2005 Weblog of Marcel Timmer

• 08-12-2005 - Why you should not use XHTML
• 05-12-2005 - Special edition of Radio International
• 27-11-2005 - Photography website of Thomas Sytsma
• 24-11-2005 - Using Google.com to find MP3 files.
• 01-11-2005 - MSI 516BT: a true Bluetooth miracle
• 20-10-2005 - Logitech MediaPlay Cordless Mouse
• 21-09-2005 - The new office computer
• 16-09-2005 - Aaargghh
• 14-09-2005 - A new office computer
• 24-08-2005 - biomedischetechnologie.info
• 23-08-2005 - Finishing another college year
• 22-08-2005 - MSI 516BT MP3 Player
• 21-08-2005 - Radio International
• 20-08-2005 - Holidays are over...
• 16-06-2005 - Aimak
• 15-06-2005 - Do-It-Yourself WiFi Dish
• 14-06-2005 - Configuring WiFi
• 13-06-2005 - Siemens A62
• 08-06-2009 - Waarom Roken Rokers (2)
• 31-05-2005 - WEP-cracking
• 23-05-2005 - Coming closer
• 18-05-2009 - Waarom Roken Rokers
• 18-03-2005 - A new workstation
• 17-03-2005 - WiFi experimenting
• 08-03-2005 - Ending a history
• 01-03-2005 - Serious Do-It-Yourself WiFi dish making
• 16-02-2005 - Coming close

Why you should not use XHTML

10:30 08-12-2005

The last few years I have had numerous discussions with other webdesigners about whether or not I should start to use XHTML as a standard for my websites. I have always said that I can't think of a good reason to give up something that works perfectly: HTML4.01. All that time I had the feeling I couldn't formulate it in a way that was really convincing. Fernando sent me the following link to the website of Spartanicus. Spartanicus gives good reasons why you should and why you should not use XHTML. He examines the claims made about XHTML, and lists the problems that arise from them.

Special edition of Radio International

13:59 05-12-2005

November 30st, Wynn, Sally and JP invited guests to their studio to celebrate Radio International's 7th birthday. Enjoy listening to the special edition of Radio International. Listen to the: first hour and second hour.

Photography website of Thomas Sytsma

15:20 27-11-2005

Because of my busy life I have almost forgotten to tell you about onbe of my recent projects. I have made a website for Thomas Sytsma about his professional photography shop. His website is a practical example of the latest concept (concept 24) I have presented. See the nice effect PNG transparency establishes, at the: photography website of Thomas Sytsma

Using Google.com to find MP3 files.

20:14 24-11-2005

Just a link. I'm not telling you what you could, should or should not do with it.
Use Google.com to find MP3 files by Coldplay

Ofcourse I will present you some nice examples:
Use Google.com to find MP3 files at Groningen University

And ofcourse it is also applicable to find all kinds of other files:
Use Google.com to find financial administration files in Excel format
Use Google.com to find Dutch school exams

MSI 516BT: a true Bluetooth miracle

15:34 01-11-2005

One would expect that providing a certain device with Bluetooth would be with a good reason. In my short review-like-story about the MSI 516BT MP3 Player, of August this year, I already mentioned something about its wonderful capabilities. Last week I decided to give it one more chance to prove itself. The idea was to make a connection from my laptop to the MSI 516BT, by Bluetooth. Goal was to simply control some of its main functions: play and stop.

I enabled the pairing mode of the 516BT and waited for something to appear in the Microsoft Windows application for Bluetooth. Unfortunately here the adventure ended. Every time there seemed to be some kind of communication, the MSI apparently lost control and simple was turned off.

Of course I also searched the internet for a possible hack. But I couldn't find anything. So, the MSI 516BT went back into the drawer waiting for the day someone tells me its use.

Logitech MediaPlay Cordless Mouse

10:15 20-10-2005

Today I bought a new mouse, to be used with my laptop. I found it as a discount offer at computerland.nl. Not only does it look nice, it also works nicely! The contour shape makes the mouse to be held and used like a remote. It has an extended cordless range of up to 3 meters. The backlit media control buttons even make it fun to use in the dark! Also, the comfortable rubber grip provides optimum control in rough terrain. There are back-lit extra buttons such as Play/Pause, Forward/Back, and Volume Up/Down. Its wireless mini receiver elininates clutter and installs instantly. Conclusion: it's great!

