Kindasophically speaking

Phew, what an end to 2008!

2009-01-04T23:39:00.004+08:00

My dear friends,

Firstly, I really really need to apologise for the rather abrupt silence that has fallen over Kindasophically Speaking.

Contrary to popular belief, I was not, in fact,

abducted by aliens,
nor was I bitten by a poisonous spider lurking under the toilet seat,
and I certainly have not run away with some cute twentysomething millionheiress!!

Rather this old bloke here had been bogged down by more mundane issues...

#1 -- I'd decided to renovate my house some time in Nov 08.... with us still living in it!

Yep, imagine rubble, lots of hacking, dust everywhere, a regular war zone right in my living room! Imagine having 3 hammer-drills going off in opposing walls simultaneously! Its an experience even a THX system can't (and shouldn't ever) reproduce!

Fortunately, my wife had the foresight of sending my two boys over to their grandparents' for the whole duration of the renovation! Thank goodness for:

(a) wonderful in-laws,

(b) school holidays, and

(c) Astro, PSP and lots of fun places in Penang to keep them busy!

I should show you the before-after photos one day (of the reno, not the kids!), when I get my things organized.

#2 -- End-of-year during good times is tough (raking in the orders for a wonderful close).... but end of year during tough times is *painful*.

Well, at least I still have a job (for now!) so keeping busy at work is a good thing. 'Nuf said!

#3 -- One of my boys (when they finally got back) decided he missed my PC so much, he gave it a kick.

My workhorse was already whirring a bit too noisily for my liking the past days, but my boy's kick looked like the final straw. It actually just died that very instant! That IBM Netvista had been chugging along 24x7 for nearly 3 years without any fuss in an un-air-conditioned room. It even kept running during the dusty renovation (yeah, dumb thing to do on my part). I think its earned its retirement!

So the combo of these 3 things effectively kept me out of active blogging for these many weeks.

My priority now is to get 2009 started -- back to work tomorrow!

After that, find a worthy replacement for my trusty Netvista... and hopefully, get back to some of my usual ramblings! Hmm, that's going to cost a pretty penny!

And nope, I still haven't gotten the X1 yet, and nope, am not settling for the E71 either.... but am starting to get interested in a couple of other things!

Tell me, what do you think of the LG Renoir? ;)

And all of a sudden, existing 29" TV looks rather inadequate in the newly renovated hall....

My mind's thinking of a 46 inch LCD, but with the huge dent the renovation has put in the pocket, my wallet's screaming "ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR BLINKING MIND???!?!!!?!?!?"

Oh well, back to work....

(I hope to get back to regular postings once I get a replacement PC... so until then, please excuse what's likely going to be very sporadic postings! My sincere apologies....)

How about an alternate to the X1 -- the Nokia E71?

2008-11-28T22:30:00.000+08:00

Okay, so if you're still looking for a super-cool, full qwerty-keyboarded phone, but are unwilling to part with RM 3,199 of your hard-earned cash, what can you do?

Well, if waiting is an option (I think my M600i can go on indefinitely, actually) then that's the surest way of getting the price down. Give it six months and I'm sure it will be in the comfortable side of 2k.

If waiting is 'not' an option, and you really need /want / itch to upgrade the phone, then how about this...

Presenting the kinda new and not quite hot-off-the-shelf, but still top scoring Nokia E71!

Lets start with what it isn't

it surely isn't the X1 (duh!)
it isn't trying to be an iPhone killer
it isn't the loser of a wifi-less, boring and bulky Nokia E60/62 as well!! (I almost bought that, yikes!!)

Okay, before you proceed further, I must stress that this is *not* a touchscreen phone. So if you're looking to touch, poke, stroke and write on a phone, then you can forget about the E71.

If you've made it through the caveats so far... then you're in for the alternate coolness that the E71 can offer! Firstly, lets hear what the critics have to say...

CNET.UK says the E71 has enough finesse to not look out of place, sitting in an Aston Martin. And gives it a 8.9 (excellent) rating for an almost-perfect phone.

Allaboutsymbian.com says there's a lot to like about the E71, which it calls a 'miniaturised masterpiece'.

engadgetmobile.com summarises the E71 as as "manages it all with style, providing a plethora of features in a speedy, beautiful and minuscule device"

Boygeniusreport.com boldly calls it "is the best phone Nokia has made to date"

Brighthand.com concluded its review calling it "probably the best handset available for prosumers" by taking the iPhone features people want and the BlackBerry functions needed and sticking it into a "package that is well designed"

Here are a few shots of the E71 from GSMArena .... if you love the BlackBerry's looks, then you'll find this quite irristable!

Source: GSMArena.com

And this is what you have inside that slim, 10mm metal-clad body -- Nokia's slimmest phone so far!!

Quad band, 3.5G (3.6mbps), GPRS (100kbps), Edge (296kbps), Wi-Fi (54mbps) and Bluetooth
16million colour 320x240 display that still looks clear under sunlight
GPS receiver with assisted GPS function
Fullscreen browser, FM radio, instant , Vlan, VIOP
Stable S60 Symbian OS 9.2 with loads of 3rd party software
Software included in the package: QuickOffice, Active Notes, Dictionary, PDF reader, Skype.... the list goes on!

There is, however, one consistent complaint about the E71 -- its Achilles' heel -- the 3.2m autofocus camera. It seems that Nokia had gone cheapskate with this particular component and put in a mediocre camera -- washed out colours, poor contrast, slow shutter, purple fringing... in short, something not at par with the rest of this phone! So phone snappers... beware this point!

So, with all of the above, wrapped up in a nice, handsome package, and a street price of RM 15xx for 'original' and RM 13xx for grey imports.... one would say this is actually a real bargain!

X1 is finally here!!!

2008-11-26T22:00:00.000+08:00

Well, that would have been true if I'd gotten around posting this on Saturday, 22nd November!! (sorry for the delay!!)

In my previous post, I'd mentioned that the early birds (i.e. first 50) stand to get between RM 1500 to RM 250 discounts on the X1.

Officially the launch was from 12noon to 3pm that Saturday in 1 Utama new wing. It turned out the first 5 customers got RM1500 discount.... no gimmick, fooyoh! Next got RM 1000 and it slowly tapered down to if you were among the last 50 then the discount shrank to RM 250.

