The wonders of children

If you didn't know I have a couple of kids. 3 in fact. And as with any other emotional touchy feely stuff, they might not have drawn the best straw getting a father. But such is life.

Still I do my best to provide as any parent would do, but my quirks of course raise issues that I don't see that many other places. First off, I've realized along the line somewhere that good parenting wasn't so much about being liked, but rather guiding and leaving a decent product in the end: Grown decent human beings. Thus far I seem to succeed, be that to their mother saving them from my insanity or just the fact children er resilient I have no comments.
At any rate, I'm a nerd. And proud of it. It's that simple. It would seem that my Oldest daughter now almost 9 years, 8,5 something, 9 at the end of august, mkay... Being my firstborn and thusly being the prime subject of my strange views on existence when looking for guidance in the worlds have become a nerd too. Whether that's genetics of heritage you can debate for hours with no results, but the fact is that she's a nerd too.

She shows some funny trades, ohh keep in mind that my Dwarflike single minded stubbornness and skills for debating she have too. This results in facts like no is merely someone that hasn't yet seen the reasons and meaning of things and must thusly be shown the light. Most often used word in our household is "Why?". Authorities, well they are there, but maybe I'm smarter then they are. This trade is common I believe and course of much trouble in danish households these days, so nothing special there. Yet she doesn't have a ground moral compass as to what is basically right and wrong, and is mostly ruled by her logic. As foul language for instance is not something understood, so there's language... she uses the language and word used around her, and there's no filter to this. Again you try explaining why censoring is good without making exceptions...

Anyway, i started this text from an experience I had yesterday sitting on the couch feeding the smallest and focusing on that, while she and her little brother started debating something and I took a listen to the details. He's 5, going on 6, He'll be 6 by September... And he also shows the sign of not merely accepting the first explanation if it doesn't co-exists with his perception of the world. They are called Lucien, and Akita.

Anyway I noticed they were discussing relative sizes, how they got that started beats me, but Akita was starting to explain to Lucien how the sun was way bigger then both the earth and the moon, to the size that he could fit 1.000 earths into the sun. The debate come to think of it had to do with sun burns and summer temperatures. And the details aren't really important. what stoke my attention was the fact she was starting to describe and illustrate the Earth evolves around Sun, with moon revolving the Earth, and every one of them spinning.
You might have been exposed to this somehow, somewhere else with Oranges, strings, sticks, apples and spinning devises. From what I know this setup is presented children in the age 12'ish and that seems consistent with around 10 year olds being able to sense abstractly. But she's 8,5. Now if someone had set up a rig like it for her to watch I wouldn't have cared, she'd just memorized the rig. But she hasn't. I expect she's picked it up from a book I noticed her reading a few weeks ago. Still going from a text to actually understanding and conceptualize abstracts like that takes me a bit on a surprise. Guess I'll have to ramp up geometric shapes and structures soon...


But that's just one thing striking me. Another thing is: taking a step back and watching it from a 3rd. person perspective both of them are rather nerdish. The way to read, memorize and use facts either picked up watching Disney Channel, reading fact books, asking teachers or others. They pick up facts like this and sets them as universal truths. Don't get me wrong, they aren't savants or anything, in fact they are merely ordinary kids, it's just the way they pick up knowledge that's fascinating. They do it literally. And well not all their logic is sound, for instance: Santa doesn't actually live next door to grandma, nor do I actually put the sun at the sky every morning. Innocent beliefs that'll be replaced in time, yet it's the way they understand the world and its logic.

I can't say I'm all innocent in the effect though and frankly I need a bit of help this summer:
In the schools among the kids today there's hobby with Soccer cards, and they collect those from age 6, kinder garden classes and up with obsessive behaviours. This weekend Lucien was exposed to this and naturally the hype got hold of him, and as any drug dealer he was offered a couple of cards.
From his perspective, it's cards with soccer players on them, and he knows nothing or relatively little about soccer. The fact there's clubs like Barcelona FC or what ever else there s is obvious to him. This is something I'm sure given the chance someone will teach him, and the corruption starts now.
So I'm going to throw a counter to that:
The main objective in the collection is to get the kids to buy more card to get the full team, following the real life clubs team setups, with transfers shirt changes and so forth. This is a common market trick and the kids are easy targets once hooked. Now how to unhook....
He doesn't know much about football, which good, so that's not going to drive him. He loves Transformers, star wars and stuff like that.
The main point in the activity is to compare collections to have the most complete collection of cards.
Bringing him a card collection that no one else have would eliminate the competitive element of it all, and getting a relatively complete collection (1 season is a collection. Season 1-10 is a collection of collections) would make it a fix expense and should last a few years.
So been looking for it, but haven't found SW which is mercantile enough to threaten the exclusive component, to Transformers. Of course all the Bacucan, Beyblade, Pokemon etc are options, but still needing to retain the exclusive and completeness illusions to ward of the soccer corruption.

