August 2006
CDF
by Volker Weber
Lotus software is at the front end of helping businesses achieve operational efficiency through SOA. Find out more at Lotusphere 2007.
SOB, that is a sexy slogan for Lotusphere.
djay
by Volker Weber
Karim Morsy, Christoph Teschner and Federico Tessmann, three german students, have written an easy to use DJ application for the Mac:
djay is the groundbreaking new software for Mac OS X. It takes full advantage of Apple's latest audio and graphics technologies, and runs natively on both Intel and PowerPC processors. It supports all common file formats, such as mp3, aiff, wav, aac, caf. With djay you can control and mix your whole digital music collection with two realistic virtual, interactive turntables and both record and transmit the audio in real-time over the Bonjour network to other connected djays.
Three students from Munich, this is a nice tradition following the Coding Monkeys Martin Ott, Martin Pittenauer and Dominik Wagner, who are responsible for the collaborative editor SubEthaEdit.
Lotusphere now "formally" expanded to 5 days
by Volker Weber
To accommodate growing expectations for people productivity software, Lotusphere -- perhaps the only technical conference old enough to have both tradition and continuity -- is formally expanding from four full days to five with its 2007 sessions. This coming year, the 14th annual Lotusphere will begin Sunday morning January 21 and end Thursday, the 25th.
In 2006 it already looked to me like it ran for five days. But now it has "formally expanded".
I like this quote:
Lotusphere 2007 will be the 14th annual conference. "You know," jokes Marcus, "in technology, 14 years is like 14 years to a dog -- it’s a rare age."
It will be my 11th, plus 3 in Germany.
NeoOffice Aqua now available for free
by Volker Weber
NeoOffice Aqua is now available as Beta 3 for Intel and PowerPC Macs. This brings you OpenOffice.org 2.0.3 to the Mac, while maintaining a Mac look&feel.
Für unsere deutschsprachigen Besucher: Keiner hat die Software bisher besser erkärt als Max.
Marco will not be a happy camper
by Volker Weber
IBM has pushed back the beta for Notes 7.0.2 Mac again:
7.0.2 beta for the Macintosh - The Notes 7.0.2 Mac beta will begin at the end of September (2006), rather than the previously announced (below) start of the end of August. An announcement will be posted in the 7.0.2 MR beta feedback forum and an email sent to this distribution list once it's available. The DWA (Domino Web Access) version for the Mac is available now and ships as part of the Domino 7.0.2 Beta 2 download file.
The reference to (below) is:
Important Note about the Mac - Plan change for the 7.0.2 Notes client for the Macintosh platform. Originally the Mac beta was planned to coincide with 7.0.2 Beta 2, but it is being delayed until end of August to resolve a higher percentage of outstanding ship stopping bugs. The exact beta plan has not been finalized, but we are working on it.
The Mac beta seems to be elusive. Meanwhile Mac users keep crashing their crappy 6.5 client.
Two projects and a funeral
by Volker Weber
Somehow I never seem to agree with John Head. He has been to a Lotus keynote at the Advisor Summit today and he is very upbeat and excited. We was also very excited about Workplace, and I was not. Looking at his live blogging from the keynote, I picked up these items about Workplace:
- Workplace Branding = Workplace is the brand for overall strategy, products in that space without the Workplace name
- Workplace advances added to Portal
- Workplace products merged into Portal
- Workplace Solutions will continue to have the Workplace Name (Business Control & reporting, Business Strategy Execution, etc)
Let me translate this to vowespeak: The Workplace products are dead. Some body parts are being folded into Websphere Portal. I said this more than two months ago, and was heavily attacked.
The "solutions" (remember, IBM does not make applications, only middleware) continue to be branded Workplace. From there it gets muddy. What is this crazy talk about a brand for a strategy? And products which are not named with that brand? We will see.
So far for the funeral. What about the two projects? They are so early, that Lotus people where instructed not to talk about them. But if you are the boss and have a good demo-god, you can make your own rules. :-)
- Shanghai seems to be an effort to bridge between all those document managing solutions IBM has. Think Quickplace, Team Workspaces, Document Manager, Learning (harrumph)
- Ventura is web 2.0 stuff. One of the parts is DogEar, a del.icio.us clone you can actually pay for. The other part demoed was Activities, done for the web.
I bet all this stuff runs on WebSphere. It is good that somebody is still busy selling Notes. If only to keep the lights on.
One interesting item: Lotus may be rewriting the Notes/SAP integration to work with Notes 6.5. This means there are enough customers sitting on 6.5 clients who want this feature. Actually, the vast majority of my customers are still on 6.5, some of them with 7.0 servers.
I am not under the Ron Sebastian spell. He can make six weeks old code look like it is a done deal. And he will use Flash to demo stuff, that has not even be coded yet. Especially for very early projects. Is that clear enough? On the other hand I was not there, so my attempt to summarize the new projects may be way off.
Lockvogel
by Volker Weber
Wie heute überall zu lesen war, will T-Mobile mit neuen Tarifen aus der Misere. Zum Beispiel mit einem 1000-Minuten-Tarif und "Minutenpreisen unter 6 Cent". Es gelten die üblichen ungünstigen Konditionen: Nicht genutzte Minuten verfallen, Mehrminuten kosten 29 ct. Das sieht dann so aus:
Nutzt man nur 100 Minuten, liegt der durchschnittliche Preis bei 59 ct. Billiger als 20 ct wird es erst ab 300 Minuten, unter 10 ct rutscht man dann bei 600 Minuten. Nur wer genau 1000 Minuten verquatscht, kommt unter die sagenhaften 6 ct. Die nächste Minute kostet dann 29 ct. Warum eigentlich? Warum nicht weiter mit 6 ct? Weil T-Mobile überhaupt nicht zu 6 ct pro Minute verkaufen will. Das sieht man daran, wie schnell der Durchschnittspreis wieder über 10 ct springt und damit in eine Gegend, die auch Aldi & Co bieten. Die gestrichelten Linien zeigen den Verlauf an, den ein Tarif für 6 ct nehmen würde.
Zum Vergleich habe ich mal Base eingezeichnet. Je mehr Leute das nutzen, desto besser funktioniert es. Sobald man aber jemand in einem anderen Mobilfunknetz anruft, klingelt dort auch wieder die Kasse. Hier hinkt der direkte Vergleich.
