800mm lens, now think of the price of a Canon EF 2x II Extender coupled with my Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS USM Lens…

The major drawbacks I experienced are:

• A loss of about 2 stops
• Loss of auto focus
• Extra weight of 280g
• Compatible with selected EF lenses
• Needs a support to be useful (Bean Bag, Tripod, …)

The major advantages are:

• Far cheaper than having to buy a specialised lens
• L lens with fluoride optics
• Easy to mount
• Doubles the selected lens’ reach

It is a “speciality” piece of equipment, getting used to it and it’s acceptable use can be difficult, even with a Image Stabilised Lens such as the Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS USM Lens. So what can it be used for? Any photography where a support can be used, I personally used it for bird, sky photography, paparazzi style photography and the odd wildlife photography but the latter is rather difficult as I used it with a bean bag in the past, I have bought a Car Window Mount since, though I have not field tested it yet.

The major advantage is the reach, with a 400mm lens you will achieve 800mm, however couple with an APS-C camera that brings it to a whopping 1280mm, for birding and sky photography it’s absolutely brilliant and a tripod can (should) be used in both these activities.

Here are some shots done with a Canon 400D, a Canon EF 2x II Extender and a Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6 L IS USM Lens.

As you can see a Teleconverter when used for the right reason can be very useful.

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It’s official my new ASP.NET and .NET site is live at http://www.theaspnetguy.com and it was not an easy task.

I had to export the entries from WordPress, clean the data, import it into BlogEngine.NET clean the entries and voila a bran new blog! And a lot of work to come. And finally, I removed all development entries from Only in South Africa.

I needed it up because I am busy on an ASP.NET 3.5 SP1 project which will make extensive use of the dreaded ADO.NET Entity Framework and the lovable Linq to Entities.

Long live The ASP.NET Guy!

No related posts.

I have been asked why I have not written another entry on development in a while, the answer is rather simple, this site will no longer have any development entries. I am moving all my development blogging to a new blog in the next 6 weeks or so. You will find all my technical stuff on my new blog called “The ASP.NET Guy”, expect some great stuff there starting with a weekly feature called “Developing Project Banana” and a monthly feature called “Optimising the web with ASP.NET”. This is to separate my personal blogging on “Living in South Africa”, “Travelling in South Africa”, “My random thoughts” and “Photography” separate to my development blogging. I felt that I was confusing the issues too much, I apologise for any and all inconvenience.

Now for some good news, you may have noticed that Wednesdays are all about photography, I intend to keep it up. If all goes well next week I’ll be talking about tele-convertors and the following week I’ll touch on ultra-wide angles.

Expect, a few new features too.

Related posts:

1. Here cometh Kevin Naicker blogger extraordinaire
2. News
3. Web Site trouble

I am new to WordPress, PHP and MySQL, to be honest I can write wonders in ASP.NET but when it comes to any other platform I am a bit lost. But I am one for learning and this is what I am doing. So let me apologize for the issues of the contact page failing and the fact that comments could not be posted. The latter has been fixed where as the former may take a little longer thanks to GoDady’s wonderful mailing support. I’ll have to “write” a WordPress plug-in just for that. Where is my PHP manual disappeared to?

Now for some good news, I have nearly completed my research into the second part of “Bandwidth in South Africa” with some staggering, at least for me, statistics. Hopefully it will be published before next Monday.

Thanks to Neels van den Burg of Evoke Media for pointing out the errors.

Related posts:

1. Site News

No I have not suddenly stopped blogging, I am rather busy with some matters at work that need my dedicated attention and caused me to have a few migraines and nightmares. But I have a plan! In the next 2 weeks things should settle a bit and I have a few unfinished entries in the pipeline.

Here is what you can look for in the months to come:

• ADO.NET Entity Framework and Linq to Entities, this will most probably be a multi-part series of entries.
• More on Project Banana.
• More on optimising ASP.NET generated HTML and maybe a bit on ASP.NET MVC, this will also most probably be a multi-part series of entries.
• In April, May or June some travel and photos, I will try for a daily “live” post now that I have a 3G Modem.
• A couple of movie reviews, I want to make this a weekly feature in the future.
• A guide to making Site Management System, if I have the time.
• Some photography entries, if I have the time.
• More rants and complains and maybe politics and economics in South Africa.

Additionally, I hope being able to post about Gizmo (currently in version 11b) seen here below.

If you would like to see something specific, leave me a comment.

Related posts:

1. New Year’s resolutions
2. Site News

I just have and I was surprised on the first page I appear a cool 5 times, even though my blogs image representation needs updating.

