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Not today. But I thought you may want to run past your local comic books store on Saturday, 3 May to see what all the fuss is about.

More than likely, the offer sounds better than it really is. I wouldn’t expect a bunch of #1’s or comics with a first appearance of such-and-such. Probably an attempt by the comics industry to try and extricate itself from the pit it finds itself in: digital publishing and P2P are threats, I guess. See a list of the comics that will be given away here. Wonder above wonder, find a participating outlet near you

There’s something for everyone, I guess. From Jughead to the Transformers and X-Men to Neotopia. As they say in the classics: never look a gift horse in the mouth…

SAP software does not exactly have a great reputation when it comes to user-friendliness. Adding content to the Enterprise Portal is a mission to say the least: fiddle with adding content to the Knowledge Management component, then make it visible or link it in the Portal Content Directory. Finally add appropriate roles for the consumers of the content. It’s all a bit much. The Web Page Composer is a first attempt at making the addition and modification of portal content a lot more seamless and a lot more PC-like. End-users shouldn’t have to bother with the PCD and KM. Why understand technical detail if all you need is to update a few lines of text or add an image?

The Web Page Composer is freely available on the SAP Service Marketplace. It needs to be downloaded and deployed using the JSPM. After installation, the J2EE engine should be restarted. Once installed, users may be assigned various roles – the possibility of providing full publication access or requiring approval is possible. Users wanting to make use of the WPC require the role wpc_editor_role added to their user master. A new tab appears in the navigation ribbon for the WPC.

Of course, the WPC cannot satisfy all content requirements and is probably best used for very simple content: ideally text and images, maybe some links and uploads. For anything else, the KM and PCD has to be used, but I’m certain that SAP is moving towards a full WYSIWYG environment eventually.

Creation of a new site is a prerequisite. At present, it seems somewhat problematic to integrate existing content.

For access to the WYSIWYG magic, we can edit or create a page on that site. Effectively, the WPC provides a bunch of containers into which content may be “dropped”.

The selection of a suitable layout is possible:

Various content types may be created. There are still issues with text length – in my tests, I had to constantly chop paragraphs off the text I had pasted until the editor would accept and save my input. It is fairly easy to add images, though these need to be added to the portal content beforehand. That’s a fairly simple upload task.

Once saved, the content appears once again in the design view.

That’s basically all there is to it – now save and publish and the content appears in the relevant section of the portal.

There are still some issues with the type of content one may wish to edit or create and I’ve yet to find a way of making the WPC read existing content for further manipulation. If your end users require a quick and easy way of updating simple content on the SAP portal, the Web Page Composer may well be the way to go. It’s no FrontPage. Then again, that may be a blessing. But it is certainly a lot easier than having to work in the Portal Content Directory. In the world of SAP, it’s generally accepted that any better way is better! Regardless, this is sure to be the future interface SAP will be pushing out in future releases.

The fact that Linux supports a huge variety of devices out of the box is simply one major reason I suggest Linux as an operating system of choice for a desktop or notebook. Contrary to a Windows operating system, simply plugging a USB device into the system running a fairly modern version of the Linux kernel is generally successful: the device driver is automatically loaded and the device is functional. Webcams and similar devices have been problematic. I have plugged all manner of devices into my Linux systems – always, webcams have been difficult or sometimes impossible to get going.

The issue has been with the drivers and these are not generally part of the kernel. Now, an initiative to ensure these drivers become a standard part of the kernel is underway. In an interview with a German IT news site, a kernel developer has indicated that the USB video device drivers are to be integrated into the standard Linux kernel. For those of you who have already downloaded Hardy Heron, you should already have access to that functionality in the kernel. Fedora 9 is set to include the necessary drivers too.

All round, just another great reason to toss those driver disks and be free of worry when installing new devices!