The new office computer

7:50 21-09-2005

After thinking that my new computer would enable me to work at least ten times harder, it ended to be a complete disaster. Because my current work consists of producing 3D SolidWorks models only, it was essential that this program would function optimally. As you already might expect, it didn't work at all.

The problem was found to be the SolidWorks dongle. This is a parallel port device that checks if you have a correct license for the program. After some serious debugging by the ICT department and some colleagues, we found out where it was all about. The dongle wasn't communicating correctly. Every change in the configuration of the Intel© 915G motherboard was unsuccessful, and didn't give any possibility to make the dongle working. The advice we got from the guys at Solidworks did help either, so eventually we bought a crappy PCI card to fix the problem. Now it works perfectly.

Maybe you're thinking: "a parallel port... isn't that really old?..." Yes, it is! We also started wondering if the people at Solidworks had found out about the existence of USB. Well, they have. Though, they have put a nasty price tag to it!

Aaargghh

17:42 16-09-2005

It seems that the onboard graphics has to be disabled when using the PCI-Express card. I have been hoping for three monitors for so long! Now my dream has ended. I have to get used to only two monitors.

A new office computer

20:28 14-09-2005

Last week I got the happy news that my computer at the university will be replaced. I'm gonna skip the crap and give you the specs:

• Intel© 915G Express chipset motherboard with Intel© Graphics Media Accelerator 900
• Intel© Pentium© 4 3.4GHz
• 1024MB Kingston Technology ValueRAM
• Maxtor SATA 160GB harddisk
• Asus ATI X600 256MB Videocard

biomedischetechnologie.info

12:31 24-08-2005

The new college year will start next week and therefore I have decided to open up a new domain for my BioMedical Engineering activities. The website concerns my work as a researcher and a student in the BioMedical Engineering field. You can find this new website at: http://www.biomedischetechnologie.info

Finishing another college year

12:31 23-08-2005

I finished my first college year at the University Groningen. I experienced it as an enormous change in all possible ways. Especially the work load is much higher than during the preceding years. After summer I will start with my Masters Program in BioMedical Technology. At that moment I will launch a new website about my biomedical engineering activies, as a researcher and student, accompanied by a new and official .info domain name.

MSI 516BT MP3 Player

12:31 22-08-2005

I found myself a new gadget. The MSI 516BT MP3 player is one of the latest products from the MSI MEGA family. The 516BT is the successor of the 515. The 516BT however has some amusing extra's.

The BT stands for Bluetooth, something the 515 doesn't have. It would have been handy, however, if the Bluetooth would have supported file transfer as well. Now it functions as a mobile phone hands-free only. The 516BT also has a SD/MMC memory card slot. Something that is quite indispensable because the 516BT comes with only 256MB of internal memory. The headphone is connected by 2.5mm plug, which means you can't use any regular headphone. A mini USB connector (USB 1.1) hidden behind a vulnerable rubber flap connects the 516BT for file transfer and charging. Last important feature to name is the far too small OLED display. The icons that are displayed on the OLED are so small you nearly need a magnifying glass. Remaining features are the FM radio, the jog wheel for menu navigation, a key lock button, a hoop for attaching a carry strap, an integrated microphone, the record button, the repeat button and two volume control buttons.

After this enumeration of flaws it should be said that the 516BT does look extremely stylish with the aluminium inlays and the lit front buttons. It's light weight, SD/MMC memory card slot and Bluetooth functionality surely make it a wannehave. Though to my opinion (there is a but as always) MSI could have made a better balance between the price and its "wannehaveability".

Radio International

12:31 21-08-2005

Just before I went on my vacation to France I had some contact with JP and Wynn of VLOK's Radio International. When you take a look at their current website, you can guess where our conversations were about. I will develop a whole new website in a MAMBO environment, though in the past I have always used my own modular Content Management System. I'm hoping to get some inspiration by it, for my upcomming version of my own "Reloaded" Content Management System.

Holidays are over...

12:31 20-08-2005

Already it's been a week since Suzanne and me came back from our trip to France. We had such a great time there and most importantly we finally got a chance to clear our minds again. So after a week of serious house cleaning and starting the usual work I have found some time to post some thoughts again.

Aimak

16:30 16-06-2005

This week, my good friend Fernando Morales opened up the doors to his new domain: http://www.aimak.com. Fernando has been using the name Aimak for the last years and this domain will surely help him to distinguish himself on the world wide web. I had the privilege to create a whole new theme and layout for his website, strictly complying with the web standards XHTML1.0 and CSS2.1. This new theme has not yet been published, because the website will be available in Spanish and English. For that reason a lot of translational work has to be done. With his very busy schedule at ESTEC, this will probable take quite some time.

