Oh no, someone’s kid knows how to boot up a PC and use a mouse at the age of two. Vanessa is already three. It seems we are a little behind time. But she’s quite the expert using Nokia touchscreen smart phones, navigating to the music player, and listening to her favourite “Nobody, nobody but you” song. Quite impressive, I think. I’m not clear what exactly “running software” means, but it does sound like a significant achievement. Or, maybe it…
Monthly Archives: May 2010
Post ICT 2010 Review
Last year’s ICT achievement was about an arcade game. This year, I couldn’t advance to the next level because the fire button was broken. Oh, too bad. But we didn’t have a lot of time to spend in the mess anyway. What would this year’s most significant ICT achievement be? Hmm, I can’t seem to pin it down to anything specific. So perhaps I’ll just mention a few.
Enemy of My Enemy is My Friend
Well, it turned out not. Rumours surfaced earlier this week about Microsoft’s Steve Ballmer speaking at Apple’s WWDC 2010 keynote. It turns out not. The enemy’s enemy denied. The rumour had earlier said that Microsoft’s CEO would have 7 minutes at the keynote to talk about a new version of Visual Studio 2010 producing iPad, iPhone and Mac apps.
How to Get Free Pizza
I heard about it from a friend. I didn’t try it on purpose to get free pizza, but I did get into the situation when the free pizza was offered. Not once, but twice. So it’s for real. But of course it is. It wouldn’t be good for their reputation if they had been reluctant to live up to their promise. The recipe for free pizza? First, find a pizza place that promises super quick delivery. Then, order pizza during…
The Making of Anti-Government Thoughts
I told Vanessa on the second day of ICT, as I was preparing to head out: “Papa has to go army now.” Vanessa looked at me, her face was painted in shock and disappointment: “Again???” I told her, “Yes, and there will be many many more days.” She asked, “But why you always go army?” And I said, “Well, I also don’t want to go army you know. But the government wants me to go.” Vanessa: “Why?” Yadda, yadda, yadda……
FOD Walk
It’s almost 20 years since I first stepped into Tengah Air Base. In all that time (well, mostly just the two years of active NSF service), I’ve been to all over the air base, either on wheels or on my two feet. But there is this exclusive piece of real estate that I’ve only travelled on for less than a handful of times, and until now, never actually stepped on with my two feet. This piece of real estate is…
Android World Domination
I came across two interesting bits of news. First of which is about Android, possibly, having outsold the iPhone. This data, from NPD, may not be absolutely accurate and reflective of the real market, but it does suggest a trend of rapidly rising Android popularity. Until the end of 2009, I myself haven’t been particularly impressed with Android. There weren’t any killer hardware then, and the promise of an open Android platform was, in my opinion, not sufficiently open as…
Security Cannot Be Slapped On
Many people are still not getting it. IT security has to be a fundamental component in any IT application. It’s not something you can easily slap on later. But still every so often, when I talk to “IT professionals” about various projects, IT security continues to be an afterthought. Most people are just concerned about rolling out features. Many people understand the importance of code modularity, code re-use, and many other nice principles of software engineering. But few actually think…
T+3D: IPPT
As you might have heard, it’s ICT time again, and today’s the third day. It’s IPPT day. For the first time ever, I went with the over-graft hand grip, and cleared the station. I’ve been using under-graft since forever, but always felt it was an uncertain struggle, so results were a bit inconsistent. Over-graft is supposed to achieve better results, but it’s difficult to get started. So there’s this great inertia to overcome to give over-graft a fair chance to…
The Annual Evil is Here Again
Yes, it’s ICT time again. This year with a slightly older Vanessa who can ask intelligent questions. Questions like: “Papa, you go army again?” Or: “Why need to go army?” On day one, she was amused that my No. 4 uniform is green like her child care centre’s uniform. She commented, “Green, green, same!” Yah, but army is so unlike going to child care centre eh. But anyway, on day two, I think she wasn’t very pleased that I had…