Ich bin wirklich mal gespannt, wann ein deutsches Gericht dieses "Verfallen" bereits gezahlter Minutenkontingente bei diesen Tarifen kassiert. Vielleicht fangen die Mobilfunker dann an, seriöse Angebote zu unterbreiten. Die Minute kostet eben nicht 6 ct, sondern meistens deutlich mehr.
Top-Berater, ich sag nur: TOP-Berater
by Volker Weber
Dass ich das noch erleben darf: Eine Positivliste des überaus streitbaren "Don Alphonso". Mir gefällt die Charakterisierung der beschriebenen Personen. Sie stimmt weitgehend mit meiner eigenen Beobachtung überein, soweit ich die Leute kenne. Don und ich kennen uns übrigens nicht, deshalb ist seine Empfehlung mit Vorsicht zu genießen, auch wenn sie mir schmeichelt. ;-)
Normalerweise beteilige ich mich nicht an den Diskussionen und Längenvergleichen der Blogger. Technorati-getriebene Listen wie die deutschen Blogcharts oder die Top 100 Business Blogs finde ich als Orientierung nicht hilfreich. Um so mehr freut mich dieser Beitrag von Don. Er kann auch positiv.
Usha
by Volker Weber
Hello, I'm nobody
by Volker Weber
Apple publishes three new ads for the Get A Mac campaign.
SHA-1 hashing is broken
by Ragnar Schierholz
It seems as if a research team at Shandong University in China Institute for Applied Information Processing and Communications has found a way to break the SHA-1 hashing algorithm. The team has published a paper describing collision searches on SHA-1 hashes at the Crpyto2006 conference and a short note on the results can be found here (PDF, 48kB) here.
Basically, the algorithm finds an appendix to an arbitrary message which results in a collision with an authentic message, allowing to manipulate any authentic message while maintaining a valid signature.
Now I am wondering: does this make highly structured content (e.g. valid XML documents) less vulnerable against these attacks, since an appendices would hardly go unnoticed?
Update: Thanks Richard for pointing this out, the link really pointed to the outdated material. Sorry for the confusion. The talk at Crypto 2006 is actually a new approach.
Nachwehen des Updates für den Ogo a.k.a. 1&1 PocketWeb
by Volker Weber
Vor gut zwei Wochen hat 1&1 eine neue Firmware auf die PocketWebs (a.k.a. Ogo) gespielt. Danach gab es eine Welle der Empörung in einigen Foren. Stein des Anstoßes waren vor allem zwei Änderungen:
- Das Gerät hat nun fix einen Proxy eingetragen.
- Die GPRS-Verbindung wird nicht mehr aufrechterhalten, sondern automatisch getrennt.
Anstatt wilde Vermutungen anzustellen, habe ich ganz offiziell bei 1&1 angefragt, warum diese Einstellungen geändert wurde. Hier zunächst die Antwort zum Thema Proxy:
Long Awkward Pose
by Volker Weber
I saw this a while ago and today Florian sent me a hint, so it's about time to post it. What you need is a digicam which can record movies. Now instead of taking a picture, you videotape your victim:
It's simple, really. People look foolish when posing for a picture. So tell your loved ones you would like to take their photo... then secretly videotape them the whole time.
Here is a good one. Instead of having a site with only 37 entries, one should start a new meme on YouTube.
Quote of the day
by Volker Weber
Sicheres Auftreten bei völliger Ahnungslosigkeit ...
— Thomas Lang
It's all in the numbers
by Volker Weber
Sony says the battery replacement for Dell and Apple will cost them between 20 and 30 billion Yen. Divide this by 6 million batteries and you get 3333 to 5000 Yen per battery, which is 23 to 34 Euro. This includes shipping batteries, administration and so forth.
If you want to buy a replacement battery, you pay 129 Euro.
A burger with everything
by Volker Weber
Tim tries a burger with everything. And he gets smart before finishing it. :-)
Einkaufsbedingungen Oracle
by Volker Weber
Entweder hat der Webentwickler bei Canon gerade Stress mit der Datenbank gehabt oder an zwei Projekten gleichzeitig gearbeitet.
Update: Canon hat's gemerkt und der Link ist verschwunden.
Apple is calling back 1.8 million Sony batteries
by Volker Weber
Dell is not the only company that bought batteries from Sony. Now Apple is calling back 1.8 million batteries, which were built for iBooks and PowerBooks.
Once Apple has recovered their website, you will find more information here.
John Roling is not a happy camper
by Volker Weber
At Lotusphere 2006 John paid a conference fee of $1195 $1395, because IBM offered a discount for CLPs (yes I know that has been rebranded, but I prefer CLP). For Lotusphere 2007 IBM offers a "discount" for everyone. Which means, the price goes up from $1695 to $1895 to $2095, depending on when you register.
Do I smell "buy one, get one free" towards the end of January? ;-)
Amazon special deal
by Volker Weber
Pluto fired
by Volker Weber
The Solar System lost a planet today. Pluto, Charon, 2003 UB313 and Ceres are now called dwarf planets. Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune: There are now only eight planets.
Of course nothing has changed out there. ;-)
10 Megapixel Canon EOS 400D released
by Volker Weber
If you have a Canon Digital Rebel XT/EOS 350D, your camera is now officially old. :-) Long live the XTi/400D. Larger display, self-cleaning 10 megapixel sensor, 20% cheaper than the Nikon D80.
Lots of pictures here. And this particular one suggests they edited the badge.
Not as easy as you may have thought
by Volker Weber
Cross-platform development isn't easy. At least not for IBM. They may have the Eclipse platform, but that is not sufficient to deliver on all targeted operating systems. Case in point is the brand new Sametime 7.5 client. It relies on Microsoft Internet Explorer (!) to render chats. On Linux it needs Mozilla, as does the "native" Notes client. Which btw also builds on Eclipse, but does not contain the Sametime plugins, which are also built on top of Eclipse. If you have tested the Sametime 7.5 client on the Mac, you will have seen how badly that rendered the buddylist and the chats. That may be due to the fact that IBM has to use Apple's Web Kit, which is the technology behind Safari and inherited from Linux' Konqueror.
