Dec 25, 2007 0
This morning when arriving at work I had this tune stuck in my head, and it wouldn’t go away. Don’t you find it so annoying when that happens? All I had was something like “…floating on air… on a wing an a prayer…”, that was it. So a little Googling later I find out it’s the theme to “Greatest American Hero”, a short lived US TV show from 1981-1983. As far as I know I’ve never even seen the show but I guess I have heard the theme.
Dec 25, 2007 0
Gulfnews: UAE and Bahrain top Arab world in internet and cellphone access: “The UAE tops the Arab world in the number of internet users per every thousand users, but is placed second behind Bahrain in the use of cellular phones, according to a 2005 statistics.
It is also second behind Lebanon in the use of fixed-line telephones, the figures showed.
The Human Development Report 2007-2008, issued by the United Nations Development Programme (undp) says that the UAE tops the Arab countries in the area of web access, with 308 users per every 1000 persons.
Kuwait ranks second with 276 for every 1000 persons, followed by Qatar with 269 and Bahrain with 213. Lebanon is placed in the fifth position with 196 users for every 1,000 persons.
Oman comes eighth with 111 users and Saudi Arabia is ranked 11th, with 70 users for every 1,000 persons.
On the use of cellular phones, Bahrain tops the Arab world with 1,030 subscribers per every 1,000 persons, the UAE follows at second position with 1,000 subscribers, Kuwait at third position with 939 subscribers, followed by Qatar with 882 subscribers. Saudi Arabia, Tunisia and Oman trail the list with 575, 566 and 519 respectively.
With regard to standard fixed-line telephones, Lebanon tops the Arab world with 277 telephones per 1000 persons.
The UAE follows with 273 telephones, followed by Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia with 270, 253 201 and 164 respectively, while Oman is placed 12th, with 103 telephone lines per 1,000 persons.
In view of the above figures, the report shows that members of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) occupied almost all the leading positions in the Arab world in the use of modern means of telecommunication.”
Dec 23, 2007 0
The last couple of days I’ve been getting strange things happening in my RSS reader for 7Days’ feed. Many articles in their feed appear three or four times, exactly the same thing. This morning, by chance, I checked their site and the same problem seem to be there.
I think someone needs to look at their publishing system.
Dec 22, 2007 0
Dubai Building $1 Billion Jurassic Park: “A new $1.1 billion Jurassic theme park called Restless Planet, is being built in Dubai. The park will feature 109 animatronic dinosaurs of over 40 different species in a 500,000 square foot (46,000 square metre) space. The new park will be the star attraction of a large Las Vegas-esque entertainment and business development called City of Arabia.”
Dec 22, 2007 0
March of millions: “Provided by 7DAYS.ae
Perched on their fathers shoulders, children joined the almost 2.5 million Muslim pilgrims thronging the Saudi holy city of Mina yesterday to cast their stones at Satan. Worshippers, dressed in the traditional white religious robes, filled the roads as they edged their way towards the sacred Jamarat Bridge to hurl rocks at the three pillars which symbolise the devil.
According to the figures given by the authorities a total of 2,454,325 pilgrims are performing the pilgrimage this year from 181 nations. The walls are traditionally believed to be the place where the devil appeared to Abraham, his wife Hagar and son Ishmael.
After the stoning, the pilgrims celebrate Eid al-Adha, literally the day of sacrifice, when animals, normally sheep - but also goats, cows and camels, are sacrificed, in remembrance of Abrahams readiness to sacrifice his son to God. The human wave approached the bridge amid tight security imposed in a bid to prevent repeats of the fatal crushes which have typified parts of past rituals and which have claimed thousands of lives.
In January last year, 364 people were killed in huge crush during the stoning ceremony and a similar tragedy in 2004 saw 251 people trampled to death. The worst incident occurred in 1990 when 1,426 people suffocated to death in a tunnel in Mina after a ventilation system broke down. Saudi authorities have built a third level on to the bridge complex to ease the pressure, allowing more than 200,000 people an hour to cast pebbles they collected the previous day.
The vast crowds can be particularly dangerous for children who can become separated from their family among the turbulent sea of people. Thousands of medical staff were stationed around the bridge to the treat cuts and bruises of pilgrims hit by stones which missed their intended target.
