Hallo

Google besoek ons Dinsdag 12:00.

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/07/computer-science-resources-for.html

Translated from Afrikaans:

Google is visiting us Tuesday 12:00.

Awesome!

At least it’s someone from Google, don’t know who exactly, but none-the-less. Cool.

Microsoft also visited our University (Stellenbosch Uni) earlier in the year. Trying to find people to recruit.

Moving countries is probably the biggest reason why people don’t want to go work for these big companies. I have commented on this issue on Charl van Niekerk’s blog before. He was the only person from South Africa to do the Google Summer Of Code this year (2007).
Basically I said that the Summer of Code’s timing isn’t right for South African Universities Timetables. Also, I said that Google should email all the Universities in the country to get more info and spread the word, they went one up on that and are visiting us instead!

As an aside, personally, I think MXit is becoming the Google of South Africa, in its own way. In the fact that they have to handle largehuge scale instant messenging and data transfers in real time. And what seems to be the largest single instant messenger this side of China!

Google Offices in Africa

Google opened its first office in Sub-Saharan Africa, in Kenya, earlier this year.
Google is opening up some offices in South Africa too. Don’t know much about it though. But it doesn’t look technical yet. [1]
Amazon has offices in South Africa, Cape Town, with developers too. (Jerith is someone who works there.)

Here’s the proposed agenda, any questions you all want to know? Let me know, I’ll ask them.
I could maybe write something on my site about the meeting when it’s done for those interested.

Google University Meeting Agenda

1. Introductions
1. Introductions from University
2. Introductions from Google
2. Overview from Google
1. Google overview
2. New Africa office overview
3. University Programs overview
4. Growth and opportunities in Africa and worldwide
5. New Initiatives

3. Overview of Google Programs
1. Google Apps
2. Open Source
3. Summer of Code

4.Questions and Answers
1. Google and University discuss
5. Next Steps
1. Determine best point of contact within University and Google
2. Best method of communication going forward
3. Discussion

Other topics to discuss

**************
• Understanding the various departments / degree programs offered pertaining to ICT
– (e.g. Computer Science, Computer Engineering, Informatics? Multiple programs?)
– What is the curriculum for each of these departments?
– Is the curriculum standard or is it customizable for each student?
– Are there different specializations or tracks of study within these courses?
– Would it be possible for us to obtain an actual course list?

• Student Statistics
– demographics
a. What is the ratio of male to female students university-wide?
b. By ICT department…
c. What is the general age of most incoming students?
d. How would you characterize the ethnic diversity of your university?
e. What is the total number of students enrolled in each of the aforementioned ICT

departments?
f. Where do most of your students come from? (both in terms of which high schools and regionally within the country)
g. What is the percentage of international students? From which countries do they hail?
h. What is the ratio of incoming students from urban vs rural areas?
– matriculation
i. What is the graduation rate? (both university-wide and for each of the ICT departments)
j. What do students do after graduation?
k. Who are considered the favorite employers among the ICT student body?
l. What is the employment rate among graduating students?
m. What percentage of students go on for additional education?
n. What percentage of graduating students stay in the field of ICT / engineering?

• Academic Calendar
– when do classes begin?
– when are exams held?
– when do students graduate?

It’s capable of everything else too though.

I’ve been using Mandriva Linux (previously known as Mandrake) for a few years now. A pity, the thing just has not been getting better.

I always wonder, “Why are there so many different types/brands of linux?” (called distro’s, short for distributions).

Most people use Windows (XP). It’s a fact. Developers, office workers, you name it, they all use Microsoft Windows.

It’s not easy for them to exactly try something else.

Well, try this: Ubuntu Linux

How?

Go to the Ubuntu site and you can get a free copy to install (or test) on your computer for free.
They will send it to you free of charge too.
shipit.ubuntu.com

* If you are someone who likes to explore or play around with your computer, then this is a great way to start learning linux, etc.
* Scared of the black screen command line? Don’t worry, with the new Linux desktops out, you won’t even have to see one.

Comon, let’s stop using a hundred different (distrowatch.org) linux distributions, and start focusing on making one great and popular, Ubuntu!
Microsoft has a Windows fits all. Why can’t there be a free Operating System (OS) like that?

Ubuntu is free. Windows is not. Just by the way.