What do we have now? An Eclipse environment, which runs best on Windows. Ask those who have seen and run the current version of Hannover, or look at the state of Sametime 7.5. Nothing on the Mac yet. Let's take a look at the current visitor demographics at vowe's magic flying circus:
Luckily, IBM has committed itself to support a native Notes client in 7.0.2, both on PowerPC and Intel. Not like the "native" Linux client, but a real one. However, it has not been beta-tested yet. Because it had bugs which did not permit it to be released to beta testers. I just hope for IBM that they can get enough bugs ironed out to release the client in 7.0.2 and not postpone it as they just did with the Sametime client.
How can you make this work?
by Volker Weber
IBM shows a nice picture on your buddy's card. How can you make this work? Where do you have to put the photo?
Where can I buy the record?
by Volker Weber
[via Robert]
Sametime playing hard to get
by Volker Weber
IBM has done it again. At least they are consistent. And so are we.
You can download the demo as a Windows executable, play it right here, and for the rest of the files, you know the drill by now.
Look Ma, no data center
by Volker Weber
I have heard this Microsoft "push mail"* story often enough now. "You don't need to send your mails through an intermediary server." Of course you do. Your server is on a private network (at least I hope it is) and your handheld is on the operator's private network. If they want to talk to each other, they need somebody to call. The difference is: With a Blackberry, RIM operates this data center. With MS "push mail", your admins do it. They host a frontend server in your DMZ, and this server must be able to talk to your private net. Two questions:
- Do you allow a publicly accessible server in your DMZ to talk to your private network?
- Do you trust your administrators to secure a server more than you trust RIM's?
If you can answer both questions with "yes", you may consider Exchange "push mail". And you can do this of course if you are just running your Exchange server with direct access from the Internet.
*) I call it "push mail" instead of push mail, since the handheld polls your server for mail. At least every 20 minutes. And when it gets a new IP. And when it loses the connection.
Did you say Pink Taco Stadium?
by Esther Schindler
The family behind Morton's and Hard Rock Cafe is offering $30 million as evidence of their commitment and are promising to pursue an agreement with the Arizona Cardinals. But they want to name it, no kidding, Pink Taco Stadium.
The Cardinals, who control the Glendale stadium's naming rights, say they want no part of the name.
"We will not be the same old, boring corporate naming-rights partner,' Morton said during a news conference. 'We will deliver celebrity.'"
Knapp daneben
by Volker Weber
Hier dagegen stimmt der Preis. Eine gute Kamera ist es in beiden Fällen.
Disqualifikation
by Volker Weber
Die Sonne scheint. "Stellt Euch doch mal vor diese weiße Wand", sagte der Fotograf.
It's all marketing
by Volker Weber
[Thanks, Nico]
Testing Sametime 7.5
by Volker Weber
Here are a few things to test with the Sametime 7.5 client.
First of all, if you have a Terminal Server or Citrix test environment, please test the client in this environment. It will be very interesting to see how well-behaved the client is, especially in terms of memory utilisation. Next year's Notes release will be built on the same technology and you can get some firsthand experience. Will a multiuser environment on Windows be able to host clients built on this framework?
Second, how can you manage plugins? I have heard many incidents that plugins have had serious effect on the stability of the Sametime client. Deploying plugins is actually very easy: You just throw them into the ./plugins directory of the Sametime client. It will be available the next time you restart the client. You can also have the server deploy plugins into this directory if you have set up provisioning. As the Sametime client runs as a user process, it needs to be able to write to this directory within the "program files" tree in Windows. Can you lock down this directory while still being able to deploy plugins, and if so, can you prevent the user from installing rogue plugins?
IBM releases Sametime 7.5 early
by Volker Weber
Scheduled to be announced next Tuesday, the code can be downloaded from Passport Advantage now. IBM has released the server for AIX, AS/400, Solaris and Windows, as well as the clients for Linux and Windows. The Mac client remains in beta. IBM has also committed to a Linux server in the first half of 2007.
People familiar with the beta program tell me, that they have hoped for another beta drop before going gold and that there are a quite a number of deferred bugs. IBM has decided to release the product. I suggest you get your feet wet in a test environment before deploying to your users.
Update: Read Carl's posting on memory usage. That is the price you have to pay for developing on top of the Eclipse framework.
I think I need to write an "eSuite 2.0" opinion piece.
Writely opens up
by Volker Weber
Writely lets you collaborate on the web with nothing more than a webbrowser:
What you can upload:
- HTML files and plain text (.txt)
- Microsoft Word (.doc), Rich Text (.rtf) and OpenOffice (.odt, .sxw) files smaller than 500K.
- Image (.gif, .png, .jpg and .bmp) files smaller than 2Mb.
What you can download as:
(from the File menu within the editor)
- Zipped HTML, RTF, and PDF.
- Microsoft Word and OpenOffice.
I expect this to be folded into the Google login soon, so that you only need one account. What do they have now? Word processing, spreadsheet, mail, calendar, address book, instant messaging. And you can leave your computer at home. Neat.
Windows reicht nicht
by Volker Weber
Aus meiner Inbox:
Das ist lächerlich: Wollte gerade bei Microsoft meine Partnership erneuern... Und nach 37 Cookies & 2 Zertifikatmeldungen kommt:
Man kann nicht ein bisschen katholisch sein. Und mit einem kleinen Wechsel des Betriebssystems sieht sogar die Fehlermeldung irgendwie besser aus. ;-)
New toy: BlackBerry 7130
by Volker Weber
The courier brought a new toy today: a Blackberry 7130. Like former 71xx models it tries to look more like an ordinary phone. It uses a system called SureType, which is sort of a T9 for buttons which have three (1ER) instead of four (1ABC) characters. I will see how well this works. So far it is the best looking Blackberry I have had, with the same powerful CPU as the 8700 and a smaller but even brighter screen.
Update: After writing a few mails with SureType, I have mixed results. It works much better than you would expect, but on the other hand you constantly worry whether it writes what you are typing. There is one serious problem for me: You have to tell SureType which language you are using. But I am actually using two, and I don't want to switch the preferences time and again.
The 7130 competes head to head with the 8700. You get a smaller screen (240x260 vs 320x240) and the smaller keyboard, but the rest is basically the same. The narrower screen makes it a bit harder to read the message list, but the message display itself is good. Placing phone calls from the keypad feels more natural than on the larger 8700 where the numeric keys are much smaller and off-center.
First impression: the 7130 is the better phone, the 8700 is the better message machine. I like them both. The 8707 flies a bit higher since it has a UMTS/3G radio.
