Please Make it Stop!

Why am I continually assulted with an election that gets more press coverage in Canada than Canada’s own election? People complain about Canadian Politics, but that’s because everybody’s so fixated on the wrong country.

Struggle For More Pixels

Anybody that uses a computer a lot, usually would agree that there’s just never enough pixels on the screen to do what you want. This term, my old roommate left his monitor behind, and I’ve taken it into my room for use with my laptop. My laptop’s display is 15.4 inch widescreen, with a native resolution of 1280×800. The current monitor I’m using has a native resolution of 1680×1050 (just shy of 1080!), however, sometimes even that doesn’t feel like enough. Having a dual monitor setup is perfect, but I wish it worked better in Linux for a setup where both monitors might be a different size.

X seems to think that the best way to do this is to make a square screen, even if one screen is taller pixel-wise than the other, meaning I don’t get the bottom of the screen on the smaller monitor. The other side-effect here is that the KDE panel goes across the bottom all the way, even if I wanted it just to be on one screen (Windows does this, and it’s a feature I like). Dual monitors is something Windows gets right, and Linux absolutely fails at. Then again, there might be a solution I don’t know about. At work, I have a nice setup. I have a nice large square screen, and spend all day in VMWare, so switching around VMWare has become second nature.

I’m also thinking within a year I’m going to have to get my laptop replaced. Heat has became a big issue for it, and even a chillpad struggles to keep it cool. I’ve tried dusting it a couple times, but unfortunately the air circulation on it has never been that great. I have the most problems when running something that gives the GPU a pretty good workout, usually pushing the sensor temps over 100C, and making the bottom of the laptop too hot to touch. In my dual monitor setup, I must remember to keep the laptop lid open, even if the screen is in use to promote air circulation.

Who Turned Off the Pump?

Every weekend, my friends and I go to a pub called “The Lieutenants Pump” for bunch at about noon. Last week we got this letter:

Dear Valued Patron,

I regret to inform you that the Lieutenant’s Pump has been assessed a two day Liquor license suspension by the Alcohol and Gaming Commission. The Commision found us guilty of being over capacity by five people on the patio during last years Stanley Cup Finals.

On the night of the infraction, we did everything in our power to control the patio but did not foresee people jumping the fence. We had staff supervising the patio and when people hopped the fence they were immediately escorted off.

We were not aware at the time that this would be considered insufficient by the Commission. Somehow, the Commission expected us to prevent the fence jumping. Short of barbed wire and electrification I’m not sure how this could have been accomplished. None the less, in its wisdom the Commission has concluded that the suspension is warranted as a general deterrent to other operators and as a specific deterrent to us letting it happen again.

The Lieutenant’s Pump will be closed October 11, 12 and 13 which is Thanksgiving weekend including Monday.

I apologize in advance for any inconvenience this closure will cause. Any concerns about this situation should be directed to:

Ted Meekin
Minister of Government and Consumer Services
4320 - 99 Wellesely St. E.
4^th Fl. Whitney Block
Toronto M7A 1W3

416 - 327 - 6611
TmcMeekin.MPP@Liberal.OLA.ORG

“See You At the Pump”
<SIGNATURE>
John Couse
Owner

Getting Lost

I had a meeting with a company this morning at 10:30 in a part of the city I’ve never been to before. Between Google Maps and OC Transpo’s trip planner, I was about to figure out approximate times and buses I’d have to take. Since the meeting was at 10:30, I obviously didn’t want to be late, so I targeted to be there about 10:00. Both websites said the latest I could get there, without being late, was 9:00.

I woke up early at 6:45, and got up about 8:00, got showered, etc, and left by 8:30. I jumped on the 96 to Bayview, hopped off, and picked up the 182 to where I thought the building was (according to Google Maps). I started in search for a Tim Hortons, found one, but the line was ridiculously long. I started back to the building. When I got to the building, I remembered the email said suite 300. I get to suite 300, but it’s not that company. I try looking it up on my cellphone through webmail, the my phone was rejecting the webmail’s server certificate. Great. I do a quick google, and find a result for a building down the road, so with 20 minutes to my interview, I hike it about a kilometer to the other building. Upon reaching the elevator of this 7 storey building, and I got in and pressed floor 3. She started to press floor 3, then realized I already had. Knowing about the meeting today, she asked if I was the person whom had the meeting.

The meeting went fairly good, about 50 minutes long. I left the building, and went to the bus stop, and waited for about 15 minutes for a bus to arrive. A 15 minute bus ride to a transit terminal, and I took a bus back home. It took me about an hour and 20 minutes to get home, and in 30C heat with 35C humidex. I probably covered about 5.5 km (3mi) of walking today, but I could do with the exercise.

Questionable

One thing I’ve always said I was going to do, is read all the archives of Questionable Content, a daily web comic. When I first saw in on April 1st, I thought it looked really cool. I decided that I’d read right from the beginning, but with 1,200 comics, that isn’t an easy feat. I recently had a small three week vacation before I flew out to Ottawa, so I took 3 days, and read about 300 comics a day. I can safely say I’m caught up, and I highly recommend the comic to other people.

Also, sorry for the lack of content of late. The well of ideas is kinda dry right now. I start a new job on monday, so maybe that will give me something to talk about.

Wrapping Up Another Term

Summer session is quickly drawing to the end. Over the summer, I’ve taken a total of four classes: Computer Organization 1, The Romans, Data Structures, and Software Engineering. In case you weren’t familiar with how the summer school works at UNB, it’s divided into two smaller terms, Interssesion (May & June) and Summer session (July and August). Classes are super compressed into six weeks, as opposed to three months (with a month for exams, totaling four months). This Saturday at 1400h, I have my software engineering exam, and then Monday at 0900h I have my Data Structures exam.

