Archive for the ‘Technology’ Category
Posted on December 21, 2006 - by John
LinkListing Thursday
Posted on December 19, 2006 - by John
Tesco Mobile Ireland: A New Mobile Phone network in Ireland
 It was years and years ago, when no body even heard of a mobile phone, and if they did visions of a millionaire playboy with a brick phone came to mind, well a total exaggeration there, it was only a few years ago, that if your mobile phone went off in a shop, everyone turned to see who the hot-shot was. Eircell was the only player with the 088 network, which was owned by Telecom Eireann, and was a terrible network by all accounts, which dropped calls frequently, and had no security elements to prevent people from ‘listening in’.
Some things have changed; all for the better, competition has increased, quality of services have increased. For example 3 Mobile Ireland announced their new broadband service, which offers fast download speeds through their mobile network. And now in 2007 Tesco will launch their Mobile network in Ireland. The network will use O2 Mobile’s infrastructure but will be independent from the O2, so it will be in itself the fifth mobile network in Ireland, and thus add to the competition.
If competition is so great, why are standard calls so expensive still? These figures - below - (courtesy of RTE News) speak for themselves. The services being offered are becoming top of the range, however the cost of basic mobile phone calls is still something that needs a lot of work.
O2 last month reported an average revenue per user of €545 a year at its Irish business, compared with €299 in Germany and £272 in Britain
Do these figures mean that Ireland spends more, or costs are higher for calls?
Posted on December 14, 2006 - by John
LinkListing Thursday
Posted on December 13, 2006 - by John
Wordpress 2.1
The latest version of wordpress 2.1 is near completion, and it seems most of the changes are to the backend, the SQL database stuff, something I know very little about, in fact all I know is how to connect to the database, that’s about it. It seems the clever developers over at wordpress.org are cleaning up the database structure which will cause problems with some wordpress plugins, this could be a problem for those people who upgrade without checking if their plugins are compatible with the upgrade, however, now is the time, it seems, for the plugin creators to get busy, upgrading their plugins.
“WordPress 2.1 is almost here and you know what that means for developers. It’s time to pull out those old plugins you’ve had stashed, blow off the dust and start applying some spit and polish and make sure it will last longer than Grandma’s Ham and Bean soup that has been sitting in the refrigerator for weeks.â€
I was hoping myself, for some cosmetic changes to the admin side of wordpress, I always felt that the structure and design of the wordpress was very impressive and easy to use, but the user interface of the system is a little… bland. I don’t think this version will bring any such changes however; I don’t see any mention of such. However, it is a very small complaint for such a wonderful piece of FREE publishing software.
So much work obviously goes into this software, so here is to those clever developers!
Posted on November 27, 2006 - by John
Spam on the rise
A recent report by an US internet security company (Postini), says that 9 out of 10 e-mails are spam. This shocking report goes on to state that “E-mail systems are overloaded or melting down trying to keep up with all the spam,” A vice president for Postini said, its company has detected 7 billion spam e-mails worldwide in November compared to 2.5 billion in June.
I must say that in my experience this report is 100% accurate, if not 110% accurate. Recently I have noticed that my spam filter sorts through, on average, 10,000 pieces of spam over a period of only 5 days or less, not including the pieces of spam that make it through the spam filter. I decided to do a little experiment and open a few of these e-mails and see what they were selling, and here comes the shocking bit.
Nothing! Yes nothing, the e-mails (well most of them) contained random words that did not make a coherent sentence, and whilst there were links in some of the mails, they did not refer to an active site, or in come cases, the link did not contain a correctly written domain name.
I can only conclude that these e-mails must be an attempt to damage, or slow down mail severs – as suggested by the opening quote above, by sending large quantities of spam, the servers are unable to handle all this data.
Posted on April 12, 2006 - by John
Google Analytics Invitation Code
I have an Invitation Code for google analytics to spare if anyone wants one, please comment below, I will pick someone at random if more that on is interested. Its pretty good, from what I can see of it so far.
Posted on March 8, 2006 - by John
For Everything else there is mastercard
This is pretty funny… if you find it funny that is… (more…)
Posted on February 10, 2006 - by John
I don’t have a blog I like to discuss my problems with my friends!
At work today during one of my many discussions with work colleagues. We came to the topic of weblog’s, or blog’s as they are calling them now, well whatever you call them, you know what I mean, my colleague suggested that he does not have a blog and does not need one for two main reasons. The first, if he has a problem he discusses it with his friends and not the internet, and second reason is that he would not want the world to know his problems. And although I see his problems with blog’s, I think it is a very flawed and misunderstood view of what weblog’s can do.
