Roll on Hogmanay!

Hogmanay, otherwise also known as ‘New Year’s Eve’, is rolling on. Though not in Glasgow, and not in Stirling. It is however going ahead in Edinburgh. I won’t be going out on the streets though – as mentioned a couple of days ago, we’re going to a party at a friend’s flat. We might go out briefly before/after midnight, but certainly no more than that!

I’ve decided I’m going to wear my leather (biker-style) trousers to keep me warm and probably a leather coat which will make me look like The Matrix’ Trinity.

Anyway, we’ll be leaving soon, so I’ll bow out to the great year that was 2006.

Edinburgh Zoo Outing

Today we went to Edinburgh Zoo. It was quite pleasant – it was a lovely day, the sun was shining and the animals all round cute/entertaining with lots of information raising awareness of endangered species. For example, the Amur Tiger – apparently only a few hundreds left and they had one as part of their conservation programme. There was also a Polar Bear – again an endangered species (though not as bad as the Amur Tiger).

I didn’t take many pictures of the animals as the light wasn’t too good and also in most cases you’d have to photograph them from behind glass or a cage. It’s not too pretty a sight either to see animals in captivity (though I know it’s necessary in some cases).

I took one beautiful shot though from quite a high viewpoint and the light was pretty special. Edinburgh is very good for light – it’s so open and the light (when it’s there ) is just everywhere

No More Work This Year

Today I worked my final shift for the year. I’m off for the next 4 days (yeah!) so I might not be on the computer as much.

Not sure what we’re going to do for New Year’s Eve – Edinburgh has (arguably) the best Hogmanay Party but the weather forecast is pretty atrocious – gales are expected:

Storm force winds are likely in the early hours of Saturday with storms returning on New Year’s Eve when gusts are expected to reach 70 to 80mph.

We’ll probably go to a friend’s friend’s flat in Tollcross and then on to the Meadows for midnight. I don’t mind gales too much as long as it doesn’t rain.

Translation Translation Translation

Yesterday I had news from my contact in regard to a little translation project I’ve been working on. I’ve blogged about this before – so far I’ve done this web 2.0 startup’s Terms of Service and their Privacy Policy. BTW I’m going to reveal who it is once their UK site is up and running…

Yesterday the contact and I had a quick chat on Skype [all names have been changed]:

[27/12/2006 17:47:46] non-lenina says: hi. has the programmer set you up with everything you need?

[27/12/2006 17:47:55] lenina says: nope

[27/12/2006 17:48:09] lenina says: i thought he was still working on it

[27/12/2006 17:48:24] lenina says: you got any news?

[…]

[27/12/2006 17:49:07] lenina says: so, are the text files ready?

[27/12/2006 17:49:09] non-lenina says: no, the programmer is on holiday until the 30th. I can’t reach him right now, and I’m leaving as well. but as long as you 2 are in touch…

[27/12/2006 17:49:16] lenina says: hm.. what’s the plan then?

[27/12/2006 17:49:24] non-lenina says: yes, the text files and an interface is ready

[27/12/2006 17:49:31] non-lenina says: I thought he gave you the access. hmm

The problem is that the programmer (who’s an old friend of mine) went on holiday without filling me in on the latest with regard to translating the rest of the website (GE into BE). He was going to train me last week Friday I think, but it never came to it. Maybe the site isn’t ready. When I looked at the interface it still had what appears to be the old version.

Briefly, the problem with the old interface was as follows: The programmer had separated all the text from any code and then kind of pulled it together at the other end in an interface. I.e. the idea was to extract the basic text from the rest (html code etc.) and then create an interface with forms where I’d simply fill in all the translations into a form and then click submit, thus making them ‘live’.

Big problem: Nearly all sentences were chopped up! Impossible to translate half sentences that are listed totally out of context and instead in alphabetical order! I gave them extensive feedback about it a few weeks ago and I do hope that they’ve changed it! I mean, how am I supposed to translate these bits and bobs without any context or knowledge what sentence they belong to? Examples from the backend:

• ‘Zurück zur Künstler Seite von’ [back to the artist page of]
• ‘Bilder von’ [images/pictures of]
• ‘hochgeladen durch’ [uploaded by/using/with]
• ‘noch keine’ [not yet any]

It is certainly possible to translate these bits; however, how is the sentence going to come out the other end, after being put back together by a computer program? I don’t think it’s going to work and I do sincerely hope they give me access to the full sentences and the full text extracted as text file so I can see the context. If they don’t, I can translate and I’m going to send them an invoice for it; however, I’ll make it quite clear to them that I can’t guarantee for the quality of the end product if the sentences are assembled by software rather than wetware. Bloody programmers – they think everything is binary

Idle Days

The last few days have been idle. Nothing has happened, there’s nothing to do, and no shops are open. I’m finding it difficult to have nothing to do. I can manage, but it isn’t as relaxing as I thought it would be. I mean, I’m not totally free – I still have to clock on every day.