Stuck at Heathrow
by Volker Weber
So, I went through 3 security checks but some unlucky individuals went through more if they were randomly selected. The security line was long, 2-3 hours each. The first line was for checking in luggage, which was your only chance to check in everything and only carry on what was allowed (many people tried cheating this). The second line was the first security check to get into the terminals with x-rays, pat downs, and hand searches into your only plastic bag. This is also where a great deal of goods were thrown away. There was a trashbag on the floor full of cell phones, ipods, cameras, jewelry, razors, notebooks, usb sticks, key fobs, lipstick, some really expensive pens, and many other items that would be hard to throw away.
And it only gets better ...
Overheard in New York
by Volker Weber
Teen girl: Do you think Christmas will ever be on Friday the 13th?
— Times Square
Woman in elevator: She said 13...Where's 13? What the... fuck? There's no 13. Should I press 12? Or 14? What?...She said 13. Well I'll just press both.
— 22nd & Broadway
Tween boy: Did the dinosaurs come before or after Bible times?
— Museum of Natural History
[Source]
How to geocode your photos
by Volker Weber
I discovered today that the NavMan iCN530 can write a GPS track. The manual says it should only be done when instructed by Navman service. This is probably a precaution to avoid that people fill up the internal memory with log data. Of course I had to play with this feature. :-)
You go into Preferences/Routing (Einstellungen/Routen). On the third page you will find a button which lets you turn on Track Recording (GPS Protokoll). You can select a name, for example PHOTO. Until you deselect this option, the iCN530 will now record your whereabouts to a logfile. When you mount* the iCN later, you wil find the file in "My Flash Disk/Navman/Lightning":
Copy the logfile to your disk and take a look at what's inside:
$GPGSA,A,1,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,*1E
$GPRMC,000000.149,V,,,,,,,070805,,*29
$PTTKT,STAT,0,0,0,0,0*6D
$GPGGA,000001.135,,,,,0,00,,,M,0.0,M,,0000*50
$GPGSA,A,1,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,*1E
$GPGSV,3,1,12,20,00,000,,10,00,000,,25,00,000,,27,00,000,*79
$GPGSV,3,2,12,03,00,000,,31,00,000,,24,00,000,,15,00,000,*78
$GPGSV,3,3,12,16,00,000,,05,00,000,,01,00,000,,26,00,000,*7D
$PTTKT,STAT,0,0,0,0,0*6D
$GPRMC,000001.135,V,,,,,,,070805,,*23
$GPGGA,000002.135,,,,,0,00,,,M,0.0,M,,0000*53
$GPGSA,A,1,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,*1E
A quick search on Google revealed that these are NMEA sentences, which is basically what a GPS tells your navigation software. You can translate this information into something more friendly like the GPX format with GPSBabel.
Now that we have this track, what can we do with it? Well, you can plot your whereabouts on a map. Or as my name for the track log already suggests, you can geocode your photos. GPS Photo Linker reads your track and your photos, and then writes GPS coordinates into the photo metadata:
GPS Photo Linker can be used to save location and GPS position data to a photo. The latitude and longitude recorded by your GPS unit while you were taking photos can be linked, and saved, to the photos. GPSPhotoLinker automatically enters the city, state, and country annotations into the metadata.
So how does the program know which photo was shot where? It matches your recorded track with the date/time information inside the photo. So it is very important that the clock in your camera is set to the correct time. The software lets you define the offset if the clock was not set correctly. The GPS track will be correct, since it operates on the GPS satellite clocks which are very accurate. But how do you find what the time offset in the camera was? The best way is to shoot one picture of an accurate clock, so you can later compare the time in the EXIF header with the time displayed in the photo. If you forget to shoot the clock before the other photos, it does not really matter, since you can also record the difference later.
Once you have set the correct offset and loaded the appropriate track log, everything else is done automatically. GPS Photo Linker will write the location information into the photo metadata. There is actually a standard way of doing this, as you can see in this dialog of Mac OS X Preview:
If you click through to the original file (Flickr login required) and download it, you can look at the metadata yourself. The benefit of geocoded photos is obvious. You will always be able to tell where those photos were shot. But there will be additional benefits. The Navman iCN720 and iCN750 were the first navigation units that could navigate to a waypoint described in a geocoded photo. I expect many more to follow this idea.
Update: GPSBabel is one cool program. It also lets you translate the GPS track into Keyhole Markup Language (KML) format, which Google Earth (originally developed by Keyhole) reads:
And, as Hajo correctly points out, Google Earth can also read GPX files. You just have to enable "Gps" or "All files" when opening the file:
*) This is easy with ActiveSync on Windows. On the Mac you need something like MissingSync.
What makes your PC personal?
by Cem Basman
Awesome. Upload your photo and star in a personalized HP video ad. Btw, nice dubbing of my voice ... Watch some amazing ads in the same style with Marc Cuban, Pharell, Jay-Z and more.
Achtung Frau am Steuer
by Volker Weber
[via Robert]
Aus der Reihe "Was es nicht alles gibt"
by Volker Weber
Heute: Ein Hotel mit Geldwaschanlage.
[Danke, Christian]
Apple updates Boot Camp
by Volker Weber
Boot Camp 1.1 has a number of interesting enhancements:
- Support for the latest Intel-based Macintosh computers
- Easier partitioning using preset buttons for popular sizes
- Ability to install Windows XP on any internal disk
- iSight camera support
- Built-in microphone support
- Right-click when pressing the right-hand Apple key on Apple keyboards
- Improved Apple keyboard support including Delete, PrintScreen, NumLock, and ScrollLock keys
Those enhancements, especially driver support for iSight* and the internal microphone, make Windows more usuable on Apple hardware. However, I would still go for virtualisation instead of dual boot. The download went from 83 MB to 202 MB.
*) Just a thought. Maybe you can extract the driver and use it with a Firewire-attached iSight and a PC?
Kleiner Intelligenztest
by Volker Weber
heise security bringt diese dpa-Meldung:
Vor einer Masche mit betrügerischen E-Mails warnt das Bundesamt für Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik (BSI). Nach Angaben der Behörde in Bonn kursieren derzeit Werbe-Mails mit den Absendern "Germany Online Consulting" oder "Consult-Online-AG". Den Empfängern wird die Überweisung von bis zu 100 Euro in Aussicht gestellt – egal, ob sie weiter Werbung vom Absender empfangen wollen oder nicht. Voraussetzung für die Überweisung ist aber ein unterschriebenes Formular mit Bankverbindung, Name und Adresse, das per Fax oder nach dem Einscannen per E-Mail an den Absender geschickt werden soll.
