Swimming with the shark

The following takes place between 8 am and 10pm

2007-04-10T23:20:00.000+02:00

I wanted to try out my new compact Sony DSC-T100 so I decided to take a photo every hour of my day. Results below:

8 am - walking to my car

9 am - admiring the mural we've collectively painted on our office whiteboard

10 am - the crew eats breakfast

11 am - Petter helps out a customer on the phone

noon - Petter, Håkan and Jonas walk away after having inspected a possible new site for us

1 pm - Petter and Håkan in the parking garage at work

2 pm - Petter manages to almost completely obscure Tomas

3 pm - skype chat with Johannes and Petter

4 pm - admiring the piece of contemporary art created by Petter just moments ago

5 pm - in the car in the parking garage, Petters computer bag in lower right corner (wow)

6 pm - waiting in line to buy a part for the car's exhaust

7 pm - eating dinner while watching Babylon 5

8 pm - rockin' time with Guitar Hero 2

10 pm - (I wonder where 9 pm went ...) stopped playing GH2 after having beaten medium difficulty

and that's my day :) - my photography skills are virtually non-existant but I guess I'll learn.

Wishlist

2007-03-12T20:43:00.000+01:00

Since I can never remember what I want when christmas or my birthday comes up I've decided to put edit this post whenever I think of something.

The Macallan 18 Years Old
Lagavulin 16 Years Old
Dalmore 12
Balvennie DoubleWood 12

TV Shows

2007-02-03T16:08:00.000+01:00

I recently recounted the number of shows I'm currently watching and realized that I must have no free time :)

In no particular order they are:

24
Battlestar Galactica
Doctor Who
Dexter
American Dad
Family Guy
Simpsons
The Unit
NCIS
CSI: NY
The 4400
Heroes
House
Entourage
Lost
Numb3rs
South Park
Prison Break
Scrubs
Stargate SG1
Stargate Atlantis
My name is Earl
The Wire
Sopranos
Torchwood

and then I remembered the shows that have ended ...

Firefly
Farscape
Arrested Development
Alias
Enterprise
Dead like me
JAG

and these were just in the last two years! :D

More pictures :)

2006-08-08T17:43:00.000+02:00

My new TV

2006-08-08T17:33:00.000+02:00

I recently bought an LG 42PM1MA plasma monitor and got it installed today.

Some pictures below:

Tv moved out of its box. No wall attachment yet.

The wall attachment.

The box it came in (no it didn't stand on the side :)

Just unpacked :)

A picture of a HDHR version of a Lost episode, transcoded from Windows Media Center.

Fudged network

2006-07-25T11:48:00.000+02:00

I had to do some work from home today and was using a VPN connection to work when my laptop suddenly just turned off.

When I switched it back on I couldn't get any network connection at all. Running ipconfig resulted in absolutely nothing. But then I remembered listening to a show of Hanselminutes (I couldn't recommend this show enough btw) where Scott talked about tools you didn't know you already have.

The part I specifically remembered was about a command line utility called netsh. It lets you control your network settings from the command line. So the command I entered in my console was

netsh interface ip reset c:\resetlog.txt

That resulted in a logfile and after reboot my network was back to normal.

Thank you Scott :)

Passive FTP and the Netgear WGT624 router

2006-07-24T18:43:00.000+02:00

An ftp site I use suddenly stopped accepting my connections. Since this was out of the blue I found out that the router on the server's side had been updated, but the ports had been reset to what they were before so it should've been working.

The site uses RaidenFTPD and the error message received was 'no one connects to me at ip: xxx,xxx,xxx,xxx port:xxxx'

According to the forums at Raiden that meant the connection was blocked by the router.

After a bit of searching I noticed that the passive ports I setup in raiden wasn't the same ports that got sent out to the client when it sent PASV. Very strange. Apparently someone was messing with the ports!

True enough, I found a setting in the router that said "Disable SPI Firewall". SPI checks the packets so it can handle DOS-attacks. I disabled SPI and everything worked like a charm.

TechEd in Boston 2006 - Day 12

2006-06-21T15:49:00.000+02:00

The only plan we had today was to see the game between Sweden and England. We looked up a bar called The Place and took the subway there. Just our luck; the damn thing that said it showed world cup matches didn't open until an hour after the game had started!

We strolled up the street and found ourselves an irish pub instead.
The game was exciting, the pub had alot of english supporters in it and they exploded when Joe Cole scored the first goal for England.

We got equally happy when Swede equalized :)

All in all 2-2 was a great result. They still haven't beaten us for the last 38 years. However; we will meet Germany in the next round and we haven't beaten them in 48 years! :)

We had dinner at The Cheesecake Factory. We got humongous portions of food and yummy yummy cheesecakes for dessert. I wish Anna would've been here, she would've loved it :)

Tomorrow we are going home. The plane leaves at 7pm and we will arrive on thursday at 1155am in Sweden. It's going to be a looooooong day.

TechEd in Boston 2006 - Day 11

2006-06-20T03:50:00.000+02:00

It was very warm today again. 34 degrees celsius in the shade.
A great day for shopping.

At 9.15am we were picked up at the Hilton by ... a limousine :D
We went to Wrentham Premium Outlet in style - it took about 45 minutes and cost us $50 each. This mean we could leave whenever we wanted. Had we taken the bus ($36) we would've had 5 hours to do all our shopping.

We got there at 10am and left at .... 6pm. I've never shopped for so long in my entire life.
I got lots of cool clothes and I filled my spare suit case!

We were pretty beat when we got home and dined at the Wendy's around the corner.

TechEd in Boston 2006 - Day 10

2006-06-20T03:38:00.000+02:00

It was brutally warm today, somewhere around 32 degrees celsius in the shade.
We checked out from Hilton and checked in at Oasis Guest House. We got a small room with a double and a single bed.

Turns out the double bed isn't really big enough for two of us to sleep in comfortably; so we went hunting for an air bed. We went up and down Mass Ave looking for various shops that might have it. None did. The only ones we found were automatic ones with their own motor in it - costing somewhere from $100 to $200. Not what we were looking for :)

Finally we got a tip to try Bed, Bath and Beyond at Fenway. Strengthened by our previous tours we went there by subway. Alas they only had the same air beds we had already found.

