Will Knott

I can only assume that the Tayto cheese and onion crisp chocolate bar is a childhood dream come true for someone. In the days when mixing your snacks together (probably with fizzy orange and birthday cake in the mix) was a good idea, you would try it.

It tastes exactly like what you would expect crisps (potato chips for the Americans) and chocolate to taste like. Mouth feel is chocolate and crisped rice (there is rice in the ingredients). The combination does not work.

Part of this is that the childhood version would have been Tayto and +Cadbury UK Dairy Milk. Rumour has it that Butler's chocolate was used. Every chocolate maker has a slightly different taste, this mix was tweaked the wrong way.

Glad I tried it. But no. Until the Smokey Bacon Tayto Crisp and Chocolate Bar that is.

"I still believe in Bewley's"… I think that's the only line you would need to change to do a version of this in any Irish town or city. I still believe in Sir Henry's, I still believe in King John's, I still believe in Eyre Square…

So take a walk through very late night Dublin City, with salty (NSFW) language and a fundamental truth, "there are ten good reasons to go, but a thousand tiny ones not to, and you can't tell which is which anymore."

The icy weather across the country has broken for rain. And I'm playing catch-up with the Loose Bloggers Consortium, again.

The missed topics are "Rains", "Doom and Gloom" and "Music" so the song below comes to mind. "When the Rain Falls" by Eleanor McEvoy.

This song first came to my attention when the "A Woman's Heart" CD came out. This was an all female, all Irish, compilation of songs and the title song sung by Mary Black was written my Eleanor McEvoy. Unsurprising as she is one of Ireland's highly accomplished songwriters (I really hope there is a league table hidden away somewhere for this title). The album released in 1992 spawned a few sequels and spin-offs and a couple of tours. Poke around YouTube and you'll probably catch a few of the tracks.

The song its self is a jazz, well blues, influenced number. "I woke up this morning" isn't how it starts, but its a collection of minor disasters following a break-up. The coffee's run out, the milk has gone off, the heating won't start, have trouble getting on-line, and when she does, the nasty reminder awaits.

And then it rains.

But it sounds so good.

This is a Loose Bloggers Consortium post on “rains”, “doom & gloom” and “music”.
To find out that the others in the consortium think, check out, …
Delirious, Maria/Gaelikaa, Maria SilverFox OCD writer, Padmum, Paul, Ramana, The Old Fossil, Grannymar.

It seems like months ago that a US based TV crew came to film a Coder Dojo session and interview a few of the participants.

Well folks the video is up and it shows sessions in the NCS Cork and the Science Gallery in Dublin.

There are Coder Dojos all around the world now, we really need to see if Coder Dodo Antarctica is possible (I suspect a "R" workshop would be best there).

And yes that is me, looking terrible as usual, in the clip. But its also some amazing minds coding, modding and creating.

CoderDojo.com for details of your nearest Dojo.
Above all, be cool…

Malware is a useful catch all term, but sometimes things are nastier than viruses and auto-deleting thingamajigs.

For example; Ransomware put simply it is a nasty program which put itself on your machine and refuses you access to it unless you pay someone.

There is a version doing the rounds in Ireland purporting to be from An Garda Síochána (The Irish Police force) saying simply pay up since we found naughty files on your computer.
The give-away is that its in both Gaeilge and English, or rather badly translated versions of both. Like it or lump it, but since, legally at least, all Irish laws are written in Gaeilge and translated in to English then the Gaeilge should be correct. In practice however the laws are written in English first, translated in to Irish and sometimes translated back to make sure the meaning hasn't changed.

So its a fake. That and the fact that the Irish Authorities prefer to prosecute after a forensics team have paid a visit to your hard drive (for the moment).

Its also fairly easy to remove this version, there are nastier ones which encrypt on the go (so go and back-up your datas now).

The steps are taken from Jimmy Collins' blog (link below) who I used to work with in a computer security company that I'm not going to mention in case it gets both of us in trouble.

"The infection itself is quite simple to remove. After booting into safe mode and checking the usual places like the Windows folder I came across a suspiciously name folder in ‘C:ProgramData’. It was a randomly named folder with a name like ‘ajklvnksnvsdfvfv’.
Inside, a 158mb HTML page, and all the necessary images, and CSS files etc. There was also an .exe in the root of the ‘C:ProgramData’ folder, the name of which I can’t remember, but it was name similarly to the folder with the HTML file, images etc. (I didn’t have a USB key handy regretfully).
Deleting these files and folders removes the infection, so it doesn’t seem too complex in the methods it employs to evade detection."

Still it would give you quite a shock to be suddenly presented with this. Automatic shutdowns rarely have an appeals process which works in a reasonable time.

Play safe out there…

This is a Loose Bloggers Consortium post on the theme of “Panic”.
To find out that the others in the consortium think, check out, …
Delirious, Maria/Gaelikaa, Maria SilverFox OCD writer, Padmum, Paul, Ramana, The Old Fossil, Grannymar.

