Where to start?

Life, as we know it, is hard to quantify...

Your happiness is not the sum of all your success minus the sum of all your failures. In fact your failures lead to happiness and your success leads to sorrow often.
So given the above..... What are you going to day to make yourself happy?

Blade Transfer Services 6000 - Sharepoint Portal Server - Nil

Dontcha just love Sharepoint Portal Server (SPS)? (NOT)...

I'm currently using Blade Transfer Server (BTS)to transfer 6 GB of data to a remote server across the world using http. No problems... Not one error, in fact the file got there in 6 hrs!

However... I'm struggling with SPS to get 6 word docs no larger than 800k each transftered to a remote SPS server. Does anyone use SPS seriously across the internet? I have no end of problems with it. (I'm really sorry to say)...

Perhaps we need to add some Document Managment attributes to BTS ;-)
Watch this space

Peter

Why YOU need Blade Transfer Services

Today has been a strange day. Floods in Seattle, network interuptions here in Wellington. All in all it led to a day where you couldn't trust a computer would be running, let alone network be relient and available.
Here's where BTS came to my aid and saved the day (again)....

We all use software that we think we know, but then there is always that moment (it's akin to the bomb defuser cutting the wire) where we say to ourselves "Is this really going to work, and if it doesn't have I wasted hours of my time?"....
Today I was so happy to use BTS to upload 4GB a data from here in Wellington New Zealand to Microsoft USA. I knew for a fact that if it broke 5% of the way through the upload could resume. I knew for a fact that if it broke 80% of the way through the upload could resume. I knew for a fact that if it broke 99% of the way through the upload could resume.
To cut a long story short, the data got to Redmond and the job got done against all odds!

I'm so happy we've got BTS (even if we did have to write it ourselves!)...

Peter

Bankers!

Bankers, yes I type it correctly although I'd be forgiven for a Freudian slip I suspect...

Well I'm finally back from my world tour of travelling to Amsterdam/Prague/UK/Las Vegas/Bangalore (I'll post later on how to get a good cup of tea in these places)...
But for now let's look at banking...

We charge in $US, it makes it easier that way. Sure we're from New Zealand but charging in a single currency makes it easier for you customers out there. I THOUGHT!
Here's the rub... If you pay us by cheque from a bank using $US (and you're not physically in the USA) then the banks cannot clear the cheque without sending it back to the country of origin who will then charge approx. $100 to clear it.
Any bankers out there who can tell me why this is and why it makes any sense at all?

Mr Grumpy ;-)

What a lovely movement Free Hugs is. It's certainly alive and thriving in Tokyo!

I took a walk down Takeshita Dori amongst all the colourful creative kids there and up to Harajuku station. Just between the entrance to Yoyogi park and the station there is a large area of colourfuly dressed teens, loving having their photos taken.
Then I came across it, the Free Hugs group. They all looked a little Emo to me, but what would I know? In fact the whole free hugs thing does quite fit in with the Emo culture.
It led me to think, at the end of such a shocking fortnight of loose mad gunmen on the run killing people for no reason. Perhaps the world needs to listen a little more to Free Hugs. Certainly it was uplifting for me, a stanger in Tokyo.

Thanks Free Hugs people of Harajuku, the hugs were lovely!

Peter

Outlook clients receive error 0x8004010f when downloading the Offline Address Book

Now I know lots and lots of you get this error.... It's one of those ones that drives you nuts and you never really get to the bottom of it. Here's the best description of that error I've seen.

http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2007/04/19/437902.aspx

Just came out 2 days ago :)

Peter

The most important thing - Making a cup of tea worldwide in hotels.

I spend more than 50% of my nights in hotels overseas. (I spend 3% of my nights on airplanes, but that's another story). I'm currently in Tokyo and managed to make a good brew. It occurred to me that this travellers insight could be useful.

Here's my guide to a good cuppa in the hotel room. A good cuppa is hot black tea, with milk and sugar in a cup.

1) Tokyo: In the rooms they provide a water heater that boils water and keeps it not all day! Brilliant if you like green tea which they provide free. For Tokyo, bring tea bags (hard to get in shops) and grab the sugars from the breakfast room (they don't provide in room). Milk you'll need to get from a store.
2) USA, where to start? Mr Coffee is a machine that is in nearly every room and is great for coffee, sometimes you get little tubs of long life milk, but mostly you get a plastic bag containing, a napkin, 2 sugars, 2 non sugar sweeteners, 2 sachets of non dairy creamer powder, a plastic rod for stirring. There is no chance of getting a tea bag in the room (see Decaf Tea blog) so you need to bring tea bags, with a bit of ingenuity you're ok.
3) USA- Los Vegas Forget tea!!!! seriously forget it. There is NOTHING in the room to make tea or coffee as they want you in the casinos, room service takes 90 minutes!!! Vegas is not a good place... Bring tea bags, milk, sugar, cup, electric water element that fits in cup. Above all don't drink the water out the tap in Vegas, I've been sick twice on tap water there.
4) New Zealand; Australia: Civilised they provide all tea equipment in room and free.
5) Britain, it varies, but generally it pays to check when you book if they'll provide in room. The Brits are always into making money, so don't be surprised if you have to call room service. However the Brits understnad the tea-aholic and you can always get a cup somewhere, even if it's sharing a cup with the night porter! (I'm not joking).

That’s all for now...
More later

Peter