We were about to give up when we turned a corner, literally, and found an outdoor shop with an actual MANUAL air bed for $25 :D

While we were out there we took the time to catch a movie, Nacho Libre at AMC fenway 13.
This time we got the huge theatre :)

The movie was alot of fun. Jack Black was great as Nacho, very toned down and almost subtle.
We laughed the whole way through.

After we got back to our room we went out to get the best margaritas in boston!
I got some a BBQ Pulled Pork sandwich with rum beans. Very yummy!

The margaritas were very good. The dessert was excellent:

A layer of chocolate ganache, a layer of vanilla cheesecake and finished with a layer of homemade toffee.

I finished about half of it as it was VERY rich and VERY tasty :)

TechEd in Boston 2006 - Day 9

2006-06-18T04:34:00.000+02:00

We started off the day with some breakfast and some Ben & Jerries ice cream. The only thing we had planned for today was the Duck Tour. It was a really good tour; I highly recommend it. We got to see alot of Boston and we got alot of cool information about the city and its history.

Captain Covert was very entertaining and we tipped handsomely.

When we got back to the hotel we relaxed on the sundeck; playing some cards and munching donuts.

We really didn't have any plans so before we left the hotel for the evening meal we decided to ask the concierge, Mirko Bisetta, about any good italian restaurants in the vicinity.

He told us that while there were alot of italian restaurants around the hotel he couldn't recommend them. If we wanted to get real italian food we should go to the north end.

We took the subway there and after walking around a bit we finally found the place. Limoncello.

Three words.

Oh
my
god

We started off with some olives; the best olives I've ever had. For the main course I had fusili with a lamb and veal ragu. Possible the best pasta I've ever had.

The setting was great and we were so happy that we took the time to go out there.
It wasn't exactly cheap and we tipped quite handsomely; but well worth it.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 8

2006-06-17T03:04:00.000+02:00

The last day of TechEd was a day of catching up on sessions that i couldn't attend earlier in the week.

Some more sessions on WCF and one about involving security in the development lifecycle.

The funny thing about TechEd on the last day is that when the last session is over, the whole place has been cleaned out and the buses leave for the hotel. That's it. It's all very final :)

To sum up this week I feel like I learned more this year than last. I will really benefit from the things I learned about .net 3.0 this week.

After coming back to the hotel we were going to purchase bus tickets to the outlet we're going to on monday. It turns out it was $13 more expensive for us (per person) to hire a personal driver to drive us there and home again; giving us full flexibility on when we want to leave and go back.

Only in America :)

We went out to go bowling but were disappointed with the bad lanes and light pins. Dinner was better. We ate at California Pizza Kitchen and I had a Thai Pizza with pieces of chicken breast marinated in a spicy peanut-ginger and sesame sauce, Mozzarella cheese, green onions, bean sprouts, julienne carrots, cilantro and roasted peanuts.

It was really really good!

Tomorrow we'll finally get to sleep in.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 7

2006-06-16T04:19:00.000+02:00

Today started off with a session about creating your own enterprise framework with Scott Hanselman and Keith Pleas. It was a good session and I got to ask scott some questions that I had been thinking about.

It was good to know that I was on the right track and had come to the right conclusion. Never hurts to have it confirmed though :)

I did a lot of labs for the rest of the day. One lab was a bit different from what I normally sdo. It
was about coding for Microsoft Compute Cluster and thus coding for parallell processes. Thing is the lab was in C++ :)

It was cool to do it but very hard.

In the evening we went to the big party event at Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox.
It was cool to have been there but I think the americans appreciated it more.

Tomorrow is the last day of TechEd for the sessions.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 6

2006-06-15T04:30:00.000+02:00

Most of the morning was spent doing various labs; trying to get some hands on experience with the things we've seen at the different sessions.

We then saw some cool new things you can do with Windows Presentation Foundation. The day ended with a session about Windows Communication Foundation and ASP.Net.

After we got home to the hotel we got a tip about a bed and breakfast very close to our hotel. We went over there to check it out and decided to book it from sunday to wednesday. From what we gathered it's small but cheap and good.

We'll be staying three people in the same room. It's going to be an adventure :)

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 5 supplemental

2006-06-14T14:32:00.000+02:00

We went out with a client this evening and decided to go to the restaurant at the top of the Prudential Center. The food was good and the view was even better.

After dinner we lounged in the bar where three guys were playing jazz. Me and N ordered frozen margheritas - the best I've ever gotten. All in all a great evening!

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 5

2006-06-14T00:22:00.000+02:00

We started off with a session about building secure services in Windows Communication Foundation; part of WinFx (now known as .Net Framework 3.0). They've really done a kick ass job with all of it. It's gonna be so much fun using it once it's released.

I continued with another WCF session and then followed that one up with a session about SQL Query Governors. That session was held by Richard Campbell and was very interesting.

They showed a cool way of solving the problem of running queries that are costly when the server is already under heavy load.

Then, the piece de resistance. "Dirty SOAP without ASMX" with Scott Hanselgod, sorry, Scott Hanselman.

Just like last year both the sessions content and the presentation was stellar.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 4

2006-06-13T02:45:00.000+02:00

Today we started off with breakfast. T overslept and had to stress his way to the first session.

An overview of entlib for .net 2

I knew most of it already but there were some new points that were good to know.

The second session was alot better. SQL Querying Tips and Techniques with Richard Campbell. A real pro. He was funny and we got some great SQL Query tips. Especially good was the crosstab tips.

After lunch we attended some sessions about Windows Workflow Foundation. It seems to be really cool but it's not going to be launched until Vista is - so we're in for a long wait.

At about 6pm the expo hall reception started. It was swag time!
I filled my TechEd bag with stuff - all in all a good evening :)

This year I am so much more relaxed. Everything isn't new to me so I don't have to process the experience of being here which can be very tiresome.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 3

2006-06-13T02:38:00.000+02:00

Today we decided to skip the hotel breakfast and went to McDonalds instead.
Turns out they don't exactly have the same kind we have in sweden where at least there are *some* healthy alternatives and whole grain bread.

I ended up getting a bagel but T and N went for the McGriddle. We all agreed I probably made the best choice :)

After the breakfast we went to the convention center to register for TechEd.
Then we walked around the place; checking out the CommNet. We planned the sessions for Monday and Tuesday.

