Work & Eid Celebrations

I'm not sure if its because I said that I hate the server room twice this morning :p but they called me at 2 pm to tell me that two main applications stopped working after they upgraded the Coreswitch at work so I had to go there.

on my way to work: 

Server Room: *I love you*, a restart + starting all services needed solved the issue.

My way back:

Enjoy the holidays :)

Happy National and Liberation Days

Academy Awards Winners

1. Slumdog Millionaire (8 Awards)
2. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (3 Awards)
   
3. Milk (2 Awards)
4. The Reader (1 Award)
5. The Dark Knight (2 Awards)
6. Vicky Cristina Barcelona (1 Award)
7. The Duchess (1 Award)
8. WALL.E (1 Award)
   

Detailed Results

Cafe: Living Room [Pictures]

You all must have visited Living Room cafe by now. These are some pictures from the place:

This morning's rain.

Outside view.

Inside view, today I made them play "Fairuz's dvd" twice for me :)
(my favorite lady of all time, I love you)

Movie: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

The story of a man who is born very old (80 years) and keeps growing younger. 13 Oscar nominations. 166 minutes. This is a long beautiful well acted and well written movie. This is definitely a great weekend movie.

Note: I've watched it at home, don't know wether the kncc version is good or bad.

Life

Last Month

Today

Location: bathroom window

Windows 7

I guess everyone is talking about how great is Windows 7 and how it is going to be the best OS Microsoft has released (here is one review). I know that they have focused on performance but I haven't tried it nor my friends did.

Question is, have you tried it?

Nintendo DSi

On Pre-Order

Release Date: April 5th 2009

Earth Centered Model

Until the sixteenth century, the whole world believed that the Sun and the other planets orbited our planet Earth (Earth centered model). it was a simple fact just like 1+1=2. The textbook that explained the "Earth centered model" lived for ~1600 years.

Is everything we believe in nowadays true?

Mobile: LG GD900

Whats so different about this mobile?

It has a transparent sliding-out number pad!
World's First Transparent Phone :)

Release Date: 2009 Q2

Chip Chick

Tech and Gadgets from a Girl's Perspective

You may also check ChipChicklets (For your kids Bashar :p)

Enjoy :)

Special Valentine's Gifts (For Her)

Philips/ Swarovski HeartBeat USB £89.00

Red Rose 2 GB USB Flash Drive $25.99

MSI Wind Valentine's Edition $429.99

8 GB USB Flash Drive Necklace $27.99

Sterling Silver Heart Necklace $75.00

Circuit Board Necklace $19.99

Man/Woman Talking Remote Control $19.95

Binary Love Shirt $18.99

Geek Love Poem $18.99

Linux Download Manager!

I'm looking for a decent download manager for Linux (If any!). I have so far tried (order by worst => best):

1. Gwget: No username/password option!
2. Kget: When you close it and open it again your links disappear!
3. Multiget: it seems that it doesn't like me because I tried to download some links that needed username/password and its not working (retcode fail?!).
4. Downthemall (firefox extension): The best out of all the ones I have tried. No complaints so far.
   

What is your favorite download manager?

NBK WOL Security

Here is a tip I got from 1801801, Answer all the questions with the same answer! Smart! Never thought of it. But I didn't try, not sure if we can do that!

More on WOL is here.

Spring :)

Today is the first day of Spring! in Kuwait :)

Source: Mr Essa Ramadan (Weather forecaster).

Why?

picture was taken at 12:00 pm

I know that we are expecting 100 days of dust this summer, but Feb?

The JavaScript Verifier

This tool saved me today. I had a piece of java script code that referenced some form variables. the code was okay on Firefox but not on IE. The problem was simply because the form variable (input type=text name=var) was called "var" which is a reserved word in JS :p

Kindle 2

When Steve Jobs meets the Kindle. :p

Tomorrow is the official release of the new kindle.

Source: CNET.

Cute USB Flash Drives

Cutest USB Flash Drives are Here.

Source: Engadget.

Grey's Anatomy & Private Practice

The second cross over episode will air next Thursday (12/2/09). I'm excited since I watch both :) and since Grey's Anatomy has been boring me lately ;( I'm hoping that this episode will bring life again to Grey's!

* Addison, Naomi and Sam from "Private Practice" will be appearing in "Grey's Anatomy".

* I'ts going to be Grey's S05E15 and Private's S02E16.

Update: It was an ok/average episode, you should start with Greys e15 and then Private e16. (2-hour) episode.

