LolocoJr » Misc

Suriname

andy — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 15:18:05 +0000

Currently enjoying some vacation in Suriname.

Update: and back again (2009-03-06)

Sold!

andy — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 09:50:00 +0000

We sold our apartment a few weeks before the credit crunch hit hard, phew! We already purchased a new house (new construction) last year. Last week we had to move out of apartment. Unfortunately the new house is not yet finished. Well it is, but the utility companies still need to their stuff and the municipality needs to finish the roads, in that order. the new location is just 1 block away because we really like Osdorp and wanted to stay in or around Amsterdam.

In the meantime we’ll be moving between my sis and brother-in-law. c’mon waternet, move!

Getting rid of KPN

andy — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 11:40:00 +0000

So, we moved and I canceled all our subscriptions at the old address. So I thought, it turns out KPN has /dev/null’d my cancellation request for the fixed line twice in a row. Each time customer relations assured me it would take 5 working days for the request to be processed. I just called them a third time now, because the line was active. The kind lady gave me a reference number for the cancellation order. So, whenever you deal with KPN I think it’s a good idea to ask for the reference number of the case or order.

Moving in 3 weeks!

andy — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 18:16:42 +0000

Earlier in the year we sold our appartement and bought a new house. With 2 kids it was simply not fun anymore in our cosy appartement on the 4th floor. We won’t get the keys of our new house, which is in the final stages of construction, for another month or two. In the meantime we have to make room for the new owners so the next couple of weeks are gonna be extra hectic and very interesting to say the least.

Meetings

andy — Mon, 05 May 2008 09:44:00 +0000

Found here (thanks Jan). Soo true! Happy telecommuter for 2 years now, with the occasional Meeting midweek. I do not expect to be productive (code-wise) on those days.

Keeping things in perspective

andy — Sun, 16 Sep 2007 22:21:00 +0000

Someone pointed out an article on How programming can ruin your life. I really enjoyed reading it and could definitely find myself in some (but not all) of the conclusions. The best remedy is IMHO replication. Nothing like your own version 2.0 to keep things in perspective:

Old new job

andy — Tue, 21 Aug 2007 20:41:00 +0000

I accepted a job offer 2 months ago at IndependentIP as “technical teamleader”. My “proefperiode” just finished and I’ll definitely be staying on, really love the way the company works. Lots of smart and funny (as in: haha) people working there too, time flies when you’re having fun!!!! And we’re definitely going to change the face of music distribution, keep watching!!

Switch from Typo to Mephisto

andy — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 12:51:00 +0000

After the final botched Typo upgrade I gave up on it and am now serving this blog from Mephisto (0.7.3). The migration went fine. Luckily I still had a copy from the old Typo database structure since the Typo SVN version is not compatible with the migrations scripts from Mephisto. So far everything seems to work fine, except for the Sections. But I can now tweak Mephisto without fear. Typo has become such a huge opaque monster making changes felt like gambling. The last Typo version I checked out had over 35.000 files in the trunk!

The only downside I see so far with using Mephisto is that it’s even more obscure than Typo so there is no ready-made migration path to anything else

With the migration completed I will start posting articles again..for real

Update: Mephisto’s SPAM filtering (through Akismet) actually works and the approval process is very well done. I also like the Overview section.

Home office upgrade, new LCD!

andy — Thu, 21 Dec 2006 12:25:00 +0000

Yesterday the new Dell 24” 2407WFP arrived for my home office, woohoo! I was really torn over which monitor to get, either the Dell 24” or Apple’s Cinema 23” display. The 30% off deal from Dell this week made it really easy in the end. The Dell was €400,- “cheaper”, 1” larger, has composite, s-video and component (PS2 already hooked up!) and finally even HDCP support for future HD-DVD/Blu-Ray/Playstation3 integration! Finally, OS X and Linux (again) in 1920×1200

Specs:

Screen size	24”
Native resolution	1920×1200
Contrast ratio	1000:1
Brightness	450 cd/m2
Response time	6 ms
Inputs	DVI (with HDCP) VGA Composite Component S-video 4x USB + card reader

HP Laserjet 1020 on OSX

andy — Sat, 26 Aug 2006 10:46:00 +0000

We purchased a couple of dirt cheap LaserJet 1020 printers for the office and home. While they work fine in Windows and Ubuntu Linux (with proper hackery applied) getting it to work on OSX is not straight forward. If you google around you’ll find both success and horror stories on this printer. It seems HP supports the newer 1022 model officially but not the 1020. Turns out the 1022 driver will work fine for a 1020 if, and that’s a big IF, you get Mac OSX to list it in the printer list. This thread on macosxhints.com was the most informative of all. I tried the suggestions a couple of days ago but to no avail. This morning I tried again and with success! All the steps seem to be there, but the following order worked for me:

Download; http://www.railsguru.com/assets/2007/4/16/1601_LJ_1022_Series_OSX.dmg;
If you have anything for the HP 1020 in ”/Library/Reciepts” delete it.
Delete anything for the HP 1020 in Printer in “Printer Setup Utility”
Install the downloaded printer drivers
Remove all files from /Library/Printers/hp/laserjet. Leave the 1020 subfolder! You’ll need the contents in the next step;
Move all files from the 1020 subfolder to /Library/Printers/hp/laserjet (the parent);
Restart Mac OSX, just for luck;
Add new printer in “Printer Setup Utility”, select HP LaserJet 1020, driver should come up, click ADD

Disclaimer: this worked for me™. No guarantee the above steps will hose your printer setup or other things.