Yep, another frosty night, the other cars in the street were frost-free so it was about the lightest frost imaginable. But still. It stayed cool and dry all day. Well until about five, then something between mist and drizzle descended.

A relatively unproductive day. I was busy enough but I didn't achieve much. The best thing we did was getting Jan Geurts instructed about the new set-up and method of the validation handling. And I got the get-go from Theo on a few of the new validations. So tomorrow should be a fine filled day.

We got some XML samples indicating how we must fill a request (end receive the result) for availability of items in non-local warehouses (SAP). Nice but without DTD they leave just a little bit too much to our imagination.
Along with the samples they send us an XML viewer. Which needs a licensed (temporal) key. They also send a program for calculating that key. Which looks suspiciously like a cracker key generation tool. ( supplier: [ Westie ] cracker.: [ ultraschall ] packer..: [ blzrelpack ] ; "Blizzard was founded in Feb 98 and since this month we have released more than 2700+ quality releases for the scene."; lots of code names; ... ).
If it were my personal system I wouldn't even think about installing it, but this is a company PC and the program is passed from someone inside the company (MSCC?) I try the installation without entering a key but that doesn't work, installation stops after the third screen (splash, licence, key entry). I expected that.
What I didn't expect was that the program had made itself the default editor for XML by that time. And I find it as fully installed (but not working). Running the un-install works but doesn't remove the program from the registry. It is amazing how fast a program can spread itself in the registry, I surgically remove it from there replacing it with the appropriate programs where needed. I didn't have a backup of the registry (of course) so I edited the whole thing out by hand. And I didn't break anything (well nothing has crashed yet. xf )
Ronny installed it (generating a key) and runs it (without ill effects) but It doesn't do more than put up a nice collapsible view of what is in the XML file. A lot of functions only work in the 'licensed' version.
The XML coding is simpler and clearer for me than the collapsible graphical stuff so I am not missing anything.

 

Did any one notice the Florida counting machines were based on the latest developments in AI ?

Cool and wet but no frost in the morning. The rest of the day is nice and sunny (requiring closed blinds:( ) with just a short soft spat of rain in the afternoon.
Current (23:00) temp is 6.5C.

Hmm, someone chopped the cable to America. And with most of the world's traffic passing there the Internet is quite silent when that happens. Well maybe something else is happening. My pages are served form a box in Rotterdam (The Netherlands) and I only get at pages that I uploaded since Saturday. Anything older seems lost in the mists of time.
Well took till about 11:00 to get solved and it wasn't the cable to America but something locally. Any link or request to a server outside the Netherlands was blocked off.

I did get on a bit with the new validations and a few ancillary programs. Not as far or fast as I would have liked but then I had to be careful because Jan is testing so anything I do could cause him to crash. Easy does it sometimes.
I did some revamping on the documentation. Currently I am using frames, one holding a table of content and the other the actual content. Highly unsatisfactory. The new method gets rid of the frames and yet provided almost the same picture.

A few reboots and a whole working day later nothing has displayed unnatural behaviour so my registry surgery from Yesterday was successful.

I got the year calendar for next year ready. That is not the calendar I use on my site but the one used in the office for planning tasks (and holidays) hence the marking of weekends and official holidays.

And, BTW, I got Mike Barkman added to my daynotes mirror and on the Meet The Gang page there. Check him out and see if he flies high enough <g>

Cool, dry and again no frost even though we had a cloud-free night. We had an equally cloud free morning followed by a shrouded and grey afternoon. No real clouds either just the blue sky turning pale and grey.
Current (23:00) temp is 12.4C in, 2.1C out.

I woke up at about 4:40 (probably) because the moon was shining straight into my face. A waning but very brilliant moon in a pitch black sky, no stars no clouds. Lo-ve-ly. And worth waking up an hour early.