What I hadn't anticipated was that X1 fans had already started lining up in as early as Friday afternoon!! You'd think you only read about this level of enthusiasm in other countries and when it was about the iPhone or another StarWars sequel. In Malaysia you'd hear about people lining up for home ballots.... but for a handphone??!! wow....

To cut the story short... I missed my chance to be the first 50. Even if I were early enough... I seriously had to then ask if I was willing to part with RM 3,199 for the phone??!? As cool as it is (you should see the one in brushed steel... its to *die* for!!!), can you seriously part with what's effectively a month's or a couple of months' salary for many people, just for a gizmo to say 'hello!' ?

Evidently, that's an easy 'YES!' for many purchasers of the X1 on that day. I met an Andy who, like me, missed out being the top fifty... but he went ahead and still bought the phone at full price.... "what to do?" he asked disappointingly!

Economy not doing so good you say? Tell that to the tech fans, my friends.... tell that to the tech friends!!!

TARA 3 - Congrats to the winners..... (Spoiler ahead!)

2008-11-21T00:19:00.002+08:00

You've been warned... do not proceed if you haven't watched the final and don't want to know who just won! :)

Really... read at your peril....

Alright, I give up, so the winners are...

Actually, I'm more interested in first, proclaiming the most sports-person like, most bubbly and fun-loving, most liked and best national ambassadors ... i.e. the 'true' winner of The Amazing Race Asia 3... IDA and TANIA!!! Congrats, you guys are the clear winners in my book. Okay, so you missed the USD 100k top price, but I think nobody can claim to have as much fun as you guys! Way to go ladies!!!

Ida and Tania

Congrats also to Sam and Vince! You guys really gave your best, came up from behind and trumped the rest to grab the top price... well done, you guys really deserved to win! (ps. So glad you guys beat Mr. Motormouth ... me and the boys were rooting for you during the very last, kan-cheong minutes!!) :P

Sam and Vince

Will be back next with a 'proper' technology post... soon .... cheers!

Arriving this Saturday -- the X1

2008-11-18T00:44:00.002+08:00

When I first saw the pictures of pre-production models of the Sony Ericsson Xperia X1, I thought this was simply an amazing phone! That was way back in February this year.

Along the way came snippets of details...

that it would run Windows Mobile (boring!) but have its own panel interface (cool!);

that it would have a metal body for that sleek sliding keyboard mechanism;

that it would have the sexiest eye-candy of a screen that any phone would die for!

And the the most intriguing bit of all was that this would not be made by SE! Instead, it will be crafted by the equally expert hands of HTC.

But the phone won't be available until September 08. That was quite a bummer... Imagine having to wait another 7 months before you get to see it!

In September, I just couldn't wait, and had to do something.... so I wrote a post on the X1 instead. AARGH!! The launch in end September was only for some European countries and the UK. Countries in ASEAN will just have to wait some more!!

So here we are, in the middle of November 2008 -- a good 9 months after those early sneak peeks. SE Malaysia started the hype with a full-page newspaper add 12 days before the launch.

Yesterday, another add reminded readers that there's still another 5 days to go... and threw in another hook -- signup via their site at www.bethefirstx1.com for an opportunity to pre-order the phone. The add also noted that if you're the first 50 to buy the phone at the special launch in 1 Utama, you stand to get savings from RM250 to RM1500!!

At the time of writing this... its another agonizing 4-day wait. But hang on... am I seriously going to get one? Word is that its going to cost RM 3000! Ouch, yeah. Not a very pocket friendly price in these difficult economic times. But hey, I can still ogle at it if I'm not going to buy it right? Oh, and they'll only have it in black on Nov 22nd. Dang!

So what do we do in the mean time...? We do what tech geeks do ... read up on reviews (warning, all is not rosy though... !) here, here and here! And until I really do get a new phone..... I'll still have my trusty, if not somewhat quaint, M600i to meet my calling, texting and synchronising needs!

Congrats Obama!

2008-11-09T22:36:00.005+08:00

Saw this featured in Time today and thought it was really funny...

Source: Time Cartoon of the Week

Barrack Obama sure has his job cut out for him... and will take something short of a miracle to really fix the problems that US has. Time will tell if Mr. President Elect is all talk and hype, or he's a man of substance. Good luck!!

Source: Time Cartoon of the Week

ps. Oh yeah, and the poor critters back in Alaska better watch out... cos She's back!!!

Source: Time Cartoons of the Week

When Generations Collide

2008-11-03T22:38:00.002+08:00

While surfing around blogs back in September, I came across this interesting post by FongPC titled Are you Generation X or Y? That was an interesting post as it shows the change in mentality of folks of different ages. For those who care to know, I'm firmly planted in the Generation X category. Kinda the sandwiched-in-the-middle generation, if you asked me!

Anyway, I started looking around for more information about that and came across this piece of work by Lynne Lancaster and David Stillman, authors of the book When Generations Collide (hence the title of my post today!)

Basically what was interesting for me was how this study changes the way I look at things. It used to be that we think people think a certain way because of their age. And when we too reach that certain age, we'll too would think like that as well. Well, the study says we won't. How we think is not just dependent on our age but on what we experience in our lives.

Gen-Xers ('65 - '80) went through events like the fall of the Berlin wall (and subsequent thawing of the cold war); Contra war and Iran vs Iraq; the dot-com boom; AIDS; MTV; Reagan, Gates and Madonna -- and in a way, these events and people shape our generation.

Gen-Xers were the 'me' generation who learned to rely on ourselves. We were the original latch-key kids who grew up being independent, resourceful but at the same time skeptical and even aggressive.

In contrast, the Gen-Y ('81 - '95) youngsters grew up with 9-11 and two Gulf wars; the dot-com bust (dot bomb); cellphone, IM and all things digital; Clinton, Osama and Buffy.

Gen-Y have started entering the workforce, and if you ask the older guys, they get uneasy around Gen-Y 'kids'. The study tells us why we feel like that. Gen-Y are smart, very tech-savvy; multi-tasking and multi-networking (i.e connecting with people). They thrive on learning and excitement and is not afraid of authority (Don't command me, collaborate instead!).