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Can I use the slate?

I did plan to write a lot more on this thing then I've managed to. Also way off with the review on it's uses.
It's okay. Nothing more, nothing less. Writing these on it is abit of a pain, can'tfind out if it's google or the slate but proff reading and spellchecking is seriously nothing something you want to do. I miss my arrow keys. Aside fromthat it's good. Got a nice size so my chopy fingers actually hits the rigth keys more then 99% of the time, doesn't always register and that is bad as it means backtracingto the error.
The power levels on it is good, but it takes for ever to charge, took me by surprise the first day. But planning gets you far. Application wise I love it, but I ew I would. Only missing a good spreadsheet.
Price being 75% of an ipad it's a good buy, just know what you want to use it for.
Last thing I need to figure out is transport. As I take it everywhere I need a bag, which is not very manly, but what else can I do? Break it?

Tablet vs. Slate

So I've managed to borrow a Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 (GT-P7500) from our local hardware pusher. Thinking the Samsung Galaxy tab is exactly what I need.
Now there's a few factors that plays a role here:
The wife got her self an Ipad 3.
I've just embrased the Google platform with google maps as the primary drive.
The fact I like the Google philosofy more then the Apple philosofy has a point.

My main problem actually is that since I swapped my nokia for a BB, and I don't regret it. I've been unable to navigate.

My sister in law showed my her HTC phone with Google navigation, and I knew exactly what I needed to do. Get an android platform with GPS.

For that you can go get a mobile, but my BB takes care of all the things you want from a mobile, except navigation. So what to do? Use analogue maps, I think not.
Looking around and I came to terms with the fact I didn't have a Tab/pad. never needed it, and had trouble seeing it's use. Well Navigation then, okay. It'll do that and it does, perfectly (using 3G with a data package).

I borrowed a 5" Wifi thing I used for a while and it worked great also, with 2 problems:
I'm getting old so smaller isn't better.
Wifi isn't connecting while being mobile.

But for Google platform it was great (with my glasses on). So I started looking for it's big brother this 10.1 tab with the intent to buy it. During my screenings I've noticed the Asus Transformer also, and the Keyboard attachment seems like a nice thing, but it's more cash and I can't test it before buying.

The Samsung will do. So:
I've been trying to feed it fully for 16 hours, not letting it rest much and I still haden't reach 100% and now i forgot the charger at home, so starting it's first day with 50%. So far I'm cheapish with it's usage, and it's holding up. The real roadtest will be tomorrow. Seminar day.

You're now wondering what that has to do with Sci-fi culture :)
I've just finished reading Caiphas Cain book I had managed to scavenge at the local Library (it isn't black). And my love for Warhammer 40K fills me with emotions. Well anyone knowing anything about 40K knows of the strong beliefs within both the Space Marines and the Imperial Guard.
Also during this weekend I finished off Empyrean Age by Tony Gonzales, which co insides very well with Inferno releasing the next day :)

But all the reading I notice a thing keep popping up (the Data slate). It's everywhere. and these books I believe were written before the release of Ipads atleast before they became common.
Thinking about Star trek, I recall them using dataslates to share information also. Thinking Star Wars I seem to have an impression they had them also.
Reading them as data slates for some week and a half, maybe 2 that name has stuck.
The Wife have her paddi, and she likes it, the kids like it, and it's Ipads.
When I took the 5" wifi slate home with me, they asked what it was and I answered a data slate, which they of course didn't understand. They had a look and it was from then on my Iphone.... Same thing with my sister in law saw it. it was my Iphone, when realising it was an android it was my mobile...

Completely ignoring the fact I kept calling it a slate, the Slate and so on.
After a few days they started simply correcting me to call it a tablet. (tablet is in danish a pill). I really don't like that word.

At any rate digging into what such a device should be used for, we actually quite quickly got to the conclusion that is was a datapad or slate...The wife being a sci-fi fan helps ;)
Now getting home yesterday with the 10.1" everything made more sense to the non believers.