We went home again after that and got something to eat before returning to see the keynote.

The only good thing about the keynote was the appearance of Mary Lynn Rajskub (better known as Chloe from 24). She was professional and fun.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 2

2006-06-11T04:26:00.000+02:00

Today we started off by eating breakfast at the hotel. We really filled up before heading out to find some kind of sports bar where we could watch the Sweden - Trinidad Tobago game.

It was raining; like it's been doing for quite a while now in Boston (from what we've been told) but we managed to find an irish Pub close to the hotel.
The game was a disappointment. Sweden couldn't capitalize even when Trinidad got a man sent off.

After the game we decided to walk around some just to see what the city is like.
It was still raining but it didn't bother us that much. We strolled our way down town; eventually heading to Filene's Basement that a friend of Anna's had recommended as a place to go for some shopping.

On our way there we suddenly noticed people standing in door openings. It was like a scene from The Wire. I'm about 95% sure they were dealing. It was strange seeing something like that; not exactly something we're used to in Sweden.

It was such a mess :) Clearly not intended for the average male as all three of us got stressed out just by looking at the place.
Just as we were about to leave; coincidence strikes. Turns out the friend that recommended the place just happened to be there just when we were!
What are the odds? :D

After strolling some more we went back to the hotel. We decided to go see Mission Impossible 3.
The movie was good; but the 2L coke started to bother me about half way in :)

When the movie was over I was ready to burst. I headed for the first restroom I could see and went for sweet sweet relief.
It wasn't until I exited the place that I noticed ... it was the women's restroom :D

All in all, a full day.

TechEd 2006 in Boston - Day 1

2006-06-10T03:15:00.000+02:00

The day started out at home. Me and N met up with T at the train station from where we were going to take a taxi to the airport.
First snag of the trip: N had managed to bring his girlfriend's passport instead of his own.
Thankfully we had alot of time so she could bring him the right one.

The flight to Amsterdam with KLM was short and uneventful. We then transferred to an NWA flight (or was it nwa?). The plane was an Airbus A330-200 and it was awesome.
Great legroom and a great entertainment system with on demand movies, music and games.
The hours went by real fast and before we knew it we had arrived in boston.

Once settled at the hotel we decided to go out for a walk and get something to eat.
We found a small place called Stevie's Greek & American Cuisine. I had a gyros wrap that was good.

As I blog this I've been up for 19 hours so I'm a bit tired. It's only 9.30pm local but for my body it's 3.30am
:)

PC Wireless Key Lock owns

2006-01-10T10:44:00.000+01:00

After reading about this product and the open source program that makes it actually work I knew I had to have one :)

It works great!

It's simply a usb plugin that comes with a small (...) device that sends out a heartbeat every few seconds. The adapter picks up on this and the open source program then handles that information.

This means that whenever I leave my computer at work it automatically locks and turns down the volume. (Great news for my co-workers :). When I return it turns up the volume again (but doesn't automatically login of course).

The best part about the program is that it's extensible through plugins. So if I'd want something else to happen when I leave/return; I could simply write my own plugin and have it run :)

XBOX 360 First impressions

2005-12-04T20:37:00.000+01:00

Got my 360 premium the day it was released here.

let's start with the cons:

1 Mega large power supply.
It's huge and ugly. Doesn't bother me much though.
2 Sounds like a harvesting machine when it runs games.
Good thing the music and sound from the games is louder; but when there is silence the sound from the fans is really loud.
3 Right now you need a PC with Media Center to stream video.
I've heard this will change with Windows Vista which will have this functionality built-in.
But you still can't stream XviD/DivX which is a major drawback.
I'm still going to be using my old xbox for that for the time being.

Pros:
5 XBOX Live.
Wow oh wow. This is the future of gaming. This is the reason to get an xbox 360.
The live function is ubiquitous in the xbox; you can compare your results in your local games to the rest of the world. You can add friends to your friends list and be notified when they log on. You can then chat with them while playing a game or watching a movie without having to end the game.
This is what makes the 360 something other than just another console. I think the PS3 will really suffer from not having anything like this.
The downloadable trailers and demos is a really cool feature too.

7 Great wireless controllers.
The controllers are just great. Fits nicely in your hands and are easy to set up.
I've been using joytechs controllers for the old xbox and their latest is supposed to find the channel automatically (which it doesnt). The 360 controllers do and never let go of the connection.

8 Downloadable arcade games.
For a small fee you can purchase games like Bejewled 2 and Zuma.

I've only bought Project Gotham Racing 3 and it's a cool racing game.
Right now there aren't any other games I'm looking to buy but there are a few coming up that I will.

Firefox plugins

2005-11-07T14:41:00.000+01:00

I got whiff of another great plugin for firefox from hanselmans blog.

The first one is IE View, which lets you open a page in Internet Explorer when you're in Firefox.

The other one is an extension of that. IE Tab; which lets you use IE as the rendering engine inside Firefox. It totally rocks :)

Heaven and hell

2005-10-25T22:44:00.000+02:00

Just came back from a satellite poker tournament.

I finished in the worst position I ever have; but probably had the best hands I've ever had.
It was like playing a self playing piano; I got cards that I either couldn't call with at all; or I got AKs, KK, QQ - which in a rebuy tournament is pretty much all in hands preflop.

So, after about 4 hours, 20-something people left and I had 8000 in chips; chip leader on our table.
I'm on the button and a loose player goes all in with 4000 infront of me. I knew he probably had AX; so I moved all in with my jacks to make a statement to the remaining people to get out of the way.
The person after me said "that makes it easy for me" and folded.

What I missed was that someone had limped in UTG; I thought he was in the big blind. Turns out he had limped with KK and of course called.

First guy shows A4o, just as I suspected.

Problem was the guy next to me had folded ... JJ
Anyhow, the worst hand wins; he got trip fours on the river and beat us both.
Now I had only 2000 chips left; and look down on AKs (!!!)

I of course go all in and the guy with the kings (now really in the big blind) calls with AQo.

Long story short, queen hits on the flop and I'm out. From chip leader of the table to busted in less than 3 minutes.

Heaven and hell.