Most of all, Gen-Y is the instant-everything generation. They demand instant feedback, expect instant results, have no problem seeing themselves as tomorrow's leaders. Nothing is fast enough for these folks, yet, value work-life balance.

Granted, these studies have a decidedly US slant to it, but you have to admit that wherever you may be, you should be able to identify with those traits associated with 'your' generation.

Chances are most of you reading this right now are either an X, or Y. Perhaps some Zs too? And hello there if you're a Baby Boomer, glad to see you here!

Interested to learn more? Check out a good presentation and even download it here.

What if.....??

2008-10-31T22:35:00.002+08:00

A couple of days back I decided to just kick back a bit, switch off the brains and let the TV do some of the thinking for me. On the Discovery channel was a special about alien life. There are loads of such documentaries that try to give both sides of the story.

The believers will tell of their experiences -- seeing this, hearing that, getting abducted and poked around a bit.

Then there'll be the cynics and people who profess to be men and women of science. And these guys just can't wait to pooh-pooh all this claims as wild hallucinations of nutjobs.

"Forget your leader, take me to Krispy Kreme!"

I'm sitting there listening to each side's accounts...

"They had almond shaped, dark eyes..."
"The guy probably had too much to drink!"

"The saucer flew at such incredible speeds"
"Um.. it was a weather balloon, yeah, or an unmanned vehicle..."

"Thousands of reports came in, all claiming to see the same phenomenon!"
"Its not unusual to have cases of mass hysteria..."

"Those beings are evil, and they are systematically abducting humans for experiments"
"Ah, people will say anything just to go on TV!"

Must not have been too bright, since he got caught!

And so the argument continues. Some of these are supposed to be famous scientists.
So who would you believe, some small town person who may have had too much moonshine or sun or both?

Or a distinguished professor who has chewed through a million dry facts and figures?

I've always wondered what would happen to these very public debates, if one day, the real truth really came about? What would the many vocal skeptics say if really, some green-grey skinned visitor came down one day ... took a look, decided we weren't worth their time and left.... right in plain sight of a hundred TV cameras?

I for one would love to see that day.
And for the record, I do believe there is sentient life out there! Its inconceivable for me that of the bazillions stars in this infinite universe, we are unique.

Remember, just barely a couple of centuries ago, the brightest scientific minds of that time though the earth was flat... um, no, round but in the center of the universe, not that... but the sun rotated around the earth... strike that... the moon is made of cheese....

Flat Earth - circa. 1225 AD

Well, perhaps not that last one. But you've seen scientific and religious dogma being proven wrong with every leap of new discovery and knowledge. Makes you wonder what other 'facts' that we hold as irrefutably true today would turn out to be yet another of our misunderstanding of nature?

I leave you with these famous words, spoken eloquently by many of the world's brightest minds. Its not about aliens or anything funky... but you'll be surprised how people felt about things which we take for granted today.....

"This 'telephone' has too many shortcomings to be seriously considered as a means of communication. The device is inherently of no value to us." -- Western Union internal memo, 1876.

"The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to nobody in particular?" -- David Sarnoff's associates in response to his urgings for investment in the radio in the 1920s.

"The concept is interesting and well-formed, but in order to earn better than a 'C,' the idea must be feasible." -- A Yale University management professor in response to Fred Smith's paper proposing reliable overnight delivery service. (Smith went on to found Federal Express Corp.)

"Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?" -- H.M. Warner, Warner Brothers, 1927

"We don't like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out." -- Decca Recording Co. rejecting the Beatles, 1962.

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible." -- Lord Kelvin, president, Royal Society, 1895.

"So we went to Atari and said, 'Hey, we've got this amazing thing, even built with some of your parts, and what do you think about funding us? Or we'll give it to you. We just want to do it. Pay our salary, we'll come work for you.' And they said, 'No.' So then we went to Hewlett-Packard, and they said, 'Hey, we don't need you. You haven't got through college yet.'" -- Apple Computer Inc. founder Steve Jobs on attempts to get Atari and H-P interested in his and Steve Wozniak's personal computer.

"You want to have consistent and uniform muscle development across all of your muscles? It can't be done. It's just a fact of life. You just have to accept inconsistent muscle development as an unalterable condition of weight training." -- Response to Arthur Jones, who solved the "unsolvable" problem by inventing Nautilus.

"Drill for oil? You mean drill into the ground to try and find oil? You're crazy." -- Drillers whom Edwin L. Drake tried to enlist in his project to drill for oil in 1859.

"Stocks have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau." -- Irving Fisher, Professor of Economics, Yale University, 1929.

"Airplanes are interesting toys but of no military value." -- Marechal Ferdinand Foch, Professor of Strategy, Ecole Superieure de Guerre.

"Everything that can be invented has been invented." -- Charles H. Duell, Commissioner, U.S. Office of Patents, 1899.

"The abdomen, the chest, and the brain will forever be shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon". -- Sir John Eric Ericksen, British surgeon, appointed Surgeon-Extraordinary to Queen Victoria 1873.

"No flying machine will ever fly from New York to Paris." -- Orville Wright.

"I think there is a world market for maybe five computers." -- T.Watson, chairman of the board, IBM, 1943

"Computers in the future may weigh no more than 1.5 tons." -- Popular Mechnics, 1949

"There is no reason anyone would want a computer in their home." -- Ken Olsoon, founder of Digital Equipment Corp., 1972

The hidden cost of travel - CO2

2008-10-20T22:50:00.001+08:00

A reader asked how it was possible for an MPV travelling 15,000 kilometers to generate 4,000 kgs of CO2? If you think of it, its quite amazing that the CO2 generated is almost 3 times the weight of the vehicle!

The truth is that when your car burns fuel, the resultant CO2 generated weighs more than the fuel itself. Here's a quick conversion: burning 1 KG of fuel will generate roughly 3.25 kgs of CO2.

Did you know that on average, a Boeing 747 can burn about 200 tons of jet fuel per trip?
And, this is how much fuel burnt (and the resultant CO2 generated) to carry 1 person from Kuala Lumpur to:

Bangkok: 100kg fuel --> 325kg CO2
Tokyo: 400kg fuel --> 1300kg CO2
Sydney: 480kg fuel --> 1560kg CO2
London: 750kg fuel --> 2440kg CO2
New York: 1090kg fuel --> 3540kg CO2

You can try out how much fuel is burnt from flying here.

