I’ve been dithering about using the System Recovery DVD on my old XP machine for ages, I almost can’t face it, and this is something I’ve done numerous times before but not for several years.

If I don’t prepare, backup and migrate loads of data I’m going to lose it. The question is can I remember everything that needs preserving. Let’s give it a shot by making a list of everything I can think of that needs saving:

1. All email and the address book from Outlook. That’s relatively easy, write the outlook.pst file to a cd and put it onto the Vista machine, or even easier copy it via the network or use the Easy Transfer Vista application.
2. The DVD I created with Sony Vegas can be moved to the Vista machine and I think Sony Vegas is Vista compatible, but of course the proof is trying to use it. The companion product DVD Architect isn’t Vista compatible. So I can get the data onto Vista, edit it again but can’t write it. Might be an idea just to copy the Vegas files to a DVD then load them back on the XP machine when it’s back up and running.
3. iTunes will need to be reinstalled but the iTunesmusic folder is on the D: drive so that is safe. When iTunes is reinstalled and I point it at the iTunesmusic folder with about 80,000 tracks for it to import, it will fail somewhere. I wonder if I’ll lose my playlists, ratings and play counts? I shouldn’t as I assume they are buried in the iTunes XML data file somewhere.
4. I’ll need to reinstall the Treo software and hope the darn thing is recognised when I next sync up after its reinstalled. I bet it’s not recognised or there’s an activation code I’ve lost.
5. Newsgroups are easy enough. Just lose all the old threads, reinstall the client, enter the user name and password and resubscribe to the relevant groups.
6. Web favorites. That’s easy enough in Explorer 7. Right click on the toolbar and click on the Menu Bar option and the old File drop down appears then export the favorites to a file and write that to a CD and import that back again.
7. Documents and photos, copy all of them to a CD or DVD or Easyshare them to the Vista machine
8. All of the other applications can be just lost and then reinstall them. Where this can often get frustrating is you forget about all of the little apps you use and fail to reinstall them and only notice when you absolutely essentially have to you that app working right now. Better make a list of all those that need reinstalling from CD/DVD and those need downloading: Office 2003, Photoshop, Azureus Vuze, HP printer driver, iTunes, Nero 7, Treo Hotsync, Deep Log Analyzer, Winzip, Winamp, Synctoy, Adobe Reader, Windows Messenger, Windows Live Onecare (You’ll never get that registered a second time, another fine opportunity to pay for it again. Ed), Sony Vegas, DVD Architect, AnyDVD, CloneDVD, Outlook Connector, D-Link wireless adapter driver, and a load of really small fry apps.
9. That’s it, apart from after the reinstall, downloading about 2 years worth of XP updates which may work, but is going to take a long while.

Quote of the day

‘Life is a moderately good play with a badly written third act’ Truman Capote (1924-1984)

The weather has gone cold, in August, and I have received one solitary email since 6am this morning, and not one call on the landline or the mobile either. Get a northerly wind and everybodies desire to communicate shrivels up.

I have been looking at other contracts and I don’t feel too good about that as I have only been on my current contract for a month, but I’m not sure they’d miss me. The test team do what they think of as system testing but is really user acceptance testing. If you explain this to them their eyes just glaze over. A graduate from university, who has 6 weeks experience, is considered one of the more experienced testers. Mention schemas, database tables, log files or any other system plumbing and they are just not interested. It’s odd because some of the more aware testers are under the impression they are heading for a disaster, which they aren’t really. They just need to re-jig the teams a bit and change a few processes a little. As they are a small company getting bigger they have never experienced the problems they are facing. It seems that they are determined to face these problems head-on, rather than try and work around them right now, then they’ll address the problem and deal with it then. 

Somebody has actually accused me of having too much experience. They’re probably right. The person that would fit in perfectly would be a tester with 2-3 years experience who they can push around and intimidate, and who doesn’t keep offering them help on strategy and planning. They’re gonna have their crisis if it kills them and I’m note sure they want me to tell them how to possibly avoid it.  

I’ve been here before with these kind of problems on many projects years ago and it’s a bit heart-breaking going through that same old song and dance when it is avoidable. It’ll also be a shame to leave in a way as I have bust a gut learning how this pharmaceutical business works, experience that I can’t see is going to be much use anywhere else.

I’ve been put forward for three positions. One of for a CMS project, which I have never done before and the agent is very precious about it. The second project is for a Japanese company and the third is for a company that writes security software. They all sound quite interesting and all are in London, and I haven’t worked there for ages. Please make it the West End not the dour City.

The position I would most like would be to test some horrendously complex financial derivatives. This would require test planning to the nth degree and would test me to my limits. Of course that would mean working up in the dour City.

A lot of English Premiership football matches are broadcast live, if not on TV via Sky, then on radio via BBC Radio 5 Live or 5 Live Extra.

But what about away games, such as possibly 3rd round FA Cup matches away to a smaller football club where there is little chance of it being broadcast on TV or radio. Can I listen to the commentary on other stations? Yes. There are dozens of BBC local radio stations which have sports programs on Saturday afternoon and often broadcast commentaries of the local teams. These can be heard from their own web pages but you would have to do a fair bit of searching and add all of them to your favourites so that they can be accessed quickly. One of the problems with listening via a web page is to make sure you don’t accidentally close the web page or shutdown Internet Explorer or even have Windows crash on you.

Is that it? Is that the the only option?

Nope. Get an Internet radio. I have one by Logik – http://www.reviewcentre.com/reviews113474.html. And what does an Internet radio do that a PC can’t? Not much, except that you are less likely to lose the connection because your PC crashes or you have mistakenly abandoned I.E.. What an Internet radio is, is just enough of a computer to connect to the Internet, via Wi-fi, and understands internet radio stations, in fact that’s all it understands. In its default setup mode there are over 6,000 radio stations grouped via country or genre that can be tuned into. That is a lot to sift through.

The Internet radio I have has a web site – www.reciva.com – that allows you to create a list of favourite radio stations that you can save to their servers. When you next start the Internet radio, the stored favourites are downloaded to the radio and appear in an area conveniently called ‘My Stuff’.

So, to listen to your teams away fixture commentaries, that aren’t on Radio 5, what you do is to make all of the BBC local radio stations your favourites on www.reciva.com which are then downloaded to the Internet radio. When your team is away to Blackburn and it’s not broadcast on Radio 5 then with your Internet radio listen to BBC Radio Lancashire, there’s a fair chance they may be broadcasting it.