Let’s face it, the summer weathers pretty crappy. (Thanks to El Nino!), so why not make the best of the changable winds and hit the water.

There are plenty of options: Windsurfing, Kitesurfing, or find a Yacht , Boat or Cruising Club to hit the water.

Remember to be safe on the water and put on heaps of sunblock !

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You can now add a IFRAME ZoomIn map to your website for your favourite groups. (See the map of the Silicon Welly group on ZoomIn.)

Enjoy!

Mat, our Summer of Code student has created a Xmas message from the ProjectX team.

Have a happy Xmas and a safe break over the holiday period and we’ll see you online in 2007 !

ProjectX Team

Ten Random links pulled from my blog reading.

• Samsung’s plan for Tera-byte flash memory – What can you do with that…. Terabyte iPod or put our entire database in memory!
• Venice project goes beta – Skype guys next projects kicks into gear.
• Simplicity is highly overrated! – Musings from Don Norman (Usability Guru)
• Joel Sposky’s response to Don Normans article
• Firefox 3 alpha is released
• NZ first mammal fossil found
• Two headed reptile found in China !
• CBS thinking of animated Star Trek. – I want an animated Kirk !
• Ten good unix habits – Good solid unix tips from IBM
• Inside look at ILM’s work on Pirates of the Caribbean 2

Enjoy !

A quick look at our stats shows that our Australian cousins are getting in the Xmas spirit! Top page in Australia is Kenny Drive Christmas Lights Display in Duncraig, Perth.

Top location in ZoomIn NZ is Hutt Boyz Choppers.

<rant>
I just got sent a .docx file.(I had to look up the fact its a word doc xml file from the new word.) I have been trying to open it, as I dont have the new word and I’m don’t know why I would buy it. And to my disgust, I can’t open it. A quick google tells me that I need to rename the file to a .zip and then extract the xml and then sift the files to find something I can look at.

What a ROYAL pain in the ass!

I thought for a moment that surely microsoft would have some proper instructions or a convertor. To my surprise, this is what I found…. Exploring Office open XML content . I do have use this process to extract the documents. It inspires you with confidence when Microsoft tell you to ignore a warning !

I am a big supporter of open standards and XML, but why dont they make it easier for normal people. I am a geek (which means I’ll try and make it work) but I dont have time to muck with extracting files to read a word document !

ARRRGHHHHH!!!
</rant>

UPDATE:

Just used the converter to convert docx to text http
://docx.converter.com to look at the document.

We asked our dozen Summer of code interns about their some of their favourite things…

Food:

Lasagne, pasta, chinese, pizza, chicken biryani and rice, curry, fish&chips, Mexican, homemade rolls, sweet and sour pork, miso soup and sushi.

Drink

Beer, Raspberry and coke, green tea, coke, Gingerbeer, Bundaberg Lemon Lime and Bitters, apple and juicy pear Fresh-up, V and other caffeinated products.

Music:

Incubus, Beyond (Hong Kong), Pink Floyd, Cake, The Killers, Lagwagon, Spoken, Shooting Stars, Muse, The Killers, Alkaline Trio, The Shins, Queens of the Stone Age, The Living End and Green Day.

TV:

Prison Break, Friends, Venture Brothers, the Family Guy, Scrubs, Heroes. House M.D.

Movies

Napolean Dynamite, Jackie Chan’s ‘Who Am I?’ Fiteclub, Pulp Fiction, Lord of the Rings, Star Wars, Forest Gump, a Beautiful Mind, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Trainspotting and American Beauty.

Top 10 Places to be in Wellington

Creative HQ!, the Harbour, the Zoo, Airport, home, the waterfront, bunker overlooking Lyall Bay, top of Wrights hill in Karori in a warm car, the bookshops on Lambton Quay, with their mates and the Botanic Gardens.

Game:

God of War, Kingdom Hearts II, catch phrase, World of Warcraft, Gears of War, Oblivion, Halo2, PC, RL, Zelda Twilight Princess.

Must have gadget:

PSP, multi-touch screens, mp3 player, to be invented, Nintendo Wii

Must have in 2007

PS3, Wireless, ipv6, sound, the ability to fly, teleportation, everlasting gobstoppers, flying cars, Vista, Office 07, various Xbox360 games, further standardisation of 64bit chips, chips with more cores, Playstation 3, iPhone.

Dream Holiday Destination:

New York, Germany, France, Poland, Canada, Nederland, Italy, Europe, Antarctica, Iceland, London, Sydney, tropical beaches, Fiji.

Previous employers:

Electrician, contract web developer, student, redvespa IT support, electronic salesperson, garden centre, tutor at Victoria University, the Warehouse, McDonalds, consulting company.

Could not live without..

Mac Mini’s, head, brain, ipod, laptops and computers, camera’s, internet access, food and drink, bed’s.

This summer they are REALLY looking forward to…

The sun, holidays up North, graduation, exciting plans, next summer, new camera and longboard, having money to trade for goods and services, NYE, surfing, hanging out with mates, biking, Christmas, Parachute 2007!, getting ridiculously sunburnt, working for Creative HQ incubator companies.

If they won Lotto they would…

Save the world (whatever that means!), invest it all and live off the interest, be rich, be surprised, travelling on a luxury yacht, zooming round in a helicopter, travelling and philantrophizing, spend it in 1 day, buy anything and everything.

Right now they would rather be a…

Software developer, doing their job!, spending someone elses money, sleeping, more awake, rich.