Technology

This site has now been converted to Drupal as the primary content engine. Thanks to the very useful wp2drupal module and some examples like the recent conversion of darcynorman.net. We've taken the plunge here. More on drupal later. There was a major issue with the version of PHP required to handle the conversion. Not wanting to risk more changes to the code running on the server - Parallels Desktop to the rescue. Created a copy of the server in a virtualized environment did all the upgrades and changes, then exported the new database back to the production box.

Parallels Desktop for the Mac was offically release today after a few months of public beta. Running operating systems like Windows XP, Suse and Ubuntu. The release version implements the hardware-based virtualization that is part of the Intel Core Duo chips. This feature was not enabled in the beta. Attempts to run the Vista Beta 2 were unsucessful leading to and ACPI error when booting from the install DVD. Application testing with Office, Quicken, and Simply Accounting has been very sucessful. Simply Accounting was an application that stubornly refused to work in other emulators.

Following in the steps of Steve Dembo of teach42.com I also dropped PCs out of my office in favor of a Windows on Mac solution. A $1000 Mac Mini replaced a PC, DVD player, and home media server. Using the Parallels Desktop  solution and a copy of XP Pro all the software that was previously on the Athlon 3500+ is now on a virutal environment on a Mac. Noteable differences from previous emulation (VPC7), Speed! and getting Simply Accounting working.

David Weinberger is adding to the conversation on Network Neutrality. With an added dig at TELUS for their blocking of a union site during their 2005 'labour disruption'. There are 3 areas of network neutrality at risk from recent actions

• Peering - the agreement that multiple providers agree to carry each others traffic. This is the issue where consumer ISPs (Cable/Telco) are wanting to charge a premium for their users to recieve content from providers on other networks such as Google and Yahoo

The Boot Camp program will offer a safety net for consumers running Windows XP on Intel-based Macs. But dual boot is not the experience most users want. A hypervisor-based Windows offering would be more useful. Apple Offering Lets Users Choose Their Operating System Specifically Gartner states: "Small businesses, consumers and freelance contractors may find it useful to run their Windows applications on the Mac at work while also running the Mac OS for personal use."

This has been my growing opinion anyway, nice to see Gartner is sounding off on this one. Policies Must Enable Workers to Use Own PCs Anarchy is at the gates of enterprise IT departments as employees use their own PCs for work. Enterprises wonder how they can allow access by PCs they do not own; the answer is that they may not have a choice. However, manageability and security depend on control of PC configurations and use.

TechCrunch » Google Calendar is Live Techcrunch reports on the new Google Calendar. My question, does the word Beta really mean anything anymore?

Upgrading a NAS box with some more storage was an oppourtunity to benchmark some transfer preformance. The NAS solution was an Athlon 2100 with a Gigabit (Dlink) NIC and Server Element's NASLite+ solution. The software supports NFS, SMB, and ftp for read/write access. The differences between the services is striking. Clients were a Powerbook (1.33) for NFS, SMB, and ftp, and a Ath64 3500+ for SMB and ftp. Max observed speeds were NFS - 3MBps, pretty consistent whether a single or multiple transfers at once SMB - 4.5MBps (peak), varies with the block writes, a noticible sawtooth pattern in the bandwidth usage

It's been interesting to follow the Windows on Mac talk on all the boards and blogs. Even the quote by John C Dvorak on Apple moving to Windows as an OS. But I really wasn't ready for this: Apple - Boot Camp More and more people are buying and loving Macs. To make this choice simply irresistible, Apple will include technology in the next major release of Mac OS X, Leopard, that lets you install and run the Windows XP operating system on your Mac. Called Boot Camp (for now), you can download a public

The CRTC (Canadian equivalent of the FCC) is meeting to review May 15th to review broadcast radio policy including - "What is the likely impact of other audio technologies, such as satellite radio, Internet radio, podcasting, file sharing and down-loading, on commercial radio and the music industry?" read more | digg story