ITechLog » Alex Costa

Virginmedia has bad customer service

Alex Costa — Mon, 12 Jul 2010 16:36:00 +0000

Having had services from Virgin Media before I decide to go back with them for my broadband at my new place. I did that against all the bad comments from others about their bad customer services and slowness in getting your connection setup. Well here is how it went.

Called Virgin Media to setup connection..
VM: “oh sir we need first month payment up front and we can get you connected”
ok Payment made
VM: “Now let’s arrange your connection date … I am afraid the earliest available slot is on the 12th of July (in 3 weeks time)”
ME: “How come? Can’t you do it sooner….”
VM: “I am afraid not”
Installation day ( 3 weeks later)
VM Engineer: “Sorry mate we cannot connect your cable, it would have to go over someone else’s business sign,we cannot do that”
ME (calling VM): “Can I get the account cancelled and upfront payment reimbursed to my card?”
VM: “Just hold the line a second.”
15 min later
VM: “Sorry about the wait, yes that can be done, your reimbursement will take 3 weeks”
ME: “How come? I had to pay it on the spot. Why do I have to wait 3 weeks for my money back?”
VM: “Sorry sir, but that’s how it is. Have a good day!”

So I had to log this here. It’s appalling that as a customer I can get treated this bad. Now I am wondering if I should go with Sky, I heard that they are just as bad. Can anyone share any light on their experiences with Sky and other broadband providers in the UK?

Technorati Tags: bad customer service, Broadband, BT, Internet, ISP, robbery, Sky, Viginmedia

April 26, 2009 -- Cheaper Phone Calls with Vonage (VOIP)
July 23, 2009 -- East Africa Undersea fibre optic network is live

Facebook privacy

Alex Costa — Wed, 26 May 2010 21:22:59 +0000

Facebook makes a wise and intelligent u-turn in their privacy tools.

extract from a letter from FB.

Starting today, Facebook will:

* Provide an easy-to-use “master” control that enables users to set who can see the content they share through Facebook. This enables users to choose, with just one click, the overall privacy level they’re comfortable with for the content they sh
re on Facebook. Of course, users can still use all of the granular controls we’ve always offered, if they wish.

* Significantly reduce the amount of information that must be visible to everyone on Facebook. Facebook will no longer require that users’ friends and connections are visible to everyone. Only Name, Profile Picture, Networks and Gender must be pub
icly available. Users can opt to make all other connections private.

* Make it simple to control whether other applications and websites access any user information. While a majority of our users love Facebook apps and Facebook-enhanced websites, some may prefer not to share their information outside of Facebook. Users can now opt out with just one click.

Technorati Tags: Facebook, privacy, social network

December 3, 2009 -- (Mis) understanding Social networking
September 30, 2009 -- Google Wave
December 6, 2008 -- Facebook Connect

HTML5:Up and Running book on pre-order

Alex Costa — Tue, 25 May 2010 14:51:10 +0000

HTML5: Up and Running
By Mark Pilgrim
Publisher: O’Reilly Media
Released: June 2010 (est.) on pre-order at Amazon

Even though work on HTML5 is ongoing, browsers such as Safari, Mozilla, Opera, and Chrome already support many of its features — and browsers for smart phones are even farther ahead, especially iPhone’s MobileSafari browser. With HTML5: Up & Running, you’ll learn how this new version enables browsers to interact with JavaScript much more easily than before. You’ll also learn how HTML5 can help you develop applications that:

Display video directly in the browser, without having to rely on plugins
Work even when a user is offline, by taking advantage of HTML5′s persistent storage
Offer a drawing canvas for dynamically generated 2-D graphics

This concise guide is the most complete and authoritative book you’ll find on the subject. Author Mark Pilgrim writes the weekly digest for the HTML5 Working Group, and represents Google at conferences on HTML5′s capabilities. Stay ahead of the curve. Order a copy of this book today. (extracted)

Technorati Tags: Apple, Flash, HTML5, iPad, Mobile Safary, O'Reilly

May 24, 2010 -- Mobile Apps overload?
July 19, 2009 -- New iTunes blocks non-Apple devices
January 31, 2009 -- Is Mac Safer?
January 10, 2009 -- The MacBook Wheel revealed by Onion News Network
December 12, 2008 -- Apple release Firmware upgrade for new MacBooks

New Pandigital Novel eReader with android OS

Alex Costa — Tue, 25 May 2010 11:25:58 +0000

Coming soon.. the new Pandigital Novel eReader has a 7in Colour Touch screen and runs Google’s Android OS. It comes with some very nice features:

ebooks (integration with Barnes and Noble’s eBook store)
Built-in WiFi
SD/MMC card slot
up to 6 hours battery (reading)
Email access
Browser
Music and Video Player
Calendar
Games
and everything else you can find in the Android OS

Pandigital Novel. More than a Good book.
With a full color, touch screen display, the Pandigital Novel brings dynamic multimedia to the eReader world. (extracted)

Technorati Tags: Barnes & Nobel, ebook, eReader, Multimedia, Novel, Pandigital

No Related Post

Mobile Apps overload?

