Archive for the_time('F Y')


24 January 2005 in Blogging & Intergen | Comments (0)

I thought it must be about time for a general update. I’ve decided to try and blog more on certain topics than so much about myself. Maybe a 3 “article” style posts to 1 personal post. That should hopefully ensure that my blog is read by those who don’t really know me.

So far I’m enjoying the long weekend – I’ve been fishing twice which was great. Tried some fishing down at the harbour which is pretty easy fishing but what you catch tends to be very small but not very edible (well – I wouldn’t eat something out of there since it seems a bit polluted). I also cycled around to Evans Bay with my flatmate and we tried fishing around there. Unfortunately it was way too windy so we didn’t stay too long. The area looks promising however – water seems cleaner and deeper. I’ll certainly try out there again soon. I’ve always enjoyed fishing – used to fish a lot with my brother and Dad so it’s somewhat in my blood to do it. I’m yet to find a pastime that is so relaxing, gets you outside and into nature and also provides the occasional high of catching something. Great thinking time.

My weight loss is still going to plan. My rate of weight loss has slowed a little (only around 200grams for the last week). However that’s because I’ve been very busy with work at the moment. I’m supposedly doing two projects, one takes about 80% of my time, the other about 20%. However I have two other projects to contend with which aren’t huge but do take up precious time. This has left very little time to actually get out and go running or cycling etc. I did manage to fit in about 20km of cycling over the weekend but I feel I should be doing more.

The great thing is that I’m getting to the point where you feel you have considerably more energy. I can motivate myself considerably easier than I used to be able to and with minimal effort. I also just feel like doing more. Anyone who is feeling lethargic really does just need to exercise more. It seems strange to say it – if you don’t have any energy you should do more. It seems to release a lot more energy than you need. Something I’ve started doing, especially when coding at home (It’s a tad embarrassing if I was to do this at work!) is when I start to feel tired I get out of my chair and do a short sharp workout. It doesn’t take long – maybe 50 press ups, 20 sit-ups and 20 bicep curls. Takes a grand total of about five minutes but it wakes you up and gets you cranking! I suggest you try it next time you’re feeling a bit low and think a chocolate bar would help you out.

Anyway, hopefully this week I can get in some more exercise and keep the weight loss train moving along. I’ll keep posting updates of where I’m at and what I’m doing.

- JD

Average Rating: 4.8 out of 5 based on 191 user reviews.


17 January 2005 in Business | Comments (0)

The Art Of The Start Book Cover

Last night I finished reading Guy Kawasaki’s The Art Of The Start.

The book is primarily about starting businesses but in no way limits itself to just businesses. If you are at all interested in just how to generally start anything that is worth your time this book gives some valuable advice on how to ensure it works out well. For example, there are mini chapters on such things as starting projects within a company and how to ensure that they are successful.

My primary disappointment with the book would have been that Guy is a venture capitalist and thus the book is very VC centric which doesn’t apply so much to the New Zealand startup market as much. Still, the good points vastly outweighed the bad.

One thing that I particularly liked about the book was that Guy isn’t afraid to use emotive terms for people. For instance, people in a company that just “ride” on the success of others are called “corporate pukes”. There are many other terms for varying groups of individuals throughout the book but I liked that on the most.

Overall, probably one of the better business books I’ve brought and read in the last 12 months (of about 15) and I would certainly recommend it to anyone.

- JD

Average Rating: 4.5 out of 5 based on 277 user reviews.


6 January 2005 in General | Comments (10)

I’ve finally decided to bite the bullet and put some proper effort into trying to slim down. I’ve been inspired by talking to a few people who have trimmed down and it also helps that one of my flatmates is a gym instructor :-)

I started before Christmas (bad choice – I know) and yet still managed to lose around 1.5 – 2Kg in just over a week. I’m not quite sure how I managed that much since I did eat a lot of chocolates. I did make sure I cut the skin off my turkey and chicken, didn’t eat roast veges and also (this will shock some, sit down) switched to drinking diet coke.

I’d been listening to some banter between some people at work last year and one guy mentioned how he hated the taste of dient coke as well but that it was only when he first had it. He reckoned that if you stick to it for a week or two that you begin to love it. Sure enough, it does work. This is despite my literally almost throwing up after drinking my first can!

Since returning to Wellington I’ve lost another kilo or so and have engaged a more active lifestyle. I’ve been going on runs, cycling, working out more with my weight set etc. Now I just need to keep the ball rolling througout the year.

- JD

Average Rating: 4.9 out of 5 based on 210 user reviews.


3 January 2005 in Code & Tools | Comments (0)

I’ve just been reading an interesting article about BitTorrent. Personally I’ve only every used it once – when it was first came out – and I wasn’t overly impressed. While I cast doubt over the suggested figure that BitTorrect accounts of a third of all Internet traffic it does seem to be gaining a lot of popularity.

The article involves an interview with the creator of BitTorrent but discusses more how P2P and the availability of more and more bandwidth will turn current media distribution on its head.

Well worth the read.

- JD

Average Rating: 4.8 out of 5 based on 226 user reviews.


2 January 2005 in Tools | Comments (1)

I’ve been playing around with Firefox for a while now (I remember trying it when it first came out because mozilla felt bloated) and this morning discovered online a really great tweak to speed it up for broadband users.

1.Type “about:config” into the address bar and hit return. Scroll down and look for the following entries:

network.http.pipelining network.http.proxy.pipelining network.http.pipelining.maxrequests

Normally the browser will make one request to a web page at a time. When you enable pipelining it will make several at once, which really speeds up page loading.

2. Alter the entries as follows:

Set “network.http.pipelining” to “true”

Set “network.http.proxy.pipelining” to “true”

Set “network.http.pipelining.maxrequests” to some number like 30. This means it will make 30 requests at once.

3. Lastly right-click anywhere and select New-> Integer. Name it “nglayout.initialpaint.delay” and set its value to “0″. This value is the amount of time the browser waits before it acts on information it receives.

If you’re using a broadband connection you’ll load pages MUCH faster now!

I’ve noticed that pages seem considerably more responsive now. Also, the text on the status bar at the bottom goes nuts (changes often) which always makes me feel like my browser is being more responsive.

- JD

Average Rating: 4.7 out of 5 based on 202 user reviews.