Kling zu gut, um wahr zu sein? Genau. Ist auch nicht wahr:
Die Absender haben es auf die Kontodaten mit Unterschrift der Empfänger abgesehen, um eigenmächtig Geld abbuchen zu können, heißt es.
Wer so einen Quatsch glaubt, sollte vielleicht wirklich erst mal Lehrgeld zahlen.
So cute...
by Ragnar Schierholz
This made my day today!
Wer zu früh kommt ...
by Volker Weber
Ein "anonymer" Blogger, der sich "Joe" nennt, hat mittlerweile eine erkleckliche Anzahl von Blogeinträgen verfasst, die seine Odyssee zu einem Nokia E61 mit Blackberry Connect beschreiben. Natürlich ist "Joe" bestens bekannt, weil er sich mittlerweile mit einigen Leuten bei Nokia und RIM auseinandergesetzt hat.
Wie auch immer, an diesem Punkt hat er sich verflogen:
You need software version 2.618.06.05 on your device. Mein Device hat aber 1.0610.04.04.
Ich habe nur kurz ein bisschen an dieser Stelle herumgeklickt, und komme zu diesem Ergebnis:
6.28.1 ist die neueste Version für S60 und die läuft anscheinend auch auf seiner Firmware. Schon mal probiert, oder zu sehr mit aufmischen beschäftigt gewesen?
Corrolar: Man kaufe niemals ein Nokia-Gerät mit Firmware 1.x. Niemals. (Test: *#0000#)
Bruce Schneier on security theater
by Volker Weber
Hours-long waits in the security line. Ridiculous prohibitions on what you can carry onboard. Last week's foiling of a major terrorist plot and the subsequent airport security graphically illustrates the difference between effective security and security theater.
The chance of losing your luggage if going through Heathrow is now higher than ever. And since you have to check your notebook, your camera and your phone, and you must not lock your suitcase, chances are pretty good that you can kiss them goodbye. These items are not covered in case they are lost or stolen. Been there, done that.
No time for change?
by Volker Weber
I like the dumb look on Brandy's face and of course The Hoff.
[Thanks, Mitch]
Kontaktsammler
by Volker Weber
Heute bei Alex gelesen und herzlich gelacht:
Als Berliner OpenBC Nutzer kommt man schwer an Leuten wie dem Herrn Waldmann oder den Herren Niels Rüstmann und Michael Kaufmann vorbei. Kaum angemeldet, hat man schon Post im Kasten.
Ich war ja erst etwas enttäuscht, dass ich nicht zu diesem illustren Kreis gehöre, aber dann kam schon Post. Herr Rüstmann expandiert jetzt:
Alex schreibt weiter:
Nun haben sich die Herren Rüstmann und Kaufmann offenbar entzweit. Und geschickterweise senden Sie nun ihre Partyeinladungen jeder einzeln ab. Schlimmer noch, sie veranstalten jetzt Events zu exakt den gleichen Zeitpunkten zu exakt den gleichen Themen an zwei unterschiedlichen Orten der Stadt. Gut, der eine fängt eine Stunde früher an, der andere ist 5 Euro günstiger. Schade ist nur für die beiden Networking-Profis, dass der genervte User jetzt endlich aufräumt in der Kontaktliste. Raus mit den Kontaktsammlern. Ein willkommener Anlaß zum Ausputz.
Und da der Herr Rüstmann gerne Post bekommt, helfen wir gerne: nils.ruestmann@berlin.de.
Print your own concert tickets
by Volker Weber
Cem created this ticket for me.
Core Duo maxxed out
by Volker Weber
I finally found a way to get the fans working on the MacBook: Traktor
Talk time testing, for real
by Volker Weber
Amobil has done some real world testing with GSM and UMTS phones. You would be surprised how low the real world talk times are for some of the most acclaimed mobile phones. I was just burned by my N70 when I travelled to Kiel without a charger. I had to borrow one on the second day after talking to Ute at night. The test result is no surprise to me: 2 hours 35 minutes in UMTS mode!
[via mobile macs]
Kids, don't try this at home
by Volker Weber
Adobe releases Flashplayer 9 for Intel Macs
by Volker Weber
This is a good update for your Intel Macs. Adobe releases Flash Player 9,0,20,0 for the Mac. It now runs natively on Intel without the Rosetta engine. Linux, Solaris, Windows 95 and NT are still on version 7,0,63,0.
TypePad Mobile
by Volker Weber
This is pretty cool. A mobile client for TypePad. Runs on Palm OS 5, Windows Mobile 5 and Symbian Series 60. Speaking of Six Apart, Movable Type is now free for personal use. With as many authors and blogs as you like. Too late. Now everybody is on WordPress and I am too lazy to upgrade my site.
[via Heiko]
Nothing up her sleeve
by Volker Weber
Fooling around with the iSight
by Volker Weber
Write a Redpaper about Lotus Notes Access for SAP in September
by Volker Weber
IBM is offering a residency for this redpaper in September:
By participating in this residency you'll gain hands-on, practical experience with the new Lotus Notes Access for SAP feature . You will be able to interact with other highly skilled participants and members of the Lotus product management and development teams --- and become a published author.
I see some consultant opportunity in this space, so you should apply if you are not too busy in September.
Update: If you have skills in Websphere, you may also find this residency interesting.
Spiegel Mobil
by Volker Weber
Spiegel startet das neue Angebot Spiegel Mobil. Leider packen sie gleich auf die erste Seite ein Werbebanner. Die Top 5 Seite ist schon etwas besser. Aber beide sind ganz schlecht, wenn man Tagesschau.de als Vergleichsmaßstab nimmt. Oder meine selbstgeschneiderte Seite, die man unter vowe.net/ota.php als Spiegel Schlagzeilen findet.
Can you scale the output of Terminal Server?
by Volker Weber
A friend is running an MS Access application on Windows Terminal Server 2003. All nice and dandy, but there is one problem: If he remotes into the server with a 17" WUXGA 1920 x 1200 display and Microsoft RDC, the application is just too tiny. Can you make it scale up? I don't see any options in RDC.
