So often in my line of work, technology, I encounter the dilemma of watching technology emerge that does not directly benefit the end users; technology that sometimes makes life needlessly difficult. So, it’s at a time like this when I hear about a new development where technology is applied to a useful purpose that will give people great enjoyment, that I applaud the developers.

A couple of days ago I got around to setting up MovableType 4 on my blog server. All went well for the upgrade as usual and I was very happy with the new features and the new look and feel of the upgraded platform. However, last evening I think I have stumbled across the first bug. I have my Flickr account setup to post images to my blog via XML-RPC and this appears to have broken since the upgrade. So, I tried the usual steps of recreating the Flickr setup through my Flickr account and resetting the web services password in MovableType but nothing seems to work. Flickr complains of an invalid password and I cannot setup the feature again because of this. Anyone else stumble across this problem since upgrading to MT4?

I’ve been waiting to get around to this for a while and finally took the plunge. MovableType 4, my blogging software’s latest update, is here and it’s very different to 3.x. Different in a very alluring and aesthetically pleasing way. The administration interface has come on in leaps and bounds to look like a very professional piece of web software. Under the hood, I’m not sure if too much has changed but the top layer is a welcome change. Furthermore, this upgrade has finally allowed me to make use of the “notify me of further comments” subscription option that is only available in version 4 through the use of Rob Synnott’s plug-in. The upgrade itself is incredibly painless, coming from 3.34 as a base. Go for it! If you notice any problems please let me know.

If like me you’ve run into the wonders of WordPress permalinks previously and hit brick walls such as 404 and 403 HTTP errors when you change from the default ?p=ID to the pretty /blog/2007/07/12/entry, then this post is for you and the many other people who have asked me this question previously. Not sure why considering the fact that I use MovableType as my blogging software but anyway!

Changing your permalink structure from the WordPress default to the pretty, year/month/day/entry-id or similar custom structure can cause problems for some people depending on the setup of their hosting infrastructure. [..]

Here’s an interesting idea: A library to contain an archive of e-mails submitted by the public. A means of capturing a snapshot of our lives in this technological era. This could lead to some interesting content accrued over the years being made available as a source of entertainment to the public. I often thought that it was a shame that some of my older relatives never had their stories recorded for the ages but it looks like our generation will have a means of ensuring that our life experience is not lost. Must keep an eye on this project and see if it spreads to Ireland and Europe. source: Email Britain

Dell have finally made their decision on Linux and will soon be offering Ubuntu Linux as an option for their machines. Finally after all these years people will have a choice of what they actually want on their PC or Notebook. It will be interesting to see what effect this has on Vista uptake from now on when people are given the ability to choose. source: The Register

Yesterday, Carlow became Ireland’s first hotspot town. Congratulations to Carlow and whoever attracted this project. I believe that the difference between this project and other wireless offerings is that it’s all account-based and you can use your broadband account anywhere within reach of a hotspot rather than just in your home. I have yet to see a statement to this effect though. However, there has to be a reason that this is better than the Digiweb offering in Carlow Town. The internet access will also be made available to passers by with WiFi enabled devices for approximately EUR 3.50 per hour. It’s a little expensive for using your own equipment but I admit that I’ve paid more in the UK in the past. If this pilot project is successful then it might spark the setup of WiFi hopspot towns and cities all over Ireland. Coincidently this follows on the back of the London mesh network that was announced in the last week and more unfortunately it also falls on the back of the recent arguments in the media of the supposed dangers of wireless radiation on the general public. source: Irish Times

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About two weeks or so ago I posted a quick intro to Orbitfiles.com, an online backup solution that provides 6GB of free space to put your stuff. Naturally when I first saw it I signed up without thinking as why would you refuse free space? Well I’ve only just gotten around to really using the service in the last few days and as promised I’m posting a quick review of the offering.

Overall I’d have to give it a thumbs up in terms of simplicity and doing exactly what it says on the tin. The interface is very simple to follow with the one notable exception of how to change your password. Creating folders, selecting content for upload and managing uploaded content are all pretty straightforward and not so taxing that your average web user without any technical grounding couldn’t figure out. The option to allow public access to your files is also interesting but why you would want to do this I’m not so sure. When you consider that youtube covers sharing video content, flickr has the photo audience, Google pretty much have the documents and spreadsheets market covered and e-mail does pretty much everything else. I don’t really see the advantage of making it all publicly available. Perhaps if there were accounts you could set up yourself for restricted access but not generally accessible. As a quick and dirty backup option for non-sensitive data though I would be happy to continue using the service for small amounts of files. Backing up anything larger than 15MB from my home BB connection is just painfully slow and not worth ignoring my NAS or DVD writer for.

Downsides of the service include the HTTP upload problem of selecting file at a time uploads but at least the web interface tries somewhat to appease users by offering the option of multiple file boxes per upload action. The JavaScript/Ajax thingy that is supposed to act as a live feedback of your current upload seems to break in Firefox on my Mac and therefore leaves you wondering when it might finish uploading large quantities of data. There is definitely a reason to have an uploader client here to drag and drop directories rather than having to tar everything up first. Enter Hercules but sadly this is only available for the Windows platform at the moment. Hercules also offers the ability to schedule backups and so, might be attractive for the paranoid amongst us using always-on connections. The team also offer a mobile version of the site for backing up while on the move. Finally, the last feature that caught my eye was the ability to zip up multiple files and folders in your account by simply selecting them and clicking the zip button. Convenient if you only want to download a single bundle or increase your available backup space. For non-techie users it’s far simpler to understand than using gmail as a hard drive and that’s probably were it will get a lot of custom from. Good free service overall, not sure how much I will use it but I can definitely see it being a blip on my radar now and then.