Most recent blog entries

The last weeks and month I'd spent a fair amount of time on a redesign of the Swyx License Database. This weekend I have updated the productive system and am quite pleased with the results.

Two major "faults" had made the database very slow over the last years. As you all know the Swyx licenses are dongled with the hardware of the server machine. So, the first fault was to do all the hardware comparisons needed everytime one wanted to have a look e.g. on a customer. The second fault was introduced when implementing the SUS license management 2 1/2 jears ago. Because of a lack of time I had decided to make (intensive) use of "User Defined Functions" on the MS SQL server. In the beginning everything worked fine, but over the time, with more and more licenses in the database, the UDFs showed their major drawback more and more clearly: they became a performance problem.

So, if you ever have to design a database application, stay ... Read More »

Friday night I saw the movie Shut Up & Sing (just started here in Germany). A film about the Dixie Chicks, an american country band and in fact the most successfull girl band ever in terms of sold records.

During their Top of the World tour in 2003 the lead singer Natalie Maines said one sentence on a concert in London, between two songs, just meant as a joke. A sentence that changed her life and the life of her sisters. It was the evening before American and British troups invaded Iraq. She said that she's ashamed that the president of the United States is from Texas.

While being still on tour this sentence found it's way through the media back to the US with remarkable effects. I am not sure if this is a purely amerian phenomenon, but from my german point of view the reactions all over america are simply unbeli ... Read More »

Try this !

http://www.isnichwahr.de/r297535-Langeweile-beim-Shoppen.html

Just an idea...

I don't know if this is a pure german phenomenon but have you also ever wondered about all the christmas stuff already in the stores in august ?

Well, now there is an easy and purely logical answer to it. It's given a in short story (unfortunately in german language only - I hope you don't mind).

Richtiges Verhalten am Hindukusch - Wie ein Afghane unter Afghanen

Welche Regeln ein Zivilist befolgen muss, wenn er am Hindukusch unterwegs ist - und wer dort nichts zu suchen hat.
Eine Außenansicht von Reinhard Erös.

Ein Artikel aus der Süddeutschen Zeitung vom 24.07.2007.

BAYERN-Alpha - der Bildungskanal des Bayerischen Fernsehens - berichtet am Donnerstag, 19. Juli 2007, 20.15 Uhr - 21.00 Uhr in der Interview-Sendung "ALPHA-FORUM" über die Arbeit der "Kinderhilfe Afghanistan".

Details: ... Read More »

You might have already noticed the new banner link in the right pane of each swyx-forum page. I have decided that a fixed amount of all donations and sponsoring fees will be donated to the German Aid for Afghan Children - GAAC (Kinderhilfe Afghanistan). Why this organisation and not another one ? Well, there are plenty of possibilites to spent money on charity purposes. As I know the work of Mr. Eroes now for more then two years and have always looked out for an opportunity to actively support it, the decision was a quick one.

I am deeply impressed by the work of Mr. Eroes, his overwhelming sense for humatiy and the connected will to put it into action (in medical , humanitarian and political terms).

You can read about Mr. Eroes and the GAAC to get your own picture of it here.

Just received an interesting link to a petition against dubbing of movies and TV shows. The arguments of the people having already signed the list are quite intersting.

• Against dubbing of movies and TV shows
• Gegen Synchronisation in Film und TV

The following is a very interesting article about dubbing in Norway (sorry, this is available in german only):

• „Synchronisieren ist unnorwegisch“ von Arnt Maasø (PDF)

If you need to deal with MS databsases (most likely the MSDE as this is the standard database of SwyxWare) you should definately look for some visual tools instead of trying to learn the osql command line syntax.

Free available 3rd party tools are (just to mention a few of them):

• EMS SQL Manager 2005 Lite for SQL Server
• Universal Table Editor

Microsoft delivers tools as well. As for SQL Server 2000 there are two quite usefull tools, but they are not free:

• MS Enterprise Manager
• MS Query Analyzer

With SQL Server 2005 Microso ... Read More »

Release delayed.

Due to the fact that the necessary forum module update hasn't been released yet, the release of swyx-forum will be delayed. The next target date will be 21.05.2007.

Fortunately the Wiki is already available. When using a FireFox browser you might notice a small display bug within the "search" link. This is just a minor bug and will be fixed shortly.

Hi, I just wanted to give everyone an update on the current status of swyx-forum.

The preview phase has started a week ago and I got a lot of positive feedback and favourable opinions. I take this as an affirmation that the idea of swyx-forum is good and that it is needed.

So, what is the current status ?

As already mentioned within the forum I am currently waiting for a new forum module version that fixes some bugs (e.g. search, own avatars) and comes with a number of new features. This new version is mandatory for the release of swyx-forum. I am optimistic that this version will be available until 14.05.2007, the scheduled release date. If not, I am going to postpone the release date.

Additionally the wiki module isn't finished yet. There is currently an old version available and also within a couple of days a new one. If the new vers ... Read More »

Is this an official Swyx website ?

Most definately: NO ! This is my own private project.

You might know me as a Swyx employee for many many years now, with a number of different responsibilites in the past. It was always and still is my first aim to spread as much knowledge as possible into the "Outside of Swyx" world.

Swyx has it's own policy getting this done, e.g. by reseller trainings, parnter net and a forum available for resellers only, and not forgetting to mention the Swyx Knowledgebase. Swyx as manufacturer has its main target on business and this is done with distributors and resellers. So they spent a huge amount of time, support and other resources to provide the best possible service for this business model.

Unfortunaltey a certain amount of Swyx users is not involved into this model and "knowledge transfer chain".

So, my ide ... Read More »

As a good and friendly and nice host I have finally decided to write my own blog here as well.
Hopefully I'll get lot's of other bloggers gathered together here as well.

You will see from the blog list in the left pane that there are not only individuals writing blogs here (currently just me), but also projects (currently ECR :: Call Queue - Blog). Those last blogs are directly connected to a project on this site and are maintained by the project team leader. They are used to tell the community about the ongoing of a project.

So, lets wait and see how the blogs get flooded by the time :-)