The E90 is a faithful everyday companion. With the move to G2S, I’ve had to reinstall a number of applications. Among them, a copy of Nokia PC Suite. I’m most impressed with the change since I installed the version delivered on the CD with the device. I’s been awhile…

The interface has seen a much-needed face lift. The phone connected to the software is now displayed in the left pane, with information about it easily accessible. The usual functions are present, so few surprises there. It’s a pleasant improvement overall.

Media handling has been substantially improved with automatic conversion options available.

Most impressive is the integration and notification of firmware updates for the connected device. Even though I’ve checked the Nokia site many times, no new firmware for the E90, or at least my E90, has ever been available. The PC Suite connects to determine available updates. Now, I have an update waiting for my E90…

The current version of the PC Suite is 6.86. If you’ve been negligent in updating, I recommend you download the latest version and install it. You’ll be pleasantly surprised!

Could be a post about life in ZA, but then again, we tend to live through it and entertain ourselves to forget reality. With the latest teaser poster for the new Batman movie for example, due in the country without rules around about 18 July.

Why so serious? Sometimes, fiction is reality…

This is the most fun I’ve had on a PC in a long time! On a recent trip to Cape Town, I spied the E-Sky USB remote control transmitter. The box indicates model E-Sky 0905A, but there is no mention of it on the Shenzhen TWF Hobby site. The box contains the USB controller and a CD with the FMS software on it.

FMS is essentially freeware, so the ZAR 250 bought me the controller. I’m more than happy with that – my aspirations to head off into the clear blue yonder soon to be realized…

On G2S running Vista, I experienced the first issue with FMS: the installation failed, requiring a DLL not present. The DLL’s name is D3DRM.DLL. Other than shuddering at those three letters in the file name, the problem is easily solved. Simply download the DLL after a quick Google. The DLL installed and the controller inserted into the USB port, I’m anticipating my first take off. Unfortunately, the display flickers like crazy and I can’t resolve the issue.

Enter ClearView RC Flight Simulator. Don’t get me wrong: I’ve seen FMS work on an older machine and it’s absolutely stunning. Unfortunately, I can’t use it in its present incarnation on G2S.

ClearView is available as a download and trial version. I was immediately impressed: it works flawlessly on Vista and the E-Sky controller can be used without a problem. I’m certain there are more intricate simulators for this purpose out there, but at present this is more than good enough for me.

ClearView has more features than I could present in such a short time. Suffice to say there are numerous RC plane and helicopter models to choose from, all of which offer different flying characteristics. Photo-realistic landscapes and environments are provided to make outdoor and indoor flying experiences true to life. Within a short time I had paid the fair price of USD 39 to register my trial version.

Having taught myself how to take off and circle, I’m now attempting to bring her in without buying the farm! Though my ultimate guide is to pilot a helicopter, I’ve realized that it’s probably better to start small and stay humble. It’s a lot easier to save face when a simple click of the spacebar can restore a trashed model to its former glory for a retry, instead of waking up at five AM on a Sunday morning, traipsing 20km to the nearest flying field only to crash that pride and joy in the first ten minutes As I said at the outset, this is easily the most fun I’ve had for a long time. If you’re thinking of starting a hobby in RC aviation, this is the best way to get going!

A conflubberation of the Matrix, Transformers and the sense of connection, NeoConnect Prime is how Neotel has decided to brand its first consumer offering. It’s supposed to compete head-on with those of iBurst, Telkom, MTN and Vodacom.

The good news is that the all-inclusive price of ZAR 599 per month will buy the following:

• 2.4 Mbps Internet connection
• 10GB cap on monthly Internet usage bandwidth

As someone forced to use wireless technologies due to location, this is already a good deal better than what I have on iBurst. For about ZAR 100 more, I could have a 10GB cap instead of 3.5GB. The CDMA connection also provides better transfer rates. The service is based on CDMA 2000 technology which is very similar to 3G/HSDPA. It is slower than HSDPA, though.

There is is apparently no activation fee.