 

Just as I started checking a problem in the code I added yesterday Wilbert came by for transferring some of his workload.
Normally a bunch of programmers (Ronny and me for TeleSales, but there are some other projects going as well) do the development, coding and testing, and System Management, Wilbert and Tom, do the packing and shipping. They also made and maintain the version control system and are the sys-op's for all the AS/400 systems. And now they have to manage the SAP systems as well. Their tasks have been expanding but their time hasn't (sounds familiar anyone?).
Apart from becoming overloaded they were becoming a 'single point of failure'. Some years ago they knew each others tasks intimately so one could take over the others job blind. That is no longer the case, they can still take over but not blind anymore.
So now Wilbert is moving his TeleSales related tasks over to Ronny (on PC and NT) and Me (for the AS/400 side). Moving the tasks from one overloaded system to another overloaded system is called 'load balancing'. Right.
I spent a few hours standing by at the installation of the latest release of the Progress DataServer on the development AS/400. And then I started checking a bunch of code that is used to maintain and run the DataServer. We now have two release installed and they must be able to run parallel without interfering with each other. Did I mention that they will be serving from the same database?
I am at heart more a tool maker than a tool user so I love this type of work. I know, my normal job is also tool making but that are tools for users. The new part is making tools for toolmakers.

 

Bo Leuf discovered an error in my redirection page. I have a static link to the actual daynote for use in browsers that don't support (incapable of or switched off) redirection. I did change the redirection to the new week but I forgot to update the static link. I never noticed that because the page does redirect too fast for me. Bo uses Proximotion and that disables the redirection but fetches the pages linked to (for off-line browsing). So the wrong page is downloaded which means he has to get the right pages manually. Which beats the whole purpose of off-line browsing.

Cool (-2C) with clear skies but because the air is dry there was no frost. After a magnificent sunrise, it stays nice and bright all day. Up to and after the impressive sun set. Winter at its best.
Current (23:00) temp is 12.2C in, -1.7C out.

I spent most of the day going trough the Progress management programs checking and adapting for the next release.
And I got the new navigation layout for the documentation ready. Simple, consistent and without those damned frames. While doing that I hit on a method to pop up a message box without displaying the page where it starts from.
And Theo pushed the line/item calculation problem all the way to the top of the to do list. That list is looking quite top heavy and ready to capsize any moment now.
And the ....
AAaaarrrrcchhh.... stop it!

Cool, almost cold (-5C) and frost all over the place. Clear, unclouded nights do that sort of thing. They also lead into exhilarating sunrises tat are followed by enjoyable, sunny days. About the shortest you can get actually. It never got warmer than about 2C and there were only a few clouds. specially ordered for decoration.
Current (23:00) temp is 8.6C in, -2.1C out.

I do more or less the same stuff as yesterday only I start at the main menu and work my way down trough the program structure. On the AS/400 you typically don't work with big monolithic programs like on a PC. On a PC you write lots of small modules that get compiled into one big block. On the AS/400 each module remains a fully contained program. That is not the best way performance wise because a program call takes more time and resources than an procedure call. It does make for easy maintenance and version control.
So working my way down trough a menu means I pick up the command hooked on the first menu option and check that. Then I lookup the program that handles the command and check/adapt that. Then I check each program called by that first command processing program. And so on. In this case menu option 1 netted me a program tree of over 50 programs.

Oh, in between we had a discussion about a new function that is requested for the TOS application. (TOS is the e-Commerce side of the sales/TeleSales application). We are in stage two of the design cycle. The first release has been 'finished' and works, sort of, well, the concept is proven to the internal people. Now they start to add features that they think are needed. In this case, being a Web application some legal-eagle has been meddling in as well. For example, on a typical printed order form the back is printed, small font, with the sales conditions and liabilities that must be accepted by the customer. No one actually reads that (unless it is too late) but is there for legal-safety reasons. Now they demand that, at the end of the ordering process, just before the client presses the save button, a web page should be presented with just that same legalese dense printed stuff on.
And the non-legal eagles want, also just before pressing the send button, that a (printable) page gets presented with all the details of the order on it. The end result? Well you order one packed of paper and you have to confirm that about 5 times. And even then you cannot be sure the order gets processed, you only know that it has been passed on.
Modern times.