I'm surprised how quickly I've managed to it up to my liking, there's still a few bugs that I can't seem to iron out or find a work around for, so all in all it's exactly what I want.
Next step will be figuring out how to mobilize it... A shoulder bag?
One thing is for certain I'm going have such a slate with me henceforth.

It's seemingly easy connection to the Google world with all the applications that offers where excell sheet is my last roadblock. Now I haven't written this blog on it, but every following Blog will be. And once I find a good way to send stuff for inspection back and forth it'll be perfect for showing stuff to people explaining stuff.

Insuing insanity

I was meaning to write in danish. I failed. Danish political fumblings in this awareness blog.

So the time finally came. My digital signature expired. I've known this would happen for 2 years now, and have had inklings as of it's effect. Ironically this happens on the days L160 enters it's last step to completion.

And for those of you not knowing L160, it's basically the law which dictates every danish person either accepts the NemID OCES terms of service\use or be a criminal. To cite one of my news medias.

For those that doesn't know what I'm talking about, let me line it up as simple as I can:

In Denmark the financial sector have created a company to handle digital identities. This started some 10 years ago with net banking not wanting to accept the official certificate solution which was a bit tricky to get running.

So they've created their own solution hand lobbied the Government into using the same scheme to enroll everyone into the digital age.

2 years ago they presented and launch then basically Single Sign On credentials under idea that it was a "digital Signature" meaning you and only you would have access to it. Oversimplifying it the rouse took good hold of the populace, piled onto it was the fact that all online banking required the use of the NemID.

In this day and age, few people can live without net banking a few have tried, and precious few resists. So of a populace of 5,5 million people was issues a NemID by the end of 2011.

Now for the funny part. the NemID credentials are owned, used and managed by this DanID firm, which is a private firm working for the Financial sector. Pretty much as a workers union, but for banks.

Yet with a simple check box, you agree by binding contract that NemID is as legally binding as well your passport, and can be used thusly in all danish government matters. It's infallible, so if anything is wrong, you are carring the risk and would be liable for the damages.

Thus far you can avoid the government part and use the ID for Banking purposes alone, thusly holding a barrier between the finacial sector and your government records, say insurrance companies will still have to ask permission to read your health records, and even inform you if they do. You do that by not aquiring both the NemID and activating the OCES certificate for it.

Currently the treasury minister is passing a law dictating that all goverment information is to be provided via digital means, and specificly via something called "E-Boks". This is rather convinient, if it was not for one simple fact. "E-Boks" is a privately owned company, and you have no claims on the information they store on your behalf. Also the only access to that system is via the NemID OCES or digital signatur OCES (the old PKI solution). Also mind you there's not the love option to withdraw your agreement with these firms....

Now to be fair within the law there's rules for exceptions. And these exceptions are claimed by showing up at the local municipality office and claim the rigth. Within the law there's indications as criteria you should fulfill to claim exception. Ohh, if you claim exception falsely you're guilty of fraud and can be sentenced to 4 years of jail... But the general understanding is that you can claim exception but you're are not suppose to and will be punished accordingly for it (when time permits).

So what the frag does all that have to do with me specifically.. Yea, as I mentioned from the start my original OCES certificate expired this Monday, thus I can't renew it and my only option to regain a such would be by accepting the terms of usage given by DanID. And I don't want to do that. So do I need one?

Well besides the inconvenience that I can not report taxes, sign my kids up for school or daycare. I can't interact much with governmental issues. But "E-Boks"....

In theory anything could be sent to be in that web mail and I'd be legally responsible for reading and acting upon it's constant. This is no matter if I have access or not. And for this I only have one option (get a NemID OCES).

As I keep telling people the coming years will be rather interesting times, things are actually going for the worse moving along a self destructive path. At some point the barriers of sanity will be broken and the times after that will be radically different then the day and age of today. Interesting indeed.

Further immergence into the Google world (Hardware)

So this was supposed to be written on a more mobile device and the thing that thus far has caugth my eye would be the Samsung Galaxy.