Read more UAE News on www.7days.ae“
Dec 21, 2007 0
Rich asks:
Without revealing any financials or numbers from which financials could be derived, could you satisfy the geek curiosity in me and share a few details from 37 Signals apps? Number of customers, contacts, projects, milestones, files on S3, number of servers, logical infrastructure topology, etc.
Here are some rough numbers we can share:
We’re currently upgrading our server infrastructure to use significantly faster hardware along with the Xen virtualization software, so we’ll have fewer servers to manage. Our current server cluster contains around 30 machines, ranging from single processor file servers to 8 CPU application servers, for a total of around 100 CPUs and 200GB of RAM. Over the next couple of months, we plan to reduce the number of servers to 16 with around 92 CPU cores (each significantly faster than what we use today) and around 230 GB of combined RAM. Not only will our applications run faster, but our cluster will be much simpler to manage when we’re done.
Email svn at 37signals dot com and title the email ‘Ask 37signals’. Thanks!
“
(Via Signal vs. Noise.)
Dec 21, 2007 0
Norway mandates use of open formats: HTML, ODF and PDF: “Government, state and regional agencies, authorities and services may also publish in other formats, but they must always publish in one of these formats. The decree is retroactive, and by 2014 all documents published prior to this decree must have been converted and made available in one of the three formats.”
(Via digg.)
Dec 21, 2007 0
Review: Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon takes on Mac OS X Leopard for the OS of the Year |
Linux Magazine: “Today we have a technological cage match involving two operating systems, both UNIX- based, both mature, both with passionate detractors and even more passionate defenders, and both released just a week apart. I’m talking, of course, about Ubuntu 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon), with its final release on October 18, and Apple’ s Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard, which was available for purchase on October 26.
The stereotype for each OS is well known: Mac OS X is elegant, easy-to-use, and intuitive, while Ubuntu is stable, secure, and getting better all the time. Both have come a long way in a short time, and both make excellent desktops. So we have two great desktop operating systems out at roughly the same time. Let’s see how they stack up against each other.”
Dec 20, 2007 0
Back to My Mac: Supported router devices (Mac OS X 10.5): “
Back to My Mac (BTMM) is a new feature in Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard that makes it easy to automatically connect to your other computers over the Internet. It requires the use of either an AirPort base station with NAT-PMP (NAT Port Mapping Protocol), or a third-party Internet router with UPnP (Universal Plug and Play) technology.
For more information on setting up Back to My Mac, see this article.
Note: For best compatibility with Back to My Mac you should always use:
Dec 18, 2007 0
Jailbreaking OTB 1.1.2 iPhone: “
Not terribly long ago I provided instructions for jailbreaking an iPhone that had been upgraded to iPhone software version 1.1.2. In short order the comments area was choked with questions regarding iPhones that shipped with 1.1.2. Could they also be jailbroken?
Seems likely to me, thought I, but am I or am I not the kind of guy who’s willing to put a few bucks on the line to find out for sure? Turns out I am. I purchased a new iPhone the other day to see exactly how easy it is to jailbreak it without also signing up for another AT&T account (after all, how many iPhones does one person need?). The procedure is not that difficult, but it requires a few extra steps not required of an iPhone that has been updated.
I could regurgitate what I’ve previously written and then include those extra steps but, quite honestly, I think you’ll gain the greatest benefit from visiting modmyifone.com to view its Getting Started iPhone Modding OS X guide. It’s a clearly illustrated, three-page guide that takes you from a boxed iPhone running iPhone software version 1.1.2 to an activated and jailbroken 1.1.2 iPhone. For all intents and purposes, what you wind up with is an 8GB iPod touch that bears a camera and speaker.
(By activated I mean only that the iPhone won’t bug you to activate it as, after you’ve followed this procedure, iTunes and the iPhone will believe that it’s activated. Of course it isn’t so you can’t use it to make calls unless you really activate it.)
I performed the operation on a MacBook Pro running Mac OS X 10.5.1 (Leopard) and iTunes 7.5. Worked like a charm.
The usual disclaimers: If you muck it up, you’re on your own. I performed the operation successfully twice but you may not be so lucky. Also note that this procedure will not unlock your iPhone for the purposes of using a different carrier. This procedure is useful only for installing third-party applications on your phone.
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“
(Via iPhone Central.)
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