Priceless

2005-10-25T15:22:00.000+02:00

This is just so good. The AYB fad was over years ago but this is still brilliant :)

I give you .... All your base rhapsody

Monkeys are back

2005-10-18T10:18:00.000+02:00

We've begun coding on three (!) new modules for DotNetNuke 3.
The first is the module that got it all started: NCM Picture of the Day; now renamed to NCM Daily Image.

We've added some goodies in the pro version that hopefully will be of use to a lot of people.

The other modules we're working on are part of a licensing solution for DotNetNuke developers.
It's actually our own licensing solution that we are working on to make it easy for other developers to add licensing to their own modules.

Stay tuned for more updates :)

Trains

2005-10-03T21:44:00.000+02:00

Today has been a big travelling day. First down to the south of sweden by car; about 2 hours each way. Then I got my butt on a train heading for Uppsala where I'll be attending a course for the next three days.

Trains are usually very boring; I stock up on movies and such to keep me busy. However there has been an advancement in the fight against monotony. Wifi!

Some of the trains are fitted with free wifi that actually works. It's somewhere along modem speeds; but it works. I even managed to play 2 hours of poker and whore some more bonus :)

Shouts go out to my monkey pal; ROFWVB6A.

Live poker tourney

2005-09-20T23:05:00.000+02:00

It's been a while since I played in a live poker tourney so me and Pär registered for a satellite tournament.

Problem is there really is nothing to write about it.
From 6.30pm to 10.30pm the playable hands I got was:

AQ AQ AK 55 44 22

The rest of the time I got

75 92 K3 J5 64 etc etc

I finished 13th out of 40 and didn't qualify for the next tournament (7th place or better required)

I don't think I played badly under the circumstances; but that doesn't feel like it matters right now :)

Crap cleaner

2005-09-19T14:04:00.000+02:00

I thought I'd recommend a small utility called Crap Cleaner.

It cleans out all the crap that's gathered in your computer. Registry and all.
On my laptop it cleaned out 400MB of crap and on my stationary 2 GIG (!).

Well, I'm pissed off Rick, how are you?!

2005-08-22T14:35:00.000+02:00

So it all began with me purchasing a Sandisk Memory Stick Duo Pro 1GB from blueproton.co.uk on Ebay. A power seller with a 99% rating.

Once I got the Memory Stick I plugged it in to my PSP and started copying files.
It seemed to work fine, but then I got the error message "Incorrect parameter" and the PSP no longer recognized the Memory Stick.

Oh well, I thought. I'll buy a card reader and format it that way, that should work.

No go. Nothing worked, it couldn't read my card at all. I tried 5 different programs to no avail.

So I contact the seller and he gives me instructions on how to return the item to get a replacement. I follow this to the letter.

That was 3 weeks ago. I still havenn't received my replacement and he's ignored my emails. I got no help from PayPal and Ebay hasn't even responded to my emails.

The seller has sold items after I emailed him so he should still be active. I'm just so pissed at being ripped off like this and having no way to do anything about it. His site doesn't list any address or telephone number; just a form on the website which he ignores.

I'm hoping for the slim chance that he's in the hospital or something and that's why this has happened....

Update:

Got this in the mail -

"Replacement shipped today.

Thank you!
BlueProton Sales"

No explanation to anything.

I'll believe it when I see it.

Greasemonkey ownage + MORE OWNAGE

2005-06-30T14:14:00.000+02:00

I was looking around for some Greasemonkey news and found a UI for greasemonkey where you can visually remove parts of any page and then save that as a Greasemonkey script!

It's called Platypus and it totally rocks!

I'm starting to remove the ads from all the pages I regularly visit :D

Home again

2005-06-20T10:46:00.000+02:00

The trip home was so very very long.

We left the hotel at 11am (EST) on thursday and when we got to the airport they put us on stand by for an earlier flight to Newark because of the impending and ubiquitous thunder storms.

Ulf checked in first, Christofer after that and then I did.

When we got to the gate it turns Ulf had been checked in last (eh?) and only me and Christofer made the earlier flight. Ulf made the original flight though and there wasn't any trouble.

I picked up a pair of Shure E2c at the airport while we waited for Ulfs flight to arrive.

Our home flight was to leave at 6pm and we boarded in time. However we sat in the plane waiting for a, you guessed it, thunder storm to pass by before we could take off.

The ride over was uneventful and boring. I arrived in Stockholm at around 11am (CET) and managed to get a flight home at 12:55.

I'm still deaf on the left ear and it bugs the hell out of me. It's good to be home even though I'm suffering from the jet lag. My brain still thinks it's 04:45 right now ...

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 11 & 12

2005-06-15T21:15:00.000+02:00

Wednesday started off by lounging at the pool for a few hours, then we went to Sea World to visit Shamu and his family. The show was really cool and we sat in the soak zone and got really wet. Like every day here it was about 30-35 degrees so the soaking part was good :)

My cold is getting worse, I felt like crap all day but have refrained from whining so I won't spoil the others vacation.

We also saw some sharks, penguins and a "dolphin" show that had 2 minutes of dolphons and 13 minutes of people swinging from lines and jumping in the water.

We rounded off the day at the hotel with the guys watching Constantine (since I can't really watch a movie being half deaf and all; and since I've seen that movie). I fell asleep at around 10pm.

Today we went to the mall so I could buy a new bag to put all of my stuff in. Ulf bought stuff for his kids. We went back to the hotel and did nothing for the evening. We're all pretty beat. Christofer has caught my cold it seems.

Tomorrow we're going back to Sweden. I miss my family so it'll be good to come home again!

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 10

2005-06-14T12:01:00.000+02:00

Crap.

It wasn't the salt water. I've got a cold.
Woke up all night from the soar throat and the first thing I did when I got up was to go over to Walgreens and buy some DayQuil. Thankfully it helps and I was able to eat breakfast.

The plan for today was to go to the Everglades National Park. The trip there took about 5 hours with stops for food and gas. Once we got there we decided to rent bikes to ride around instead of sitting down for another 2 hours on a tram :)

Turns out the bike ride was awesome. We saw lots of wild aligators right by the road, a racoon, a white tailed deer and turtles! The bike ride took about 2 hours and was hot as hell. It was alot of fun though!

The trip home took about the same time as getting there and my cold just got worse all the time.

While I'm writing this my left ear has gone deaf .. sigh. I "#¤%"! hate colds!