UPDATE: Even easier to try Ubuntu:

• Use a virtual machine – A program that runs a whole computer in a window. So you are in Windows, but you can switch to a window where Ubuntu is running and it thinks it’s its own computer. (Make it full screen, and you won’t even know it’s just a program in Windows.) Try VMWare or Virtual PC, both Free VM‘s
• Wubi, Install Ubuntu the easy way – No need to change your hard drive partitions either, install Ubuntu in windows as a program (into a folder). Then when you reboot, it’s an option to boot into Ubuntu. Here: wubi-installer.org

There’s plenty of help for Ubuntu users on the internet. And it’s really easy to get help should you want to find out how to do something!

NEW: Apple, the legends, iTunes brought out iTunes U , U stands for University I guess.

iTunes U has arrived, giving higher education institutions an ingenious way to get audio and video content out to their students. Presentations, performances, lectures, demonstrations, debates, tours, archival footage — school is about to become even more inspiring.

Great, another place where you can get world class information for free.

Isn’t it amazing that the internet can allow me to get content from the top universities in the world, for free, from the comfort of my own country?

apple.com/itunesu/ – University and educational material (MP3′s etc) via iTunes!

Some universities’ iTunes U sites:

• itunes.stanford.edu
• itunes.berkeley.edu
• itunes.psu.edu
• itunes.duke.edu

Mostly American universities.
Who will be the first South African university to have an iTunes.domain? itunes.sun.ac.za? or itunes.uct.ac.za?
apple.com/education will help you.

Google also broadcasts the talks that are given at the Google Offices to the world for free. Again, without technology, those talks would have fallen only on the ears currently in the room. Now anyone can be there, without actually being there.

• Google Tech Talks 1
• Google Tech Talks 2

Check out my previous page: time management i for some more links.

The Problem

I noticed that dropdown boxes (<select> html elements with <option>’s) on Motorola phones were being shown as a list, instead of as the usual dropdown list that we are used to.

Normal dropdown box html	How a dropdown box should look like
<select> <option value="CellC">CellC</option> <option value="MTN">MTN</option> <option value="Vodacom4me">Vodacom</option> <option value="Virgin">Virgin Mobile</option> </select>	CellC MTN Vodacom Virgin Mobile

Motorola shows it “wrongly” like this instead:

CellC
MTN
Vodacom
Virgin Mobile

Which does waste a lot of space on the limited screen size of a mobile cellphone.

The Solution

Fix Method 1: Leave out the closing /option tags

This is the easiest way to fix, although it doesn’t make the markup XHTML, it is still valid HTML.
You have to leave out the closing OPTION tags.

Like so:

<select>
<option value="CellC">CellC
<option value="MTN">MTN
<option value="Vodacom4me">Vodacom
<option value="Virgin">Virgin Mobile
</select>

That’s it, the Motorola will then display the dropdown as a normal PC browser would.

Fix Method 2: Add a Optgroup

In HTML there is a cool <optgroup> tag. Which allows you to group items in a dropdown list.
Example:

        
v3
v360

        
        
6230i
7250i

        

So, to get the motorola to display a dropdown list as we would like it to, we just have to add one <optgroup> element to the <select>ion box.

Like this:

<select>
<optgroup>
<option value="CellC">CellC</option>
<option value="MTN">MTN</option>
<option value="Vodacom4me">Vodacom</option>
<option value="Virgin">Virgin Mobile</option>
</optgroup>
</select>

In PHP before generating the “option” tags I check if it’s a Motorola phone and do this:
if (strstr($_SERVER['HTTP_USER_AGENT'], "MOT-")) {
echo '<optgroup>';
}
And remember to close it afterwards.

The Tools

Motorola actually has a browser / internet / xhtml / html-mobile / wml /wap simulator-emulator program so that you can test how your webpage / wappage will look on a Motorola.
It’s called the Motorola ADK (Application Developer Kit).

ADK Features

* Supports WML, cHTML and xHTML-basic
* Syntax Directed Editor and Script Debugger
* WML Script Compiler: 1.2.1 Compliance
* WML Script Debugging
* Incorporates actual browser components – to achieve Realistic Simulation capabilities across Motorola and other devices

Download the Motorola E398 ADK. Requires Login / registration first. Get Skip Registration here or Download Moto ADK directly.
The actual cellphone model / version of the ADK doesn’t matter as their browser is pretty much the same across all the phones. (V3, V3x razr, renders the same way as MOT-E398)

Happy testing!