Alex Costa — Mon, 24 May 2010 14:22:22 +0000

The “There’s an App for that” claim for the iPhone makes me cringe. How many of the Apps we have in our mobile devices do we actually use?

I am not a good exmaple to start with as I am not an early adopter of anything technical and I tend to stay away from what the crowd goes for, so any Apple device is a no go area for me. I have though not too long ago acquired an Android powered device which I really like. I have browsed the Android App store up and down and tested a number of Apps, some cool stuff but I only keep the ones I actually use.

Here is my humble short list of favourites

Gmail App (native to Android)

Peep (for Twitter)
Facebook (on the mobile browser)
Orkut (on the mobile browser)
Google Maps (use it a lot in conjunction with GPS)
Google Calendar sync (native to Android)
Music player (native to Android)
File Browser
gStrings (Guitar tuner)
Youtube (native to Android)
Droid Locator
A couple of games
Daily Sudoku (Embarrassing I know, but great for calming my ADHD)

How overloaded is your mobile? What are your must have Apps?

Technorati Tags: Android, Apple, Google phone, HTC, iPhone, mobile apps, there's an app for that

July 19, 2009 -- New iTunes blocks non-Apple devices
July 8, 2009 -- Android to iPhone Apps with XML
May 25, 2010 -- HTML5:Up and Running book on pre-order
March 11, 2010 -- Request the Audible.com books application for Android
January 31, 2009 -- Is Mac Safer?

The Facebook privacy fuss

Alex Costa — Sat, 22 May 2010 18:09:13 +0000

Facebook is facing massive exodus over the latest change on its privacy settings. Why are you worried? Do you have a Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, Bebo, Orkut, Flickr, a Blog or have you applied for a job online, bought anything on any website, filled in any online survey, downloaded white papers? Your information is all over the web already anyway, and most sites do not delete your information, they mark it as disabled or unsubscribed but hardly delete all the data.

Facebook has made it a little more complicated for users to set their privacy but with a little bit of work you can tighten your privacy on FB. Start by reading the privacy recommendations on Facebook. Then use the tool provided on that page to check how your profile looks to everyone on Facebook (non-friends), and adjust your privacy settings accordingly.

Avoid giving access to unnecessary applications and only use Facebook connect to sign up to an external site when you are sure you want to share your information with that website.

According to SOPHOS security, around 60% of users are considering leaving Facebook. Really?

Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

No Related Post

How software patent broke the system

Alex Costa — Tue, 18 May 2010 10:13:07 +0000

The issue of Software Patent has been around for a while, but unless you really have the time and drive to try to understand all that is involved you will be left like most of us, just wondering. The guys at Patent Absurdity have made a great documentary about this issue.

Patent Absurdity explores the case of software patents and the history of judicial activism that led to their rise, and the harm being done to software developers and the wider economy. The film is based on a series of interviews conducted during the Supreme Court’s review of in re Bilski — a case that could have profound implications for the patenting of software. (extracted)

The whole documentary was made with free software.

Cinelerra for video editing
Audacity for audio editing
Inkscape, Python and Blender for animation
Ogg Theora and Ogg Vorbis codecs
Edited on GNU/Linux machines

Watch the Patent Absurdity documentary here.

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Tweetdeck for Android

Alex Costa — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 17:38:15 +0000

TweetDeck is yet to deliver an App for Android phones, it’s another company entangled with the Apple cult and leaving users of other mobile devices lagging behind. I would be more interested in boycotting the the whole application, but this may not be the best route, so contrary to what TweetDeck is doing I once again I call upon the support of all Android users and sympathisers to request a TweetDeck App for Android. Like we have done for the Audible.com App for Android (please continue to request this one also).

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Digg on The Go App for Android and the iPhone

Alex Costa — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 21:09:22 +0000

Digg.com has announced the availability of the Digg on the go App for Android phones and iPhones. To download the app just visit http://m.digg.com and install the the application.

Check out the the official announcement.

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Apple announces Flash add-on for the iPad

Alex Costa — Thu, 01 Apr 2010 00:40:01 +0000

On the 28th of March Apple has announced via its website that even though the iPad will still be shipped without flash support, users will be able to download a Flash add-on from their website. To Download the add-on ( I would call it a patch) you can go here. http://apple.com/ipadfd

Finally Mr Jobs has done something sensible.

