Web Cam

Some time ago I discovered a wonderful tool, LogMeIn, which allows me to remote control another computer onto which I've installed it. This, as you can imagine, makes my support easier, because it's often possible to remotely control a PC, find out what the problem is, and fix it without having to trawl all the way over to Woking.

I've already used it on my home computer today, and have made valuable use of it in the past, to check how something reacts when it's not hidden behind the barbed-wire-and-concrete of my work ISA server.

So you're getting the picture that it's a very useful thing to have. It's like having a window into your own home.

As I strolled back from lunch this afternoon, I was struck with a sudden desire to have a similar thing attached to my Freezer. I planned to use some of my lunchtime to place my shopping order online, but I really wanted to find out if I have any mince in my freezer.

What I want is the ability to log into my freezer remotely, and find out what I've got in there.

Black

Wearing black one always looks mysterious and Gothic.

Until one has to move old computer equipment, after which one merely looks rather dusty and sad.

Communication

How is it, do you suppose, that we cannot communicate with those we love the best?

So there you are, madly in love with someone new. This isn't just a physical lusty thing, it's a true meeting of minds, and you can talk about anything and everything. Your nights are spent together in a dizzying whirl of lust and deep, meaningful, philosophical conversation. This isn't just chatting, it's real communication, and this person is obviously the person with whom you're going to spend the rest of your life.

All is fabulous until the day you make that little throwaway comment which makes your new and exciting partner look at you as if you've just bitten the head off a puppy. And not just any puppy - this was their favourite puppy whilst growing up - the one they played with and walked every single day until the beast died in their arms of old age. That puppy. The one they mourned with a passion abated only by your very own arrival in their lives, with your complete, utter and perfect connection to them.

And just so that you never have to see that look of total disappointment on their wonderful face again, you tuck away inside, that little part of you which made you say that oh-so-hurtful thing, and a tiny part of you dies just a little bit.

The sad thing is that this goes on, every year brings another look from the puppy face, and in time, the perfect communication you shared during those long, hot, passionate nights is a whisper of a memory, replaced by small talk of those subjects you know, from long experience, don't elicit that bittersweet expression.

And then comes the melancholy day that your flawless love, for whom you killed such a lot of your own personality, moves on, because they are no longer able to communicate with you. But they've found someone new, and this time it's perfect. Again.

Y2K Disaster?

Even now, 8 years after the millennium, I keep reading that the only Y2K disaster was the fact that so many companies bought into the issue, and piled hundreds of thousands of pounds into fixing it. I remember that for quite some years afterwards, there were many articles jeering at these so-called "morons" for buying into the hype, and sending their money gurgling down the drain of the consultants pockets.

What I don't see is anyone actually defending much of this spend. OK - yes, there were some jokers insisting that your washing machine, tumble dryer, dishwasher and even your toaster were going to be affected by this move from '99 to '00. Thankfully most people were above such panic (although there were sad, sad stories of people actually "upgrading" their white goods because they had been suckered into believing that they'd stop working at midnight on 1999!) and were able to see that it wouldn't matter what year your white goods thought it was, because it'll function just as well in 1900 as 2000.

What did matter were many database systems where the year information had been stored as a two digit number instead of a 4 digit number. It's very simple, but there was a hell of a lot of data out there with just that problem, and the companies who had such databases paid to make sure they were up to date by the end of 1999. There were other systems where the year mattered, and these were updated too. The reason the "millennium bug" failed to bring the world to its knees was because so many companies had paid so much money to ensure that systems would NOT cause problems.

I worry, in retrospect, about claims that aircraft would fall out of the sky because they'd suddenly stop working on the dot of midnight 1999. Even now, I just can't see how this could possibly have been an issue. HOW would this have worked? If I change the date in my PC back to January 1900 (actually, the internal clock wont let me go back further than 1980), is my computer going to suddenly think - "Oh my God! They didn't have computers back in 1900! I can't work any more."? Well, let's look at this logically - I'd be thrilled if my computer started thinking at all! But computer systems don't, as yet, have any kind of awareness save what we've programmed into them, so, no, I think it unlikely my computer would worry about the fact that computers hadn't been invented in 1900. Similarly, I'd be prepared to bet that no aircraft would have any kind of programming which would give said aircraft cause to worry that no-one was able to fly back in 1900, so it shouldn't be able to fly either. I can see no reason to have year information in the programming of an aircraft at all. That said, I bet Airforce 1 has some pretty fancy software!

Has it ever occurred to these people who now dismiss the whole Y2K bug theory as having been a load of old hokum, that the reason it didn't hit us nastily was because it was part hokum, and part preparation.