I came across this problem because the contact quick list I have on my free sms sites (CellC, MTN, Vodacom) weren’t showing nicely on Motorolas. Now that’s all fixed

UPDATE: Added a new workaround. (exclude the closing </option> tags)

Sometimes, Internet Explorer (IE) just has issues when you try to get some critical updates that you need, from windowsupdate.com or Automatic Updates, to keep safe.

So, what you can do is use Firefox or Opera to get the updates you need without any problems or hassles!

Here is the address:
windowsupdate.62nds.com

Almost any non-MSIE browser works here.

Go get your free windows updates!

Keep safe,

DEF

Some people would tell me they couldn’t scroll on some of my wap pages sometimes, and it’s not exactly easy to reproduce if you don’t have a Motorola to test with

So, I saw it came up on the hawhaw mailing list: groups.yahoo.com/group/hawhaw and decided to test it.

Here is what I found…

Thanks, looks like I’ve found something.

SUMMARY: Don’t use “position:relative;” in CSS for a mobile page for some Motorola’s.

See, wap.defza.com/test/1.php (and up to 7.php).

A motorola V3 Razr fails to scroll on every one except the 7.php one;

The difference: the main <div> looks like this on the broken ones:
<div style=”text-align:left; position:relative;”>
The one that works has
<div style=”"> So, clearly it’s an issue with DIVs and STYLEs on some Motorola’s;

I tested more to see if it’s “text-align:” causing the issue or “position:”.
I used wap.defza.com/test/a.php (up to d.php) for this;

a.php and c.php are OK. b.php and d.php FAIL on the V3 Razr.

The difference:
b and d have “position:relative” in either the div class or the .body CSS.

So, the fix would be to NOT have “position:relative” as a style in a WAP page for some Motorola’s.

The value of text-align: does not affect this bug.

I see in the hawhaw.inc file it says:

// position:relative is needed to work-around MSIE’s Peekaboo bug …

What version of IE is this referring to?
I removed it from my hawhaw.inc and it seems fine in IE.

Glad this is hopefully solved

Cheers,

David

There is nothing the end-user can do about this issue, but if you do find a webpage that can’t scroll on your Motorola at least you know what to suggest as a fix to the website owner

Motorola, I hope you’ve fixed this bug already!

Do YOU want to download 4 Gigs today?

YES, let me download Windows Vista

NO?
Well, you can order the CD too.

Heavy system requirements. 15Gig install. 1 Gig RAM. 1Ghz CPU. DX9 Graphics Card.

Ouch, someone buy me a PC!

Ah… the backlogged life…… by Greg Knauss.

I found it at 43folders.com.

My entire life has devolved into an endless, grinding slog through my back-log. Everything I do is about catching up, doing the stuff I didn’t get done the day before, plowing through some other goddamned thing that needs my attention. Ending the day without actually adding to the total aggregate is a victory. There are times when it piles up faster than I can shovel it away.

The tools I use to manage information have evolved to the point where I can abdicate the tedious process of gathering it all together to them, and they now do a very diligent job of making sure that it’s all brought to my attention. Endlessly. Maddeningly.

Oh boy, doesn’t this sound familiar?
How many of us don’t work with 3 email addresses, a feed aggregator with 100′s of unread posts, and multiple communication mechanisms? It’s quite scary actually. And how much of it is really important? 1% maybe?

Well, this article does a good job of articulating the situation of a new way of geek.
Yes, I see myself falling into it… but, if you want to get anything done in your life, you have to buckle down and close the browser.
That’s what I’ve been practising lately: Pressing The X.

I think the Internet has become the new TV: a place to spam your time away, learning nothing useful.

Do you think people get things done by browsing? (the new channel-hopping)

So, what you gona do? Stay, or leave?

The choice lies in your… click.

Firefox crashes and locks up a lot. Firefox seems to have memory issues.

This is how you fix it. Free.

This is why:

Opera vs. Firefox in the flesh.

Opera does not crash and lose all my work!
It saves my tabs no matter what!
It’s a tiny download!
It has more features than 10 programs put together!