No Related Post

Books for sale – Linux Shell, Qmail Handbook and SSL/TLS

Alex Costa — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 16:01:29 +0000

I have selling on Amazon.co.uk a copy of each of the following books:

Linux Shell Scripting with Bash (Paperback) (SOLD)
by Ken O. Burtch (Author)
Linux Shell Scripting with Bash will help you learn to not only get your system up and running quickly by employing the Bash shell, but it will also show you professional scripting solutions through the use of structured programming and standard Linux development tools. The book focuses on the Linux environment, which the shell relies on to function, and the robust Linux tool set, making this book ideal for learning shell scripting. Real-world scripts are included that are readable, extendable and easy to debug. This book is an asset to any Linux user.

The Qmail Handbook (Paperback)
by David Sill (Author)
qmail is used by hundreds of ISPs and thousands of other sites, including Hotmail since 1997, which has over 30 million users. qmail is popular because of its security, reliability, speed, low memory use, user-controlled mailing lists, straightforward administration, and much more! An Introduction to qmail is designed to guide system and mail administrators of all levels of experience through the installation, configuration, and maintenance of a qmail server.

SSl and TLS: Building and Designing Secure Systems (Paperback)
by Eric Rescorla (Author)
SSL and TLS: Designing and Building Secure Systems offers clear and comprehensive descriptions of these security protocols and their implementation, and also provides “designs”–tried and true templates that suit various scenarios. Armed with this book, you can become well versed in the importance of SSL and TLS, be able to work with them to provide solutions, and furthermore identify an appropriate tested “design” that will solve the security problems of a proposed new network installation.

Technorati Tags: Amazon, Books, Email, IT Books, Linux, Linux Shell Scripting, Qmail, Security, Server System administration, SSL. TLS

March 11, 2010 -- The future of gaming is OpenGL
March 11, 2010 -- Request the Audible.com books application for Android
January 7, 2010 -- Linux ClearOS to rival Microsoft’s SBS
December 8, 2009 -- Google Chrome Beta for Linux
August 20, 2009 -- Creating a bootable Linux USB flash drive

reCAPTCHA error

Alex Costa — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 21:49:38 +0000

Today I had a few complaints from users not being able to download PDFs from one of the sites I manage. Users were not able to get beyond the registration page which kept hanging due to an error on reCAPTCHA. The error caused the $rep->is_valid to return null. I am not sure if the problem was in validating the reCaptcha words or if it was in sending a response back. The fix was pointed out by reCAPTCHA support in a Google group. I just want to make it more public here.

Update your current recaptchalib.php with the one from http://code.google.com/p/recaptcha/downloads/detail?name=recaptcha-php-1.10.zip

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The future of gaming is OpenGL

Alex Costa — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:18:48 +0000

As a Linux user and Open Source enthusiast I always want to see people moving away from the proprietary stuff and into the Open Source world, but sometimes it’s easier to keep them where they are (stuck to Windows), specially when it comes to gaming. I am not a gamer, and would rather spend my time on other more fulfilling tasks like testing a ClearOS installation, but when it comes to helping people migrate from Windows to Linux, there’s always that dreaded question “Will my games work?” The answer could easily be “yes very well, better than before!” but in reality a majority of the games won’t. Why? The proprietary monster that is Microsoft has allured programmers, graphic card manufacturers and the common citizen into the idea that DirectX is the best, and it could not e further from the truth. While DirectX only runs on Windows, OpenGL offers equal or better results and runs on every platform.

But don’t let me talk to you about this, as I said I am not a gamer, let those who know what they are talking about tell you. This great article will help you understand Why should you use OpenGL and not DirectX (Wolfire Blog), and you may also enjoy reading this article Commercial Gaming coming to Linux? from the Linux Magazine.

Technorati Tags: DirectX, Gaming, Linux, Mac, Microsoft, OpenGL, Windows, Xbox

May 12, 2009 -- Offline Blogging Tools
January 28, 2009 -- Synergy – share mouse and keyboard cross platform
January 7, 2010 -- Linux ClearOS to rival Microsoft’s SBS
September 18, 2009 -- Open .eps files on GIMP for Windows
April 9, 2009 -- 96% of Netbooks sold last year have Windows – Why?

Request the Audible.com books application for Android

Alex Costa — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 13:04:33 +0000

I am deeply shocked at audible.com for not having an app for Android. They claim that “the Android media player does not allow playback of our titles“… right. Anyway they are now attempting to get the ball rolling for an App for Android in 2010. There’s a signup for upcoming beta testing on their website and I urge every Android user (or user to be) to sign up and put a little bit more pressure on them.

