Safety on the Internet

/

Every now and then I get asked to comment on something technical by the local radio stations. They say I have the perfect face for radio.

Anyhoo, today a chap came to talk to me about safety on the Internet, Tomorrow is European Internet Safety Day (what, you didn't know?) and they wanted some quotes about the dangers lurking out there on the wire.

My opinion on this is quite simple. Just about everything in life can be used for good and bad things. Even fluffy cushions can be used to bad purpose (as they are in just about every other "Midsummer Murders" episode). The Internet, mobile phones and social web sites are just the same in this respect. The key is to be aware of what they can be used for, then you can get involved and help.

The oldest trick in the book (and particularly if you have kids) is to put the family computer downstairs in the living room rather than hidden in one of the bedrooms. Then you can see what is going on, and maybe have a go yourself. In these days of WIFI and multiple systems in houses this may be more tricky, but there is now technology you can use to limit the use of the computer and the places that kids can visit. Windows Vista (to name one system at random) has technology for both controlling access to web sites and limiting login times.

With regard to social networking, why not have a go yourself. Apparently there is presently a huge growth in middle aged use of things like MySpace and there is nothing to stop you having a go apart from fear itself. And as for mobile phones, be aware that they can be used for bullying and sending nasty messages.

Apparently when postcards were invented they created a whole new way in which people could get in touch with each other. Rather than having to visit the house to correspond, a lady could scribble a message on a card and then drop it into the nearest postbox. This brought about a revolution in courting behaviour. This took a lot of control (and awareness of what was going on) away from the parents, and was probably the cause of much debate and concern at the time.

Something similar is happening/has happened with mobile communications. I'm sure that when postcards came out there were people sending nasty ones, and you had to learn to deal with this. I guess the same is true with the Internet and mobile phones etc.

Repeat Offenders

/

We had another open day today. Some of the candidates that turned up had been at our earlier one in November. I fretted a bit about using the same appalling jokes as on their earlier visit, so I took special care to add some new and untried material to my bit. Oh well. Although the ET joke seemed to go down OK. Thank you for coming folks, and I hope you all enjoyed the day.

I also went up town first thing, and took the little camera. The light was very good.

379081820
Right in the middle of Queen Victoria Square. What are the chances eh?

379082669
View from the car park

Black Marble XNA Followup

/

I said to the folk at the XNA talk last night I'd post some followup material. You can find the presentation here and the program files here.

After the talk I had a great chat with some students about the business of computer science. I said I'd make some notes in my blog about the subject, but instead I've added the material to our Where Would You Think community site. You can find my thoughts, plus links to the books that I mentioned, here.

Vistafied

/

Got a spare quid? Near a newsagent? Nip in and buy a copy of "Windows Vista - The Official Magazine". It is only 99p, so you'll even get change. Then open the magazine to page 86. And there I am. Some time back I got a request for some "picture tips" for the magazine. And a photo of me looking suitably heroic. And they've printed my mugshot and one of the tips. Wowzer. Fame at last. They've even put my blog URL on the page. (if you have read the magazine and followed the link here, well done and feel free to stick around - take a look at Trip Hazard next - new episode coming soon)

I've been using Vista for a while and really rather like it. Every now and then I find something new and wonderful that it does (like the search feature in explorer. I've just found 2194 files of mine that contain the word cheese. Took six seconds to do the search- fantastic).

Since I'm now supposed to be a Vista expert I'll post the odd Vista tip as I find it.

PS/3? Perhaps Not for Me.

/

So the PS/3 launch date has been announced. And the price. For the privilege of getting the machine five months late we suckers in the UK are having to pay nearly half as much again as people in other, luckier, parts of the world.

I was talking to a chap in one of the Game shops on Friday. He reckons that they will have to open the shop up early and get us to queue first thing in the morning just to reserve the thing. Not to buy it. So that means two early mornings and a whole slab of cash to play slightly better looking racing games than ones I have already. And do you know, for the first time in a long history of early adopting, I might not bother.

I've bought launch versions of both of the previous to Playstations. And the PSP. I have a "Sony reflex" which means that if I'm shopping for electronic goodies the Sony one is usually what I end up with. I really like their stuff. I even got one of their dogs for heaven's sake (and then they stopped making the Aibo - something I've never forgiven them for). But the PS/3 isn't really floating my boat just at the moment.  I know that the power is awesome. I know that it will play Blu-Ray movies in HD. I know that Sony are losing a fortune on each box that they sell.  And I know that it will be successful (in Japan at any rate).

But at the moment I'm OK for consoles. The XBOX 360 lets me play good quality, high definition, games. The Wii lets me just have fun. And as things stand I'm not sure what the PS/3 would bring to the party, apart from a bigger hole in my bank balance. Once I've bought the console, an extra controller, an HD lead and some movies and games I'm going to be out around 700 quid and I'm not sure that I'm up for that. Plus I know that I'm being ripped off just for living in the wrong country, and it will only get cheaper in the future....

Ho hum. Perhaps I'll change my mind. I'm keeping my name on the list, and I'm going to start a sort of PS/3 sinking fund and sell a few bits on ebay. But at the moment I just don't feel that motivated.

The Busiest Man in the World?

/

Been mucho busio today(o?). All our new modules start this week, and I've not yet finished marking exams and coursework from last semester. So it was give a bunch of lectures, mark a load of exam scripts and then stagger home to write some more on the Micro Framework book.

Sometimes I wish there were more than one of me, so that I could share the work out amongst us (there have been movies about this kind of idea). I'd be the best  looking and smartest version of course.

I thought that everyone had musical socks

/

Some discussion around the place about musical socks. Apparently not everyone knows what they are. How surprising. Perhaps the rest of the world has not reached the heights of culture and refinement that we take for granted at Chateaux Miles.