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Last week I was asked by a friend if gaming machines make good development machines. Well, the answer is a resounding YES they do at least on the hardware side but there is more to it, much more! Most developers I know also know that I have a gaming machine, so I suppose I now need to explain why? Because I cannot stand for Crysis, Crysis Warhead, Far Cry 2 or Unreal Tournament 3 to stutter at 1600 by 1050 with everything on high and 4x anti-aliasing and there you have it. I am a gamer and so is my wife, hence the gaming machine. However, there are a few concerns regarding the use of a gaming machine as a development machine.

First and foremost is the Operating System, my OS of choice for gaming is Windows Vista x64 and that will land me into trouble, I just know it. Seriously,   Windows Vista x64 SP1 is stable as a rock, just make sure you have the right drivers for your hardware and if you are about to buy new hardware make sure that a Vista x64 driver is available. The catch is to run Windows Vista x64 with at least 4GB of RAM so your game machine not only needs to have a high end graphics card and fast hard drive but also plenty RAM. As discussed in my previous post, you do not need a gaming machine to develop on but it seriously helps.

So what is the catch? Well a developer will most probably need to load Microsoft SQL Server and friends, a Web Server, MSMQ and even MySQL Server if not more, most of these take valuable resources from the gaming machine and often render it mediocre at best for games. The obvious solution is to disable the services and shut down any unnecessary programs running in memory. Though that all good and helps a lot, the OS configuration for a gaming and a development machine are different, the development machine OS of choice should be Windows Server 2008. Additionally, the gaming machine does not like clutter where as most development machines I know are filled with it.

So is there a solution, dual boot? Dual boot has always been problematic with me and I’ll avoid it at all costs. I went a different route, I have different “boot” drives for different use. I have a hard drive with Vista SP1 x64 for gaming, a Windows Server 2008 hard drive, a Windows XP SP3 hard drive, a Linux (openSUSE) hard drive and so forth. So what of licensing, well I suppose that could become a problem, however the gaming hard drive has the Microsoft OEM Vista x64 licence that came with my PC. The rest are licences from my MSDN Subscription, if you do not have an MSDN  Subscription I recommend you get one.

i get asked if it is not a lot of work to change the drives, the answer is in Mobile Racks, I personally use Vantec’s EZ Swap and it has served me well over the past few years. The nice thing about the Vantec EZ Swap is that you can get the Cartridge separately at a lower price, thus avoiding to have 5 full kits of which you only use one.  I use 80GB hard drives and install the selected OS on it, all my data lives on a separate 400GB hard drive mounted in the PC, thus making it available to all my OS installations.

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I am rather happy with my move to WordPress, however there are a few wishes that I have and intend to carry out, even though I will need to learn PHP.

1. A print button, so my articles can be printed without the need to print the entire page. (Done)
2. A working contact us page, I am sure that it is a configuration issue.
3. A working Flickr gallery, that would go with the next one (Done)
4. A working URL re-writing scheme, I’ll have to contact my host for that. Because on “Project Banana™ ” I needed to run on a Microsoft Windows Sever, so this is PHP on Windows.
5. Excerpts only Home page, I think I’ll find the answer in the theme. (Done)
6. Direct links to other domains in the top bar, again this will require a theme modification.
7. A better “Comments area”
8. A full rework of the entry’s header layout, including rating and maybe Digg badge
9. A full rework of the entry’s footer layout, including tags, full date, print option, add this page to my favourites or any of the social sites (though I have something similar it is not good enough for me), …
10. Rework of the page footer.
11. Fix the RSS stuff (Done)

I am sure I’ll find more but this is a good start.

No related posts.

09:31 and the new Only in South Africa site is launched. Now on it’s new host GoDaddy.com and using WordPress it should be faster and far more stable.

Expect many changes and growth in the coming months, starting with more entries, more intrigues, more opinions and more photos. Also coming soon is as "Only in South Africa" WIKI in both French and English as well an "Only in South Africa" travel forum and an "Only in South Africa" where to go site. All of which will live under the "Only in South Africa Info" banner.

Also coming up soon is the launch of "Project Banana ™" but more about that in due time.

In the mean while please visit my Flickr site for photos of South Africa.

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Last night I was at a presentation by Scott Hanselman at Microsoft in Johannesburg, what a blast. I have never had so much fun listing to a technical presentation ever. The insight into MVC was great but better yet is little cracks of it. If you are in Cape Town don’t miss him.

On another note, it is shameful that less than 2 years before the largest event to be held in South Africa, South African officials are still difficult to impossible to live with, I know that our country is undergoing major changes but come on you got to read this. It is completely unacceptable and officials mustn’t blame race or the apartheid that would be lame. They must just remember that tourism represents a large amount of our GDP and it has dropped by an estimated 37% for next year.

Come on South Africa, let’s get it together.