Here's another number: The aviation industry alone, contributes to 2% of the world's carbon emission! Talk about a guilt trip!!

So what am I talking here, do we not fly? Do we just take ourselves back to the pre-Wright era in this modern day Flat world? Well, here are some alternatives....

Use trains (for long- and shorthaul) -- they generate about a quarter of CO2 compared to planes
Use cars (for short trips) -- still generate half of the CO2 of planes
Don't travel -- video conference or Skype! (no, seriously, many business are turning to this!)

But if you must fly (and many of us do), there is a way you can help...

Many environmentally conscious Airlines around the world have started to implement a carbon offset program. Cathay Pacific, Qantas, Continental, Virgin are some names who have offered either carbon neutral flights or an option for passengers to participate in their carbon offset programs.

Closer to home, Malaysia Airlines (together with sister companies MASwings and Firefly) have also recently opened its carbon offset program to all its online customers. This is a voluntary program where passengers have the option of contributing a sum of money to help fund selected UN programmes to reduce greenhouse gasses.

If you like, you can even make one-off contributions without even needing to travel.

So next time when you book a ticket through MAS, have a think and consider contributing to their program for the sake of the environment. You can check out MAS' initiative here. Happy tree hugging!! :)

Okay so Symphony is FREE but is it GOOD?

2008-10-17T00:50:00.004+08:00

I'll start right off with what I don't like about Symphony, and get that out of the way first.

Symphony TAKES TOO LONG to load!
It needs between 15 to 40 seconds in a 'cold' start before you finally see the first page! Compare that to the 5 or so seconds it takes Office to load, it makes you wonder just what on earth is churning in this Eclipse-built application!

The warm start (i.e. opening a 2nd document after you've already launched the app) is much better at around 6 seconds. Its still a couple of seconds slower than Office, but at least its less noticeable.

If you can live with the wait, then read on, as the rest are mostly on things I quite like about this sluggish beast!

1) Installation was a breeze!

The installer comes packaged as a single file. Its hefty, at 201mb, but then this is an office suite afterall, and takes surprising little time to install.
Having everything in a single file also makes the distribution of this software a simple matter of copying into a CD or thumbdrive. With ADSL, it is also a practical size to download from the net.
No CD Keys to remember or loose -- remember, this is freeware that can be used both at home or in the office

2) All 3 apps in one integrated platform

You don't have to bother with opening multiple applications as a single program opens all your Word, Excel and Powerpoint file.
Each document appears as easily accessible tabs, much like the tabs in Firefox.
Working on multiple documents and sharing data between docs now become easier with all features in one view.

3) Nifty properties bar easily accessible

I liked that there is a context sensitive bar on the right that shows me the properties of whatever object I am working on. It saves me time of not having to right-click and select format.
Having all the pertinent information visible takes the guesswork out of formatting a document.
Of course if you don't like it, and don't want it hogging too much screen real estate, you can easily collapse or make it go away totally!

4) Re-creates as much as possible the feel of Office

The main thing for me is that it uses the same Excel formula format. And in my tests, the data does seem to render quite nicely, although some of the more complex formatting did run a bit!
This means you avoid steep learning curves and loss of productivity as you'd intuitively use this as you would Office.
It actually does better than Office by giving a rather pleasant looking interface with some nice design touches!

5) Its OPEN!

As in open standards -- as it supports the Open Document Format.
MS Office may be pervasive and is the de facto format, but it is still proprietary.
Not only does it support ODF, the application itself is also open. You can enhance its features with FREE plug-ins that you can download and install. And best of all, the plug-ins don't just come from Lotus. 3rd party developers can also build plug-ins for Symphony.

So is this the product for you?

Its not for everybody -- at least not quite yet.
If you are a hardcore Office user who use its features heavily, you can forget about Symphony for the time being.
If you have always only used Viewers for Word etc... then this is YOUR TOOL.
If you are looking to also do some basic editing of Office docs, and be able to do it FOC AND LEGALLY, then you should seriously have a look.
If you're a company looking to deploy lots of PCs to your users, but don't intend to fork out big bucks for Enterprise Licensing, then YES go for Symphony! (your power users can still buy their Office)

Net of it, I think, is this -- you've got absolutely nothing to loose from using this software. Fully installed, it takes up only a paltry 380mb. If you use it and hate it, leave it there just in case. If you love it, well even better!!

I for one will be leaving it in my machine. Its V1.1 today, and with the amount of enhancements planned, I can surely look forward to even better features in the future.

Find out more and download from the from Lotus Symphony website.
http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/home.nsf/home

Add free upgrades and soup-up Symphony.
http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/plugin.nsf/home

Work on your MS Office documents legally, for FREE

2008-10-15T08:08:00.000+08:00

Question -- how much do you or your employer pay for a genuine copy of MS Office?
A quick check with ComputerWar's September quotation says a single user license will set you back about RM 600.
Take that and times the number of users in your company, and that usually adds up to a tidy sum! To add to that, your Office would be obsolete in a couple of years, and you'll need to fork out another pretty penny for an upgrade.

How much of Office's rich set of features and functions do you really use?
A study by triactive.com and THINK Strategies discovered that :

50% of Office users use only its basic features found in Office Pro/enterprise
25% never used Office at all, even though it was installed in their workstation
Only 25% are exploiting the rich features in Office pro/enterprise editions

Then why are we paying so much for something only a quarter of the people in the company are using?
Good question! Why don't you ask your MIS manager that question?

But then, if we don't invest in Office, how are we going to read and edit all those Word, Excel and Powerpoint documents which have become the de-facto office suite formats?

Well, the folks at IBM Lotus say they have the answer to that -- in the form of the free, open source office suite called Lotus Symphony. Symphony is a single, integrated application suite combining a word processor, a spreadsheet and presentation software. Developed using Eclipse (a free, open source java development platform), Symphony V1.1 today runs either Windows or Linux.