Android is a great mobile platform and companies like Audible.com (an Amazon associate) are stalling its growth with short sightedness.

UPDATE from comment by JP White: “A Beta Audible app is now available for Android devices. Read more at
http://wp.me/pCOs1-aw“

Technorati Tags: Amazon, Android, Android App, audible books, Audio books, Beta, Google

May 24, 2010 -- Mobile Apps overload?
March 26, 2010 -- Books for sale – Linux Shell, Qmail Handbook and SSL/TLS
December 11, 2009 -- Microsoft’s attempt to bribe its way to the top
September 30, 2009 -- Google Wave
September 18, 2009 -- Google Duplicate Content & Multiple Site Issues

Campaign for the right to create, forward and follow links

Alex Costa — Wed, 20 Jan 2010 14:17:48 +0000

There has been a talk for while about news agencies blocking bloggers, aggregators and search engines from indexing their content. This has started to become a reality when the Times Online decided to block the news aggregator site newsnow.co.uk. In response Struan Bartlett the founder of NewsNow started the right2click campaign. Watch his campaign video.

Technorati Tags: NewsNow, right2link, Times Online

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Linux ClearOS to rival Microsoft’s SBS

Alex Costa — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 14:27:16 +0000

Microsoft has dominated the small enterprise market with its out of the box feature rich SBS (Small Business Server). Linux has always trailed behind it and although most of the technology to rival Microsoft has been in place, it has always been a mammoth task to setup a server from scratch to do that. ClearOS came to fill in this gap.

“ClearOS is a powerful network and gateway server designed for small organizations and distributed environments. Though ClearOS comes with an extensive list of features and integrated services, the solution is easy to configure thanks to the intuitive web-based interface.” (extracted from Clear Foundation website)

Take a look at how ClearOS’ features match the MS SBS:

Microsoft SBS

Centralized Authentication (Active Directory)
Mail, calendaring and instant messaging (Exchange)
Webserver (IIS)
Firewall (ISA)
Content management system (Sharepoint)
Antivirus (Forefront)
Database (MS-SQL Premium version only)
Remote Desktop Services
Virtual Private Network (VPN)

ClearOS Linux

Centralized Authentication (LDAP)
Primary Domain Controller (Samba)
File and Print Services (Samba and CUPS)
Mail (SMTP, POP, IMAP, Webmail)
Calendaring (Kolab groupware)
Webserver (Apache)
Firewall plus intrusion protection (iptables, Snort)
Antimalware (Clam Antivirus, Antiphishing, Antispyware)
Antispam (Spamassassin)
Database (MySQL)
Virtual Private Network (IPSec, OpenVPN, PPTP)
Web Proxy (Squid)

The Linux Magazine published an in depth article comparing and explaining this “new” Linux distro.

Technorati Tags: Active Directory, Apache, ClearOS, CUPS, File sharing, gateway server, LDAP, Linux, Microsoft, network server, Samba, SBS, Server, Small Busines Server, Snort

March 11, 2010 -- The future of gaming is OpenGL
March 26, 2010 -- Books for sale – Linux Shell, Qmail Handbook and SSL/TLS
December 11, 2009 -- Microsoft’s attempt to bribe its way to the top
December 8, 2009 -- Google Chrome Beta for Linux
September 18, 2009 -- Open .eps files on GIMP for Windows

Microsoft’s attempt to bribe its way to the top

Alex Costa — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 17:04:09 +0000

Once again Microsoft is showing it’s dirty claws. According to a report in the Financial Times (also mentioned in the KPMRS Blog), Microsoft is planing to offer to pay publishers to remove their content from Google in an attempt to make its search engine Bing (no link on purpose) the #1 search engine.

According to the FT, one website publisher approached by Microsoft said that the plan “puts enormous value on content if search engines are prepared to pay us to index with them”. – extracted

I cannot believe the greedy minds in the media industry are already thinking about embracing it. Again Microsoft has gotten it all wrong, will they ever learn? Attitudes like this will only promote two things, firstly the dissemination of online content theft, were people will republish full content of paid websites to drive traffic to their sites/blogs and secondly it will take away the choice that users now have of using any search engine they like. This is so “un-internet”!