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 9

2005-06-13T23:28:00.000+02:00

Todays trip was to Kennedy Space Center.
We rented a Ford Explorer and made our way to the coast.

The trip there took about an hour and the visit itself was very educational. They didn't mention any of the disasters though.

When we went back we stopped at Cocoa Beach and did some body surfing on the waves. I managed to hit two perfectly; it was awesome :)

When we got home I started to feel a bit raspy in my throat but I'm attributing it to the massive amounts of salt water I swallowed.

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 8

2005-06-12T12:34:00.000+02:00

Today was the first day of the holiday part of the trip.
The only thing I wanted was for the day *NOT* to just be wasted away, sitting around doing nothing. This is exactly what happened. The guys had no motivation to do anything so I decided to go shopping to get something to do. Micke joined me so at least I wasn't alone. When we came back we ate at the indian restaurant we visited earlier in the week. Then we went to Friday's to watch the Tyson fight.

Tomorrow we've talked about renting a car and going to Kennedy space center but if I see the slightest evidence of apathy then I'll go do something myself directly instead of waiting for them to join me.

Edit: added the NOT :) (thanx protorion)

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 7

2005-06-11T00:16:00.000+02:00

Yesterdays trip to Universal was very disappointing. We had 5 hours to eat, drink and go on the rides. We managed to go on the Mummy (which was very cool but soooo short), Men in Black (which totally sucked) and Terminator 2 3d (which was cool).

That's all we had time for. Maybe I'm getting old but I didn't get excited after standing in line for 45 minutes to ride 3 minutes no matter how cool the ride was.

Back at the hotel we brought out the heavy artillery at the jacuzzi. We were joined by a girlfriend to some guy that also attended Tech Ed. She was pissed because apparently the buses that went from Universal to our hotel had stopped going even before everyone was brought home. So they had waited for an hour and a half for a bus that didn't come. She was a nanny from New Mexico and she and her boyfriend were going to leave with a plane at 4.30am so she didn't want to sleep.

Next came an IT pro from Northwestern university and his girlfriend. His name was scott and he was originally from Hawaii. Some more people joined and eventually departed.

So some of our team had a bit of a trouble getting up to the sessions this morning :P
Once again I woke up without a hang over (I must be blessed) and attended some good sessions about ASP.NET and about client development in .NET 2.0.

After Tech Ed was finished we went to shop some more at the premium outlet. I bought some more things at the nike store. I tried to find something for Anna but it's impossible to shop for someone else :( :(

We eventually got real tired of shopping and went back to the hotel; eat some burgers at TGI Friday's and ended the evening by watching the movie Robots on pay tv.

We've extended my room until thursday so at least we have somewhere to stay for the rest of the week. We haven't really decided exactly what we're going to do - but I'm sure it'll be fine.

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 6

2005-06-09T17:04:00.000+02:00

I knew yesterday that today wouldn't be filled with any good sessions so I just attended one. It was about data driven web applications and had about 10 minutes of useful information.

Meh.

So, I did some labs and decided to try and do the only test I had left to get my certification complete. 70-229 - Designing and Implementing Databases with Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition (phew).

I had made half a transcender test but the test was so cheap (only $60!!) so I figured I could give it a try and see what happened.

I passed :D

So now I'm an MCSD for Net as well as the old Visual Basic 6.0 MCSD.

Just stopping by at the hotel for a quick shower before we go out to the attendee party at Universal.

Oh, and I met some of the guys that have created DotNetNuke. Pretty cool. I even got a T-shirt for you Tomas :D

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 5

2005-06-08T23:44:00.000+02:00

First session today was ASP.NET 2.0 Under the covers; which talked about the life cycle and compilation model of 2.0.

Next session was a two parter about ASP.NET where Scott gave us an overview of pretty much all the new features in ASP.NET v2. It was really good and I got some cool ideas.

I continued with some hands on labs on v2 and then went back to the hotel.
We were planning on going to the Premium Outlet and were waiting for the trolley when the other guys got tired of waiting (after 10 minutes ...) and wanted to go eat instead.

So we went to a crappy steakhouse. The ribs were pretty good but the fries were sub standard. We spent the rest of the evening just lounging at the hotel watching the womens softball finals. Michigan won apparently.

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 5

2005-06-07T22:58:00.000+02:00

Todays keynote was about SQL 2005 and Visual Studio 2005. I was looking forward to it but was disappointed. The niveau of it all was very basic.

First session of the day was Code Generation with Scott Hanselman where he talked about how they've set up a whole very cool framework for generating code from xml and wsdl.

He was using notepad2 and slickrun so he's cool in my book :)

The session gave me some good ideas about creating a generator for some episerver code that I always have to write.

After that session I sat down for some hands on labs about ASP.NET 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005. It was real easy to sit down and boot up the lab. Very smooth.

Session three was more info about ASP.NET 2.0 and Visual Studio 2005.
The main focus of Visual Studio 2005 was to increase productivity for the developer. Boy have they done a good job. There are so many new cool features that might seem like small things, but they save maybe 3 seconds of work on tasks you do hundreds of times in a week.

The biggest applause came when they said "VS Studio will NEVER reformat your code".
Boy have I been waiting for that one :)

Session four was more about Team System; this time through the eyes of a developer.
They've really stolen everything from NUnit, NAnt, trac, cruise control etc and integrated it into Visual Studio. The only thing that seems a bit ... gay ... is that they're changing the licensing model. Not that I have to pay for it, but it still sucks.

That was pretty much my day. It was totally an ASP.NET 2.0-day and I learned alot of cool things that i'll have great use for in the future.

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 4

2005-06-06T23:33:00.000+02:00

Today was the first real day of Tech Ed.

We had the continental breakfast in the meal hall. I'm amazed how easy everything flows. There's over 10K people here but there's hardly any lines anywhere.

After the breakfast we attended the keynote speech from Steve Ballmer. The fun part of it was when they showed some of the new features of Windows Mobile 5.0 that included push email.

Next was a break out session about some c# tips and tricks in the Visual Studio IDE 2005.
They had included some nice time saving features like snippets, xml-formattted snippets that you can write yourself to help automate tedious tasks like writing properties.

Session 2 was about an in depth look at the new features of c# 2.0.
The lecturer was the "father" of c#; which was really cool and he talked about:

Generics: Something java has had for a while, but generics in .net seem to be better implemented because they've actually adjusted the CLR making it a .NET feature and not just a language feature.