My BF is back so at least I’m not on my own, but this free time is rather tiring – and there are a few more days to go! I’m looking forward to the new year. I’ve already received my list of amendments (re: my thesis) in the post and it won’t be that much to do. I think one page is just typos etc. and I was even going to start on it the other day. The first of January is a Monday so I’ll probably start on the amendments on Tuesday 2nd.

There’s also a deadline for an academic journal that I wanted to try and submit a paper to.:

Proposals for papers should be directed to the editors. The deadline for
submission of research articles is February 1st, 2007.

I think I’m going to deal with that issue separately, in my ‘convergent media’ blog (no link here as I really haven’t done any work on that blog yet).

The bottom line is: I’m kinda bored but am not going to do anything about it. For now.

How Secure is Your PW?

Well, I thought my PW was pretty secure but apparently it’s not that secure. So, I’ve decided to change it to one that contains:

• at least 8 letters
• both capital and lowercase letter(s)
• number(s)

I’m still thinking about the other recommendations that I found here:

As a general rule the following character sets should all be included in every password:

• uppercase letters such as A, B, C;
• lowercase letters such as a, b,c;
• numerals such as 1, 2, 3;
• special characters such as $, ?, &; and
• alt characters such as µ, £, Æ.

hm…it’s a pain in the arse. I have signed up with so many different accounts and have used more than one pw. I remember them all but will have to change most of them. I’ll start with the most important ones – anything related to money (credit cards etc.) and my email accounts.

I call it ‘digital housekeeping’. It’s a dirty job but someone’s got to do it.

Merry Christmas Everyone!

Unlike in Germany, where we celebrate Christmas Eve as the main festive day (e.g. giving presents, going to church, Christmas dinner), over here in the UK the main day of celebration is Christmas Day (25th December).

I have got used to that and we had our Christmas dinner today rather than last night. Note however that the Royal Family too celebrate the 24th rather than the 25th. Why?

The reason is simple: They are German! I.e. they come from the Saxe-Coburg and Gotha line:

As a consequence of their marriage, Saxe-Coburg and Gotha became the Royal House name of the British Royal Family from the accession of Edward VII in 1901 until changed to Windsor by King George V in 1917 because a German name was deemed unpatriotic during World War I.

Hence, they celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve rather than Christmas Day. I didn’t watch the Queen’s Speech earlier today BTW, but here’s a link to it. I haven’t found it on youtube yet so I’ll have to put up with the sh***y BBC RealPlayer plugin.

Merry Xmas

Happy Birthday to Me

it’s my birthday today so I’m not going to do much on the computer. In fact this short entry is probably it

ttfn

lenina

2006 – The Year That Web 2.0 Broke

Yes, in my opinion, 2006 is the year that Web 2.0 broke – i.e. hit the mainstream. For me, the most pleasant Web 2.0 surprise has been last.fm. I’ve always been into music, mostly the alternative/indie kind, ideally fronted by women singers. After all, I used to front a band myself! Through last.fm I’m gradually expanding my music knowledge base, though I mainly concentrate on contemporary British bands (tip: The Long Blondes from Sheffield). Great stuff

Today I finally signed up with delicious. I’ve been discussing signing up to Web 2.0 sites elsewhere (heading: Is there a Point in Signing up to MySpace?) and the bottom line is this: I don’t really think I need to participate in all the big social networking sites. E.g. I do have a digg, youtube, and flickr – account [can't be arsed to put all the links in..] and a fair few more, but don’t really use those all that much. Hence, I’m probably never going to sign up to MySpace and Beebo etc. etc. – don’t think there’s a point.

What I will do however is provide a link and bookmark it myself, with ‘The new 100 most useful sites‘ as per Guardian Technology guys, and they should know.

The second link I’m providing is a huge collection of web 2.0 resources. I haven’t looked at these in detail but the purpose, similar to the link above, is to provide something to bookmark/put into delicious and read later

To conclude, 2006 for me is the year that web 2.0 broke. Let’s see what happens in 2007 – experts think that blogging for example is going to peak in the new year. We’ll see..

The Queen’s Christmas Message on Your iPod

The traditional Queen’s Christmas Message this year can be downloaded onto your iPod (iPod video, that is) as a podcast. Story is here:

For the first time, people will be able to download the traditional Christmas message on the monarchy’s website, royal.gov.uk.

Subscribers to the royal podcast will automatically receive the Queen’s message on Christmas Day at 3pm, just as its television broadcast begins.

I might view it online or DL it onto my computer. I don’t have an iPod video. I wonder whether it’ll turn up on youtube – I bet it will!

Edit: Below is last year’s I think (though it says ‘2006′ – but I think that this year’s will be ‘2007′ as it’s kind of meant for the year that lies ahead). It’s probably very boring but just included for reference. The annual Christmas Message is quite a tradition though, and the Queen is obviously trying to be in with the crowd – apparently she also has an iPod.