Do-It-Yourself WiFi Dish

12:54 15-06-2005

On the first of march this year, I posted a small story about me making a WiFi dish. I eventually ended up having a nice 20cm dish, with a gain of at leat 10dB. I received a lot of reactions on that post and thats why I've put some pictures her with some comment.

After analysing Stan's Poor Man's WiFi article, I decided I wanted to build a WiFi dish too. Rather soon I remembered the old camp stuff in our attic. Among all the good-for-nothing stuff I also found a primitive frying pan. I adjusted the shape with a far too big hammer, but the result was surprisingly good. The dish has a diameter of 20cm, with its focalpoint exactly the same as the depth of the dish. Thats rather handy when having to mount a USB antenne in front of it.

The USB WiFi stick is just a standard version. This one did come with a nice pliable module, that made it very easy to mount in front of the dish. At the back of the dish I mounted the handle of a paint roller. I connected it to the dish with a bicycle pump holder. This construction makes the dish easy to handle in a car, and you can put it atop of a broom stick. For the rest I only used a lot of tie-raps and a USB extension cable.

I tested the WiFi dish throughout our house, and it seems to work flawlessly, while before I used to experience some critical loss around the kitchen and toilet. In a final test set-up crossing 7 meters from our bedroom over to our study, the WiFi dish showed an amazing 10dB gain!

I'm sure now you've read this story your absolutely convinced to make a WiFi dish too. Therefor, a few links that will help you make a WiFi dish or complete antenna: IVamp, Stan, Stan again.

Configuring WiFi

13:21 14-06-2005

After desperately trying to hack WiFi networks around my house unsuccessfully for a large period of time, I have asked our neighbour if she wanted to share her DSL connection. "Ofcourse!" she answered. After explaining her the possible troubles she might experience she still didnt see any problems. So there I went again, driving my bike to Funprice. I already bought some magazines to expand my knowledge on WiFi technology. So deciding which WiFi router I should buy wasn't a difficult issue: a nice WAP54G or Wireless-G Access Point at 54Mbps in Wireless-G (802.11g).

When reading the Linksys website the Linksys Wireless-G Access Point should be the most incredible product on the market. In practice it isn't quite that easy, most of the times. But in this case it really is. This great linksys product comes with a CD that contains a very simple installation procedure.

After the basic installation it was important to configure the WEP encryption in a good way. I would have preferred WPA, but one of the workstations only supports WEP. I use a basic 64bit encryption with 4 different keys: one for every workstation in our house. I did this because I experienced some troubles in making multiple connections to the router at the same time, when using the same key on multiple workstations. Besides WEP encryption I also enabled MAC filtering, although I've heard some stories about MAC filtering not being as reliable as I thought it would be.

Siemens A62

15:37 13-06-2005

On Saturday I bought myself a new mobile phone. The last few weeks my old Nokia 3220 showed serious troubles in surviving with only a battery providing current. Because Suzanne is using her Siemens A49 without any troubles for quite some time now, I decided I wanted a Siemens too.

At the Orange shop I found only one prepaid phone: the Siemens A62. That means easy decision making. Back home, Suzanne and I unpacked the phone together. And yes, I found a defect right away. The navigation button had a very awful sound when you released the button. Undoubtfull I had to go back to the store. Though I also had to learn for my exams. Ofcourse I stayed home that afternoon to study, but today I went back to the shop.

At the shop, the same guy that soled me the phone on Saturday helped me out. While riding my bike to the Orange shop, I doubted whether they would give me a new one right away. They couldn't post it for repair, leaving me empty handed... could they? No they didn't. The guy completely agreed and gave me opportunity to check every A62 in their store, whether or not they all had the same bug. Actually, a lot showed the same bug, but luckily not all of them.

You can find my new treasure over here, at: Siemens.com

Waarom Roken Rokers (2)

14:11 08-06-2005

Het onderzoek van Suzanne staat vandaag in de krant! De Groninger Gezinsbode heeft een kleine oproep geplaatst met als titel: "Waarom rokers roken".

Wil je deelnemen aan het onderzoek? Bel dan snel met het vermelde telefoonnummer en maak kans op 1 van de 20 waardebonnen van 20euro!