I agree with the comment on the KPMRS blog by blogger Greg (null pointer) who said:

“How about instead of Microsoft spending millions to make their search results appear (artificially) better than Google’s, they spend that same money to create better search algorithms? That’s real competition!” – extracted

Technorati Tags: Bing, Google, Microsoft, newspapers, search engine

September 18, 2009 -- Google Duplicate Content & Multiple Site Issues
June 5, 2009 -- Keyword search and website ranking tools
March 11, 2010 -- The future of gaming is OpenGL
March 11, 2010 -- Request the Audible.com books application for Android
January 7, 2010 -- Linux ClearOS to rival Microsoft’s SBS

Google Chrome Beta for Linux

Alex Costa — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 18:15:41 +0000

Google has announced the release of a beta version of its browser Google Chrome for Linux (Debian/Ubuntu/Fedora/OpenSuse).

Here are a few facts from the Google Chrome team:

60,000 lines of Linux-specific code written
23 developer builds
2,713 Linux-specific bugs fixed
12 external committers and bug editors to the Google Chrome for Linux code base, 48 external code contributors

Technorati Tags: browser, Google chrome, Linux

March 26, 2010 -- Books for sale – Linux Shell, Qmail Handbook and SSL/TLS
March 11, 2010 -- The future of gaming is OpenGL
January 7, 2010 -- Linux ClearOS to rival Microsoft’s SBS
August 20, 2009 -- Creating a bootable Linux USB flash drive
July 21, 2009 -- Firefox Add-on Collector

(Mis) understanding Social networking

Alex Costa — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 17:41:25 +0000

Can you imagine if you were to be made accountable for every joke and funny comment you made when hanging out with your friends? Life would really stink. I have recently seen a lot of people getting annoyed with, or embarassed by their friends on Facebook, Orkut and the kind. Why do people take social networking so seriously? Is it a problem understanding written communication or is it that our malicious minds just expect the worse from people? Or is it a simple lack of good old common sense? I think it’s all of it, and if you just add a bit of insecurity to the pile, social networking can become a pain. I have come to a few personal decisions regarding social networking and there’s no harm in sharing them.

The benefit of the doubt: A difficult concept in today’s society. People are not as mean as we expect them to be, so give your (or someone else’s) friends the benefit of the doubt, take it with a pinch of salt. Relax.
The e-persona: We all have it, yes we ALL do. That sarcastic, naughty part of us that comes alive when we go online.
The intonation (or lack of it). This one goes with #1 (not what you are thinking, e-persona). Most languages base the entire meaning of a sentence in its intonation. So when reading something, try not go with your very first impression, especially if it’s a negative one.
TWRTCS: stands for “Think Write Read Think Correct Share(or not)” – it’s a friendship saviour. I can’t number how many times I have written something really funny (at least I thought it was) but didn’t share as a public comment, because I just took time to read it again before sending and saw it could be misunderstood.
Avoid work colleagues (specially your boss): You really don’t want your “private social life” to paint a different picture of you to your boss. It’s not about being fake, but they may not chose to give you the benefit of the doubt and may think that your e-persona is the real one. If you do have your boss on your social network just be very aware of what you write. Unless she/he are really cool!
Privacy: Don’t write on someone’s wall about something that is more of a private issue, either yours or theirs.
Get a life: Being in touch with friends on social network sites is fun but it can take over your life, and turn you into a very annoying “comment on everything” kind of person.

Add to it if you like….

Technorati Tags: Facebook, My Space, Ning, Orkut, Social Networking

December 6, 2008 -- Facebook Connect
May 26, 2010 -- Facebook privacy
May 14, 2009 -- LinkedIn Timeout at Login

Google Wave

Alex Costa — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 13:35:48 +0000

Google Wave is an online (and open source) tool for real-time communication and collaboration.

A wave can be both a conversation and a document where people can discuss and work together using richly formatted text, photos, videos, maps, and more.

On an interview with the BBC technology site the developer behind Wave described it as “a communication and collaboration tool”.

“It struck us that e-mail is still the main communication tool on the web, which seemed remarkable given that it is 20-year-old technology,” said Lars Rasmussen, who, alongside his brother Jens, was the brains behind Google Maps. (extracted from BBC Technology)

An interesting (but possibly annoying) feature is the live transmission as you type. With this live typing participants on a wave can have faster conversations, see edits and interact with extensions in real-time.

To test Wave you will will need to request an invitation, if accepted you can then invite 5 more people to join in the experience.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_UyVmITiYQ

Technorati Tags: Google, Google wave, instant messaging, Open Source, share photos, social network, team collaboration, TEchnology News

May 26, 2010 -- Facebook privacy
March 11, 2010 -- Request the Audible.com books application for Android
December 11, 2009 -- Microsoft’s attempt to bribe its way to the top
September 18, 2009 -- Google Duplicate Content & Multiple Site Issues
July 25, 2009 -- PHP-GTK is still live

ITechLog » Alex Costa

Virginmedia has bad customer service

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