I was quite happy today to find out that the project that I'm working on with IBM (M-PESA) has won the GSMA "Best Mobile Money Service" award for its third consecutive year. What makes it extra special for me this year is that out of the two new features that earned it this prestigious award, one of them was developed by me (bulk payments)! This new feature was used to pay the Safaricom shareholders their dividends through the M-PESA service.

More details here.

I'll be flying out to India tomorrow on business. This'll be my first time venturing east (unless you count Belgium as "east" ;)). IBM has a funny way of putting your mind at ease when travelling - ever since being booked to go out to India, they've been sending me daily terror alert emails. Apparently going out on the 14th of February and celebrating is an invitation to being attacked due to St. Valentines Day's association with western culture. It sucks that my birthday happens to fall on the same day, so it might be a low key celebration in the hotel bar. That aside, I'm very excited!

It's been a hectic preparation - only having had a week's notice that I was being sent out has meant that only a week has passed since my immunisations and my VISA has arrived a whole 24 hours before my departure!

I've been working on a new project! A Second Life chat client called SlXSLChat. If you use Second Life, do you ever get fed up of having to log in to the really heavy-weight and resource intensive client just to be able to talk with friends? Well, I do, so I wrote my own. More details Here.

After quite a long journey with my employer, I'm now officially an IBM employee! I was transferred under the TUPE regulations, which state that if a client changes a contract so that a service transitions to a new provider then the new provider must take on the staff from the original provider. Simply put, Vodafone decided to change suppliers from Sagentia (my ex-employer) to IBM (my new employer)... and all the staff on the project moved over to IBM! For now we're all still working on the same project (M-PESA) - it's very nice moving to a new company and not being surrounded by complete strangers and having to start on an entirely new project right away.

It's quite a change going from a company with about 150 people (30 in my office) to a company with about 400,000 employees globally! Also, I'm in a company that supports open source and UNIX systems more than Microsoft systems, which is a refreshing change.

Is there anyone else from IBM that reads this? If so, look me up on BluePages! ;)

If you know me in person you are probably already aware that I'm headed off to Vegas on September 3rd for 5 days of gamblin' fun. Well, this morning I received my currency from the Post-Office (hooray for Saturday home deliveries!). Do you think that I have enough?

Seriously, I don't plan on spending much more than $50 or so per day on things like slot machines and maybe some blackjack. I'm not a gambler at all and don't have an addictive personality, so I'm hoping I have some money leftover in the end.

Today is a pretty special day for me. After a lifetime of being overweight and unhealthy, I've finally reached my target weight of 75kg - actually, I overshot a bit down to 74.3kg (11st10lbs or 164lbs). When I first started dieting and being more active 18 months ago, I weighed in at 114.5kg (18st or 252lbs) meaning that I've lost a whopping 40.2kg (6st5lbs or 89lbs). This puts my BMI right in the middle of the "normal" band (21.7, where normal is defined as 18.5..24.9). Basically, I did it in 6 month stints of dieting where I'd eat no more than 1000kcal a day. I know that many will consider this unhealthy, but I never felt lethargic or malnourished. My meals would consist of the following:


Breakfast: Banana (90kcal)
Lunch: Ginsters Chicken and Mushroom Slice (439kcal)
Snack: Apple (72kcal)
Dinner: Heinz Chilli and Tomato Soup (146kcal)
Snack: Tomatoes/Cucumber/Oatibix cereal/Celery/Beetroot/Grapes to top-up to 1000kcal
(Yes, I know those caloric values off by heart!)

It's a fairly boring (yes, no alcohol, but plenty of water) and repetitive diet, but it works! Dieting alone isn't enough to be healthy, though. So I gave up driving to get my lunch every day at work, instead I now walk 2 miles every day to the local BP garage (one of the guys there thinks I'm a bit strange always buying the same Ginsters slice every day). I also walk 6-14 miles every weekend. All of my walking is done at ~4mph. Thanks to my iPhone and TrailGuru, I've been able to track my walks. There have been some days where I've been unable to complete my exercises due to being out on business, but those have generally been few and far between! Also, believe it or not, playing guitar burns a fair few calories, so I've tried to play for at least 30 minutes a day (though often quite a bit more).

After the first 6 months, I pretty much stopped dieting for 8 months after losing 20kg (3st2lbs or 44lbs). Then in April of this year I started again and managed to lose the same amount of weight in 4 months.

I expect to carry on with this diet until September, when I head out to Las Vegas for my annual vacation, where I plan on "relaxing" the diet quite a bit ;). Hopefully, with a bit of self control, I'll be able to maintain around 70-75kg.

Anyway, as they say... "A picture is worth a thousand words" so here is a collage of before/after shots. Hopefully you'll be able to tell which ones are which!

