Posts from September 2006

And just this once, not mine.

When you take out a Self Invested Pension Plan (SIPP), most SIPP schemes are unable to accept Protected Rights.

Imagine my surprise, then, when Sippdeal contact me asking for authorisation to make a payment from my SIPP to Equitable Life in respect of a refund of Protected Rights payments that the Government are requesting, in turn, from Equitable Life.

Equitable Life claim this refund is now very urgent because the original request was made in January 2006 and no response has been received.

I ask Sippdeal why they didn't forward this original letter from Equitable Life to me in January. The answer was simple. Sippdeal did not receive any such letter from Equitable Life in January 2006. Sippdeal are efficient. Sippdeal communicate via email. Sippdeal send me copies of correspondence from Equitable scanned into a PDF. Sippdeal answer my emails promptly. Sippdeal are well informed and helpful.

So I contact Equitable Life directly and ask them why a refund of protected rights contributions is required from a SIPP that was legally unable to receive any protected right contributions.

Inevitably, after a lengthy delay and some 'research', it transpires the letter (both of them in fact) were sent to Sippdeal 'by mistake' and should have been sent to my other pension provider.

I'm not sure whether my decision to consolidate all my pension plans into a SIPP was the correct one and whether my SIPP funds will outperform the fund managers in grey suits.

However, for the pleasure of not having to deal with Equitable Life any longer (apart from the rare interruption caused by their unbelievable incompetence), I'm prepared to take my chances.

Yesterday I had a pretty bad day. I got up early and drove to Chesterfield. Unfortunately, the performance environment was not available as originally planned (overrunning weekend engineering works) so I simply collected some data and drove back to London.

Still, it could have been worse. The original plan had me staying overnight in a hotel in Chesterfield.

Although this unexpected change of plan was inconvenient and tiring, it still wasn't as terrible as this gentleman's bad day

I'm still here. I've been in hospital after accidentally locking myself in one of my beehouses. I was stung so much that I have given up beekeeping as a pursuit.

I am certain he has made the correct decision in giving up beekeeping. Maybe he should now study 'How to unlock a door - quickly !'

Dad - please can I have 5 pounds ?

If I were to give you the 5 pounds, what exactly would you spend the money on ?

'I'm going into town to buy Emma a CD for her birthday.'

'...but surely 5 pounds won't be enough.'

'Well Mum gave me 15 pounds but I can get the CD for 8 pounds from Tesco'

'Oh I see. Now you've got me interested. You have already secured seed funding from an angel investor. Net margin close to 100%. What will your turnover be in years 2 and 3 ?'

'Oh just forget it. I'll use some of my babysitting money.'

[In a amazing development, the entrepreneur reveals she has a second business which she hasn't even disclosed]

'What babysitting money ?'

'I got 20 pounds for babysitting for the Barnstormworths last Saturday night'

'Why the Barnstormworths ?'

'Well they pay the most and I always babysit when Mrs Barnstormworth is driving'

'What do you mean ?'

'Well - it's 3.75 pound an hour but if Mr Barnstormworth has been drinking, he can't do the sums for quarters of an hour so he just rounds up to 5 pound an hour.'

'Any plans to grow the business ?'

'Well Mum said next year, I could babysit in mid-week if my homework was finished and after midnight the rate doubles'.

'OK. Let me tell you where I stand...'

'Dad - please can I just have 5 pounds or I'll miss the bus ?'

'I like the sound of the business model but the valuation is simply ridiculous so I am prepared to make you an offer of 4 pounds for 10% equity in the CD racketeering business and 40% equity in the babysitting company. '

[After this astounding and unexpected turnaround, this young person looks to have secured the funding]

'However there is one important fact that you have completely overlooked a fatal flaw...'

'What's that, Dad ?'

'You won't have any time for babysitting as you'll be staying in looking after Norman Junior while me and your mum go out and enjoy ourselves. This service will be completely free of charge. Therefore, I am withdrawing my offer. You didn't pitch well. You don't have a viable business plan. You don't know anything about

CRM.

You're young and inexperienced. You don't listen to advice. So that's it. I'm not interested in working with you and I'm certainly not interested in investing so I'm out.'

'Mum - can I have 5 pounds ?'

[With apologies to Cabaret Voltaire]

I want to synchronise my Thunderbird address book between work and home and my Palm Vx. I also want to synchronise Google Calendar with Sunbird and my aging Palm. This is for two reasons; to synchronise and simultaneously back the data up. I feel nervous and exposed, like an Oracle DBA relying on nightly exports.

One option was to repeatedly export/import the data between applications but that is far too time consuming and I am lazy.

I noted with interest, Matt's recent experiences with Plaxo but decided that the name sounded too much like Sage & Onion stuffing. Also, the Plaxo Thunderbird plug-in doesn't currently support multiple address books.

Then I happened across EngTech's superb blog and this excellent article which describes how to use ScheduleWorld as a synchronisation hub (using SyncML) to synchronise anything to anything in any direction and put an end to all human suffering (well almost).

I signed up for a free ScheduleWorld account (the login page looks strangely reminiscent of Google) and successfully synchronised ScheduleWorld with Google Calendar.

Then I downloaded the Calendar Sync4j extension for Thunderbird 1.5 and synchronised an appointment ('MUFC v Celtic') from the Thunderbird Calendar to ScheduleWorld onto Google (and all the way back again).

The I remembered what I was actually supposed to be doing and configured Thunderbird to access the ScheduleWorld LDAP server. This worked once I read the documentation properly and used the numeric ID (instead of the email account).

