Posted: Tue 25 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Charm School, Thoughts, Work-related |
At work, Arsehole Boss has insisted that we use Google Talk as a messaging client so he can keep tabs on everyone, and/or nag them at a moment’s notice.
Google Talk is an utter piece of crap. However, it does have one semi-fun feature. You can have a photo as your “avatar”, an image that sits beside every thing you type, and beside your ID in the main screen.
Because Arsehole Boss has been treating us all like dicks, and because one of my colleagues has the head of Michelangelo’s David as his avatar, I opted for the image you see in this post. Everyone else in the office has seen the humour, but Arsehole Boss has just sent me the following message…
AB: dude please use a different image for gtalk i cant look at the fucking dick all day.
AB: remember we are using this as a company tool here…
Me: and i’ve a tool as an avatar. Seems apt.
Anyway, I’ve now changed it.
To a tube of Anusol.
Posted: Tue 25 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Getting Organised, Own Business, Thinking About..., Web Development, Work-related |
OK, even though the site has now gone live, Where’s Good? is still having bits done to it.
Yes, as one person suggested, perhaps I should’ve waited another couple of days to fix everything. However, in some cases the bugs were ones I didn’t know existed – and never would until it got released into the wild. And on a couple of bits, well, I just forgot something still needed doing. Mea culpa on that one.
Also, I’d said I’d release it yesterday, and I don’t like going back on what I’ve said/promised I’ll do. It’s a flaw.
So over the next few days I’ll probably still be adding stuff, fixing bits, and generally keeping on working on it. Yes, in hindsight perhaps I should’ve waited, and launched the thing properly on May 1st. But I wanted a soft(ish) launch where people would log on, try things out, hopefully tell me if something wasn’t working, and carry on like that this week.
At the end of the day, everything’s got to launch sometime. Yesterday was the day for Where’s Good. And May 1st is likely to be the “full” launch – not that that’ll mean much, there’s not going to be champagne, fireworks, and celebrations or owt, but it’ll be up, running, and hopefully not too buggy…
Posted: Mon 24 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Own Business, Thinking About..., Web Development, Work-related |
OK, well, it’s time to do the deed. I’ve been working on this idea properly for a month now, although the URL has been in my grubby little mitts for a while longer than that.
So. The site is called Wheres Good, and (logically enough) it’s at http://www.wheres-good.com . Nice URL, eh? The basic idea is to build up networks of people reviewing pubs, restaurants, shops, hotels, blah blah, and to then be able to rate other reviews (and users), building up a decent reference model of what’s good, where’s good to go, etc. etc. Along the way, you can set up a “hotlist” of places you want to remember/bookmark, and also set up events and stuff, so in theory blogmeets and so on could be arranged, including where to go, all on one site.
It’s still in beta (hey, like there’s a shock) but should all be working, which is a good start so far as I’m concerned. Anyway, let me know what you think of it…
Posted: Mon 24 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Animals, Domestic, Photography, Travel |
The weekend in Somerset was actually really pleasant – it does make a change for us to just go somewhere and pretty much collapse and die for a couple of days. Of course, we still have an Idiot Hound to knacker, but it’s just good to be doing less than we normally do for a weekend.
The drive down was a pig – the M4 was rigid all the way, and the start of the M5 section involved ten miles of 40mph traffic (well, it would’ve been 40mph maximum, but as it was hardly moving at all for most of that, it was more like 10mph. *sigh*) which slowed us down considerably.
Anyway, once we got down to St Audries Bay, all was well. Hound perked up (she knows the place well, and loves the beach) and so once we’d unloaded the car off we went down to the beach where Hound ran round like a loon for about an hour. Some things never change.
Saturday was a day for knackering Hound, but also for us to mooch around a bit, see some of North Somerset, and just generally have a relaxing day. So it started with another hour on the beach for Hound (from just after 7.15. It’s like having an excitable four-year-old sometimes, I swear), then off up North Hill in Minehead, and another hour-ish of Hound running round the woods while we walked around in a less-manic fashion. Then drove to Tarr Steps, stopping off for lunch in a village called Winsford. Another hour of Hound diving in and out of the river, chasing sticks, while we walked up along the side of the river. Then back to the caravan, with an utterly wiped-out Hound. We’d planned to go back to the beach again in the evening, but she didn’t even stir at the word “Walk”.
So, a quiet evening along with some website fixing, and all was well with the world.
Sunday just involved driving home, and being domestic.
But all in all it was a good weekend, and much needed. Pictures will probably follow, mainly on Flickr again…
Posted: Mon 24 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Getting Organised, Own Business, Work-related |
Another week, another bundle of falling shit.
And so it goes, in this wonderful land of migrating goalposts…
Still, this morning I’ve mainly been bugfixing on [the site whose name is soon to be revealed]
Posted: Sun 23 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Domestic, General, Travel |
Ah, the joys of April 23.
St George’s Day. And the birthday of William Shakespeare.
Other than that, uneventful.
Although we’ll be back from Somerset later today.
Posted: Sat 22 April, 2006 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Geeky, Thoughts, Work-related |
One of Arsehole Boss’s “Great Ideas” (excuse me while I piss myself laughing) is to market the code we’ve been developing (U-Turns and all) over the last year as “Open Source”. As such, he’s created a project on SourceForge for the stuff I/we’ve written.
Bear in mind, Arsehole Boss hasn’t actually written any of this stuff himself, and as the last week or so has ably demonstrated, he also has absolutely no bloody clue how it works, why it works the way it does, or even what the real general concept of it all is. But all the same, it’s got to be “Open Source”, and then at some point we now need to re-write it (a-fuckin’-gain) to become the modular “click’n’drool” thing that he has now decided it should be. Hmm, that’ll be full rewrite number 7, then.
Anyway, he’s also insisted that I list myself as one of the “founders” of this project on SourceForge. Supposedly this will be “cool”, and get me lots of “respect”. (As you can tell, this kind of thing is really what I work for – hence why I’ve linked to it so many times etc.) Personally, I suspect that this is more about the things that motivate AB, or at least make him feel important – and as such, it’s kind of interesting.
All the same, in the eyes of other people (and admittedly, only really in the eyes of other geeks) is it a good thing to be a co-founder of a registered Open Source project?