Best thing is that the bloody annoying “Recommendations” fly out menu on docs.sun.com has died with the migration \o/

I did watch most of the Oracle presentations yesterday, as well as following Apples iPad launch. Both left me a bit “bleh”.

The iPad is shiny, and I’m sure once I’ve had a play with one I’ll decide I need one. But, it’s not quite there IMO. $500 is tempting price but why so much extra for 3G? Also, I already have a data contract on my iPhone – why can’t I use that? Bluetooth the ipad to my phone, share the data and I’ll be really tempted (I’d be willing to pay a bit extra a month to cover extra data usage). Anyway, time will tell if Apple have again managed to come up with something market changing – I’m not convinced (yet ).

Oracle and Sun was also a bit of a non event for the bits I’m really interested in. Talk of the T processors was good – they aren’t being scrapped then. Very little talk however of the sort of servers we might buy – T5220 type boxes. Will they still be developed? Will the new coolthread CPUs be affordable to us? Nothing much was said.

The suggestion that support will be simplified is also rather worrying. While Sun support can be a pain in the arse with all the options (they are currently trying to work out if we are supported for DSEE7 under JES for example), it has been affordable to us at the lower levels (generally, Silver support). If Oracle really want to simplify it to one, easy to understand level it’s going to be gold equiv at least. Can’t see it not going up massively – probably to a point where we just can’t justify it

The other big worry is how Oracle will merge the two middleware stacks. Glassfish is going to stick around, but some of the other components it was less clear. Given we are about to deploy DSEE and OpenSSO Enterprise I was hoping for some more reassurance that they weren’t going to be scrapped. DSEE will stick around I’m sure – but OpenSSO? Less clear…and even if it does, will we be able to afford to renew the contract in 18 months time?…

Glad to hear that the rumours of massive cuts to Sun staff (well, the ones who are still left working there!) didn’t prove to be true. Quite the opposite it seems – Oracle are employing more. This is a good thing(tm) IMO.

Still, the next few months could be interesting to see how it all pans out.

Using the slightly non-conventional method of making a puller out of a bloody great seft tapping coach bolt, a big stack of repair washers and an old socket and it actually came out reasonably easily. New one fitted and so far my speedo has behaved and the ECU has stopped messing around…time will tell for sure but it’s looking promising so far.

Could have been a lot worse – I dread to think what it would have cost had it have needed the gearbox out etc. As it was, it only ended up costing £250 quid for a service with all filters changed this time, new brake shoes, the sensor and all the pissing around. Bargain \o/

Still, given I got home earlier than I thought I finally got around to sorting out the new light fitting that mich picked for the dining room. Crappy shitty thing. “twist the five cables together and insert into the terminal block”. Yeah, right. 5 cables into a chocblock while hanging from the ceiling. No way was that going to work – couldn’t even get all of them in safely when it was on the table. Ended up ripping all the crap out of it and refitting it totally. Grrrrr.. Why are these jobs never as easy as they should be

boiler seems to have finally expired overnight. Arse Arse Arse.

Symptoms do seem to suggest thermocouple (or gas value – *gulp*) but looking at it it appears that I need to remove the entire gas front (that we never use and hate the look of!) to get at the workings of the back boiler. I’m not too keen to do this but if needs must maybe I’ll have a go….hmmmm

Waiting for father-in-laws plumber mate to ring us – hopefully he will feel sorry for us

Of course, sods law is that Beccas cough turned worse yesterday and she is now on antibiotics for a chest infection – great timing!

ARRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH.

Great. Maybe we ought to just ban mains electricity completely and live off AA batteries.

Inside the kitchen the pipework is new and relatively sane (I put it all in when I fitted the kitchen 6 years ago). however, this exits through a pipe fitted by the previous house owner (a builder and “property refurbishment specialist” – say no more) . This pipe goes out through the wall straight into a 90degree solvent weld corner that is cemented into the wall and then disappears into the solid concrete base for the conservatory – this is 3 ft thick with the pipe embedded in it. To make things worse, this 90 degree corner is right up between the conservatory and the neighbours wall making it impossible to get at unless you are 3 inches wide and have arms 10ft long. I don’t really fit either of those requirements.