I'm starting to see the need for having a pad thing of sorts around. not only for the purpose of recreation. But knowing the inner workings and being familiar with them gives some nice pointers in the directions we're heading on the hardware side. Sure a PC will always be a PC, yet I notice that more and more see the benefit in getting a small desktop rather then a Laptop for the purpose of gaming, and the more work oriented free floaters are starting to settle with a laptop they like for office work. The rest are the gamers, casual floaters and kids. all these would naturally pick up a pad of sorts rather then messing about with a heavy laptop waiting for it to boot, or actually pick up a heavy slaptop.
Personally I've switched the slaptop with a desktop (SFF), considering that my gaming/art machine would need rather costly upgrades in order to last for very long. I'd like at least 5 years on my current system, and I can have that with various upgrades that i can built into a desktop but a slaptop would have to be purchased finalized, making it heavy and rather costly. But a desktop is slow not portable and cumbersome. Plus the system doesn't facilitate stuff like this very well.
You know once you finally settle in front of the screens you start getting into business and then all the fun stuff tends to fade and you never get around to it.
Same with all the creative stuff, you're never have a good option for putting down your thinking when you need to.
The solution in my case is the pad.

Now getting an Ipad seemed like a good idea 2 years ago. Today others have entered the marked. And frankly Android is more to my personal tastes of freedom of choice. so what's out there?
I've found the Samsung Galaxy as a potential option. Especially with my new found social portal that is my google account, which works nicely with Android.
So I'm currently running a test to see if the darned device meets my needs, and uhh am I needy :)

Using Latitude on a constant basis (trying that with BB is a fail), launching my self into Wikitude was also a fail, but where do you else get good AR?
At any rate I've borrowed a Samsung Galaxy S now, and first issue I get is the missing networkability. Sure it connects via WIFI, but I need more. Plus I was thinking of pad size. Never the less I like it thus far, the setting up is of course an ongoing process. I've got the better deal of my applications installed (Eve-radio, Aura, Facebook plus chat "fails", Latitude, Blogger "fails" and G+ "fails").
All in all I'm okay with the current failures to perform from some of the applications, and funny enough it's the vital ones. The battery time takes roughly 2-3 hours of Radio streaming or rather 2-3 hours of active usage. That means I'll need it pretty much power plugged, such is okay for the most part means I'll just always be seeking a power outlet where ever I settle on a location. And I kinda expect the same performance from the Pad version (I've noticed and picked the Samsung Galaxy 10.1).
Then what about usage? Well, drag n' drop works fine and intuitively. the keyboard took me a while to settle with. But 2 finger system and it works nicely, slowly compared to a standard keyboard, but I'm still faster on 2 fingers then 50% of my surroundings, so it'll be manageable. Down side is my big fingers, can't hit the keys on the small screen when it's upright, and horizontal removes the view area = I can't see what I'm doing. And if you've been reading any of my ramblings you'd know very well why that's a critical issue.
I expect the Pad to be bigger and thus will solve that issues....

Last 2 parts to deal with would then be finances ;)
Having the need for connectivity I'll need a mobile connection. In DK that's a nightmare. Spend in total some 9 hours reading terms and prices and lastly I found a page where they actually tested the lines.
As anyone knowing me would know, Speed is nice, but stable is way better.
Going through the price lists what I found was:

1. High Speed for 200 MB/month, cutting to 0,25/0,25 megabits pr. second for 29,-
2. High speed for 500 MB/month, cutting to 0,25/0,25 megabits pr. second for 39,-
3. High speed for 1000 MB for 49.

I'm still not sure the first cut data rate is true, but it's what I can find.
Now 29,- pr month is a lot cheaper then both 39 and 49. The 49,- is around my data transfer needs, but there's no credit limit so I could end up using it 5 times in one month = 250,- So remove from line up.
That leaves 200 for 29 or 500 for 39. I know I use a little under 500 MB/ month on a regular use pattern, so I'd always be a cut speeds with the cheap model, but stable lines rather then speed and I'd manage. Plus the writing in small types that you'll get extra services, like a web mail, Free usage of music and a few more like that, seems tempting...
Finally I found the that review site, and albeit the reviews were of older date (3-6 months) I frankly think I'll settle with 500 for 39. Seemed that the cheaper wasn't able to actually deliver in the tests, and well that'll mean unstable connections and I hate that. Also it didn't help much that the most support from the 200  for 29 site I recieved thus far is the customers asking simple innocent questions for help, getting none (infact most of their issues seems to be network issues they can't do anything about) and when ever a customer care person shows up they just made things worse with promises that they couldn't keep or with suggestions to buy additional products meaning the 29 would quickly end up as 29 + something more + services plus something more, still with the looming prospect of unstable connections. By the way 29,- ddk is something like 5 US dollars or 4 Euro or 3 Pound Sterling.

In my worse judgements I'm still giving them a chance, I really don't know why and I should. My history with them has actually ended in a solemn oath never to return to their infrastructure if avoidable...... Seems something of a statement of bitter judgemental folks...... Yet all of my being screams at me. Yet the promise of extra services seems so appealing. Frak I hate that sales technique.

