We’re Hoff and running

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John Arlidge of The Sunday Times interviews David Hasselhoff. The Hoff is traveling around Europe to publicize his new single, “Jump In My Car”. Have you heard it yet? It was played off the radio by pleading texts from listeners and laughter from DJs. The interview makes for a great read, he’s so full of himself it’s funny!

“What is Jump In My Car, my latest single out this month, really about?” he asks unprompted. Without pausing he answers his own question. “Essentially, it’s about driving along trying to get girls to jump in my car.”

Is that something he knows a lot about, I ask. He nods.

Just what does the star of Knight Rider and Baywatch get up to in his car these days? You’ll have to read this entertaining interview to find out!
Photo by Dwane Senior

Put it there!

After reading Ryan Tomayko’s explanation of REST I’m left wondering if I’ve ever used HTTP PUT. I don’t think I have. Have you?

Don’t be put off by the length of the page, half of it are the comments following the post. I have to agree with the people who complemented his wife on her patience. I can’t imagine many non technical people being interested in the arcane details of http and how the web works. Well done for explaining it well!

The Schneider Interview

Robert Scoble talks to Toni Schneider, the CEO of Automattic in this video interview about WordPress.com, Automattic and lots of other stuff. I’ve only watched the first 10 minutes, Toni talks about some of the features of WordPress.com – paid features, making money, adverts, fighting splogs and more.

Do you like Akismet? That’s covered too. Make sure you set aside some time today to watch this interview if you use WordPress!

Cool those aching fingers

Another advantage of the smcFanControl for cooling your Macbook is the nice breeze that rises from the keyboard as you type. It’ll probably work wonders for those sweaty sessions deep into the night when a deadline is fast approaching!

It cools your Macbook very effectively too, but I wonder what it’ll do to the life of the fan motor if it’s twirling around at 6200rpm all the time?

Cup o' tea and halloween brack

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It’s that time of the year again and one of the highlights is the traditional Halloween brack. If you’ve never had it, it’s a delicious fruit cake, usually with small objects hidden inside.
From the Wikipedia page on Barm Brack:

In the barmbrack were: a pea, a stick, a piece of cloth and a ring. Whovever recieved in their slice the pea, would be unmarried; the stick, would be a fighter; the cloth or rag, would be poor; and the ring, would be wed within the year.

The Halloween Brack is commonly known as “barn brack” but it’s properly called “barm brack”. I think I prefer “barn brack”.

How do you make it? It’s fairly easy, not that I’ve ever made one, but this recipe looks so simple I might be able to make it! A more descriptive recipe isn’t as simple. Hmm. Have you baked one?

Now, I’m off to have another slice! Yum!

I got the ring! I turned to Jacinta and asked her, “Will you marry me?” She took the ring, put it on her finger, looked at me and solemly said, “I’ll think about it!” before bursting out in laughter and eating her own slice of the brack. Ah yes. I love her! 🙂

Mac OS X – how to update /etc/hosts

Way back in the good old days of Linux and Windows it was much easier to update my hosts file. There it was, /etc/hosts or C:\windows\hosts, edit, save and the change becomes active.

MacOS X is a little more complicated. Once you update /etc/hosts you’ll have to update the Netinfo Database. That’s why I’m blogging this so I’ll remember it. This page documents the steps required but the important command is this one:

sudo niload -v -m hosts . < /etc/hosts

There is a GUI but it’s a little clunky and duplicating an existing entry isn’t the most elegant method of adding a new one. Especially when a warning dialog pops up!

Thanks Barry for suggesting a similar fix while I was in SF and getting used to my new laptop! 🙂

Help protect the kids on busy roads

There was a knock at the front door a few minutes ago. That’s not something that happens very often during working hours. At the door was a teenager in school uniform with what looked like a notepad in hand. He was collecting signatures for a petition to have more zebra and pelican crossings built in Tower and Blarney.

The petition was set in motion by the death of Clodagh Murphy in a road accident on September 20th last. She was only 14.

Hopefully we’ll see some positive results from the petition but it’s going to involve education too. There’s a pelican crossing on the main road in Blarney. It’s a very busy road with several junctions leading onto the road in less than a few hundred meters distance. There’s also a bus stop on one side of the road, and a school on the other.

  • I saw a teenager standing ready to run across the road. He was waiting for a break in traffic. He was right next to the pedestrian lights.
  • Every morning over a dozen students pile out of the bus and go to the back of the bus. They too ignore the nearby pedestrian lights and by weight of numbers force the traffic to stop and walk across the road. I’ll have to get a picture of that some morning.

The mind boggles.

Ping Google Too!

Google announced that they will accept pings to their blogsearch service. Hopefully Pingomatic will support it soon so you don’t need to update your “Update Services” in WordPress. I’d say Matt’s sleeping off the jet lag from his trip to Vienna but it’ll probably be there in a few hours!

If you can’t wait, add “http://blogsearch.google.com/ping/RPC2” to the “Update Services” in your WordPress Dashboard under Options->Writing.

Why is this good? By pinging Google you can tell them that you have updated your blog. That will get your post into the Google Blog Search index that much faster.

Update! Matt has already updated Pingomatic. WordPress users can rest easy that their posts will show up quickly on Google Blog Search now!

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Consider installing a browser extension that blocks ads and other malicious scripts in your browser to protect your privacy and security. Here are a few options.

  • uBlock Origin is a free, open source, ad blocker for your browser.
  • Use pi-hole if you have a spare Raspberry Pi on your network.
  • Set the private DNS settings on your phone to dns.adguard.com to block adverts and trackers.