A very helpful tool that I discovered during my second dieting stint has been Calorie Count. This free (usually you find people trying to make quick money off of dieting schemes!) website allows you to keep track of your caloric intake and expenditure. The great thing about calorie counting is that you get to choose what you eat. You could trade a few low calorie foodstuffs for some more rich treats, just so long as you don't go over your daily limit.

One thing that I found quite important was to treat myself once a week (but without going over my calorie limit). On Sundays, I normally have 3 slices of eggy bread (French toast) with a scrambled egg and a pint of Jelly (Jello) for dinner. This alone is about 600kcal, which means eating lightly throughout the rest of the day. In addition to this, I found it bad going to bed hungry (it'd keep me from falling asleep, so I'd usually save about 100kcal until 30 minutes before bed time. People often say that eating after 6pm is a bad thing to do, but I disagree. It means you're not hungry through the night (so are likely to get a decent night's sleep) and it keeps your digestive system going, thus keeps your metabolism working. I'm not suggesting a three course meal right before bed, that'd probably keep you awake from having to digest the meal and from all of the energy being consumed... but just something to keep you from feeling hungry.

Of course, don't take anything I say as a proper "diet plan". I'm not a qualified dietician at all and I make no guarantees that what I've been doing is at all safe.

It's been a while since I updated this site, but I figured I'd post about a new guitar that I have. It's an Ibanez Talman (Electro-Acoustic). This by no means replaces my Gibson Les Paul, but it's nice just being able to reach for a guitar and play without having to amp-up!

It provides a very nice blues sound and works well as a slide guitar (since the action is pretty high compared to my gibson). There isn't much treble when it's not amped, however when it's plugged in it sounds great!

I'm really amazed at the build quality, for just 169.99 GBP it features a mahogany body, an ash top and a rosewood finger board and bridge. The build quality feels better than my Gibson and a quick look in the sound hole shows extremely good craftsmanship both inside and out.

My only complaint is that it's a little hard to play with the fairly high action, but I'm sure I'll get used to it!

Full specs can be seen here.

With it being my birthday today, I decided to spoil myself and get a new Guitar. I got the Gibson Robot Guitar in Manhattan Midnight blue. For those who don't know, this guitar tunes itself. No, I don't suck at tuning and can tune by ear to some degree... I would just rather play something than spend 5-10 minutes tuning (tuning with a tremolo takes a long time). As with my last guitar, it arrived broken. This time, rather than a snapped neck, one of the "Powerhead" machine heads didn't work (I could tune it manually, but it wouldn't turn automatically). I managed to prove it was receiving power by shorting two of the guitar strings together - when this is done, a white LED flashes to warn you that there is a short. I then tried swapping two Powerheads over, and even when swapped to a new place on the headstock, it didn't turn. The only option left was to open the defective Powerhead. Upon inspecting the innards, it was obvious immediately what the problem was - there was barely any solder on the motor contacts AND the contacts that make contact with the PCB on the headstock were too recessed to do so properly. After 5 minutes with a soldering iron and a flat-bladed screwdriver (to push the contact further out) I'd fixed both problems. When I reassembled everything, it worked perfectly!

I'm not that impressed with the Powerhead design; the contacts aren't springloaded, which could lead to problems down the line if there isn't enough pressure between them and the PCB on the headstock. I'm also not too impressed with Gibson as when I opened the guitar case, I noticed there was no mains adaptor for the charger. I assumed this was a packing mistake and called up the shop and told them about the missing mains adaptor and the broken Powerhead. However, upon doing some research, I found that everyone in Europe was missing the mains adaptor. Gibson, apparently, decided not to include one in Europe as, according to them, we all use different voltages, which just isn't true (we all use 230v). To make things worse, the charging unit had no specifications on it as to the input voltage, current or polarity. Thankfully, someone from America was nice enough to post the details displayed on his mains adaptor on a forum and I was able to find an old mains adaptor that worked perfectly.

Anyway, problems aside, it's a really nice guitar. It sounds really crunchy and full. The sustain goes on forever compared to my Ibanez and the sound feels much tighter and cleaner.

So without further ado, here is a photo of it:

About 3 months ago, a couple of days after the launch of the 2008 MacBook Pros, I went into an Apple store and decided to take the plunge and get a shiny new MacBook. Just before I handed my credit card over to the sales person, I was informed that as I was buying a MacBook, I was entitled to a heavily discounted iPod. With Christmas just around the corner, I jumped at the offer as it'd make a cheap Christmas present. The catch? The discount had to be claimed as a rebate, which means paying the full price up front and then claiming the money back via post.

Before I even unpacked my MacBook, I went online and filled out and printed the rebate form, stapled my receipt and barcode label to the form, put it in an envelope and stuck the envelope in the post. One thing I noticed was that the offer was called the "Back to School" offer. I thought to myself "Is this offer for students only?". To put my mind to rest, I returned to the Apple store and asked for clarification from a sales person. They assured me that I was still eligible despite not being in education.

