Posts by Alex Brooker

what next, man dies on toilet?

Firstly, condolences to the friends and family of this poor man who died.

Secondly, this whole media hype about internet/computer related stories is so old. News stories like 'man meets mugger online', 'someone finds love via the internet', 'someone buys something on the internet', 'someone dies while thinking about buying somehting on eBay'. Guess what? People die all the time, every day, doing things that we all do all the time. Human beings enjoy endorphin producing activities and will always binge. One of UK PLC crown jewels just won a contract that will secure thousands and thousands of jobs and will ensure secure upbringings for thousands more children. British companies keeping this country up with the best in the world in high tech systems - and we hear almost nothing.

.....can't....look....away.....

I haven't read the article, I can't. The huge Dell banner ad to the right makes it impossible for me to concentrate on the words. I am only 27, I don't think its my brain.....

Make it the default

It has only been since wireless router vendors (or is it the broadband suppliers) have supplied equipment with WEP set up out of the box that most home networks have been protected at all. Most consumers can't be bothered to set up security - so save them the hassle with out-the-box WPA with a nice big key and a decent quick-start poster on linking your existing machines to it.

A tip: Set up the IPs statically and leave the DHCP switced on, only ban all addresses the DHCP will provide. Couple this with WPA and MAC address filtering and it might take up to half an hour for the hacker to get in :)

Stat Padders or Problem solvers?

That is the question to ask.

For the non-gamers: Stat padders exploit game(s) to increase positive attributes unfairly, using cheats or other means. i.e. it's easy to collect CV technologies.

Big organisations can afford to have lots of stat padders, as they have the large projects, the contingency and in a lot of cases the (easliy manipulated and seduced) enthusiastic graduates who will save the project. SMEs or parts of large businesses who try to act like SMEs need problem solvers and can't afford (as many) stat padders. I don't know how to knock up a form in Qt - but I'll google it, get a demo version and work it out. I couldn't care less how corba works, but if a customer has a system to integrate with, and we need to quote for a C# wrapper by the end of the day - I'll get on with it!

A technically acute problem-solving mind, a motivation for getting the job done and understanding of the business domain in order to get the work in..... you have a real find.

One more thing: The article implies that a dream team is possible - I think that you always have to compromise between having a dream team and crippling the rest of the business.

cheers,

Alex, Dorchster