That's well and nice, but I still need to read and write to my Office files...
Which is why Symphony is written to be able to open Lotus Smartsuite, Open Document Format AND MS Office 2003 documents. So in theory, with this software running, you don't need all that extra suites sitting in your machine already!

Even better, Symphony comes pre-built with the ability to export all documents to PDF as well. That again saves you a few more bucks in having to purchase an Adobe Acrobat writer.

But having said that, Symphony doesn't try to be everything Office is. Remember the stats about most users accessing only the basic functions? Symphony gives you most of the features you'd see and use -- practical!

Source: Lotus Symphony Brochure

You sure or not? That sounds too good to be true. What's the catch?
That's what we're here to find out.... watch out for the next post where we pit Symphony and Office to a couple of simple head-to-heads and see who comes out tops.

Stay tuned!!

Find out more and download from the from Lotus Symphony website.
http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/home.nsf/home

Add free upgrades and soup-up Symphony.
http://symphony.lotus.com/software/lotus/symphony/plugin.nsf/home

Hi, i'm back!

2008-10-12T22:36:00.002+08:00

I do apologise for my long silence... have been up to my eyeballs with all manner of stuff.

Am working on a review of IBM's Lotus Symphony suite. Some interesting things there which i hope to share soon, in my next post.

In the mean time, many thanks to the voices of support for our environment -- both online and offline.

I think we live in an age where we no longer have the luxury to ignore the damage mankind has been inflicting on our planet. And until we find another habitable blue-planet to mess up, this is still our only one.

At the risk of sounding trite and corny... please.... Reduce, Reuse and Recycle!

A word on our Environment

2008-10-07T23:58:00.004+08:00

Most people love to accessorise -- I know I do! Whether it be nice fashion items, some bling, or cool gadgetry -- its as much fun looking for stuff as it is owning it.

It could be a $10 costume jewelry from the flea market, or a $2799 Samsung Omnia, or a $35,000 hand-stitched Hermes handbag or even a $550,000 Hummer -- if you like it and can afford it, there's nothing wrong in getting it. Right?

Well, financially, perhaps. But these days, we have to look beyond just the price tag and understand what is the true cost of a given item -- stated in terms of the (usually negative) impact of our choices and lifestyles have on the environment.

Take my 7-seater MPV for instance. I just learnt that if I traveled a modest 15,000 kilometers a year, it would have generated -- get this -- nearly FOUR TONNES of carbon dioxide. Our other family car equivalent, although spotting a fuel-efficient engine, would still put out another 2.4 tonnes of CO2!

So just from commuting and weekend driving alone, the two cars would have added 6.4 tonnes of greenhouse gasses to our atmosphere, contributing yet a bit more to global warming.

It is because of this that some bodies are advocating attributing an environment cost to a product. That means besides the usual specifications of a product, manufacturers are encouraged to also state the environment cost of:

Producing the item -- how much pollutants were generated in the production of one item

Maintaining or operating it -- how much more will be generating with its continued use (think: fuel / power consumption / CO2 or pollutant emissions etc)

Disposing it off eventually -- impact to landfills; threat of dangerous chemicals leaching into groundwater etc

Now that we've started talking about the amount of CO2 generated by a car, should we also look at other aspects of our lives that also contribute to global warming?

How about your food choices?
How about your garbage dispossal?
How about the things you own and use -- do you repair or replace?
What are your at-home habits -- are you using more resources than you need to?
Selling off old newspapers is fine, but what about the other garbage -- do you separate them for recycling?

I started poking around the Internet, to see what was the impact to my lifestyle on Mother Nature... and honestly, some of the numbers surprised me. And you're talking to someone who *think's* he's already quite environmentally cautious:

We only switch on the a/c when it is very warm (over 31c), and even that for an hour just to cool things down
We actively use recyclable bags to avoid unnecessary use (and subsequent disposal) of plastic bags
We try to carpool and avoid single-occupancy driving as much as possible.....

So it was quite a disturbing but good learning experience when I took some quizzes and realized that there are so many other of my choices and actions that also impact the environment, that I'd never thought about so far!

Did you catch that number?
99 tonnes of CO2 a year! That's what the survey tells me what my family's lifestyle is likely producing. And that means we are living as if we have got 2 planet Earths to support us. We are living as if we have 3.7 hectares of land absorbing enough CO2 to offset what my family is producing!

I'd say this is a wake up call! Are we aware what is the impact our actions are having on the earth... and what is it our children will be inheriting from us.... our mistakes or our conservation efforts?

Read up more
http://www.carbonfootprint.com/

Test yourself

http://www.nature.org/initiatives/climatechange/calculator/

http://footprint.wwf.org.uk/

http://www.carbonfootprint.com/calculator.aspx

Chrome... chrome... bup-bup-be-doo-whop...

2008-10-05T00:55:00.006+08:00

In my earlier post about the fastest browser in town, I said I'll be taking Google Chrome for a spin. I have been using it for a few days now and as a strong Firefox supporter, I have to say this about Chrome - hey, not baaad at all... :)

Like most things Google (I'm a heavy user of Gmail, Google Maps, Blogger obviously, and of course, search!), this app is quite nicely thought out. The boys probably did their homework, found out what features users liked about their browser, and tried to incorporate them into one 'simple' browser... and out came Chrome.

The installation was a breeze. I read the end user agreement, agreed (as if you'd disagree?!) and proceeded. After a couple of clicks, I practically left it by itself to do its own thing. A few minutes later when I came back, it was done.

And by 'done', it meant Chrome had imported all my favourites / bookmarks, browsing history, IDs and passwords.. the works! When I started browsing in Chrome, it seemed like I'd been using it for ages! Its a bit freaky if you think about the security aspect... but hey, for the majority of users, they'd appreciate the seamless migration!

Oh, and a plus point was that Chrome didn't try to muscle its way to be THE DEFAULT browser. Its happy playing second fiddle if you tell it to, and won't complain. Aah, sweet silence!

BTW, Chrome is still in beta, so there may be some bugs along the way...

What I liked so far:

More than just for URLs -- you can type in anything in the 'address bar' and Chrome will automatically find best URL matches, or Google searches in one go. You just need to decide which one you want. This does away with needing a Google bar or needing to first go to the Google site to perform a search.