Translators wanted
by Volker Weber
Ben is looking for volunteers to translate DominoWiki 1.1 from English to your national language:
If you fancy a credit on the project by helping out with translation, do let me know! This will entail receiving a “script” of strings in English, which will require translation. I will then place the new language strings into the relevant file in the final template.
So far he has volunteers for Portuguese, Italian, Spanish, French, Dutch. Oh yes, plus Kiwi and American. If you like to help, comment here. Let's try and make it available in more languages than Notes itself. Ben is already working on "Swedish Chef". ;-)
iSkoot - Fake Skype for your mobile
by Ragnar Schierholz
Skype is developing a mobile client. It is currently available only for the PocketPC platform, but rumor has it that there might be a Symbian version in the works.
Today, Skype has started a cooperation with iSkoot, who provides a Java-based client. It's not as you wish it would would expect though. Here's how it works.
Nikon D80 announced
by Volker Weber
This is essentially a D200 for half the prize, with consumer features added in. The new kit lens will take you all the way from wide angle to 200mm-equivalent zoom. I like.
Skype updates Mac beta 1.5
by Volker Weber
With and without video. At least that is what they say. Currently the downloads are mixed up:
- Skype_BETA_1.5.0.60.dmg (23,586,185 bytes) contains version 0.61 w/ video
- Skype_BETA_1.5.0.61_Video_preview.dmg (22,648,861 bytes) contains version 0.60 w/o video
This may be fixed real soon now. Update: Fixed now.
Bringing back the music
by Volker Weber
There is life before and after you bought your Sonos players. Mark Frauenfelder of boingboing.net is only the latest:
I'm listening to as much music as I did when I was in college. Sonos really has brought back music into my life.
Hold it
by Volker Weber
I have enough copies of this video. As has YouTube.
Spendierhosen
by Volker Weber
Darmstadt (ots) - Passanten machten heute gegen 13.30 Uhr die Polizei auf einen Mann aufmerksam, der auf einer Bank sitzend Geld an Passanten auf dem Luisenplatz verteilte. Der 63-jährige Mann stand unter Alkholeinwirkung. Er hatte 13.000 EUR von der Sparkasse abgehoben, setzte sich auf eine Bank vor der Sparkasse. Das Geld hielt er teilweise in der Hand bzw hatte es in Plastiktüten und Hosentasche verstaut. Er verschenkte einzelne Scheine an vorübergehende Passanten. Einige Scheine wurden auch durch den Wind hochgewirbelt und wegegeweht. Die Polizei brachte den Mann in einen Nebenraum der Sparkasse und zählte hier vor Zeugen das Geld. Bei der Spendieraktion waren 1505 EUR unter das Volk gebracht worden. Dies war dem edlen Spender aber egal, denn er habe genügend davon. Die Polizei stellte das Geld sicher und forderte den 63-Jährigen auf im nüchternen Zustand das Geld wieder abzuholen.
[Quelle]
What is Apple Teams?
by Volker Weber
Apple has released the source code to its calendar server implementation under an Apache 2.0 License. The Darwin Calendar Server is a standards-compliant server that allows multiple users to collaboratively share calendaring information. It provides a shared location on the network to store schedules, and allows users to send each other and manage invitations. In order to provide interoperability with multiple calendaring clients, the server implements the CalDAV protocol, which is an extension of WebDAV, which is in turn an extension of HTTP.
If you read the instructions for client configuration, you come across on interesting name: Apple Team. Is that an internal application or something they are planning to ship?
The big letdown
by Volker Weber
I am with Leander Kahney on this one:
Steve Jobs' keynote speech on Monday was the most uninspiring he's given in recent memory. It hints at the trouble Apple will be in marketing-wise if he ever steps down.
From the IBM viral marketing department
by Volker Weber
Imagine you have produced a flash demo of a free enhancement to your product. You want customers to see it. What do you do?
Here is what IBM does.
Adjust your timelines
by Volker Weber
Two days ago I reported that IBM will not be shipping Sametime 7.5 for the Mac. They will continue to provide beta versions but will not ship a supported version until next year. Today we have two more adjustments:
- The RTC gateway which connects your Sametime server to other networks won't ship with Sametime 7.5, but sometimes later. They are now talking late 3rd quarter, which translates to a very long September. Update: Adam Gartenberg says that shipping the RTC gateway after 7.5 was announced as early as Lotusphere and he is right. I checked my notes.
- The Mac Notes client is supposed to ship with the 7.0.2 maintenance release. However there is no beta version yet. It was expected to coincide with the 7.0.2 Beta 2 released today, but it is being delayed until end of August to resolve a higher percentage of outstanding ship stopping bugs. The exact beta plan has not been finalized
Adjust your timelines accordingly.
Apple WWDC Stevenote
by Volker Weber
Apple stopped providing a live feed from Steve Jobs' keynotes two years ago. But I found a good alternative: AppleRumor.com's IRC channel. No big surprises tonight. Apple completes transition to Intel with Mac Pro and XServe, and previews OS X Leopard which will ship next spring.
Update: An MPEG4-stream is now online.
Here is the transcript of today's keynote:
IBM Websphere Portal installation still going strong
by Volker Weber
IBM has fixed the installation guide for Websphere Portal 6. They have removed the redundant chapter and the title page. The guide is now only 1034 pages long. We are on page 203 and invite you to read along:
Which graphics program are you using on the Mac
by Volker Weber
Marco asked me today which graphics editor he should use on the Mac. I am a bit dumbfounded, since I don't really know anything but Photoshop, which is way too expensive for the casual user. I am still on my old 7.0 version and have not upgraded.
OS X Preview is good enough if you want to convert file formats and crop images. I have also used Goldberg and Imagewell for minor edits. What is your choice?
Reasons to avoid the .info domain
by Volker Weber
vowe's choice: The excellent logFiler.
VMware announces Mac beta
by Volker Weber
Love your Mac even more with the ability to simultaneously run any PC OS — Windows, Linux, NetWare and others — on Mac OS X. Switch between operating systems by easily tabbing between applications and share data between the two operating systems by dragging and dropping files on the fly — all without needing to reboot. What's more, you can create virtual machines and run them on other VMware products or run any VMware virtual machine on your Mac.