 

No wonder people have doubts about the quality of teaching in America :
http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/6/15653.html

Something is a miss with the server hosting my site. Since yesterday. I cannot get at it for uploading nor for fetching pages. It also serves my mail and I cannot get that trough either.

I got home and my father had bought some rays (we eat fish each Friday and usually one other day of the week as well). Normally he gets two small rays at about 500g each (1 pound) so he got the usual two rays.
One of them alone weighted about 1200g this time. Small mistake.
Also normally, because I get home late, around 20h00, Suzan starts the cooking and I finish it. And Suzan is not a talented cook. (). The only way she makes rays is by boiling them in a large kettle. We don't have a kettle that is big enough for the beast we had now so she was almost in panic. So I took over, smeared the fish with egg white, powdered it with flour and ginger and placed it in a large oven tray with a good measure of olive oil and a pinch of oregano. After about 40 minutes at gas-mark 6 it came out delicious with the fresh mustard and dill sauce and baked mushrooms (but still too much). Served it with a good Italian White whine (Soave).

Again a lovely cool and sunny day starting out with a frosted car (-3C) and a gorgeous sunrise. And a beautiful sunny day. Late in the evening we get a little mist which will probably freeze down by morning.
Current (23:00) temp is 12.6C in, -4.6C out.

Shopping. Wine and spices, some food and fruit. And a PC.
But did I need one?
Not really but I wanted to give my father access to the network. Especially since the Jaz drive in Timareen broke. Timareen is three years old now with just enough memory and a fairly slow disk. Simply adding a network card should work but I intended to add extra memory as well. But the mainboard only accepts SIMMs (72 variety) and they are relatively scarce these days, with prices going a bit higher than DIMMs. So, after a good look I decided it would be better to replace the box completely.
WinME is installed but it is the Dutch version. I will replace that with WinME English version when I get that. And the wireless network stuff hasn't arrived yet either so the box will remain on the attic for some time.

And my site is up again. Masset moved the servers to another location (still in Rotterdam, just another building). Together with the move they got new IP numbers. The moving took just about half an hour (per bunch of servers) but the DNS update at Core was not done. Only the day after moving the boxes (and after a few reminders) the people at Core updated the records.

Cool and dry (with lots of frost as I predicted) in the morning but, after a grand purple-red-golden sunrise clouds come drifting in even with some rain in the afternoon.

I do feel I missed out on running last week. Or maybe it is just that I haven't recovered to a full 100% from my cold. One advantage of the cold weather is that I have no overheating problems. Not when running in shorts and a t-shirt that is <g>

I try to install first Linux, then Win98 on Aria all to no avail. I also try to install either one on the new box also without success. To place the new box close enough to the KVM switch I had to place it on top of Aria. So I had to place the cover on her. Frustrated by the misfiring installations I swap the disks again and in stead of shutting Aria down I press the reset button.
When I return after lunch (and doing the dishes) I am greeted by an install screen form Open Linux running on Aria. So while most people have a problem keeping their systems from over heating I seem to be suffering from under cooling.
To confirm that theory I place a small 500W electric heating fan up blowing into the new box. And indeed, when I try to install Win98 five minutes later I do get halfway into the installation (I stop there because I don't actually want Win98 on it).
It is now about 10C on the attic which is fine for me (shorts and a sweater) but apparently that is not enough for floppy and CD drives. Reading to what length overclockers go to keep their system cool I guess the motherboard shouldn't have a problem at 10C and the hard disk will probably be OK as well. Speaking of overclockers, maybe I should rent the attic <g>

I am going to make the classic Christmas cake myself tomorrow. I don't have any of the special sugar or chocolate ornaments for it so I try to make some. But I fail. The problem is that I melt some chocolate and pour it into a few pres-out forms and it doesn't want to solidify again. It remains soft, even after a few hours in the deep freezer. On a second batch I don't actually get the chocolate to melt into a smooth liquid but it remains rather lumpy.
So I will make do without extra ornaments.

Christmas these days is more about commerce than religion. Belgians spend over 8 billion BEF yesterday via credit cards (that is about $200 Million).