Why is Garfnet moving from a hand written site to a content managed one?
We believed it would make managing GarfNet much easier. However, recent issues upgrading to Joomla 1.5.x have brought this decision into question. Related Images:
Journal
This area is reserved for my occasional ramblings and musings.
FAQ | Journal | Linux | Site Blog | Technology
Didn’t you use another Linux at one time?
Editors note, as of June 2024 this web server, and indeed most of our web servers now run Debian. As do many of our desktop and laptop machines. In 1995 our ISP set us up on a server running FreeBSD. Then in 2005 we built our own server, moved to Linux and chose a ‘live…
FAQ | Journal | Linux | Site Blog | Technology
Which Linux ‘flavour’ did you choose and why did you choose it?
At time of writing, Debian 5.0 Debian stable is arguably one of the most stable platforms upon which you can build a web server. It’s also free and so are its frequent updates. http://www.debian.org Related Images:
FAQ | Journal | Linux | Site Blog | Technology
Why is GarNet using Linux?
Our old server ran since 1995 with only a handful of reboots. Needless to say, it was not an M$ Windows machine. It was a FreeBSD box and it served us well. When our ISP said we could build our own server, we had two choices; 1. Windows 2003 Server with IIS (Micro$oft Internet Information…
What is the ‘Millennium Team’ doing now?
I am working on a new ‘Friends’ area where I plan to list most of the old team and their current projects. However there is plenty of work making this new Joomla release function properly, so the ‘Friends’ area may not happen for some time! Related Images:
Is the New Millennium available in an archive?
Yes. Fully searchable archive currently lives here http://www.garfnet.org.uk/new_mill Related Images:
What happened to the New Millennium ezine?
The ‘Milly’ as we affectionately called it was an experimental but slightly dysfunctional quarterly ezine that ran from 1995 December 27th through to 1999 December 25. It’s quirky but honest view of the world attracted contributors & readers from all around the planet. The New Millennium was a big project, undertaken on a shoestring budget….
What does VISTA mean?
VISTA Virus Infection Spyware Trojans and Adware Pip pip! G 🙂 Related Images:
Journal | Linux | Technology
Joomla 1.5 Bugs
Editor’s note: We became so sick and tired of Joomla’s bugs and upgrade issues that we eventually dumped it altogether in 2018, in favour of WordPress. It actually took less time to move to WordPress than it did to perform yet another Joomla upgrade “migration”. Upgrading from Joomla 1.0 to version 1.5 must be one…
An apology
More astute observers may have noticed that GarfNet has changed a bit lately. You may also have observed that some features are missing and some don’t work at all. We’re really sorry about this. Trouble is that Garfnet is currently upgrading its main CMS (content management system) from Joomla 1.0.x to Joomla 1.5.x. This task…
Hot Spots
Garfnet has become a huge site with many component parts. Here are some of the more useful bits, complete with nice, short URL’s you can bookmark, scribble down on a stick-it note or (heaven forbid) memorise! All things Linux:- http://www.garfnet.org.uk/linux Depth of field (DoF) calculator:- http://www.garfnet.org.uk/dof Earthquake info:- http://www.garfnet.org.uk/earthquake International weather from 3000 METAR stations…
Digital pictures | General | Hong Kong | Journal | Photography | Technology | Travelogue
Hong Kong Museum
Back in Hong Kong for a few days. Today we’re in Kowloon visiting the Hong Kong Museum. I must be getting old because I remember seeing a lot of this stuff for sale in Woolworth’s when I was kid Related Images:
Shinkansen to Kyoto Japan
Today we went to the beautiful city of Kyoto, on one of Japan’s legendary Nozomi Shinkansen trains. The Nozomi is Japan’s fastest train service and runs on the Tokaido and San’yō Shinkansen lines. The service only stops at the largest stations. Its N700 series rolling stock reaches speeds of 83 metres per second (300 km/h…
Himeji Castle Japan
Day trip to Himeji Castle, photographed by my girlfriend Zsuzsi. Related Images:
Himeji Japan
Took a short Train ride to Himeji today. Related Images:
Osaka Japan
Decided to take a break from Hong Kong and spend a few days in and around Osaka, Japan. It rained quite hard today, so we took a riverboat trip. Also found some LED geese. Related Images:
FAQ | General | Journal | Photography | Technology
Cleaning a camera CCD with a vacuum cleaner and a Lens Pen
I had Fuji S1, S2 & S3, all of which had dust magnets for sensors! They would get dirty even if I did not remove the lenses, simply from the air that got sucked in by varying the focal length of the lens. However, I cleaned them quite successfully with a vacuum cleaner. However there…
Southampton Common in the Snow
There was an unusually heavy fall of snow overnight. So I thought I would wander across to the Common and grab a few snaps. Related Images:
FAQ | Journal | Linux | Technology
Is Linux a “disruptive technology”?
If you do a google search for “disruptrive technology” and the word “Linux”, you’re likely to get over 50,000 hits. Trouble is that many of the articles that appear are quite old, often going back as far as 2001 and further. A lot has happened in the last few years… For a start, today we…
Journal | Linux | Technology | Windows
Using VirtualBox to run Windows apps that will not run on WINE
I’m a big fan of WINE and an even bigger fan of CrossoverLinux. This is the commercial implementation of WINE by CodeWeavers. For many Windows apps it works very well indeed. In many ways I prefer it to using a virtual machine (VM) because firstly one does not have to start a VM just to…
Journal | Linux | Technology
UK taxpayers can submit tax returns online using GNUCash open source software
I just completed my UK tax return on-line today. At the end of it all, HMRC (Her Majesty’s Revenue & Customs) ask for some feedback. I thought that fans of open source software might be interested in my response:- “This is certainly a great improvement over previous years. It actually saved me a lot of…
Windows 7 – is it any good?
Amidst lots of puff & bluster, Microsoft has released a half decent Beta version of its latest Windows 7 operating system. One of the claims made for it is that it is faster than Vista. Mind you, it needed to be. I dumped Windows nearly two years ago, largely because of the slug-like performance of…
Merry Christmas 2008
The Shabby Trabi. Garf Technology Christmas card 2008. Related Images:
Gibseys Christmas lights
I have a pal whose house lights up like a Christmas tree – literally. So whenever he does this, I always nip over thee with a camera… Related Images:
How do I stop Google indexing a particular page on my site?
There are several ways to stop Google and most other search engines indexing a page. The simplest is to use a “noindex” metatag on any pages you don’t want indexed. Here’s the HTML code, in context. (Obviously the text between the <title></title> tags is just there for show and is not relevant to the workings…