Professional software developer

I can’t discuss which of these made me snigger on the grounds that I might incriminate myself.

Hopefully you will recognise something from your working day…

cheers

simon

Awsome video

This is probably not suitable for work, and the music is ace.

I think I saw some spreadsheeting near the end.

Just like a day in the office near me.

cheers

simon

Excel VBA tutor

Someone emailed me looking for an Excel VBA tutor in the London area.
Anyone know anyone?
cheers
simon

Apple v Google

Santa was very generous at Smurf towers this year. Especially considering how some people hadn’t really delivered on their blog updates and conference organising commitments.

I got a Nexus 7 tablet and a ipod touch. In that order.

The Nexus 7 was the worst unboxing set up experience of my young geek life. That thing is infested with Google spyware and intrustive ads. horrible. and technically impossible to use due to retarded set up requirements. (you need to go on line to set it up, but it wouldn’t let me set up a functioning internet connection with the hotel wifi. totally shit. You can’t move files on and off it via USB (in Linux). Maybe you can now several months on with some faff, but really that stuff should work out of the box. and it just did not. at all.

Google forced me to set up a new user ID whose credentials I promptly forgot. They now want me to pay them to retrieve them. Seriously. I have to pay for a password reset? Foook off.

So when Google are bragging about how Google+ has passed 1% of facebooks popularity and swiftly heading for 1.1%, bear in mind 90% of those accounts are probably zombie accounts that no one can access. Raahbish.

I used it for a few hours then I put it away and now it just weighs my bag down. It must be close to 2 months since I turned the thing on. total waste of money, not to mention the scamful cover farce with the PCWorld sharks (Yes I was so desperate to own this revolutionary piece of tech I bought from PCW!). 10 quid discount on the cover, oh, but its by internet rebate. no sorry forgot to mention there is a 3 page form to fill in. Serves me right, but lesson learned.

Compare and contrast with my iplop touche…

Great set up, limited spam, same games my kids play (their high scores tend to be min 10x mine!) and Facetime. Pur-lease – this is truly the killer app here, and all tucked away in Apples walled garden.

Our whole family is facetiming all our family and friends. Also since a few high profile kid/credit card haemorrhages its now quite simples to set up an Apple account without registering a credit card.

In retrospect I think there is a lot of sense in buying hardware from a hardware company that know what they are. If you buy from an ad pimp they are always going to be scouring through your most personal activities looking for the opportunity  to sell you Excel consultancy services!

I notice Google won’t even search properly any more unless you are logged in so they can record your every move. They are now a truly creepy company. I know they bypassed Msft’s market cap in 2012 (as predicted) but they are getting a little too crap and too heavy handed for my liking, as well as creepy and intrusive.

I know lots of people are waiting for Apple to founder, and iPhone 5 seemed to be pretty close, but whilst they have a huge stock of mini fanbois on ipod touches desperate for iPhones I think they are fairly safe.

Unlike Blackerry. My BB Bold has been the most unreliable phone I have ever owned (and I had one of those truly shitty motorola droids), everytime I unlock the screen its hit or miss if the thing is alive. I have even been contemplating replacing it with an iPhone! imagine that!!

I could probably sell or palm off my nexus, iplop and BB and scrape together enough to buy an old secondhand not too battered iPhone. Or not.

So in summary:

Google: creepy crap, Blackberry: unreliable crap, Apple: actually quite expensively good at the mo.

Have you enjoyed or endured any tech updates recently?

cheers

simon

the only spreadsheet angle here would be the fact that if any of this tech has a spreadsheet app, I haven’t tried it, or felt the need to. Anyone thinking of implementing newly draconian office app licensing might want to think about that…

Rare Excel blunder reported

Blunders arent rare, of course, but fessing up in public is…

no matter how obtuse.

Sorry for lack of progress info on the conf. I have only just identified which country I will probably be in for the next few months. Progress should improve (well begin ,-))

cheers

simon

 

secure security

Got this recently:

Surprise surprise I chose… Disable!

If you are running 2010 and have VBA in password to open protected .xlsms then they should probably be in a trusted location if you want the VBA to run. (I didn’t try very hard but there didn’t seem to be an easy way to trust the doc, maybe temporarily taking the pw off it, trusting it, then redo pw, would work).

Unless you have AV that can scan them (which products do?).

cheers

Simon

Drinks venue Tue 5th Feb 6:30pm

Here ya go:

Henrys bar

Unit C, West India Quay, London E14 4AX

Lets meet up here around 6:30-/7:00 on this Tuesday the 5th Feb, for a few drinks.

If you have been before you know the score, if you are thinking of coming for the first time please do, we don’t bite. We are easy to spot

Topics of conversation:

1. why that lazy arse Simon hasn’t sorted our conference out yet.
2. whats the point of Office 365
3. Why didnt we arrange to meet up on Ann Summers night?
4. current state of the Excel/VBA/.net/SQL market
5. Any other biz

See you there

Cheers

Simon

Rate cut rumours

Just as we thought we might be surfacing from our double dip depression, news hits that we are entering a triple (great for vodka or pastis (or both ;-))), not so great for the economy.

That might explain the rumour of that one large financial crimes institute (whose name rhymes with car keys) has just lopped 10% off contractor rates. I assume the management has identified a significant benefit to pissing off all the productive workers.

It seems I was mistaken in seeing the green shoots of recovery on Jobserve. In fairness there has been a few sub 200 per day jobs that required the earth, or perhaps its the same one with all the agencies taking it in turns to try and fill.

Its coming up the contract expiry time for me so I’m watching this sort of stuff closely, and also a little preoccupied, in case you are wondering why the conf etc has not progressed. I need to see where I am likely to be in March before finalising details.

Pub details for Tue to follow

cheers

simon

drink next week

I hope people are still up for beers next week?
Will post a venue in the next couple of days, but somewhere in Canary Wharf area that isnt all bar one.
Soz for lack of posts busy busy me like.
cheers
simon

2013 Excel dev conf update

Sorry for being out of touch for so long: busy busy…

The preferred venue for the conference is not currently available and I have not as yet found a suitable alternative.

The folks who looked after us so well last year will have availability from mid March so my preference is to put things back until then.

That doesn’t mean we can’t have an evening social in sunny London though, and I have found several venues that are nicer than the all bar one. What about Tuesday the 5th Feb from 6pm somewhere between Bank and Canary Wharf?

Thanks for all the conf interest by the way, I have had loads of emails so hopefully the event will be even more popular than last year.

Rach (pictured) said she was going to bring a few mates this time.

I said they couldn’t have one of the magnificent (all leather) folders, but I might sort them out a pen or summat.

cheers

simon