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I was reading an article on IOL "Inferno claims 22 lives after smash" and was horrified by the statement: "The government has announced plans to encourage drivers to replace their un-roadworthy minibus taxis with safer vehicles but the programme has been repeatedly delayed." Bring the law back to the roads, educate." Now that will help and by nature solve the "un-roadworthy" issue. I mean I am every day on the South African (mostly Johannesburg)  roads and I see Taxis driving on oncoming traffic, forcing themselves through red robots (or stop signs) and creating new lanes everyday. Let’s start there first, but if you call the traffic department, their answer is: "Sorry, but we only take call for emergency situations". I wish the government would wake up to the reality, if you want to control crime, start with the "little" things like road rules, because if you can get away with those why not murder?

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I received this in a mail a couple of days ago, I found it relevant for this day and age, to my greater despair.
Though I laughed uncontrollably the first time I read it. The author, though so correct, also had a very good sense of humour.

So to you all out there:

I wanted to send some sort of holiday greeting to my friends and colleagues, but it is so difficult in today’s world to know exactly what to say without offending someone. So I met with my attorney yesterday, and on his advice I wish to say the following:

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, my best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low stress, non-addictive, gender neutral celebration of the summer solstice holiday, practiced with the most enjoyable traditions of religious persuasion or secular practices of your choice with respect for the religious/secular persuasions and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all.

I also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2007, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make our country great (not to imply that South Africa is necessarily greater than any other country) and without regard to the race, creed, colour, age, physical ability, religious faith or sexual preference of the wishee.

By accepting this greeting, you are accepting these terms:

This greeting is subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher to actually implement any of the wishes for her / himself or others and is void where prohibited by law, and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher. This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher.

Regards and all the best to you and your family for the festive season.

Quote of the Day:
If it doesn’t matter who wins, then how come they keep score?
–Vincent Lombardi

Related posts:

1. New Year’s resolutions
2. I know, I have been neglecting my blogosphere duties…

Ho,  great wanders, he cooks… The rumour goes that I can cook, and apparently so it is.

The comment:  "That smells good, what is it?".

My reply: "Well something I did on Sunday, I am still finishing it off"   

So here is the recipe for you guys.

Cooking time: about 45 minutes

Effort: about 15 minutes

You will need the following:

• About 500g of cocktail pork sausages
  Pork sausages and chicken cocktail (or normal) sausages work too but I do prefer the cocktail pork sausages.
• 4 large potatoes (or about 500g)
  Find potatoes that boils well and reasonably fast.
• 1 can (450g) of whole pealed tomatoes
  I find the canned tomatoes better for this recipe then the fresh kind.
• 1 small bunch (handful) of fresh chopped parsley
  The dried king works too, but is no a vibrant.
• A pinch of Sage
• 330 ml of semi-sweet to dry white wine
  The choice will dramatically change the taste, try both.
• 1 table spoon of tomatoes paste.
• 1/2 a tea spoon of garlic
• salted butter and olive oil
• salt and pepper (to taste)

Optionally:

• Tabasco (to taste)
• 250g of sliced button mushrooms

Start by dicing the potatoes in to 1cm blocks, I advice you to "pre" boil the dices for about 10 minutes or until they look half cooked but not soft. Then cut the sausages into 1 cm slices. Put a little butter with olive oil into a large deep pan (ideally one that has a cover) or, if you have, a wok. Add the sausages, stir until they get nice a firm. Add the half cooked potatoes to the mix, let the lot go near golden.

Now add the wine, tomatoes, the parsley, the sage and the optional mushrooms. Stir a little then cover for about 30 minutes, check and stir regularly if it becomes too dry add water or if you prefer (like me) wine.

When ready add the garlic stir it in for a minute or two and serve with a nice glass of white wine, I often use the same than in the recipe to strengthen the taste, you can also garnish with fresh parsley.

Enjoy.

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Now here is an argument waiting to happen and, as you may have figured out, I love a good argument …

My take on variable naming conventions in C# is as follows:

1. Use of an underscore for any class scoped variables (private) which allows you to use the same name (save for the Underscore) for your properties.
2. Use Camel Case
3. Use meaningful descriptive names so that any other developer can understand what it contain.

It makes it easy to read and remember how to code.

Simplify.

But if you really feel this is way too simple, here is a list of resources:

• http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/xzf533w0(…
• http://www.dotnetspider.com/tutorials/BestPractice…
• http://www.irritatedvowel.com/Programming/Standard…
• http://csharpfeeds.com/post.aspx?id=5151
• http://www.csharpfriends.com/Articles/getArticle.a…
• http://msmvps.com/blogs/paulomorgado/archive/2007/…
• http://weblogs.asp.net/scottdockendorf/archive/200…

Or simply search Google.

The point is that no one really agrees.

No related posts.

Yep since I have been back I’ve been kind of busy. I really wanted to carry on with the "South African Developer News Weekly" and I will in about a month or so. Time for things to settle.

OK, so why all this?

Well first I have not been well since I came back from my holiday, I have managed to upload a day by day of my trip though and a couple of new photos (like just short of a 100). I suppose that’s good.