I think a weblog has more positive aspects than negative ones. To begin with I think a blog can be a personal expression, a new relative expression of someone’s views more like art in many ways, you can have your say in the world, views which normally could not and would not be read by the public, who the hell is going to publish your views unless there is money to be made. Most people utilize blog’s to trash out there feelings, some do not however, some use them as a way to look back on how they were ‘back then’. And some like them to document projects. Others use weblog’s to document a personal experience in there life. Having friends is of course a great way to work out things, but reading back on what you wrote at a later time can help you understand yourself more.
But I will say this, if you have never tried it, then don’t trash it.
Posted on October 13, 2005 - by John
Back with Mac
Well here I am finally back (with mac OSX!!).
Not having an internet connection is great, you get to watch allot of television.. instead, I know you thought I was going to say something like, ” Not having an internet connection is great, I have started studying Law, having joined some sort of class or a gym and feel fucking great”. You obviously don’t know me! Instead I have been watching Star Trek re-runs on Sky One and Ellen on ABC1, that’s all over now though come Monday, as I am back to the grind (being work) until Christmas, when I go looking for a permanent job, which I really should have by now by all accounts, at 24, I’m a little old to be job hopping. But as long as you have the few euro in savings and the essentials such as, iPod, net access, satellite television … that’s all that matters, right? (I’m telling myself that anyway, so please just go along with it). On the talk of Television has anyone else seen those God awful Quiz channels, there a complete rip off to get people to use a premium telephone number, there must be about 20 of those channels on our tv now scattered about so you have no choice to pass them, now to an insult to injury some good television channels have them take over their air time when they stop broadcasting for the day! Luckily however I hear that sky is bumping them off to some corner to die (hopefully).
Ok so its freezing out tonight, but I complain not! Its been a great day, and after the summer we have had here, we can do with as much good weather as we can get. Also there is little cloud cover tonight which means that they sky is clear, it’s nice to be able to be reminded what the stars look like every now and then.
When you are buying stuff on the internet it seems there is a queue of people ready to rip you off or offer awful customer service, somewhat like the high street really! For example I ordered Open Office on Friday for OSX and asked them to e-mail me to confirm my order, no answer. so a second e-mail was sent Tuesday, again ignored. Now as usual I phrased the e-mail in a friendly (yes friendly) way formal friendly (if that exists), no answer. Finally I e-mailed them and advised I would have to get Pay Pal involved (I used Pay Pal - and I worked there in there complaints department previously, so I know the procedure pretty well) and advised him that complaints tend to last at least 30 days, response 20 minutes later, Dear Mr Ryan (how formal) … BLABLA, basically it was send out, but there customer care were on a training course (translation: could not be arsed to answer e-mails, when the item only cost 5 euro. The very same thing happened with a few orders on eBay, Now don’t get me wrong here, I do give these people a few days to respond. It just amazes me that it takes a little threat to get a result.
Sorry but can just say how great OSX is! Anyone else see the new iPod with which you can buy TV shows and watch them on it, small screen though it may work, don’t know how it would work over here though, we tend to be a bit behind on the American TV shows (although RTE 2 and TG4 has some shows before the almighty BBC and SKY - so fair play)
If Anyone wants wordpress.com invites i have two of them!
Posted on June 20, 2005 - by John
FireFox as Gaeilge
This is probably old news to most people, but is new to me! Did you know you can download Firefox in Irish. And if your still using Internet Explorer… shame on you.
Posted on June 1, 2005 - by John
Photo Mail & Apple
Many of the weblogs I read, are from those among us who have been clever enough to steer clear for the what I call ‘Standard OS’, and use Linux and Apple OS X. Apple as a company, seems to be in a league of its own. It is now in the process of correcting some of it’s strategic positioning errors. For example in Ireland, up to a few months ago, people had a choice of Windows or Windows, now however Apple is placing a strong focus on making its ‘macs’ available in the shops, in particularly an agreement with 3G stores, and the recent availability of ITunes ( to those of us with Broadband - step in Irish government and speed up the broadband roll out), apple is now making its self heard.