Some new cool handling of delegates that went in conjunction with generics.

Lunch was served after that and still things went very smooth. They had people posted at empty tables with huge signs that made it easy to find an open table.

After lunch i attended a session about the new Visual Studio Team System.
This was really interesting because it described a developent lifecycle and what Microsoft has done to help out with it.

It was basically a new server product that acted as a repository for all information related to a project. This meant that they've replaced source safe (!!!!). the other things included in this was basically a total rip off of cruise control.net and nant and nunit etc etc. But it's good that they've really put an effort into solving this and putting it into one product.

After this session there was a reception where we got some more food and then we wandered the exhibition hall collecting t-shirts and other freebies. We spent the rest of the evening at the pool before going to bed.

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 3

2005-06-05T22:11:00.000+02:00

The relaxation day.

I woke up at 7am, played some poker until the guys woke up and wanted to get some breakfast.
Overpriced again :)

We decided to chill this day and lazed around the pool with me sipping margaritas and the others drinking beer. The sun finally broke through and we were treated to a glorious day.

We all got various degrees of sun burn; I got away pretty ok.

At around 2pm we hoppes on the Tech Ed designated bus to register at the convention center.
This place was huuuuuge! I think it takes somewhere around 200K attendants. We got our badges and our bags and went back to the hotel.

We stopped by the liquor store for some beer for the guys. Once back at the hotel we sat by the pool and I taught them to play texas hold'em. After the session was through we went over to Popeyes for some chicken. I managed to choose the most vile drink I've ever had there. I can't even remember the name of it but it was a fiendish red liquid that I thought was carbonized (which it turned out not to be). Yuck!

Now I'm in my room playing some inebriated poker. I'm up $50 but one never knows how it'll end.

Tomorrow we'll hop on the bus at around 8.15 and go to the breakfast at Tech Ed. I'm really looking forward to this and will report more tomorrow!

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 2

2005-06-04T22:35:00.000+02:00

Day 2 began with the guys eating a totally overpriced breakfast at the hotel. We then decided to spend the day shopping.

We took one of the trolleys to the Prime Factory Outlet where they had around 200 stores.
The stores were divided into different malls and the first one we went into was ... lame.

None of the clothes appealed to me but the other guys bought some jeans at Levi's.

We walked around just browsing until we got to a leather shop. I instantly spotted a killer jacket that I had to buy - so I did - and my path to shopping madness had begun.

I bought some surfer shorts in a surf shop, shorts and a shirt at the Reebok store, Ecco sandals and Ecco shoes. Two sets of Nike basketball shorts and a shirt at the Nike store.

Next up was the designer factory outlet where they had some really nice stuff. I bought a few Ralph Lauren pique shirts and made a few mental notes about another shop I'm gonna go back to and look at pants and suits in.

By the time we went back to the hotel we were beat. We stopped at a small indian place that looked like crap on the outside, but was really good on the inside, and ate some really spicy food.

On our walk to the hotel we stopped by a liquor store and got some beers and malt drinks which we started to consume upon arrival at the hotel.

The weather is still kinda crappy. Humid and rainy. We finished off the day by going to the pool before hitting the sack. I'm gonna go through my receipts now and see how much I've spent :)

My trip to Tech Ed - Day 1

2005-06-03T22:18:00.000+02:00

So I'm finally here. Orlando, Florida.

My day started at my friend's apartment in Stockholm at 06:00. I slept about 2 hours alltogether, waking up all the time so I wouldn't over sleep. Taxi ride to Arlanda Airport - arrival at 07:20. Met up with my colleagues and we checked in. It was pretty pain less and went smooth. I was expecting more fuss at the check in.

So, 9:20 am our flight left Stockholm heading for Newark. The flight over was an uneventful 8½ hours. I watched 8 episodes of sopranos and played some PSP. Turns out the flight was the inaugural flight for Continental from Stockholm to Newark. There was a bit of a hoopla with the american ambassador wishing the flight bon voyage et al. We got some freebie sandwiches and somekind of a glass ball.

In newark we had 40 minutes to:

1. Disembark
2. Retreive the baggage.
3. Get through customs - they took finger prints and a photo.
4. Leave the baggage again and then run to the gate where the connecting flight was leaving from.

With 1½ minuts to spare we made it on board. Some people from the first flight missed the cut off and were left behind. However now we were waiting for the baggage to be put on board. That took 10 minutes. Then we started to taxi but stopped before hitting the runway.
We waited for another 10 minutes and then we were on our way.

When we were on approach to Orlando airport the pilot told us that we had to circle for a while because of a thunder storm just above the airport. So we waited for 20 minutes .... and then were told we were diverting to Tampa for refueling.

So the flight that should've been 2½ hours suddenly had become a 5h flight. Not that we were in a hurry but I'm dead sick of flying right now :)

Anyway; arrival in Orlando was .... humid.

Oh lord the humidity.

We checked in and went out to get something to eat.
Turns out everthing here *is* bigger than back home.

A medium size coke at McDonalds here is the same as a large size coke in Sweden.
I thought i'd eat a small burger so I chose a chicken sandwich. Which in sweden is an ok snack if you're not dead hungry.

What i got was a gigantic burger, tasted good but man am I full now.
I'm using up the one hour of internet access I purchased at the hotel to write this and to talk a bit with Katie since she's the only one awake at this hour :)

Come to me, oh PSP

2005-05-19T18:54:00.000+02:00

I caved and finally ordered myself a PSP.

My friend Tomas (who is such an enabler) decided to get one today and as usual I got all excited and had to order one too :)

Shopping list turned out:

1 x 1000k Value Pack+Ridge Racers (PSP)
1 x PSP Battery Pack (PSP)
1 x Screen Guard (PSP)
1 x USB+Recharge 2 in 1 Cable (PSP)
1 x FIFA Soccer (PSP)
1 x Lumines (PSP)
1 x Wipeout Pure (PSP)

I also purchased a new camera lens for Anna which she had, not so subtly, been hinting about for a while now.

Loose talkers, tight players

2005-05-17T23:50:00.000+02:00

That seemed to fit my table at the tournament. Everyone was mouthing off pre-game on how they would go all in all the time; but when push came to shove they didn't.