Beinahe durchgerutscht: T-Mobile senkt Preise für Blackberry-Option
by Volker Weber
Ich habe es letzte Woche gelesen, aber vergessen zu berichten. Frank Köhntopp hat es in einem Kommentar erwähnt: Die Blackberry-Option kostet bei T-Mobile nur noch knapp 5 Euro:
Mit dem BlackBerry Webmail Service kommen E-Mails ab sofort ab 4,95 € im Monat automatisch aufs Handy. Für besonders entspannte E-Mail- und Internetkommunikation bietet T-Mobile den E-Mail Push-Service zusammen mit den Relax XL-Tarifpaketen oder als Optionspaket "All you can Mail" oder "Mail & Surf" mit den Datenoptionen Data 5 oder Data 30.
Wie man das "besonders entspannt" lesen kann, sollte man die Bedingungen noch mal genau inspizieren. Neben seinem normalen Telefontarif braucht man in jedem Fall eine Datenoption mit 5 MB, die in etwa den Blackberry-Traffic abdeckt. Im Blackberry-Forum gibt es eine Diskussion um die Frage, ob und unter welchen Bedingungen auch Bestandskunden in den Genuss dieser Preissenkung kommen.
Wo T-Mobile von "Blackberry Webmail Service" spricht, ist eigentlich "Blackberry Internet Service" im Gegensatz zu "Blackberry Enterprise Service" gemeint. Das heißt: Kein eigener Blackberry Server, sondern Weiterleitung der eigenen Mails auf einen Account bei T-Mobile. Dort lassen sich Nachrichten aber mit der eigenen Absenderadresse versenden.
The proof is in the pudding
by Volker Weber
In a few weeks, you will have to revisit this article:
IBM Workplace Managed Client is also the first platform that lets developers write once and deploy on any operating system, including Microsoft Windows, RedHat Linux and (soon) Apple Macintosh — and have the application look and behave natively, wherever it's deployed. Fontaine calls it a "second generation" of Java client programming, made possible by its underpinnings in the open Eclipse application framework.
When IBM releases Sametime 7.5, it will be "too soon" for Apple Macintosh:
We wanted to provide advance notice we will not be shipping a production release of our Sametime 7.5 Connect client for Apple Macintosh. Our Sametime 7.5 Connect client capabilities and user experience on the Mac platform are not yet complete. We will continue to make our 7.5 Connect client available on Mac through our Expanded Beta program. This will enable you to exercise the software and provide us your feedback. We are committed to delivery our Sametime Connect client technology on the Mac platform. Our Expanded Beta program will continue to operate until our 7.5 Connect client is available on Mac in early-2007.
I think you will see this pattern again, when IBM starts a beta program for Notes 8. For now you can say: "Write once on Eclipse, run anywhere preferably on Windows". I believe that the Eclipse RCP is not mature on Macintosh yet.
NeoOffice has arrived at vowe's magic flying circus
by Volker Weber
For the first time ever, I have a version of OpenOffice on the Mac, that I could live with. NeoOffice 2.0 Aqua looks and behaves like a Mac application. So far I have been happy with Microsoft Word, but I will try and work with NeoOffice Writer for now. Since I don't want to end up with documents that none of my other editors can read, I will not be using the standard Open Document file formats though. This may change when others request I use them.
Updates für den Ogo a.k.a. 1&1 PocketWeb
by Volker Weber
Ursprünglich hatte ich vor, einen Beitrag über PocketWeb-Updates für den Heise Newsticker zu schreiben, aber dann ist mir ein Kollege zuvorgekommen. Ich habe noch einige Hintergrundinformationen, die nicht in der Pressemitteilung standen, und die ich nun auf diesem Wege verbreiten möchte.
Vorab sollte ich vielleicht sagen, warum ich mich so für diese Lösung interessiere. Erstens hat 1&1 als erster Anbieter ein mobiles Gerät mit Flatrate auf den Markt gebracht. Dazu musste ein ISP mit einem Mobilfunkbetreiber zusammenarbeiten und ein Gerät auf den Markt bringen, das hinreichend geschlossen ist, dass sich vorab abschätzen ließ, wieviel Übertragungsvolumen generiert wird. Zweitens hat 1&1 hier eine Plattform, die einfach zu managen und auch noch "im Feld" zu aktualisieren ist. Software-Updates und zusätzliche Features lassen sich zentral einspielen. Niemand muss sein Gerät neu flashen, neue Funktionen gibt es nicht nur in neuen Geräten, sondern auch in allen bereits verkauften, der Anwender wird damit keine Sekunde belästigt. Selbst Blackberrys können das nur eingeschränkt. So kann man meines Wissens keine neue Firmware auf das Gerät schieben.
Nächste Woche wird 1&1 also ein Update auf den Geräten installieren, das eine kleine Funktion nachrüstet. Ab dem 8. August kann man als Anhänge nicht nur Bilder sondern auch Text und PDFs betrachten. Und das ist nur der Anfang. Aktuell wird bereits das nächste Update geplant, das eine Synchronisation der PIM-Daten (Adressen, Termine, Aufgaben) ermöglichen wird. Robert Hoffmann, Produktmanagement-Vorstand bei 1&1, verspricht darüber hinaus auch Instant Messaging auf diesem Gerät noch im Laufe dieses Jahres.
Dieses Update wird es nicht kostenlos geben (können). In einem Hintergrundgespräch mit Andreas Gauger, 1&1 Vorstandssprecher, habe ich erstmals ein Gefühl dafür bekommen, wie hoch die Lizenzgebühren sind, die zum Beispiel Microsoft für die MSN-Nutzung verlangt. Ich hatte das Thema schon mal bei IBM angeschnitten, als es um die Verbindung von Sametime mit AOL, Google Talk und Yahoo ging. Während IBM vollständig mauerte, nannte Gauger konkrete Zahlen. Wir haben uns aber darauf geeinigt, von "überraschend hohen" Gebühren zu sprechen. Es ist also keineswegs so, dass 1&1 lediglich eine andere Firmware liefern muss, die eine entsprechende Software für Instant Messaging enthält.
