Author Archives: daniel

Small XP

Sounds like there are broadly two ways of getting a small WinXP installation:

  • Build it that way using a tool like the freeware nLite — here’s an article about it
  • Do it after the event by ripping stuff out using something like XPlite (not freeware, but free trial available; it also works on Win2K, and also available for Win98) — article here

Something else to do for performance is shutdown extraneous services, though it’s said this doesn’t gain you much. This guide goes into a lot of detail, but is painfully formatted with one service per page. This guide is a bit briefer. This one is a nice balance.

Goldplated parts

What dumbarse designed the Optusnet web site? Out of interest I went to compare plans to other providers, and Optusnet has turned into a portal which has so much stuff on it, I can’t even find anything about services they sell.

When I did find it (memo to self: go to the main Optus site, not the Optusnet site), I found some totally incredible equipment service charges, where if a problem isn’t their fault, and you’re out of warranty, you’ll get slugged:

  • Faulty Network Interface Card (NIC) — Service call ($99.00) and replacement fee for NIC ($50.00)
  • Faulty Ethernet Cable — Service call ($99.00) and replacement of Ethernet cable ($55.00)

Please tell me I’m reading that wrong. They’ll try and charge me $149 for replacing a NIC? $154 for replacing an Ethernet cable?

Where does one buy a $55 Ethernet cable, anyway? It’s like $10 a metre retail. And it’s not hard to buy a NIC for under $20. I guess Optus’ ones are all gold-plated.

I guess they don’t really want the business.

Better command prompt font

Do you live in a DOS window, and use ClearType? Microsoft has made the Consolas font, previously only available in Vista and a few products, available for earlier versions of Windows. Looks very nice. Instructions for getting it working here — it requires a registry hack. And like many things in Windows, it only works after a reboot.

(One font = 4.3 Mb download?! Aye carumba! Check first if you already have the font; it comes with some versions of Office and Visual Studio. And why do they give so many setup programs meaningless filenames like setup.exe?!)

How to compress attachments in Outlook

I use Outlook at work, and sometimes people send big attachments without zipping them up. Often they’re documents which are in the document management system anyway. Sigh.

Anyway, it’s easy enough to compress them within Outlook.

1. Open mail item.

2. Save attachment(s) to a temporary directory.

3. Zip (or whatever) the file. (See? 2Mb XLS down to 300Kb. Why didn’t the sender do that?)

4. In the email, click Edit / Edit Message on the menu. (This feature is a boon for fraudulent modification of emails, but also for compressing attachments.)

5. Right click on the attachment and Remove.

6. Drag the zip file into the email. (For some reason you can’t use the menu to insert an attachment like you can when composing. And the drag-drop has to land in the body section of the email.)

7. Save and Close the email.

Voila, a bunch of space saved.

I haven’t explored to see if the same method can be used in other mail clients.

AFL malware?

Apparently the Australian Football League may be distributing malware.

AFL malware warning

(To my mind, they have an annoyingly unresponsive web site, but it’s not actually malware.)

Firefox ponderings

Is it just me who’s finding Firefox 2.0.0.13 (on Windows XP) freezing way more than previous versions?

Drive.com.au’s used car search is a particularly notable crashing site; ditto NineMSN Video. Both are fine in IE6/7. But there are others too, and if I had to point to a pattern, it’s that many involve multimedia components on pages, such as during Flash video playback.

Ah, I see Firefox 2.0.0.14 has just been issued. The main thing seems to be correcting a bug called “Crash in JavaScript garbage collector”… hopefully that fixes it. (Why does every update need the inline dictionary re-installed?)

By the way, anybody else notice how on Blogspot comment pages in FF (but not IE), it refreshes itself after loading, so if you’re quick at starting to type your comment, you have to start again? Annoying.

CeBIT Australia – Where is it?!

CeBITOoh cool, a promo for CeBIT Australia, offering a special code to get free entry… at least, to the exhibition. Email doesn’t say where it is, but links to promo web site.

Sounds cool. I wonder where it is? Might I be able to take a look without paying for air fares plus accommodation?

Promo web site says when it is (May 20th to 22nd), and tells you how to get free entry. But doesn’t say where it is. Points to mycebit.com.au.

mycebit.com.au is the registration site. FAQ page lists a bunch of FAQs about the site, not the event. Registration page doesn’t talk about price or location (at least on the first page). Prices page has no location info.

WhyTF won’t they tell me where this thing is?

There’s also a link to cebit.com.au. The first page has links to conference info, sponsors, a big Register Now! link. But no location info. All I want is one word: the city it’s in. There’s a CeBIT graphic in the top-right… I can see the Sydney Opera House in it. But it also has buildings from all around the world, so that’s no real help.

I finally found it hidden in the text three-quarters down the page. I also found it buried in the visitor information. It’s in Sydney. Now, why couldn’t they have said that half-a-dozen clicks ago?

(Confession: I went back to the original email and eventually found the venue info in there too. But I do like to rant.)

ADSL2+ at more AU exchanges

Telstra has upgraded a bunch more exchanges around Australia to ADSL2+, including my humble local in Bentleigh, Victoria. When I looked, Whirlpool’s Broadband Choice hadn’t been updated with the new information yet, but you can check via Telstra Bigpond’s page.

Whether I upgrade or not is another matter. I’ve noticed that while downloading Linux torrents, the bottleneck is actually at my PC, not the modem/net connection. The torrent speed is pretty good, but the connection on the PC doing the torrenting is swamped, while the other PC sharing the modem isn’t. This is a very puzzling thing to me, and something I need to explore further, as obviously something (LAN card maybe?) is operating sub-par. Obviously that needs tackling first… until then, 1500/256 will do me.