As usual I got nothing until 10 minutes before the rebuy when I doubled up twice to land at 5000 chips. Just after the rebuy period I had JJ and went up against AA (I put him on AK which in hind sight was a bad read). Very luckily I flopped a jack and was suddenly up to 9000 in chips.

I wasted some of it on a bad raise, followed by a bad bet and a bad call. I had 99 and a player that vigorously defended his blinds called me. FLop came AK and I played the hand like I had an ace. Which unfortunately he had. He went all in and I only had to call 1000 chips. Which was so stupid since I knew I was beat.

Oh well. Two hands after I had 96s under the gun and limped in. The same guy raised 1000 preflop and everyone folded to me. I decided to go all in. Since I had been playing a solid game up to those nines I figured he would fold to my "posing as AA/KK". The rest of the table was sure I had just that and apparently so did he because he folded.

The rest of the game consisted of me getting blinded down until I got 33 in a late position. I did the old string bet bluff with all my chips and got called by the big blind. He had TT and the tournament was over, I finished 14th.

Worst logos part II

2005-05-10T12:35:00.000+02:00

It's like a rorschach test and logo in one.

Apparently it's for a Brazilian "Institute for Eastern Studies".

You can't take the sky from me

2005-04-29T09:19:00.000+02:00

Finally!

*pant* *pant* *pant*

And I was pleasantly surprised to see the star from the great show Numb3rs appear in the middle of the trailer :D

Booooring

2005-04-28T21:59:00.000+02:00

New week, new tournament.

I finished around 30-something and had a lousy time.
The reason was that my table was full of people that normally played for alot more money. Which in turn caused them to go all in constantly during the rebuy period.

They called all ins with T4o and hit trips.

So during the first 90 minutes if you were in a hand, you were all in.
I didn't see a single hand to the river unless I was all in.

Sure, I hit some good hands - won with 22 and KK and AK, but I also lost my ace high flush to a guy calling with a straight flush draw - ONE OUT. And he naturally hit.

After the rebuy period I lasted about an hour before I got 77 on the button, with 3000 left and blinds at 200/400. I went all in and the big blind called with KQ and hit a Q on the flop.

i think I'll take a break from the live poker for a while. I didn't enjoy myself and that's really why I'm playing.

Oh well

2005-04-22T00:24:00.000+02:00

Just played a satellite tournament down at the casino. 300+50 with unlimited rebuys under the bar for 90 minutes.

The first 80 minutes were a complete bust, I got J high as the best hand.
But then; two minutes before the rebuy period ends I got 88 and hit an 8 on the flop.
I go all in and get called.

Next hand I get JJ and once again hit J high on the flop. I check the other guy bets and I go all in.

So with this hand won I was suddenly chip leader on my table!

After 90 minutes we had a break and immediately after I looked down on AsKs under the gun.
I limp in; so does another guy in middle position. The big blind then raises and I put him all in with about 4K.

To my surprise the other guy calls and goes all in with his 3K and the big blind calls.
First guy shows AJo and I'm feeling good.

Big blind shows .... you guessed it - AA.

After that nothing exciting happened, I got cold cards again until we were about 20 players left. I was medium stacked and got KQo in middle position. I limped in and the button called.

Flop comes 259, rainbow; and I was watching the button intently. I felt he didn't hit so I bet 2xBB. He takes a while to think about it then calls. The turn comes a T. He kept staring at the flop so I bet 2K. He thought about it for 10 seconds then folded.

I don't usually bluff so it's nice when I actually try it out.

The rest of the tournament I got blinded to death. For 30 minutes I didn't get over 9 high with crap kickers. Twice I got good hands and went all in but everyone folded.

Blinds eventually got up to 700/1400 and I had 3500 left with Q6s in the big blind. The guy utg calls and everyone else folds - so I go all in. Turns out he had 55 and I didn't hit - so the adventure was over.

I'm pretty OK with because I feel like I played well - but it always sucks to be knocked out :(

There's always next ... week? :)

Happy happy, joy joy!

2005-04-15T00:55:00.000+02:00

Me and my poker buddy Pär had decided to play in a 500+100kr Texas Hold'Em No Limit tournament down at the casino. I've played there 4 times before and felt like a noob each time; mostly because I didn't have that much No Limit (or poker in general for that matter) experience so I viewed it as learning to play live poker.

The very first tournament I was in was extremely lucky for me and I somehow managed to finish fifth, earning me a place in the Swedish Open Poker Challenge in which I finished 142 out of 150 :)

Tonight was different. I've played a lot of no limit (admittedly only online); but I didn't feel like a complete idiot like the first times. I mean I didn't even know how much a standard bet was in the first tournament!

I've read alot of Mike Caro's Pro Poker Tells and watched the videos and the goal for tonight was to try and pick up tells on people and use that to supplement what I already had learned online.

So, the tournament began, 43 people entered with rebuy under the bar for the first 90 minutes. Me and Pär ended up at the same table with $1000 chips to start with. Blinds started at $25/$50

I didn't get much the first few hands but then I picked up 99 under the gun. I limped in, everyone folded to the button that raised 3 times the big blind (i.e 150). The blinds folded and I cold called.

The flop came 7c9cKd. During the flop I took Caro's tip to heart. Don't watch the flop, watch the opponent watch the flop. - so I did. From what I could tell he hadn't hit and I didn't like the two clubs so I bet 300. He called and the turn came 2c. Now I was watching him when the turn hit and I was sure he wasn't on a flush draw so I quickly went all in.

He folded about as quickly as I had gone all in - victory was mine! :)

I spent the rest of the 45 first minutes studying the other players, trying to pick up tells that I had learned from Caro - and did pretty well on some of them.

The table got split up and I was moved just to the left of a HUGE stack. Apparently he had busted out quite a few people before we got there. I was just happy I got position on him. This guy was very agressive and played alot of hands.

Fast forward to about 1h20m into the game. I'm on the button with TT. Blinds at 50/100. The player opposite me makes it 400 to go. I think about it for a while, then called. The big blind also called.

The flop comes 742 and since I had studied the opponent I was pretty sure he didn't hold a higher pair.

The aggressor bets a standard size bet and I go all in.

