Applied!

I dropped into the West Perth branch of the CBA and filled in an application on the spot. The only issue is that I don’t have pay slips, because we use Netbank to pay ourselves each week. I asked if a letter from my employer would suffice, and she said that would be more than suitable. Good thing I’m friendly with the management ;)

They estimate a two business-day turn around in knowing if you’ve been initially approved (though their brochure said one business day…) and then a further two days until you get the money. So come this weekend I might have money to start looking for a new car.

I did the numbers, and it’ll be costing me $25 a week more than what I’m paying now on my car to have a slick GT-Four and no credit card debt. I think that’s a worthwhile venture. I also think I’ll be able to save the money each week that we’ll need if we’re going to do the travelling we hope.

As Hoops recently said “wicked, then we’ll have two GT-Fours and two Supras!”

This certainly helped motivate me. I love the bonnet, the fog lights and the rear sun-shade/spoiler. I thought a black one would be my first preference, but I’ve seen how dirty Steve’s gets after a few days. I like Ian’s gun-metal grey, and this wine one looks good. Arghh - I want I want!

Read Andrew Tridgell’s take on the proposed Free Trade Agreement between the United States and Australia. He highlights how it impacts on the IT industry within Australia, IT consumers (which includes people that watch DVDs from foreign countries) and developers of Open Source software development.

I found this to be a no-nonsense analysis from one of the world’s most respected computer professionals. It’s worth reading, even if you don’t know much about Open Source or why it’s great.

I find it similar to making it illegal to write a novel based around different characters telling a similar story. I pray this gets knocked back, or atleast ammended, but sadly, I don’t have faith in my government - which is why I voted Democrats (they have a strong policy of Open Source advocation).

I got a “thanks, but no thanks” email a few minutes ago from the kind people running Linux.conf.au. They had three times the number of submissions as there were spaces (which I thought was amazing) so I had a 33% chance of getting a talking spot, and that was assuming that every submission had equal chance, which wasn’t the case. Obviously talks by people like Rasmus Lerdof and Andrew “Tridge” Tridgell have a 100% chance of being accepted, which reduces the number of spaces for plebs like me.

On the upside, this means I can drink myself silly each night or the conference and not worry about presenting with a hangover the next day :)

I got an email a few minutes ago on one of the mailing lists I subscribe to telling me that Sun have released a new model in their SunRay thin-client appliance range.

For those of you that are not computer nerds… SunRays are basically dumb (but sexy) terminals that connect back to a grunty server. They provide an interface only, and don’t have any real processing power themselves; you have a keyboard and mouse, and in the case of the 170, a screen. This is great for hot-seat offices (like Sun, or telemarketing companies for example) where users have a Java card that contains their unique credentials. When they rock up to work they plug in their card and it remembers who they are and what they were doing when they logged out last/ripped their card from the machine. You don’t have a specific seat, or office, you basically take a free desk and get to work. A user can run their mail client, a few web browsers and a few applications, and it can hook into the phone systems to route your extension to the handset next to you, for example.

I’ve seen this is action, and it works well wicked. The demo involved SRSS v2.0. v3.0 has just completed it’s beta review process and is expected to launch shortly has just launched. In the previous demo, a user logged into station one, and began viewing a video file. They then pulled their card, walked over to station two, and plugged thier card in. The video started playing almost instantaneously. Very impressive.

The reason this excites me so much is that for web-applications, these kind of platforms make a lot of sense. Seeing as this is what we do at TFG, it’s a field I’m monitoring closely. Also, for Eve (a proposed TFG/PACC business venture) it fits like a glove. We’d basically drag a bunch of these machines to a conference, plug them in and be on our way. Instant plug-n-play network of a dozen terminals.

Solaris isn’t needed as a server platform, as v3.0 of SRSS supports Linux. There’s been reported success with Debian. Admittedly, I wouldn’t mind running a Solaris backend if it meant getting full-access to the capabilities of the SunRays - I’m sceptical if the smart cards would work 100% on a Linux server platform, for example. Solaris runs GNOME which is what Debian would pump out, so the only advantage Debian would have is the familiarity I have with it. And the price, though Sun may well be releasing Solaris 10, which would be exciting.

I really like how you the system has a VGA input, meaning you could use it as a normal monitor if you wanted. A simple, but intelligent feature I think.

The biggest drawback is the price - at the moment the new 170 systems cost just over US$1000. This is fairly reasonable, considering it contains a 17″ LCD (as you can see). However, compared to the AUD$300 price tag the 1g system has, I’m probably not going to see one anytime soon. Unless we really get behind Eve…

Update: 13/12/2004 - 3:33AM
I thought I might back up my previous statement about SunRays playing (kinda) nicely with Debian.

The second worst part about working late on a Sunday night is that it is Sunday afternoon in London, and Sunday morning in San Francisco. This means I don’t have my homeboys online to keep me motivated.

The worst part is obviously that I know there’s a sexy babe waiting in bed on her own. Getting more and more difficult to come to the keyboard; upside is I have a few resolutions prepared come the stroke of midnight on the 31st.

Update: 13/12/2004 - 12:48AM
Atleast I have Adam Freeland to keep my company :)