Christmas came and went, my mother was very grateful for her gift of an 8GB iPod Touch. Another month passed, and I suddenly recalled the rebate and the lack of communication regarding it for 3 months. The very next day, I received an email from Apple's promotions department stating that the offer was intended for students only and that I'd need to provide some form of identification proving that I was in full time education. Rather than getting out my old student ID and photoshopping the dates, I decided to be honest and explain exactly what had happened. The promotions department representative told me that I had to take this up with the manager of the store where the device was purchased from.

During a lunch break, I headed into Cambridge and stated my case. The staff, to their credit, were understanding, but said that the Apple store and the promotions department are separate companies with different tax codes and couldn't authorise the rebate. They did, however, offer me a refund. This was not the option I was looking for as it would mean taking my mother's gift back. I was told to contact the promotions department once again to explain that the device had been mis-sold and to see whether that would change anything.

After emailing the promotions department for one last time, I was told to contact customer service - there was no information about whether my case had been closed or whether it would be processed.

Today, I phoned customer services and was greeted by an extremely unhelpful person who explained, once again, that the Apple store, the online store and the promotions department are all actually separate companies and that had I bought the device from the online store, it would be within his remit to make right the situation, but as I had bought from a retail store, there was nothing he could do. He explained that the onus was on the store manager to remedy the complaint.

So, in summary:

1) Apple mis-sold me the iPod device. If I was a student, would I not have claimed a discount on the MacBook itself too? I made no false pretences about being in education.
2) Apple lied to me when I enquired about the offer upon returning to the store.
3) Apple's customer service is terrible. Everyone passes the buck and hides behind the excuse of each department being a different company. This really isn't the way to keep customers happy.
4) The Apple representative offering phone support claimed that as the device was 3 months old, it was outside of its return period. So by taking 3 months to query my rebate, Apple had effectively stripped me of my statutory rights. Apple's only saving grace is that they did offer me a refund, despite what I was told over the phone.

I believe I shall go back to the Apple store with my mother, iPod in hand, and ask the store manager to explain to her why he's taking her Christmas present back. If Apple is cold hearted enough to go through with the refund, I'll then purchase a brand new iPod (for the same price) from the same store to prove that money was never the issue and that it's the principle of the matter that counts.

I've been a faithful Apple customer for a good few years and have given them much business, but at the end of the day, it seems that the customer comes second.

* Update 02/02/2009 *
It pays to complain. The Apple promo status website now says:

"Thank you. Your record has been located. Details below:-

Your claim has been approved on 30.01.09 and is scheduled for immediate payment.

Payment will be issued in the amount of 95 GBP by cheque."

I'll take this as a quiet admission of fault. Thank you Apple for keeping your customers happy.

* Update 07/02/2009 *
I have, in my hands, a nice cheque from Apple.

This is something I probably should have posted up here a while ago... I decided to buy a guitar! I kinda got fed up with having programming as both a hobby and a profession (well, not fed up as such... but you know, variety is nice), so I figured learning the guitar would be a good distraction, and I wasn't wrong.

I bought an Ibanez RG370DX. It cost me 270GBP ($400), which is as much as my new server cost! It's pretty nice to play, though the locking tremolo makes it a pain to change tuning. I've had the guitar for about a month now - I'm still pretty bad at playing it, though not nearly as bad as when I first started (I couldn't even hit a chord without taking about 30 seconds to position my fingers).

There's a great sense of achievement when you manage to play a song that you know. I can play "Doesn't Remind Me - Audioslave" and "Seven Nation Army - The White Stripes" (both badly ;)) at the moment along with various other chords and scales.

To make sure I don't annoy people with my playing, I got a Behringer UCG102 USB Guitar Link. It lets me plug my guitar straight into my MacBook Air and I can play away and record with any piece of audio software. I find that Garageband is by far the best - it lets me add effects, choose from different amplifiers and add other computer-generated instruments, all without having to rerecord the track!

If anyone else out there wants to learn an instrument but is too worried about being bad at it, seriously... just do it. Yes, you'll suck when you start out, but so does everyone! Practise makes perfect. It's amazing how muscle memory works, I can go to bed not being able to play something without thinking about where my hand is. The next morning, it instinctively comes to me. The more you do the same thing over and over, the easier it becomes.

Playing an instrument is great fun if you don't take it too seriously. The worst thing you can do is get frustrated at yourself for not being able to play something immediately (I know this from playing the recorder and the violin). Just relax and keep at it, you'll eventually get it.

At last! My new server is in place and running on a RAID1 with regular, remote backups! I lost a couple of hours to a stupid mistake that I made. I couldn't figure out why it refused to boot from the hard drives... and after much messing around with formatting, redeploying linux and trying to boot from USB, I discovered it was due to me not having set the boot partition to active!

All that's left to do now is recompile everything for the ATOM 330 architecture, then I can cancel my Linode subscription!