Having now decided to move to apple for my next Laptop (in 2010?), I decided to, in the mean time try out another one of there much talked about ‘must have’ devices, and I really have to admit the Apple IPOD… Pretty much rocks. Not only is the design hot, it also works simply easily and stores a load of songs, don’t know how many exactly, but its more space than I need… The sound, as far as I am concerned is ace. To complement it I have ordered a load more CDS online, and started to use it out and about. Apple IPOD just works like its supposed to, and to date it has not crashed or reset itself! (even though I dropped it already!)
Posted on April 8, 2005 - by John
Vodafone Advertising
I am really pissed off about this, I don’t mind the ad too much, as we are all getting used to being spammed to hell, but putting my phone number on the end is just too much! So I mailed them about it.
To be fair to Vodafone Ireland, I have always found them very helpful and great mobile phone provider, but this boiled my blood a bit too much…
Here is the ad BTW
Dear Vodafone,
I noticed that you have started sending advertisements with MMS Picture messages, this is surly not permitted!I use my phone to send picture messages to my website. However today I noticed that you have also sent an ad, which INCLUDED MY PHONE NUMBER.
What I am most annoyed with is the fact you sent my phone number with this MMS, and also you sent an additional promotional image. I would have appreciated it if you advised me you were doing this!
Please see the information you send with my message.
“A Vodafone Video/Picture message for youYou have been sent a message from Vodafone mobile +353 87*BEEP*
REPLY FOR FREEYou can reply for Free to this message once until 21/04/05. Max. reply length 1000 characters.
I have been a customer of Vodafones since Eircell began, and I have never noticed such a disregard towards the freedom of information act
Regards
John Michael Ryan
The ages of computers has made everything possible. From web design to development to hosting, there is so much. There are more cheap web hosting options today than ever before. However do not compromise on dedicated servers for any cause, money or seo.
Posted on March 20, 2005 - by John
Wordpress 1.5 Design Themes & templates
I had a rule when I began using a blog, it was that I would design my own template from scratch. However, I was forced to join the rest of the world and download one from the vast collection available. However, customization is a great thing, and if you are one of those people that really want your own blog with its own design but just cant grasp the concept and are a bit lazy. You could do the following: Download the latest version of wordpress. - This is a big step, its easy to use, but only when you know how, once you are familiar with wordpress 1.5, then download a skin that suits your needs. The being customizing, remember though there are some themes /templates that don’t like you changing the layout.
This process is difficult though, especially if you are going for an original look, I have found that one slip of a Div tag or a simple script in the wrong place can completely mess up the design so, do what I never did at the start BACK UP, because the mistakes you made before which a browser would tolerate, are no longer tolerated it would seem!
Wordpress can be hard to get used to, but it is allot less complex design ways that other Blog software, for example I found Movable Type very difficult to manage. And when I had a fatal error on it nobody helped on the forums, now I know I did not pay for it, but some sort of indication would have been nice.
I know I mentioned some great themes, so it would only be fair to mention a link to those themes, which by the way can be found easily by searching google, I would also recommend that you keep a lookout in the support forums on wordpress, I usually found most answers to theme / template designs there! And the bloggies 2005 awarded some blog’s which have some interesting designs. Wordpress has complied a list here
Posted on March 13, 2005 - by John
Google Personalizes news to suit readers tastes
Google News Service (still in a testing or beta stage) which launched its service in 2002 has begun testing an additional feature to the news website. This feature will allow google readers to to create up to 20 sections on the website, that is news tailored to their tastes, or topical information of the period. Also you can watch for news on a particular keyword such as a celebrities. It appears according to internet reports, that this additional feature is a direct result of competition from Microsoft. The only down point to this is it relies on cookies, those little script files that hold information temporally on your PC, to help website identify various information. Unlike user accounts, this system will cause Google News to “forget” your settings if you do not visit regularly or if you delete your Internet Cookies often. Perhaps a system that integrate all these service using an ID system that gathers all your Google Services into one package?
Google Spokesperson: “We’ve made a number of improvements to Google News that allow you to customize your News front page by creating sections that focus on topics you care about, for instance, your favorite sports team, technology, or celebrity,” reads a Google News page posted Wednesday. “You can also design your custom front page by mixing and matching existing standard sections from the 22 regional editions of Google News from around the globe.”
After 350-001, a VCP-310 professional usually goes for 70-649 or 70-270. It is highly unlikely that he decides on 646-204.
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About John
Thanks for visiting my blog, my name is John Ryan I am a Civil Servant, I like to write about Wordpress, Gadgets, and post photos... My Other Site: IrishMobilePhone.com