The result is a mixture of URLs and suggested searches

Your favourite sites in one glance -- By default, when you open a 'blank' tab, google shows you thumbnails of your most frequently accessed sites, automatically! I find this way cool -- you don't have to even pull down your book marks, or tell google which is your favourite. Google figures the more you access a site, the more you'd appreciate it being easily accessible. And I say, 'way to go Google!!'

All your favourite sites in one glance... sweet!

'Intelligent' password storage -- This sounds fancier than it really is, but the slight tweak makes a world of difference. You know the nifty feature that IE and Firefox has? The one that prompts you if you want the browser to remember an ID and PW you just keyed in? The two browsers ask you that question the moment you enter the ID and PW. That's fine, if you had entered the right info... but what if you were guessing, and were not sure if you keyed it incorrectly? Chrome instead waits till you have successfully moved on (i.e. logged in) to the next page before asking you. That way, you'd know what you are asking Chrome to remember is indeed a correct one. Just a slight delay, but yields brilliant results!

Decide to keep the ID/PW only after

you see if you've entered the right one

Clean screen, really! -- Okay, some may actually find this feature a bit unnerving. Chrome takes up very little screen space. Icons are minimalist, there isn't even a menu bar... just like the Google search screen, clean and simple.

Simple and uncluttered

Peekaboo! -- In line with the clean screen, there isn't even a status bar at the bottom. If you're used to peering down at the status bar for link information and loading status, you'll notice Chrome still has that but is hidden mostly. It only pops up when there is something interesting to tell you.

Magically dissapears after it's done its work...

Downloading simplicity -- Again, a little window pops up at the bottom left corner, giving you the status (KB complete) of whatever it is you're downloading. And when down, it sits quietly there until you decide on what to do with it. Firefox would have needed a little add-on to do that while with IE... well, I don't really care how IE does it actually!

Know where your download stands at one glance

Simple but effective choices...

So, is Crome perfect?

Far from it, but it has a good chance of getting there some day!

Chrome may sometimes get distracted and either refuse to or forget to load a page. Take TheStar for example... nothing difficult or weird about this site, but for some reason, Chrome took a couple of retries before it could load the page. I'd also faced some difficulty with the some of the trickier pages in Facebook and MyBlogLog.

Hello... anybody there?

So what's next... dump Firefox (or whatever is your favourite browser) for Chrome?
Again, not quite. Being still in Beta, means that there are practically no add-ons and nifty things you can install to enhance Chrome's features. I'm guessing its a matter of time that all those add-on builders who've been contributing to the vast selection of nifty gadgets for Firefox start building the Chrome equivalent eventually.

Anyway, as Chrome is still at a relatively early stage of development, things should only get better... especially with the vast resources that Google has at its disposal. So stay tuned and watch out for even more goodies from Chrome.

** Anybody tried using Chrome and have your own opinions? Pls share them in the comments... would love to hear from you!! **

PS. In case you're wondering, the title of this post was taken from a Garfield movie where native Hawaiians were worshinping Jon's old car that had lots of shiny chrome bits... :)

A fun blog: Vision of the World

2008-10-02T22:06:00.003+08:00

The fun thing about blogging is that you also tend to surf about visiting other blogs. Whether if its about food, or a mother's pride, or politics, or technology, I find myself enriched with the musings and sharings of the blogging community.

Occasionally, you'd stumble upon some fun blogs, like this one called VOTW by Bertrend Leseigneur (at least that's what I made out from his email add). The blogger calls it a blog on technology news for the 'non-geeks' -- fun huh?

Well it is... simple posts that lets pictures tell most of the story. Nothing too heavy if you want to just chill out and brows a bit. Here are a couple of recent toons which I had a good chuckle. Thanks Bertrend....

Android vs iPhone

The new Geek

Sarah Palin's Facebook???

Raya fireworks .... well, not really :)

2008-10-01T10:58:00.002+08:00

I was kinda hoping to take some fireworks pix during Raya, to post alongside my Raya wishes (see earlier post this morning). But never got around doing it.

Instead, here are some even nicer fireworks pix (taken during the August Malaysian Internal Fireworks Competion in Putrajaya) from Tonny Yeap, who is happily firing away with his Canon 450D. He had chosen a really good spot and well... again, lets have the pictures tell the story instead.

Tony's just plonked some serious moollah on a pair of Canon L lenses!! Hope I'll get to post some more of his pix once he starts snapping with those legendary lenses.

Regretted missing the competition? Yeah, me too!

Happy Raya!!

2008-10-01T08:16:00.003+08:00

To my dear Muslim friends and readers,
wishing you a safe and happy
Aidil Fitri celebration.

May you have lots of good rest,
great times with family and friends,
and loads of yummy food!!

Selamat Hari Raya Aidil Fitri 1428H
Maaf Zahir dan Batin

Sony Ericsson Xperia X1 - launching!!

2008-09-29T12:20:00.004+08:00

When the first pictures got out early this year, I told myself this is one cool phone to have in my pocket. The crunch came in the WAIT! This phone, would not be available until end of Q3 08 :(

Here's a quickie on the X1's features.... (in no particular order of 'foo-yoh'-ness)

Sliding form factor, with a curved, sliding QWERTY keyboard
Runs Windows Mobile 6.1 with its unique Xperia panel interface
Displays all that in the full glory of a crisp, 3 inch, 800 x 480 screen
Uses the really useful optical joystick OR touchscreen for flexible navigation options
Spots a zippy Qualcomm 7200A CPU running at 528 MHz
Carries an auto-focus 3.2 megapixel camera with flash (LED unfortunately, methinks)
Uses Assisted GPS for rapid positioning even when indoors
And carries the usual 'must-have' features you've come to expect of a killer gadget like the X1: Bluetooth A2DP (stereo bluetooth headphones), WiFi (of course!), Memory Stick Micro slot (another report claims it is MicroSD???), FM radio, 3G quad-band / HSDPA / HSUPA, Opera browser with RSS reader

If you haven't already seen it, here are some pix of the X1... see if it makes you drool (I'm proud to be a tech geek, ok!).