Second, time has been rather scarce, I am in the process of improving my house. So weekends are rather busy.

Third and most important, Zeus… Yes I know it a Doberman’s name, Magnum’s nemisys as I recall. My 8 week old Malamute is going to need a lot of attention. In fact my next entry is going to be dedicated to him. And you’ll be able to track him and the reat of the family here.

I am also rather busy on a couple of concepts on WEB development using ASP.NET in the company as well as in the process of being transferred into another division at work. The latter being the most exiting thing that’s happened on the work front since… Well, I can not remember. But it might very well give me the opportunity to grow and write a little more. I am sure a couple of standards and techniques will be developed. Also I look forward to some good arguments. But all of that coming in June, with a couple of unexpected surprises.

Yes I am working on a secret plot to invade planet earth and cook it to extinction, "Mouhahahahahaha"

I just gave it away did I not… NOT!!! But the truth is… "out there?"

"Mouhahahahahaha"

PS: I feel really evil…

Related posts:

1. A busy work life, a few migraines and a plan
2. I am still alive

I have been promising a review of the DSTV Personal Video Recorder for a while now, but to be true to any products one needs to use it for a while. It has now been 2 weeks and I believe it is time.

The DSTV PVR can do the follow:

• Stream 2 channels thus allowing us to watch 2 DSTV channels simultaneously
• Record 80 hours of television, this actually could be considered a 3rd channel as it does not interfere with the other two

The following is available on both channels:

• Pause live TV
• Instant playback
• Rewind live TV
• Access to the TV Guide
• 3 programs visible in the i-Plate (the panel at the bottom)

But there is so much more to this device, some of it  I like, some I don not.

So I will start with what I do like:

• Whilst I am watching one channel or, and this is important, viewing a recording, it will record a scheduled program. This is irrelevant of what PVR channel or DSTV channel I currently am on.
• The recordings contain all the TV Guide information
• To set one program for recording once is but a single button away
• Optical digital output (5.1 sound)
• The possibility to set the device to a 16:9 aspect ratio (Widescreen TV) not that I saw any differences yet.
• Software upgradable

So what don’t I like? 

• Repeat programs can not be set up using the record button, one has to go to the "Time Based" option for that. Much like a video recorder.
  I think that an option should be added when the "Record" button is pressed to be able to choose one of the following: Once, Every Day, Every Week.
  It would be a great function.
• The remote control switching mechanism has much to desire
  To go from controlling one PVR channel to another take time and a dial… A dial? Come on…
• The program schedule is only for 7 days…
  DSTV has at at least 30 days of future scheduling, why not making it available?
• There is 2 USB port and one serial, it says "For future use…"
  OK tell me what future use, please…

I was going to add on the "do not like" but yesterday I upgraded the software and it was gone. Let me elaborate.

The PVR has a digital optical output, but did not have 5.1 abilities, so why bother? After the upgrade I had a 5.1 signal and when recording it was recording the 5.1 signal too. Giving the PVR DVD quality sound. It is also announced, as shown in the image, for a short while at the beginning of the program. You got to have an amplifier capable of 5.1 and that has an optical input to make use of this function.

Generally, save for a few quirks, I am satisfied. Now all DSTV needs to do is to do better programing.

More information is available from DSTV and DSTV PVR

No related posts.

No related posts.

Update 9th of January 2009: If you are intrested for the 2009 update please go to http://collection.sasfepu.free.fr/palm/calendrier.html#2009 where you will find all the calendars, including Saints, Lunar phases, F1 Grand Prix , Moto Grand Prix and WRC as they become available.

Well it’s Chrismas and I could not leave without leaving some gift behind so here it is a couple of files…

• Outlook 2007 Official Public Holidays for South Africa [Click here to download]
  by Pascal Parent
• Outlook 2007 Saints [Click here to download]
  by Daniel (http://collection.sasfepu.free.fr/index.html) adapted by Pascal Parent
• Outlook 2007 Moon Phases [Click here to download]
  by Daniel (http://collection.sasfepu.free.fr/index.html) adapted by Pascal Parent

How to import into Outlook:

1. Open Microsoft Outlook, select File > Import and Export
2. In the “Import and Export Wizard” select “Import from another program or file”, click next.
3. In the  “Import a file” select “Tab Separated Values (Windows)”, click next.
4. Next select the file you wish to import using browse, my advice is to select “Replace duplicate with items imported” in the “Options”, click next.
5. Select Calendar as the destination folder, click next.
6. Click on “Map Custom Fields …” and click on “Default Map”, click on “OK”, click on “Finish”. |
   This will complete the import.

   

Enjoy

Quote of the Day:
Start every day off with a smile and get it over with.
–W. C. Fields

Related posts:

1. Update on my interview with Michelle Ashburner
2. Here cometh Kevin Naicker blogger extraordinaire