The gurgling was simple to fix. A anti vac valve fitted after the trap under the sink cured that. The piss poor flow rate that causes the washing machine to flood if it pumps out at the same time as the dishwasher was not quite so easy.

After dismantling all that I could get to and washing it well (remembering *not* to wash it in the sink that now had no drain ) left me with the problem of clearing out god knows how many years of congeled grease and kitchen crap somehow. Several gallons of caustic soda hadn’t made a lot of difference. Mr Muscle Active Foamer has foamed ok but appeared to have lost it’s muscle. chemical warefare had failed – I needed something more lowtech.

Luckily, Wickes had just the tool. What can best be described as 10 quids worth of uncontrollable stainless steel springy thing with a crank handle and a corkscrew on the end. Half an hour spent ramming this down the drain and attempting to get it to go around all the corners without jamming and I have managed to insert nearly 4 metres of it into the drain. Flushing with a hose suggested it was now a lot clearer than it had ever been. I did then however have the slight problem of how to remove a 4m length of spring covered in vile smelling greasy crap without covering the kitchen and myself in it.

I half succeeded in that I did manage to remove it

Still, drain now gurgle free and getting the washing machine and dishwasher to pump out at the same time as running the tap full bore still didn’t cause a problem. Wooooo.

Springy shitty smelly thing of death now coiled in a bucket full of bleach in the garden. Despite washing my hands several times in all sorts of cleaning gunge they still smell foul but I guess that will pass

Seeing two large delivery blokes struggling to carry the mattress up the stairs reminded me of just how crap our old bed was (originally bought for the spare room). They could hardly carry the new one (jeeeez is it heavy!) whereas earlier in the day I have folded the old mattress in half, carryed it down the stairs on my own and chucked it in the back of the car. Don’t think I’ll be doing the same when this one finally wants disposing off (although given it’s price I expect it to outlive me).

Shame we haven’t got any carpet in the room – but given we are still pondering a loft conversion that may well involve moving walls around a bit it doesn’t seem worth spending cash on a carpet for a few months. Anyway, the floorboards add “character”

Talking of which, if anyone knows an architect (pref local to Folkestone) who might be interested in designing and project managing a loft conversion for us then let me know!

Spectacular.

An extension might be an option but given that we already have a large conservatory we would end up loosing that to make space for the extension – seems a bit pointless. The final option that we are pondering is a loft conversion. This seems to be the best option at the moment but I’m a bit lost as to where to start. To get some ideas for the last few months we have been watching DIY programmes. There seems to be endless DIY progs around at the moment but none that actually help us it seems.

We have Location Location which is great if we were first time buyers – we aren’t. Relocation Relocation would work if we wanted to move and we had budget for a couple of london flats. Property Ladder is for idiots with too much money who want to buy up places and then attempt to do them up with unrealistic budgets only to sell them to make even more money whereas Grand Designs is an interesting programme but seems to require you to have huge budgets, a need for a hugely complex and OTT heating/stereo system and no house.

If we wanted to move to Spain then there are several programs showing me how to buy a place in the sun and while DIY SOS is vaguely entertaining it doesn’t really tell you how to go about actually doing anything (why is there always one family with a child with a desease on it each week? They *always* win unsurprisingly). This Old House would be great if I wanted to totally gut an american house but most of what they show is completly irrelevant to the UK. What I really want is a programme that shows a family in the UK (say folkestone) where people who are generally happy with their house but want a little more space (maybe a loft conversion for example). It should show how to go about this – do you get an architect? A builder? Straight for the structual engineer? One of those “loft conversion companies” who I’m sure just sell you an off the shelf conversion. It should cover all the pitfalls and explain what permission is needed and who to talk to to get it (do I want building control or planning? If I want a dormer then you need planning. Maybe.) I’m sure if the TV company were to subsidise the project a bit to keep things running along I think this could be a ratings winner. Still, if they want a family to take place I think I know of one who would be interested.

You read it here first. I await the call from Channel4/BBC/Home and Leasure. If they throw in Sarah Beeny as a presenter then all the better…

I might actually get to start the painting today although given that my sister was due to drop her sprog last sunday I’m half expecting a phonecall…

Maybe the end is in sight? Its taken about 3 years (god, people redevelop whole housing estates quicker ) but we finally making progress. Right, back to sanding the woodwork I go