The good news is... for the lucky folks in UK and some parts of Europe, the wait ends tomorrow, as the official launch for the X1 is 30th Sept 2008! For the rest of us in Asia, Latin America and other parts of Europe, we'll have another agonizing wait until the end of the year before we get out grubby hands on this hottie. Friends in the US, AU... sorry, no news on when this babe phone is coming out.

Oh yeah, the above pix were from Sony's Xperia website. If you want to see more of it, they have a series of videos ala-Jason Bourne, where the hero, Johnny X uses the X1 to figure out his true identity. Check it out at the Who is Johnny X site.

Digital Convergence

2008-09-28T15:03:00.001+08:00

I've been down with a bad throat these couple of days. Throw in a mild fever and body ache, and my weekend's pretty much stuffed. So what's a guy to do when he can't take his kids out for the usual weekend spin or swim?

The boys have been very understanding ... and between catching up on some school work, a couple of siestas, their sunday school and a bit of PSP, they were actually quite happy to stay at home!

As for me, it was a good excuse to catch up on some office work, some Astro and to check out the blogsphere. You'd be amazed at the interesting things you find people talk about! From games, to papayas, to recyclable wallets.

Then I spotted this advertisement featured in WongPK's blog.

This talks about Microsoft Surface, a combo of Vista-driven PC hiding behind a touch-sensitive display. It still remains to be seen if this product will take off the way the add envisions it, but wow, can you imagine if it really worked?

What a concept!

Fastest browser in town?

2008-09-27T12:10:00.013+08:00

Most of us who spend quite a bit of time in front of the screen, would have a favourite browser. If you have not bothered to do anything to your PC, and started browsing out of the box, then chances are you're using MS Internet Explorer.

There are plenty of people (I'm one of them, heh) who throw scorn on MS IE -- and for good reason! It's clunky, lethargic.. and I think the fact that it was forced on Windows users probably made it public browser enemy no 1.

The guys using Macs have it made. Their Safari browser is, like many things Apple, super cool... and guess what, in many cases, they are super fast as well!

I used to use Opera... and quite liked it. I forget why I dropped it... probably because I didn't install it when I had my notebook replaced!

In recent years, have been using Mozilla's Firefox... and have been a happy customer. Their tab browsing came aeons before IE. And especially with V3 today, is even better.
Plus it has the bonus of being support by a wonder slew of free add-ons. My favourites are:

PicLens (now called Color Iris -- you ain't seen the web until you've seen it through PicLens!) and of course

Scribefire the indispensable blogging tool

A month back, Google got into the thick of the action by introducing Chrome. I've been meaning to give it a test drive -- you know, to see what all that hype was all about. I probably will have to find some time to do that -- one day!

So the question will inevitably come up -- which of these browsers are the best? Every one of the browsers will tell you they are best. And if you look close enough, they are probably focusing on one specific of performance. Like ability to render HTML, or speed to process Java Script, or uses the least memory.....

Is there a clear winner?

Kevin Purdy of LifeHacker.com posted this excellent compilation of browser performance. In that post, you'll see for yourself, which browsers are best at which category. One thing you'll notice, is that IE's (both 7 and 8) performances are the most consistent. Consistently worst or among the worst, that is!!

Check out his site and you'll decide for yourself, which is best. As for me, I think I'm quite happy to stay with Firefox for now.

Question from Scooba

2008-09-24T23:19:00.003+08:00

I received a comment left by a reader who was having trouble with his Synctoy folder pairs. I'm not really a tech expert, but if I understood his message correctly, I think this should help.

In short, I think here's the situation

he built a folder pair between his PC's HD and an external (likely USB-connected) HD
one day (mysteriously) his external HD is assigned a different drive letter by windows
all the previously configured folder pairs now refuse to work

So here's my response... I thought perhaps this may be of help to others having this same problem.

Dear Scooba, sounds like a problem where your windows decides to assign a different drive letter to your external drive... did I understand that correctly?

If it is, then don't worry, its a fairly common problem.

I used to tear my hair out when iTunes and Picasa couldn't find my music and photos respectively when suddenly one day the drive letter got changed.

The easy way out of this is to change the letter back to the one which you used to set up your folder pair. And no, I'm afraid the same problem exists for XP, so I'm afraid we can't blame vista for this doozy.

Try this (I can comment for XP only, sorry, can't comment on Vista)...

- go to Control Panel ==> Administrative Tools ==> Computer Management

- on the left window, click on "Disk Management"

- on the right window, select your external HD

- Right-click that HD and select "Change Drive Letter and Path"

- BE VERY CAREFUL WITH THE ABOVE SELECTION..... because if you click the next one, it would be to FORMAT your HD....!!

- A small window will pop up and you'll be able to assign your drive back to the original letter

- click OK and your folder pairs should start working again

Hope you find this useful.... I find myself doing this quite often... especially if you're like me and have up to 3 external HD's running at one go... and need each of them to have one specific drive letter!

Cheers!

Digital Photography - it just gets better!

2008-09-24T22:54:00.005+08:00

I'm a fan of photography. I don't take good pictures (hopeless!!), but sure do appreciate great photos and the cool gear that helps capture those photos.

And being a photography enthusiast means this is the best time of the year... yeah, Photokina! That's like the E3 of gaming... the Detroit motor show of cars.... the... well, you get the picture.

However, in the recent years, the stuff that get dished out at Photokina is nothing to really go ga-ga over. The manufacturers keep on cramming more megapixels into the sensors, they try to out-do each other with evolutionery and me-too features... BORING!

But this year, things got really exciting!

If you read my previous blogs on digital cameras, you'd hear me bemoan (here, here and here!) the tiny and noisy chips in Panasonic Lumix cameras. I had been wishing out loud that Panny woudl stop the silly megapixel race and focus on making their wonderfully small and featurefull cameras with larger and better chips.

Lo and behold, 2 surprises came...

1) Panasonic introduces its first micro four-thirds digital SLR prototype, the G1. The whaaa? Picture this:

Its like an SLR, with interchangeable lenses, but the body, lenses - everything - is much much smaller
They do away with the flip mirror and the prism, and in the process gives true live-view
The heart - sensor - of the camera is still a proper SLR-sized four thirds CCD.. so there is no compromise there

Here's a side by side comparison of how the conventional DSLR looks like vs the new micro four thirds.... lots of exciting days ahead, when we see how the market responds to this. Already, Olympus is hot on the heels and have also pre-announced their version of the micro four thirds as well!