WEP-cracking

11:04 31-05-2005

This weak an article at tomsnetworking.com came to my attention. A team of FBI agents demonstrated current WEP-cracking techniques and broke a 128 bit WEP key in about three minutes! While thinking of all the access points I could hack using their techniques, it suddenly came to my mind that this step would nullify all the charm of secretly consuming bandwidth by means of my DIY WiFi dish. Also it has made me think of the risk I am taking in using WiFi as a internet gateway. My 56k6 modem suddenly seems to provide superior protection.

Coming closer

20:12 23-05-2005

As a short comment on my post of february 16th I'm announcing the first stable steps of my own server. I have chosen to forget about configuring Apache and PHP myself. Instead I have installed XAMPP. XAMPP is a project by the guys at ApacheFriends.org. The pizza website is practically completed. In addition I have added a nice favorits and email service. Some people are testing the scripts now, ensuring me the script is bug free.

Waarom Roken Rokers

15:32 18-05-2005

Het onderzoek van Suzanne staat vandaag in de krant! De Groninger Gezinsbode heeft een kleine oproep geplaatst met als titel: "Waarom rokers roken". Wil je deelnemen aan het onderzoek? Bel dan snel met het vermelde telefoonnummer en maak kans op 1 van de 20 waardebonnen van 20euro!

A new workstation

18:32 18-03-2005

Today I finished an extensive bargain hunt, in an attempt to build a computer for a price as low as possible. Ofcourse all of this had to be done without doing any concessions with respect to performance and appearance. As said, today I baught the final part, namely a very nice Aopen housing. Under the hood is a AMD Sempron 2200+, running at 1500Mhz. An extemely cool Kingston memory module (512MB, 400Mhz) was found for an extremely nice price. But top of the bargain success is the ASUS A7V8X-X motherboard, from Funprice for only €15. Eventually this whole new computer costed me only €115! Because of unknown reasons my sister's Jetway motherboard crashed at the same day. Fortunattely for her the ASUS A7V8X-X is compatible with her Athlon XP 1000. Atleast, it should be. I had to replace the "faulty" 1012 version of the BIOS for a 1013 version. Now also her machine runs like never before.

This shows that it does pay off to just sit back and wait for the discount offers to come. At least if you have the time and patience to do so. Funprice seems to have made it a habit to have a special discount corner for motherboards. These motherboards even have three months guarantee. So if your also looking for a new system, this should be the time.

WiFi experimenting

16:45 17-03-2005

Last week my father surprised me with something he arranged with one of his "special contacts". He found a large dish for my WiFi experimenting. The dish is oval shaped, with the smallest diameter somewhere at 90 centimers, while the largest diameter reaches up to 120 centimeters! I hope to mount it somewhere on the inside of the roof construction of our house, where it will be protected from rain and environmental influences, while still giving good results due to the thin roof materials.

Ending a history

9:34 8-03-2005

On a rainy november afternoon in 2002 I baught a Compaq Presario 901EA at the Dynabyte shop in Leeuwarden. At that moment a very up-to-date laptop, with a mobile Athlon 1400, a 15" screen and a CD-RW/DVD Combo. It seemed to be a trustworthy laptop. However, I have had nothing else but trouble with it. The screen and keyboard had to be replaced, the CD-RW/DVD Combo had to be replaced twice. The last defect concerned a defect on the motherboard. With a total 10 months of repair time versus 24 months of guarantee I asked the shop for an alternative laptop. After a lot of writing and calling, they allowed me to pick a new laptop for the original purchase price. So I visited their shop again. I ended up leaving the shop with not only a whole new flashy Acer 1681WLMI Laptop, but also a nice 17" TFT screen.

Serious Do-It-Yourself WiFi dish making

8:36 1-03-2005

Most DSL providers in the Netherlands still have monthly subscription rates that are beyond my budget. Inspired by some websites on WiFi war driving, I searched for some materials to start some serious do-it-yourself WiFi dish making. I ended up having a nice 20cm dish, having its focalpoint exactly the same as the depth of the dish.

Coming close

19:29 16-02-2005

While my recently installed Apache/PHP server is running its first practice laps, my scripts are close to completion. Yes folks, I'm talking about the pizza website again. The database and admin interface are nearly finished as well as the user interface. The time has come to contact commercial partners and to really get this party started. I would already like to thank everyone for contributing to this project. It's a constant encouragement in making this project a big success.