Wie kann 1&1 mit diesen Bedingungen umgehen? Meiner Ansicht nach können sie nur ein optionales Pauschalangebot machen, das alle viereinhalb aktuellen Netze beinhaltet (AIM/ICQ, Google Talk/Jabber, MSN, Yahoo). Jedes Netz einzeln abzurechnen ist viel zu aufwändig. Auch wenn noch keine konkreten Zahlen genannt wurden, schätze ich, dass sich der monatliche Preis des PocketWeb damit um 50% verteuert. Ich halte das für ein deutlich besseres Angebot als das aktuelle Optionspaket mit 100 freien SMS.
Ein wünschenswertes Update kann 1&1 übrigens nicht over the air liefern. Dem PocketWeb fehlt ein Mikrofon. So muss man ein Bluetooth-Headset verwenden, wenn man telefonieren will.
Abteilung "Bleibende Erinnerungen"
by Volker Weber
Ein Abendessen mit Jesper Bank. Und eine Regatta. ;-)
Microsoft Web Design
by Volker Weber
Why is it that Microsoft always fails so royally at web design? I mean, it's not that it looks good in Firefox, but at least it is not FUBAR:
It's "Make your own caption" time
by Volker Weber
Quote of the day
by Volker Weber
We will be dimming the cabin lighting, as it greatly improves the attractiveness of your in-flight crew.
— Flight attendant on JetBlue flight, JFK
Udos Gelddruckmaschine
by Volker Weber
Udo hat eine Gelddruckmaschine gefunden:
Mittlerweile streite ich mich recht gern mit einer großen Telefonfirma. Es geht um zugesagte, aber nicht geschaltete Anschlüsse, nicht bereitgestelltes DSL und um Verträge, von denen die angeblichen Kunden gar nichts wissen.
Das Unternehmen lenkt eigentlich immer ein, wenn es Post von uns bekommt. Das ist schon seltsam. Denn in unseren Briefen steht in der Regel nichts, was die Mandanten nicht schon gebetsmühlenartig auf der Hotline, per Mail, Fax und schließlich Einschreiben / Rückschein vorgebracht hätten. Allerdings antwortet denen keiner. Und wenn, nur mit nichtssagenden Textbausteinen.
Angetrieben wird die Maschine durch die Unfähigkeit der Telefonfirmen, auf die Nöte ihrer Kunden einzugehen. Und vermarken lässt sich die Leistung wunderbar über sein Weblog.
Peter zahlt
by Volker Weber
Goyellow.de hat eine neue Möglichkeit gefunden, Geld aus dem Fenster zu schmeißen. Vom deutschen Festnetz aus kann man Gespräche bis zu 30 Minuten von Deutschland nach Deutschland, Frankreich, Großbritannien, Italien, Kanada, Österreich, Schweiz, Spanien und USA führen. Einzige Bedingung: Man muss das Browser- Fenster auflassen und Werbung über sich ergehen lassen. Die FAQs sagen, man brauche ActiveX, aber es funktioniert hier auch bestens in Safari auf dem Mac.
25 Jahre Fernsehen für Vollidioten
by Volker Weber
Na, das ist doch endlich mal ein knackiger Titel:
MTV-Jubiläum: 25 Jahre Fernsehen für Vollidioten
Und lesbar ist der Artikel noch dazu.
Skype not behaving well
by Volker Weber
If Skype is reporting that I am "not sharing my details" with you, you are not alone. A number of my contacts have asked me whether I dumped them off my buddylist. Well, I haven't (unless you are using "a message to all my buddies"). If you think that you should see my presence and Skype only displays a question mark, please dump me off your buddylist and add me again (volker.weber).
This is not an invitation. If I don't know you, I won't add you. ;-)
George Lucas in Love
by Volker Weber
[via Sebastian]
Doppelte Verneinung
by Volker Weber
SpOn versucht die doppelte Verneinung:
Nur ein Konstruktionsfehler verhinderte damals, dass die Bombe ... nicht explodierte.
Die wird aber nur von Bayern wirklich beherrscht.
IBM and grassroots marketing
by Volker Weber
OpenNTF.org is the clearinghouse of open source Lotus Notes templates. Template is Notes parlance for an application. Some of them have been downloaded thousands of times, one help desk application almost 15,000 times. And OpenNTF has only started to count downloads last year.
Some of the templates work around limitations in IBM's own templates, like OpenNTF Mail Experience as a replacement for the standard mail template, or DomBulletin which provides a much better web discussion forum than IBM's discussion template. Others like HELP or DominoWiki provide capabilities that are not shipped by IBM. And templates like OpenLog provide standards that frankly should have been set by IBM. And since OpenNTF is open to all contributors, you sometimes come across a reinvented wheel.
When Ed posted an article about an Australian company dumping Notes for Exchange, a comment thread with well over a hundred contributions started. During this discussion one participant mentioned that Microsoft Sharepoint ships an impressive number of business oriented templates:
Absence and Vacation Schedule, Board of Directors, Case Work Management, Change Management, Classroom Management, Competitive Intelligence, Employee Activities Site, Employee Timesheet and Scheduling, Employee Training, Event Coordination, Expense Reimbursement, Help Desk, HR Programs and Services, IT Developer Team Site, Legal Document Review Workflow, Loan Initiation Management, Marketing Campaigns, Meeting Management, New Product Development, Performance Review, Professional Svcs Contracts, Professional Svcs Site, Project Team Site, Public Official Activity, Public Relations Work Site, Publication Editorial Review, Recruiting Resource Center, Request for Proposal Management, Room and Equipment Reservation, Travel Request
John Head took the initiative and suggested that the Domino community should match these templates with Domino equivalents. While this is a noble idea, it begs the questions why IBM can not do it themselves. Or pay somebody to do it. Especially since there is already an entity like OpenNTF which provides templates that IBM doesn't.
This is clearly a marketing initiative designed to prove that Notes can match Sharepoint (plus Exchange) in out-of-the-box functionality. Grassroots marketing for IBM has been tried before. It collapsed when IBM stopped to back it up. The discussion currently revolves around simple templates which show, what could be done with Notes. My opinion on this: This ain't good enough. What you need is real out-of-the-box business benefit.
And IBM has started to do just that with the Notes/SAP integration they just shipped. This is good stuff. Continue along this path and provide more functionality that customers need. And have been asking for. And as mentioned before with OpenLog, start using robust design patterns for your own templates that partners can pick up. The mail template has long lost its ability to serve as a blueprint. And you certainly don't want people to learn from pubnames.ntf, do you?