Both call me, the agressor with AJo and the blind with A7o. The tens hold up and I gain some chips. I was now up to about 2500 in chips. Not much happened until the rebuy period ended and I decided to add on 1500 chips for 500kr putting me up to 4000 even.

After the short break I'm sitting under the gun and look down at two kings.
Knowing that Mr Huge Stack was in the big blind I chose to limp in. Everyone folded to him so he makes it 600 to go. I just call him and prepare to study him on the flop.

The flop was a nondescript rainbow; and more importantly Ace free.

This guy tried to push everyone out of pots and got away with it most of the time.
So he bets 600 again and I reraise him 1500. He calls me and the turn comes up a blank. He checks and I go all in. He calls me and I win the hand :D

I was now up to 12500 in chips when the big blind gives me AdTd. Everyone folds to Mr Huge Stack that raises it. I cold call. The flop comes 868 and I was watching him and not the flop when I noticed him quickly glancing at his chips and then quickly checked. I check as well and the turn comes T. This time he stares a bit at the flop, then bets.
The first tell gave me the confidence to lay down that hand. I was pretty sure I was beat and even if I wasn't he probably had a straight draw or a flush draw. So I fold and he shows me 68o.

Thank you Mike Caro :)

Suddenly there were only 20 players left and we broke the tables once again.

Now the play got tighter and I managed to steal two pots. Then comes the monster hand. I look down at JJ in late position. A tight but agressive player infront of me makes a 3XBB bet. I call and the short stacked button goes all in for about 5XBB. Easy call for me; but the original bettor then reraises that to 12XBB.

I curse my bad luck; knowing that the bettor had previously had KK twice that i knew of. So I was pretty sure i was beat and folded the hand but managed to fumble the muck and showed everyone the jacks...

The flop was a bust, nothing special and the agressor had pocket nines. The turn came .... a jack. And the river ... a jack. :)
Boy did that hurt.

I'm convinced laying those jacks down was the correct play but it still stung. Now I was down to about 5000 in chips and the blinds went up to 500/1000. I got crap the next few hands until I got the big blind and looked down at pocket queens.

Everyone folds to the small blind that raises me. I go all in and hope for the best.
He shows pocket fours and my hand is good.

Fast forward another round; I'm in the big blind and look down at the aces! History repeats itself and he raises my blind and I go all in with the speed of lightning. Once again he shows pocket fours.

The aces hold up and I'm back in the game with 15000 in chips.

I continued to play my game and suddenly there were only 10 of us left.
At the final table I was unlucky enough to sit to the right of Mr Huge Stack; who now had 5 times more chips than me. No bluffing for Coldshark tonight it seems.

I was blinded down while some of the other players got busted out.
The money started at fifth place and I didn't really feel like I had a chance of reaching that - but lady luck smiled at me and suddenly we were 6 players left. I was the short stack on the table; but the next player after me got busted out! I was in the money! Now I was sure I wouldn't go beyond fifth place. But then Mr Huge Stack got in an all in battle with Mr Huge Stack 2 (incidentally the same guy with the pocket nines). HS1 had ATs and HS2 had pocket kings (again!).

HS2 hit the third king on the flop and I was suddenly fourth with 7500 in chips with 1500/3000 blinds. HS2 now had 80% of the chips on the table. I was again the short stack, followed by another guy with about 11K.

Eventually I got the big blind; put in my 3K and prepared to put in the rest. My hand was A4 (which is as good a hand as any in a 4 man game with 3000 chips left) :)

Huge Stack calls me with K6. The flop hits a K and I'm out of the tournament in fourth place; bringing in 4950kr and a warm fuzzy feeling. New record for me in live winnings and a new record in finishing fourth.

I got lucky of course but I feel I did some good plays and reads and managed to stick with my game plan.

So very tired

2005-04-11T13:25:00.000+02:00

I don't think I've been this mentally fatigued in a long time. The first project has been extended to may 2nd (thank god for that). Project number three will start next week and so now three projects are overlapping.

I've got some help from a colleague that will be taking a bit of my load; so I'm confident we'll complete this project within the new deadline.

In other news; I've rented an exercise bike! We'll see how long I manage to keep it up. It's been two days now and I'm starting off light by just going 15 minutes a day at low-medium setting. So far so good :)

Those are some crazy Niggars!

2005-04-06T21:52:00.000+02:00

This is the funniest thing i've seen all week :D

Orlando!

2005-04-06T08:09:00.000+02:00

A few days ago I got it confirmed that I'll be attending TechEd in Orlando in June :D

I haven't been to the states before so I'm really looking forward to it. Not to mention all the cool stuff I'll see at the actual conference :)

In developer news, the code monkeys have been working on getting NCM Power Search 3.0 out for DotNetNuke 3.0 and tma has set up an awesome working evironment for us using subversion, trac and other goodies. We've got some cool things planned for the next release and time is the only thing stopping us right now.

Speaking of that; the two projects I am working on at the same damn time are finally coming to an end. I can see the light at the end of the tunnel!

I sure hope it's not a train.

Constantine

2005-04-03T00:09:00.000+02:00

Went to see Constantine at the cinema (no less) tonight. It was a good movie. I have played the game about half way through before seeing the movie and it was cool to see that they really had managed to imitate the movie look and locations in the game.

In other news, we managed to play 7-7 in floorball against a team that we beat 8-4 last time.

I scored 1 of our goals but didn't contribute that much because of my sprained ankle.

Is it just me or is that guy ...

2005-03-30T15:51:00.000+02:00

Click for a picture of the actual place.

Image picked up from fark

First post

2005-03-30T11:00:00.000+02:00

I guess this means I win?

So what's the point of this? I really don't know.

Knowing how well I follow through on these kind of things I'll probably end up posting the first week and then forget about it :P

Expect rants on:

Poker
Coding
Dogs
Games

The first link I'll provide you people with is (drum roll):

http://greasemonkey.mozdev.org/

Greasemonkey is an awesome plugin for firefox that lets you run site-specific scripts.
For instance if you want to get rid of all the ads while watching CNN; just download that specific script and greasemonkey handles the rest.

It's also real easy, if you're handy with javascript, to create your own scripts. It took me five minutes to remove the ad space from www.aftonbladet.se :D

If anyone wants to use it I've put it up for download here

It's very much supplied "as is", but drop me a comment if you've tried it and like it.