The following items are extraneous for my purposes, but nonetheless included in the monthly charge:

• 1000 free on-net voice minutes
• 50 free on-net SMS’s

Unless everyone I know also selects Neotel, it’s unlikely I’ll make any use calls or SMS’s. In any case, I’d be happy to pay a bit more for better and faster connectivity, never mind the added bonus of a higher cap.

The device worries me most of all (the photo is filched from here)

It looks like a phone. That’s the problem. I’m guessing, this thing has little other than a USB connector to connect it to a single workstation. I’m guessing and have little other detail. If that’s the case, there’s no way I’d be able to power the house with the Interweb – I want to connect the source to my hub and not have to rely on a shared system for access to the Internet. I hope Neotel will provide alternative devices to consumers.

There’s some more information regarding the phone device here. My suspicions are confirmed: the device is USB only and, even worse, you can’t surf and call at the same time.

The service should be available sometime in May. I’m keen to wait and see whether there’ll be a change to the proposed monthly charges and whether an Ethernet-cabled device will appear. Of course, the area of coverage might be an important factor too…

The Ubuntu team has announced the availability of the latest Ubuntu release, 8.04 (Hardy Heron). Significant is the provision of long-term support, something that is important to businesses and large organizations. For the technocrats, the new release provides a slew of new features that is sure to make upgrading worthwhile.

At the time of writing, the links to the downloads have not yet been provided.

I was rather surprised that a new version of the GARMAP Africa Series maps for Garmin GPS units is available. I have only recently upgraded to the 1.5 release and assumed that another upgrade would be available only much later this year or only next. I decided to purchase the ZAR 99 DVD containing the updated map set and was hopeful that the upgrade to the Street Maps would not involve a substantial cost.

When I upgraded to 1.5, I also checked for a new Garmin firmware update for my nuvi 300. At that time, the jump in functionality was rather substantial as I had neglected to upgrade the unit for quite some time. Late March saw the release of firmware 5.40 for the nuvi 300 and I decided to download and upgrade as a matter of course.

The upgrade seems not to have changed anything, as is evident from the Garmin change log. Updated display settings. Sadly, Marc’s ability to hack the track on the nuvi 200 is not available on the nuvi 300…

On to the map upgrade. All map sets are provided on the DVD. The GPS needs to be connected and an Internet connection is required. All validation is performed online against the GPS unit intended for the upgrade. It’s a question of clicking Continue every now and then…

The upgrade procedure is well-thought out and works reasonably well. One issue I ran into was that the verification code sent to me during the activation procedure was not accepted by the GARMAP installation program. It kept on complaining that the code was incorrect and case-sensitive. That’s all well and good, except that the code I was provided with consisted only of numbers, with no letters to be seen. I tried to no avail to enter a lower-case 4, but eventually gave up and restarted the installation. This time, an alphanumeric code was provided. All uppercase, but at least this code was accepted.

The best part of the upgrade for me was that the 2008 map sets were provided without charge. Probably because I had purchased the 1.5 version at the beginning of the year, or maybe all 1.5 owners are eligible for a free upgrade. That’s how it should be.

I dumped the entire ZA onto the nuvi and had the GPS on during my travels today. As with the GPS firmware update, my experience is that there is very little new. Of course, I drive through some established areas and, yes, the most notable name changes to streets have been made. Other than that, I can’t see too much different. It would be interesting to hear from those of you who have seen some major additions and changes to the maps in your area.

On the whole, the fact that the upgrade was free and relatively painless is a big plus. It’s great to have the latest information, though I worry that GARMAP may be starting a campaign of frequent updates that may not entirely be necessary or even useful…

Max Planck was born in 1858, invented quantum theory and overall, was deemed to be one of the most influential and important physicists in history.

Except, his real name was probably not Max, but Marx. It seems historians have confirmed this fact, based on entries made in official church documents during the baptism of baby Marx.

Of course, the revelation is not as simple as assuming the new name. The Max Planck Institute has over 78 research and other centres in Germany alone, never mind the use of the name in other countries to denote buildings, streets and conference rooms.

The addition of a simple r may be a rather expensive alteration…

via Spiegel Online