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Beware – Ransomware
So this evening I was sitting at home when I get a panicked call from a friend in some distress. When he eventually explained what he was seeing on his computer screen at that moment, I immediately suspected a Ransomeware infection.
Ransomware, for those who have been living on the third moon of Jupiter for the last few years, is a type of malicious software that basically holds your PC for ransom. The user is prompted to pay a fee to ‘free’ thei…

Seán Bán Breathnach is a feature of Radio na Gaelacht and has been broadcasting for decades. But his loosing it and crying when the results at the Women's Boxing at the 2012 London Olympics announcing the gold medal for Katie Taylor is a thing of, well, wow.

I love how he compares her to the famous women of Ireland (Mná na hÉireann). The thing is, for a little while, the whole country went a touch mad from happiness, including people like me who had no idea what was going on.

Still, #Ledgebag was created for people like her.

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Katie Taylor, Olympic Gold in Irish
Katie Taylor, Olympic Gold in Irish (mp3)

View at audioboo.fm

This is a Loose Bloggers Consortium post on the themes of “Olympics” and “Editing”.
To find out that the others in the consortium think, check out, …
Delirious, Maria/Gaelikaa, Maria SilverFox OCD writer, Padmum, Paul, Ramana, The Old Fossil, Grannymar.

I’ve not forgotten about the missed topics, “Earliest memory” requires time and baking, while the “deadlines” post may require state clearance once I’ve coded up the data.

A shot of a Starbucks from inside a Starbucks. In Dublin.

Starbucks recently took over the old Westmoreland Street Bewley's cafe, and put a different restaurant in the old dining hall at the back (no idea about the hotel), however another Starbucks built up in November already exists on Westmoreland Street. And the large College Green shop is around the corner.

Does Ireland drink that much expensive coffee?

How does bottom up intervention work? And how with the likes of Enterprise Ireland?

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After a decade of intervention…
Got this in iMessage just now. Describing frustration with trying to kick off a startup in Northern Ireland.
I’ve met with a few private investors, a couple of angels, a few venture capitalists, lots of public sector funding managers and a few deal brokers. I’ve read a few term sheets – enough to realise when I need help but also, thanks to three friends in particular, read enough to realise when someone is being shafted. We’re a long way from having this fixed. And, if I am honest, after a d…

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Some things just go together. Tomatoes and Salt (causes a chemical reaction which creates a natural version of MSG), fear and economics (think about it, fear makes people want to sell, lack of fear makes people want to buy) and good friends.

But you do get odd couplings. The most unusual couple I can think of is (without naming names and hiding some of the personal details) well… One is a hacker with yearly visits to Chaos Computer Club con and Black-hat, and if the bits I’ve heard are true, really deserves a TV series for the biography. The other, also if the bits I’ve heard are true is also a computer man, however he was based in an interesting technological area, one which includes interesting governmental computer security type folks. I have no idea how they met (I’ll have to wait for the TV series) but I got wind of their wedding plans.

This couple has been together for quite some time, and it turns out that chalk and cheese isn’t an apt description. Rock and Roll would be closer. Some people just click.

The only thing I left out is why they have been together for so long without marrying. The two men had to wait for the laws to change to allow Civil Unions in Ireland.

It’s not quite marriage, but its close. And due to the overall lack of objections, it may become full marriage and adoption rights soon.

The lack of adoption rights has lead to a legal quagmire; adoption as a couple is not possible, and adoption where one parent is the birth mother/father isn’t possible without the birth parent loosing their rights. Should something happen to the legal guardian, the only other parent the children have ever known is, legally, a stranger and can be taken away from them. The fact that there are children reaching voting age who grew up with such a threat hanging over means that the change should be considered sooner than later.

This is a Loose Bloggers Consortium post on the theme of “Marriage”; chosen by Conrad. To find out that the others in the consortium think, check out, Anu, Ashok, Conrad, Delirious, Gaelikaa, Grannymar, Magpie 11, Nema, Noor, Padmini, Paul, Plain Joe, Ramana, Rohit, The Silver Fox Whispers and The Student Diaries.

Saturday July 18 is World Wide Photowalk day. Thousands of images will be taken on the day and uploaded to Flickr with an overall winner chosen by photographer Scott Kelby.

Now I’m uploading to Pix.ie, so I won’t be in the contest part, but I will be wandering the streets of Cork wielding a camera. Its not just Cork, there are photowalks taking place in Cashel, Tipperary, Dublin, Galway, Limerick City and Adare in County Limerick,

Some of these are booked up (the maximum on a photowalk is being limited to 50. (Try herding a group of ADD afflicted photographers dawdling with a camera in one hand and traffic rushing towards them. The 50 limit is probably a touch much). But if your nearest one is full, you can set up your own (New York has at least five at the moment.)

Then again, meeting a bunch of fellow photographers (or messers with cameras) and wandering around with them is a lot of fun. You’ll pick up things. You’ll also discover views of your city or town that you haven’t considered before.

To be seen by the organisers upload your photos and tag them with “skpwalkcork” (or skpwalkdublin or what ever is listed in the instructions for your intended photowalk. The SK stands for Scott Kelby.

Because you never know what you might see on the streets.

Will Knott