After my exams I’ll be returning back home for a few weeks before I head back out to Ottawa for another four months. This fall I’ll be going to QNX Software Systems out in southern Kanata. I’m not familiar at this point as to what my actual assignment will be, as they said they’ll figure where I want to work when I get there. The only unfortunate thing about working out in Kanata is that it’s over an hour bus ride from my house, vs about 45 minutes to the IBM lab I worked previous. The one good thing about a bus ride that long is that I can take a small nap on the bus. I’m really looking forward to my term there, and I think it’ll be fun to try something different. After my work term, I’ll be returning to Fredericton for another term of school.

Walk Through The Park

iPod/iPhone 2.0

Well, I figured I’d better write a post. It’s been a little while!

I’ve been using the 2.0 firmware on my iPod touch now for a couple weeks. So far things have been going really smoothly. The enterprise WPA works beautifully at my university, although setup wasn’t that fun (instructions here). Stability at first was a bit of an issue. Some of the apps kept crashing (it was actually less stable than my jailbroken iPod). In fact, sometimes an app would freeze up and make my music skip.

Some of the apps are great, some are not. The Facebook app is pretty decent, at least now you can view people’s walls. The Lastfm app would be a lot better, however, Apple doesn’t allow background processes, so unfortunately it doesn’t support scrobbling. As expected, Super Monkey Ball delivers and is really great, but is also very challenging! A fun little game is JirboBreak, which is just a breakout clone. The NYTimes app is pretty good, although a bit unstable at times. Tap Tap Revenge is great, it’s like guitar hero type deal for the iPod/iPhone. There’s a wordpress app, which I haven’t had a chance to use yet, and the best is the Remote App. Remote lets you use your iPod/iPhone as a (ed:) [G.D.] flickerbox for iTunes, allowing you to browse your music and change the volume, scrub, and pause tracks. Very useful for parties.

Exchange support is here, however, I don’t (yet) have any use for it. One thing iPod touch users will like is the beeping on mail. As soon as it gets new mail, it’ll beep at you, alerting you of your new mail. It doesn’t seem to be as quick on the draw as before, and doesn’t always tell me if I have new mail. I’m not sure what the issue is, but I wish it would tell me every time!

Push notifications aren’t anything really interesting. Mail checking can only be set in 15 minute increments. Since all my accounts are IMAP, they only support fetch anyways. I’d rather have 5 minute increments for mail checking, but I guess 15 minutes is fine.

The only thing I want back from my jailbroken iPod was Lastfm scrobbling support. I’m hoping someone will find a way to make this work, but until then, I guess I’ll just have to live without it.

Apple to Limit iPhones to Canada?

Written on another blog is news that Apple, king of the new mobile market, and creator of the iPhone, has bitchslapped Rogers, Canada’s only real GSM carrier across the face.

Rumour has it that Apple, who is dissatisfied with Roger’s data plans, is limited shipments of iPhones. Numbers have not been mentioned, but apparently the numbers have been “significantly reduced,” and apparently it’s been confirmed that the extra units are going to Europe. There are some other interesting tidbits, and I encourage you to RTFA.

In other similarly related news, Bell and Telus are supposed to start charging users for incoming text messages if they’re not on a texting plan $0.15 per text. Users that go over their current plan, or do not have a plan, already get charged $0.15 per text. There are several facebook groups dedicated to the issue, and a petition at the New Democratic Party (NDP) of Canada. Bell and Telus have released new texting plans, as follows:

• $5/mo, 250 outgoing, unlimited incoming
• $10/mo, 2500 outgoing, unlimited incoming
• $15/mo, unlimited outgoing, unlimited incoming

There’s an internal PDF document with steps on how to deal with the matter here

The Telecom Delemma

Currently, my cellphone provider is Bell, a national CDMA telecom business. Bell’s influence even reaches my corner of Canada, although under a different name. In Atlantic Canada, the big telecom business is Aliant, which is is pretty much Bell under a different name. You’d think that by essentially being the same company, that it’d be easy to switch between the two. This is not the case.

Last time I switched to Bell from Aliant, the customer representatives had no idea what was going on, and it took many hops between the two carriers to get my contact onto Bell. Normally that would be fine, but every 4 months I switch in and out of Aliant and Bells areas. In the fall, I just kept my bell number back in Ottawa, a mere 1,000km away, because I really don’t use my cellphone when I have a land line.

In an effort to try and stay with the same company, I wanted to try Telus, which is consistently available all through Canada, plus has the advantage of already being CDMA, which one would think would be easy to switch my Bell/Aliant phone to Telus. Once again, I am easily foiled, as today, they inform me that I have to get a new phone with them, as the two systems are incompatible. The hitch is that I wanted to go with Pay as you Go, as I really don’t use my phone that much, so lots of my minutes get wasted. This means that I would need to buy a $400 phone outright, which obviously, if you’re trying to save money, is no good.

Why not just switch between Aliant and Bell on Pay as you go? Because there’s the pesky $35 activation fee, and probably a cancellation fee. But wait, you say, what about GSM?

The only GSM provider in Canada, Rogers, is probably one of the worst companies to deal with. I completely flat out refuse to get a cellphone through them. I’ve heard bad stores about them, and even I have had issues dealing with them (about their internet).

I may end up just canceling my cellphone for the time being, and just using a land line until I get back in Ottawa, and then going with Pay as you Go for those 4 months, rinse and repeat.