I managed to install Limewire on Vista. Their site doesn’t say it is compatible but it went on OK. Part of the installation process is to install Java which did fail, which meant Limewire wouldn’t start. 

Went to java.com to download that which initially failed due to OneCare getting in the way. The firewall’s settings were set to ‘Restricted’ as I am connected to a public network. Lowered the firewall setting to ‘Ask first’ and Java downloaded and installed OK. Restarted Limewire which ran OK.

I worked for a company several years ago where one of the guys, nice bloke, was some kind of office administrator. Big music fan and a lover of all things US, especially bowling alleys, American football, odd US burger chains and all the latest movies. We were working for a large UK company that regarded IT as a necessary evil and basically hated it. Their IT expectations were pretty low and the IT department even failed those. Not that I included myself amongst that lot as I was only employed for some Y2K work (That’s convenient. Ed). For example, if you called a meeting to discuss some work nobody would show up, no kidding, If you emailed someone with a question about some work issue you wouldn’t get a response as the email receiver would just delete the email, no kidding.

Anyway the big music fan office administrator was a bit of a home hacker i.e. he had a PC at home - this was about 8 years ago - and fiddled away with it to his hearts content and did all sorts of installs and upgrades quite successfully. Eventually he talked himself into doing a motherboard upgrade, which is a big deal. To him it was just swapping out another board. Of course he had trouble doing that particular swap and whenever I asked him how it was going I recieved a vague reply and eventually I stopped asking him and the issue sort of faded away.

He did understand the concept of servers - this was 8 years ago - and was able to answer a few server questions on them at work, like where they physically were and what was on them, Unix or Windows Server, Oracle or SQL Server etc. He also managed to find the relevant passwords. He soon became a systems/database administrator, effectively with no IT skills apart from the home hacking variety.

What does this prove? Dunno, but I did tell him to never be tempted to leave and join another company as he was doing OK where he was.

The weather here in California is actually quite cold, the weather guys on TV reckon its December type weather. Number 1 daughter has managed to catch a cold.

Quote of the day

‘I don’t know if God exists, but it would be better for His reputation of He didn’t’ Jules Renard (1864-1910)