February's Books - The List

In addition to January's Books,

Here is the new list:

Title	Author	Recommended by
A Child Called "it"	Dave Pelzer	..:: P.ANONYMOUS ::..
The Lost Boy	Dave Pelzer	..:: P.ANONYMOUS ::..
Among The Free	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Among The Hidden	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Among The Impostors	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Among The Betrayed	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Among The Barons	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Among The Brave	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Among The Enemy	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Found	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Turnabout	Margaret Peterson	Anoosa
Busy Woman Seeks Wife	Annie Sanders	seriously2009
Chasing Harry Winston	Lauren Weiseberger	seriously2009
My Sisters Keeper	Jodi Picoul	libero anima
The Long Road Home	Danial steel	libero anima
Daemon	Daniel Suarez	MBH
7 Habits of Highly Effective People	Steven Covey	Bashar
Confessions of an Economic Hitman	John Perkins	Bashar

Of the lists:
"A Man Named Dave", "A Million Little Pieces", "The Kite Runner" and "Thousand Splendid Suns" are available @ Virgin Megastore.

Enjoy :)

Work Flow Products

I have been thinking about automating various processes at work for quite a while ... for example in our department there is a process for unblocking a website that you think its important for your work. the process goes like:

1- You print the PDF form, fill it with the required info and sign it.
2- Ask your supervisor to sign it.
3- Give it to IT, IT will evaluate and unblock the website.

this is only one example, we have plenty of forms in each department.

* Do you have automated/online processes at work?
If yes =>
* Are you using a "Work Flow" product? or
* Are you manually developing these processes?
if no =>
* are you considering having automated/online processes at work?


Finally, have a nice weekend :)

A Movie to Watch: Seven Pounds

* Mom said that she cried in the movie!
* Today, a colleague of mine said that he cried too and he said that its even better than "The Pursuit of Happyness".

So if you have nothing planned for the weekend you may want to check the movie out. if you already had, tell us what you think.

I'll go myself If I had the chance, last time I went to the cinema was in August for "Tropic Thunder"!

Info Connect 2009 (2)

So I finally went to Info Connect and its way below my expectations except for the "DSL offers" that are really good, you will find them for an avg of (2 Mbps ~ 200 KD). I have a friend who subscribed only 2 months ago for (512 Mbps => 1 Mbps (with double speed)) paying 19 KD a month thru NBK. After the upgrade (1 Mbps => 2 Mbps (with double speed) he is going to pay 18.750 a month! ... so you can upgrade for a lower price.

My other friend who was looking for a mini laptop didn't find anything interesting really, not many options:

Dell Mini (Intel Atom 1.6 GHZ, 1 GB RAM, 16 GB SSD HDD, XP) = 130 KD.

Toshiba Mini (Intel Atom 1.6 GHZ, 1 GB RAM, 120 GB HDD, XP) = 129 KD, without OS = 99 KD

HP Mini (Mobile via 1.6 GHZ, 2 GB RAM, 12o GB HDD, Vista Buisness) = 185 KD

MSI Mini (?, 1 GB RAM, ? GB HDD, XP, Multi Colors (White, Pink)) = 109 KD

I saw there: Toshiba, Fujitsu Siemens, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, QualityNet, KEMS, Wataniya, Viva, Fastelco, Anwarko, Alghanim-Xcite, InfoCenter, different ministries?, Gulfnet...

February's Books

I would like to thank all you for your recommendations in January. So last month I took the list and went to virgin before ordering anything online. I found two books of what you have recommended:

1. The Kite Runner. (very touching, powerful story, moving and gripping story that is hard to put down).
   
2. Thousand Splendid Suns. (loved it even more than the first one, this story will break your heart).
   

I have also downloaded the movie "The Kite Runner". I'm going to watch it tonight.

As for February's list, I'm still gonna use January's list in addition to the additional recommendations I got. If you have something new or something you forgot to add please list it :).

I'll be working on February's list.

My favorite place to read now is Marina waves - Living Room.

I so loved the idea of reading 2 books a month :) so Thank You again for helping me :)

Quality Net Vs KEMS

I have been with quality net since 2001. I still want to stick them with just because i got used to them. I'll probably go after tomorrow to Info Connect to renew my subscription. My uncles are changing now to KEMS because they have an offer (2 Mbps for 180 KD) while Quality Net's offer is still (1 Mbps for 199 KD).

Do you think I should change?

And what is your connection at home? and how much do you pay?


Update: My Mom was in Info Connect, She renewed the subscription (Quality Net) (didn't wait for me), the offer was 2 Mbps for 225 KD (Download Speed: 200-240 KB/Sec)