Posted: Tue 17 July, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Geeky, Thoughts |
So Google are now supposedly all heroic for saying that they’ll set their cookies to delete after two years (my emphasis) instead of the current setting, where they will expire in 2039.
I’m sorry, but two years is still bollocks. Along the way they also say that two year expiry entails not visiting any Google website in that time.
Now, I use cookies on a lot of sites – they’re a standard thing, after all. But with any site I work on, they’re usually set to delete in 30 or 60 days. Yes, of course if a user re-visits the site then the cookie gets re-set, but still with the 30 or 60 day expiry. If a user hasn’t visited the site in that time, then the cookie deletes, and if they re-visit after that, then they might have to re-set a preference or two.
I don’t understand why a company like Google can’t set their cookie to expire after something sensible, like 90 – or even 180 – days. If someone hasn’t come back in three (or six) months, then the cookie expires. More than fair.
Why on earth would you want a cookie to hang around for two years?
Posted: Tue 10 July, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, News, Travel |
All I can say is ‘And about time too‘.
I’ve ranted long and hard about Virgin’s shitty cross-country rail service. And now they’ve lost the franchise. Boo-bloody-hoo.
Still, I bet Arriva make just as much of a pig’s ear of it…
Posted: Tue 3 July, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Own Business, Work-related |
The Top Ten signs you may be charging too little – fairly tongue in cheek, but amusing all the same.
Posted: Mon 2 July, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Work-related |
Oh god, yes, I’m back to doing self-assessment tax-returns again.
A while back I got a ‘short form’ self-assessment. This shouldn’t be rocket-science, as I’m completely PAYE (Pay As You Earn) at the moment, so it’ll just be a matter of filling in the final figures from my P60 for Tax Year 2006/07, and job done.
Only, um, I haven’t received a P60. That’s odd. I’d best check it up.
So an email goes off to Parasol, the umbrella company that’s currently my ’employer’, asking what’s happened to the P60.
“We’ve sent it out, back in April” comes the reply.
“I haven’t received it. What address did you put on it?”
“[xyz], Bracknell.” they say.
“I haven’t lived there since December, and have updated my address details with you on both moves since then. So why did it go to an address that’s six months out of date?”
“…” Nothing. No response.
They have managed to send me a PDF copy of the P60, so I can do all the tax-return stuff, but all the same, I’d still like to know why they sent the P60 to the wrong address…
Posted: Sat 30 June, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 1BEM, Customer Services, Cynicism, Sweary, Thoughts |
I’ve mentioned before that I’m quite a fan of the books by Richard Morgan – I’ve read (and re-read) all of his stuff so far: Altered Carbon, Woken Furies, Broken Angels, and Market Forces.
So I was fairly high on the purchase list for the new novel, Black Man, and read it when I received it.
Between ordering Black Man a while back, and the time it (finally) got delivered, I noticed that there was another Richard Morgan novel coming out – also in hardback, but two months later than Black Man. This one was called ‘Thirteen’ (Or ‘Th1rte3n’, if you believe the typography) so, like the fanboy I so obviously am, I ordered that too. Great, two novels in a short time – that explains the delay in releasing Black Man, and how long it’s taken the new stuff to come out.
I received ‘Thirteen’ (sorry, I just can’t be arsed with the typographical nancing about) yesterday. And it turns out it’s just ‘Black Man’ with a different title and cover.
To me that’s a pretty scummy way to do things. I don’t know if it’s been decided that ‘Black Man’ is a title that won’t sell, or something. But I would have thought it better to have some form of notification that it was actually a rebranded title, rather than alienating Morgan’s readers, and making the book purchasers feel like shit-for-brains arsehats who’ve been taken for a ride and bought two copies of the same fucking book.
Posted: Fri 29 June, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Domestic, Own Business, Work-related |
Calming Down
After the chaos of the last couple of weeks, things are finally calming down a bit. Some of that is through our own actions, and some of it is through the actions of others.
Firstly, we’ve completed two full rooms of the house, to a point where all we now need to do is buy some extra furniture for the living room, and unpack books and stuff onto bookcases in the office. It’s a good feeling – and the reactions of other people who’ve come round has shown us that the plans we’ve got for the place are just about right. The rooms we’ve worked on (and when I say ‘we’, I mean primarily Herself) look really good, smart, open, and comfortable. If you saw ‘before’ and ‘after’ photos (and you still might) you wouldn’t believe they were the same house. We’ve now just got to complete one more room (our current bedroom, which will- eventually- be the guest bedroom) for the moment, and that now really only needs some painting to be done.
Secondly, the garden stuff is well on the way. There’s not been a lot we could do over the last couple of weeks, with the levels of rainfall, but equally everything is still becoming more manageable. There’s still an amount of work to be done, and most of that will be done in July, but it’s getting there.
And Thirdly, my workload has dropped. Client #2 have received what they wanted, they’re happy, and the job’s done. When I got the contract, it was supposed to be a rolling thing with continuous work coming in, although I was rather cynical about that, and wondered whether that was some kind of ‘sweetener’ to get someone good to do the site, rather than just a two-month contract. Bizarre, but hey. Turns out I was right – the site’s been completed- within timescales and budgets- and all of a sudden there’s no more work coming in, but thanks for the site.
To be honest, I’m not surprised – and nor am I really all that bothered. I’ve been paid for the work I’ve done, the client is happy, and that’s fine. It’s also had the side-effect of giving me some other ideas of my own that can be developed and tried out. Even better, it means I’ve got some time to myself again.
In hindsight, taking on Client #2 wasn’t my smartest move. It pushed up my workload to silly levels (although not quite to the levels of downright stupid – been there, done that, no plans to do it again) – and while normally it wouldn’t have been a problem, when I then also took into account house stuff as well, it wasn’t my finest hour.
Still, all’s done now, and July is looking like it might actually be slightly more sensible. Well, except for social life – we’re away this weekend, I’m seeing Peter Gabriel in two weeks’ time, and then we’ve guests the weekend after. Lessened workloads never looked better.
Posted: Thu 28 June, 2007 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Customer Services, Cynicism, Geeky, Work-related |
Ah, I do love it when I have to sort out the PC of a new starter in a company.
Particularly when the IT department in the company are a bunch of smeghead chuffbags, and can’t get anything right.
So far, Windows Update has had to install 57 fixes that IT couldn’t be keffed to do.
As well as that, various useful things (in the context of the work we do, and how this company’s web stuff is set up) like :
- IIS (Internet Information Services, for those who don’t know- a web server that in this instance runs on the local machine)
- Subversion
- Tortoise SVN client for Subversion
- Firefox
- MS Office
- MS Outlook, along with setting up email account etc.
So, nothing important then. *cough*