Ohh I wanted to put in some images of the current device, but my camera FUBAR'ed on me.
Instead let's use Google.
Test device Samsung Galaxy S : Google image search   Page at Samsung UK
Target device Samsung Galaxy 10.1: Google image search  Samsung site (UK)

I suppose I've been rambling along for far more then you wanted to read, so I'll cut it here.

Privacy settings, what do you mean by that?

So it's time to write up one of those thinking out loud posts, was thinking of writing futher about the Freebi project, but there's more to my rambling then a simple project.

Now I've been hanging on here for a few days or weeks, guided here by the fantastic marketing principles that are coming from Google. At first all i need, and still need is a navigation application for my Blackberry. Being the Nokia guy and being used to their Ovi maps for quite a while the transistion from Nokia to BB was somewhat horrific, and I still have the few setting issues to smoothen out, but it'll come along eventually. Frankly I need a software for sound editing that I can figure out how to use and that can create MP3's plus I need the time to settle down and get the sounds rigth the way i want them.

At any rate I stumbled across Latitude remembering the how flawless Google maps is, and being presented with the Google navigation used on an Android phone, I knew rigth away the Latitude was the thing I was seeking, I found it/installed it on the BB, yet to my disarray it's not working very well and the navigation isn't working either, at least as intented. I could have lived with the 5-6 hours of battery time having the Compass running non stop. But Latitude and my BB doesn't get along as latitude is not permitted to use the compass or something like that (I'm investigating). After these few weeks it's simply become way unstable though, same with the G+ app for BB. In fact I'm close to getting an extra mobil or pad for this purpose alone.... I've seen one on sales...android. Frankly i migth want it simply to use as a mobile platform. If you know of any good models please let me know so i can have a closer look..

Back to the point enlisting to Latitude, having a Gmail, and finally adding myself to the G+ network (yet another social thing) knowing my affinity for personal disorders (I've got more fake IDs then I have games). I fear that the google network would end up being just another....

Yet i have trouble placing it. Their views on the groupings using circles is rather comforting compared to the usual friend or not friend. Like they for one accept the fact we all interact in different setting. We don't say the same thing to everybody we know, we don't want to listen to everybody we know all the time. Like not all my hobbies doesn't really apply to you, but some of my hobbies migth have a great interest with you.

Yet i can't quite get it to work. One of my major problems is the fact I don't really know what interests me. Google haven't found out yet, I'm sure they will eventually, either that or i simply end up ruining their profiling. (It happens, i mess up my own profiling).
But at least it has potential, funny thing I've realized with Socials is that you effectively have to just drop the privacy settings. It's like either you go all in or you migth as well just stay back.

And this is where I start getting scared. My mind sees complex enough patterns to realized how most of these things work, where we're heading, the effect of what's going on. Stopping it, stemming the tide is a whole other matter. I don't even want to begin trying to understand the effects of my privacy settings, understanding where my information/data ends up etc. But does that mean I should keep everything in the business facade front "I'm running for President".
If that's the case, I should be on any of these things, as that'd be a very gray, rainy world. and frankly I like purple more.
Besides anonymity (being unknown) is not something you can do online anymore. In fact if you want to be incognito you need to stay offline. (profiling stuff gives away insane information if gathered).

I noticed some younger modern tech guys slowly adapting the philosophy that all data was exposed and available to everyone in the near future, and I see where they're going. But will they be rigth, and if not who's gonna stop em. (As opposed to the doctrine that data is owned by the creator, and access is well guarded).
Actually it's a quite funny thing that is currently going on in Denmark.
Everything is officially managed via Social sec. numbers, and a few + all the official channels consider this to be a unique identified that the person knowing this number is the person in the database. Reality is that these numbers listed with names are in fact to common online that anyone using a few minutes can pick up a name and Sec number and use it for what ever they like.
But there you have perceived reality that doesn't quite mix with reality. It's always fun to watch when that clashes. Hell when it happens to you. But at some point some one's gotta see the bigger picture, trouble is whether it's before or after some big scandal...



Okay, if you've been reading all the way down here you migth notice I don't quite have a stringent line of thinking, or criss cross all over the place. I migth, migth not have a point. This is how my mind works. This is what happens when I think out loud. I use the labels? Etiketter? to give a hint what I'm writing down. Just remember I'm merely trying to manage Chaos here. Ohh I love feedback...