The traditional four-thirds DSLR: note the mirror and pentaprism

The micro four-thirds DSLR : everything smaller except the sensor!

Then, things got even more exciting!

2) Canon announces its mother of all compact super zoom... the Powershot SX1 and SX10

It finally has a really great camera that starts of with 28mm
It has an optical image stabilized 20x zoom, with super fast and silent mechanism that beats the stuffings out of the competition
Ths SX1 has Canon's excellent CMOS CCD.... with a bonus that it can shoot at a lightning speed of 4 frames per second!
It does away with even top-end consumer video cameras by being able to shoot videos at FULL HD
On paper... the features are really top notch.... can't wait to test it out when it's finally available here!
The only thing is the price.... no idea how much is it going to cost in Malaysia .. but it does look like its going to encroach quite deeply into DLSR country ... and may (hopefully not) end up with a very niche market..?

Read more about this amazing camera here, here and here.

Sorry, Panny, but I may have a new favourite hottie now.... !!

Malaysia and Singapore bands milk-based products from China

2008-09-23T07:30:00.000+08:00

The situation has worsened as more reports surface about the impact of the melamine tainted milk from China.

Damage so far?

53,000 children reported ill
104 classified as critical
3 deaths -- so far

How did it get into the milk?

Milk farmers water-down the milk so they can sell more
They add in melamine to fool tests into showing the watered-down milk is still high in protein
The milk passes tests and gets distributed and made into milk powder, yogurt, chocolates etc....

Malaysia and Singapore have started banning milk-based products from China, as a precautionary measure. Many of you would have received SMSs warning people about a whole list of branded candies. I have my doubts on those, especially if they are not made in China, or made with Chinese milk.

Still.... here are some reports on what our government is doing: here , here and here

Tainted Chinese Milk affects other products

2008-09-21T23:41:00.002+08:00

Just when you thought you'd be safe so long as you avoided milk from China, there is breaking news that authorities have found other products made with Chinese milk that have also been found to be contaminated by melamine.

So far, Singapore has identified 3 products to be contaminated (remember, it applies only to China-made ones):

Dutch Lady strawberry flavoured milk
Yili Choice Dairy Fruit Bar Yogurt Flavoured Ice Confection
White Rabbit milk candy (I used to and still love this sweet!!!)

There's even an SMS going around expanding on that list to cover a whole bunch of international brand, China-made chocolates too. So far, I haven't seen any news reports substantiating that SMS, but be on a look out ya... better be safe than sorry!

How safe is your favourite bottle?

2008-09-20T01:33:00.001+08:00

About 22 years or so ago, soft drink manufacturers started replacing their large glass bottles with lightweight, and hip-looking plastic bottles. These PET bottles quickly gained public acceptance and was soon seen in every supermarket shelf.

Along the way, some smart guy figured that these nifty bottles would make cheap and perfectly practical water bottles, in place of the much more expensive Tupperware bottles. Before you knew it every other student was toting a PET bottle. Some manufacturers even made straps so you can fasten onto these bottles and make carrying these around easier.

Fast forward 10 years later, and the public started warming up to the idea of drinking mineral or filtered water out of bottles as well. These were also made of PET, and soon replaced soft drink bottles as the 'even hipper' water bottle.

By now, you'd have to have been hiding under a rock this past decade if you don't already know that re-using PET bottles for all drinking liquids is a big NO-NO. Studies indicate these bottles may leach DEHP into the water. DECP is a suspected cancer-causing chemical.

Of course it all depends on which side of the story you hear. PET manufacturers' FAQs will say this is a load of baloney. And some people will tell you if you listen to every warning, you won't even be able to breath, let alone live to the next day. Go figure!

Back to our history lesson. About 5 years or so ago, along came a new wonder bottle, made of polycarbonate (PC for short). These were touted to be the perfect medium for water bottles -- they were very tough, durable, looked pleasant, were recyclable, heat resistant, odour-free, and most importantly, perfectly safe.

Most, if not all of us, fearing for our health, ditched our PET bottles in favour this new, 'space age' bottles in an instant! The considerable take-up factor was also aided by the fact that for all its benefits, these bottles were still much cheaper than Tupperware!

PC is a really versatile plastic. It is actually clearer than glass and can transmit light better. Because of these qualities, it is used to make high-end reading lenses. This stuff is also used for making CDs and DVDs. You find them in baby feeding bottles, tough plastic appliances, car head- and brakelights, skylights, display cabinets, ... the list just goes on!

With so many wonderful uses, you'd imagine you can't go wrong with this stuff! Unfortunately, recent studies have found that with regular use, PC can leach BPA (bisphenol A), a hormone messer-upper. Some studies link it to breast and ovarian cancer, while others warn against dangers to infants.

2 days ago, there's even a news report about a class action suit againt the manufacturors of baby bottles and sippy cups for a host of health problems like prostate and breast cancer, diabetes,
premature onset of puberty in females, lowered sperm count and
infertile sperm in men, developmental toxicity, attention deficit
disorders.

So how do you identify which bottles are safe?
The trick is to look at the bottom of plastic ware, for the triangular recycle signs.
The look something like this:

So far, plastics with the number 2, 4 and 5 have yet to be reported to be dangerous or known to have caused any harmful effects. So your safest bet is to go with plastic products with these numbers.

Numbers to avoid:

#1 - The soft drinks or mineral water (PET) bottles

#3 - for PVC, which is not a food-grade plastic and should be avoided

#6 - The familiar white 'styrofoam' boxs used when we 'tapau' our food. These contain a harmful neurotoxin

#7 - PC falls under the miscellaneous plastics category, along with other classes of plastics

To be fair, PC bottle makers like Nalgene have come up with BPA free PC bottles now. Similarly, you can also find BPA-free baby feeding bottles in the market -- you just to be on a look out for these products.

Forestgrovelive.com has published this simple reference card that you can easily use as a guide. It doesn't specifically pick PET out as a danger, but like I said, there are lots of people have either support or reject this.... so its your choice!

Stay healthy ya!!