Musical socks have a small piezo sounder and a little circuit that allows them to play a reedy, square wave, rendition of some out of copyright ditty or other. My socks play the one that goes "Dee dah dah dah, dah dah dah...". When you squeeze one part of the little plastic envelope they are sealed into this wonderful music issues forth. Mine tend to go off when I cross my legs for some reason.

And this is why you should not wear them in bed, no matter how cold your feet get. Being woken up at 2 am by a muffled, eery tune wafting out of the bottom of the duvet is not an experience you'll want. Take it from me.

Graduation Daze

/

Did a couple of graduation ceremonies today. I'm the chap who stands up at the start and gives a 10 minute spiel on how to behave, when to stand up, sit down, wear your hat etc etc. Great fun. Had two very well behaved audiences who did everything right. Thanks folks. We also had a couple of really good honorary graduates; Jane Tomlinson and Michael Apted.

372229238
Free food and drink for our graduands

I think I'm going to have to retire my opening joke that I use at the graduation ceremonies. It never gets a laugh and I think it might be turning audiences against me. I'm not going to reproduce it here, ask a Hull graduate if you want to find out what it is.....

372231682
After the show is over

Game On with Bing

/

Yesterday we went off to London courtesy of Electronic Arts, who had arranged an all expenses paid (perhaps my favourite three words) trip to the Game On exhibition at the Science Museum with free beer (perhaps my favourite two words) and a talk from Bing Gordon, EA's Chief Creative Officer.

368853172
Just before we boarded the magic bus

We set off at 10:30 prompt, bound for London. The M1 was kind to us, so we got to the big city in good time. I'd taken the big camera, so it was time to go off and take some snaps.

368831926
The Natural History Museum looking good

We piled into the tube and took a ride up to Oxford Street.

368832081
Oxford Circus

368832216
Fruit and Veg

Then, at 6:30 the doors opened and it was, quite literally, Game on.

368832395
EA had set up some gamer pods around the museum. That big shiny thing at the back is the wing of a Spitfire plane.

368832537
Bigging Up Bing

First up was the talk from Bing Gordon. Very interesting. Some good comments about life, followed by some more specific discussion of video games.

Health note: these are pulled from my recollections, if anyone who was there remembers differently then I apologise in advance.

From the life point of view:

  • Find out what you really enjoy doing and then try to get to do that as your day job.
  • Don't be afraid to fail.
  • Set yourself big goals (but make them testable so that you can decide when/whether you reach them)
  • Maximise your learning opportunities
  • Set very high standards and give everyone who fails to meet them a really hard time. There is nothing more demoralising than a boss who accepts poor quality work.

This is all good stuff. For me what was also interesting was that one of Bing's heroes is a chap called David Ogilvy. He was an advertising executive who ran some of the most successful campaigns of all time and went on to set up one of the largest Ad agencies in the world. I remember reading one of his books a long time ago (I've always found the advertising field fascinating) and I would advise you to take a look as well. Then the talk turned to games. More from Bing:

  • Games are becoming hobbies (people play them in the same way that they would build model railways, or go fishing)
  • Games are including things like searching, trading and community..
  • .. and search engines and other tools are starting to behave like games
  • By around 2012 we can look forward to movie level realism in games

There was a very good question and answer session at the end, and then the doors to the Game On exhibition were thrown open and it was time to get in there and start playing.

368832650
..but first a drink

368832772
Game On indeed

368832813
Not the kind of high score I'd take a picture of, but there you are

368832878
Jon Purdy gets back to basics

368832941
One of my all time favourites, Ridge Racer

368833057

Not sure quite what this is, but it looks fun.

368833133

I used to own quite a few of these....

Then, at 10:00 we all clambered onto the magic bus and headed back to Hull (I had a kind of bet with David Byrne from EA that all our students would turn up on time - and they did. Kudos guys).

Many thanks to the highway engineers who added around an hour to our journey back just because they wanted to play with their big Meccano near one of the bridges. I finally managed to hit the sack around 4:30 am, just as the birds were starting to sing. But it was a good trip.

Thanks to EA for setting it up and making us so welcome.

Email Etiquette

/
I sent some emails out last week and got no reply. Nothing.

There is a difficult etiquette issue here. Do I assume that the message has not got through? Do I assume that the person who received it does not think the message worthy of reply or would rather not talk to me?

This is tricky. If I send a further message saying "Did you get my email?" I force them into responding when they'd probably rather not. If I do nothing, and the mail didn't get through, then they might think me rude for not getting in touch, or I miss out on a conversation which may benefit both of us.

In the end I solved the problem by checking my junk email folder. Which of course is where the responses had ended up. I'm no further forward on the etiquette issue, but I'm going to check through my junk email more frequently....

New Soul

/

One of my favourite books since forever is "Soul of a New Machine" by Tracy Kidder. It recounts the story of an attempt by a bunch of engineers to build a new microcomputer for an ungrateful company.

Whilst the technology described is now very elderly (the book was originally published in 1981) the story of what drives engineers to create is still bang up to date. So, get the book and read it. Even (or perhaps especially) if you know nothing about computers.

Then spool forward 26 years in time and read Dreaming in Code. I've not got it yet myself yet, but a review which compares it to "Soul" is good enough to get me onto the Amazon site and flashing my credit card.

Building the Future

/

We had an admissions Open Day today. As is our won't on such occasions, we put on a hearty buffet and sat around with candidates and their parents eating sandwiches and chewing the fat.

One of the parents made the point that he thought Computer Scientists were an enviable bunch because we are "building the future". I nodded and smiled, and managed to avoid mentioning the half a day I spent a while back trying to get Aero Glass running on Vista, so my windows would have semi-transparent borders.

"It is an awesome responsibility" I managed to reply eventually. And then changed the subject.