This is not truly synchronisation in the old sense of propreitary conduits and commercial products. This is purely storing data on a server with an open, standard (LDAP) interface manipulated using various client applications to perform, err, synchronisation.

Now Thunderbird could retrieve contact details from ScheduleWorld. Unfortunately, Thunderbird currently has no SyncML support embedded so Thunderbird is unable to modify the address book. However, I was able to export addreses to LDIF format, import to the ScheduleWorld server and manage (clean) the data using the ScheduleWorld Web interface.

ScheduleWorld doesn't currently support ~~bisexual~~ bi-directional synchronisation with Gmail contacts which would be the 'killer app' and the icing on the cake but if/when the Google API allows it, even this may be possible.

The only disadvantages in this blissful state of nirvana is the fact that the Palm is now an legacy application, an islolated silo and I will erase the entire contents of my Palm address book. Consequently, I will forget to send Great Auntie Agatha a Christmas card including my traditional round-up of the year together with a delightful family photograph.

This is because Great Auntie Agatha doesn't have an email address and her details solely resided on the Palm. Great Auntie Agatha will then pass away peacefully in her sleep next May. All my relatives will be rich beyond their wildest dreams while I will receive absolutely nothing after this Christmas card debacle.

I will then be forced to pursue legal action against 'EngTech' and the brilliant author of 'ScheduleWorld' so if someone could furnish me with their real names and addresses, I would be eternally grateful.

Whats going on ere, then ?

Woof.

I briefly used Box.net as a virtual 1GB memory stick. Briefly because after the initial transfer of important files, the onus was on me to identify files I had changed recently and upload them.

Mozy seems better suited to lazy people. You simply download a lightweight client, identify folders you want mirrored and Mozy encrypts and mirrors them, quietly in the background.

When you add new files, Mozy mirrors the incremental changes. Mozy offers 2GB of storage for free.

Also, Mozy includes the phrase 'Reticulating splines' during initialisation.

Thankfully, I dont have cause to use Microsoft Excel much. My kids can produce pretty charts about the demographics of pet ownership in the classroom better and quicker than I can.

Excel is a very powerful product but the sheer size and complexity of the software is just overwhelming which makes it difficult (for novices) to accomplish straightforward tasks.

For example, people are kind enough to send me gargantuan, complex spreadsheets where I want to freeze the header row while scrolling data down to the sole point of interest on row 23,538. A seemingly simple task.

Microsoft Excel

Exhaustively search all Menu options. Look in online help. Ask that irritating paperclip wizard: 'So what is it you are trying to do, you idiot ?'. Try some random control key combinations. Plaintively ask for the data in Oracle DMP format.

Slump over the keyboard, weeping in despair, randomly striking keys which unexpectedly reveals a buried Easter Egg (a fully fledged Doom clone). No wonder Excel is so bloated. Search the Microsoft Web site. Search using Google.

Finally, admit defeat and sheepishly ask a (Microsoft Certified) colleague who sneers 'God - don't you even know that ? Place the cursor on the row you want to lock. Hit Windows-Freeze Panes. There you go. Oh no - sorry - you place the cursor on the first row you want to scroll normally.'

Google Spreadsheets

Sort - Fix Header Rows - Freeze 1 row. Screen updated to reflect user action (1 row frozen). Done.

Sometimes, less is more.

Thoroughly enjoying Margave of the Marshes and pleased to see The Chameleons get a mention:

For David Fielding of The Chameleons, that meant loitering outside Broadcasting House in order to press their tape directly into John's paw. In the case of The Chameleons, John thought he was the victim of a practical joke after listening to their demo: the recording was so accomplished that he suspected he had been given a cassette of an established band.

...although this slightly contradicts the note that John Peel sent back to the band where Peel describes the tape as 'Very muffled'.

A few years, when Mark Burgess got married, I made a paltry contribution to a wedding present. A few weeks later, I was staggered to receive an email from Mark Burgess thanking me together with a draft chapter of his (still unpublished) autobiography. Mark also describes travelling down to London and hanging around outside Broadcasting House with a tape.

I subscribe to a fair number of blogs.

Some of those bloggers use Blogger (despite my WordPress evangelism).

Some of those Blogger bloggers are technical types who would normally seize any chance to play with newly announced beta software.

Curiously, not a single one of them has experimented with the recently announced Blogger beta which includes exciting new developments like 'Labels', drag'n'drop page design, private blogs (where you can be assured no-one is reading), multiple authors, additional templates, RSS feeds and 'instant' publishing.

I lie awake at night and wonder - why ?

Holy Father

It is 23 years and 7 months since my last confession. Since then, I have downloaded Ethereal and started to sniff packets off the network. I know it was wrong but we had worked for a week on this problem. We had all exhaustively checked everything (twice) and we were tired, hungry and increasingly desperate.

I fervently wished this was a conventional database problem or even an unconventional Siebel problem but the symptoms, the controlled tests and all the hard evidence increasingly pointed to 'the network'.

Initially, I was swamped by gigabytes of meaningless data until I discovered all about the powerful filters with an esoteric syntax (that sometimes even worked). Then I could trace a complete 'conversation' between the browser and Web server. I was so excited when I could actually examine HTTP requests and the associated response. Why I can even look at the packet sizes and the actual contents with timestamps to the nearest microsecond.

I am desperately resisting the urge to examine the detailed effects of content expiry and static file compression and publish a whitepaper. Worse still, I am feeling increasingly lured by '/etc/services' to find interesting ports to sniff on.

Please have mercy on this wretched, miserable, pitiful sinner kneeling before you.

Yours faithfully

Norman Brightside