As usual, to send you my Best Wishes for the coming year, I send you my best shots of the year before. Here are my best shots of 2008.

From Best Shots 2008

HAPPY 2009 !!!

Today we went to Aqualibi so we could walk in swimsuit all day even if it's freezing outside !

Recently I had a problem on my home computers. We couldn't connect to www.google.com anymore. A ping didn't work, a nslookup didn't work, a tracert didn't work. All other sites were ok.

I searched the Internet (using google.be ;-)) and many people had the same problem. It seems to be a strange DNS problem.

For those people, here is a temporary solution. Edit your Windows Hosts file (in c:\windows\system32\drivers\etc) and add this line at the end:

216.239.59.147 www.google.com

This way you tell your computer directly where to find Google.com. Note this solution will no longer work if Google.com changes its IP Address.

After that I could again read my gmail, my Google Calendar, my Google Notebook and Blogger.

Strange problem...

I would like to know the real issue behind it.

Today we did some mountain bike in Kasterlee/Herentals on the Montain Bike Routes of the Bloso.

I could not blog for several days because I couldn't connect to www.google.com due to very stange dns problems. Whatever, I would like to wish you the best for this end of the year.

I hope your holydays are filled with happiness and good cheer !

Very soon I will send you my Best Wishes with my Best Shots 2008.

I have seen that guy (Roxorloops) at Devoxx. What he does is amazing !

From 20081214 Druivenveldrit

From 20081214 Druivenveldrit

From 20081214 Druivenveldrit

Links :

• Druivenveldrit 2008 - official website
• Druivenveldrit 2008 - my pictures
  
• Druivenveldrit 2007 on YouTuve
  
• Druivenvelrdrit 2007 - on my blog
• Druivenvelrdrit 2007 - my pictures
  

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Last week (Dec 8-12 2008),
there was Devoxx
(formely known as JavaPolis)
in the Metropolis in Antwerp.

The fair usually welcomes 2000
developers for technical conferences
on Java, PHP, JavaFX, Scala,
Ruby on Rails...

IBM invests on this event
and this year Robin Mulkers
proposed to demonstrate IBM's
technology leadership with a
real use case of one of the
hottest technologies: RFID.

The project was exlained
in the keynote
(see some photos here below)



Furthermore, it's a usefull use case for the
Devoxx Organization : All participants
receivedan RFID badge. Those badges
were tracked so that one could
for example see which
sessions were the most popular. Or
participants could leave their name
at the booths by letting the hostess
scan their badge to participate
to games or request for more information.

At IBM, we call this innovation that matters !



PS : Devoxx is one of the best
events that I know. The organization
is really great. You have free WiFi, you
can take drinks directly from
the fridge, speackers are accessible,
topics are cool...
Everything is in place to have a great
Developer experience !

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Dimanche 7 décembre,
nous étions invités par IBM
au Cirque Bouglione pour
la Saint-Nicolas.

N'hésitez plus, allez-y.
Je vous le recommande :
Le spectacle est vraiment bon.

In the past I had already
designed goal trees using UML.

Today I have developed
several diagrams for one
of my customers :
goal trees, project lists,
opportunities, initiatives,
execution strategies....

I have put it all in one huge diagram,
that I have called a mind map.

So I have effectively
been developing
a mind map
using a UML Modeling tool.

I can't show you because
it's confidential but
I find it quiet interesting
and I will do it more and more.

You can try it at home...

This weekend I took some time to have a look at Ubuntu. I find Windows Vista is very slow and I wanted to know how Linux would run on my machine (Acer Aspire 5315, Intel Celeron 1.7 Ghz).

I downloaded a CDRom from Ubuntu's website. You can boot from that CDRom and run Linux without making any changes to your machine.

Directly, I was convinced by the performance : Linux is much more reactive. When applications are slow, the OS isn't and that makes all the difference.

There are however some things that make me realize it would cost me time if I would completely switch to Ubuntu :

• My wireless didn't work. I should locate the windows driver and install it on Ubuntu.
• My Graphical palette didn't work. Linux doesn't seem to understand how it works
  
• I could not read my MP3 immediately. I should install a special codec over the Internet but as my wireless didn't work...
• How to synch with Windows based phone like my Samsung SGH I600 ?
  

So I guess I will have to go for dual boot. Unfortunately I'm short on disk space... So I'll need to buy some storage first.

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This Sunday (Nov 30, 2008) we were at the Lotto Arena in Antwerp for the last concert of Natalia's Glamorous Tour.

It's the 4th time I see Natalia in concert. The first time was ok. The second time I was disappointed. The third time was ok but I still found she was shouting instead of singing.

This time was ... exceptional :

1. She was singing and not shouting: real emotions could flow instead of a mass of decibels.

2. There was a real dance floor : Natalia and the dancers provided a superior experience.

3. There were nice surprises like singing Prince and the appearance of Stam van Samang.


So it was an excellent concert this time !!

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Vous y croyez- vous ?

Last week I bought a CD and a book.

The CD is "I Love Techno 2008" : 7.5 / 10 because some parts are a bit boring.

The Book is the new Jacques Attali : Gandhi ou L'Eveil des humiliés. I have not started reading it yet.

Fernando Arabal : "L'artiste, c'est celui qui rate"

Dans le sens : l'Artiste est celui qui ose prendre le risque de ne pas réussir, celui qui ne vise pas toujours à réussir, celui qui s'expose le plus en mettant en jeu sa propre image.

Raymond Devos : "Un succès c'est un bide auquel on a échappé"

I'm looking for an association that would take my old bike and give him a second life (send second hand bikes to poor countries).

Here is what I have found so far in Belgium http://www.quefaire.be/annonces/A-r-un-velo-583304_1405.shtml

If you know such an association, let me know.

What a mashup can do for you ?

See this French mashup in Paris it shows you were there are parties, concerts, exposition, theaters tonight in Paris. See

http://www.parisetudiant.com/agenda/sortir-a-paris-bon-plan.php?


Cool !

Certains spécialistes informatiques (peut-être moi-même) devraient y penser de temps en temps : notre language est très particulier et peut-être un peu opaque.

J'ai trouvé ici un bon article qui illustre cela :

http://urba-si.blogspot.com/2008/03/vue-mtier-et-vue-technique.html

Yesterday we were in Brussels to see the Cirque du Soleil : Quidam.

It's the 3rd time I go to a show of the Cirque du Soleil. This time we had places on the first row and it was really a great experience.

Ce matin Tom a fait trois beaux dessins avec la palette graphique.