July 2009 - skunkworks - Skunkworks Site

Afya Project Deliberations etc
by Phares Kariuki 06 Jul '09

06 Jul '09

Hi, Meeting has been held at Prestige Plaza, So far the development platform has been selected. What is needed are the following A project manager; Good communication skills needed. (Two names were proposed) Two software developers (Given that the work will be on a part time basis it has been suggested that more software developers are needed. Bias PHP) UI Designer - One. I have the skills database that people were kind enough to fill out. Anyone else interested kindly shoot kiti.chigiri(a)gmail.com Next meeting is at Coco Lifestyle Lounge, behind Nakumatt Lifestyle, downstairs. Apparently free WIFI is offered at this establishment. Thanks. -- With Regards, Phares Kariuki | T: +254 734 810 802 | E: pkariuki(a)gmail.com | Twitter: kaboro | Skype: kariukiphares |

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Re: [Skunkworks] SETTING UP A MAILING LIST
by SAMUEL EYINDA M. 05 Jul '09

05 Jul '09

Thank you Tony, That was very helpful. I'm already up and running. http://edsamich.blogspot.com --- On Sun, 7/5/09, Tony Likhanga <tlikhanga(a)gmail.com> wrote: From: Tony Likhanga <tlikhanga(a)gmail.com> Subject: Re: [Skunkworks] SETTING UP A MAILING LIST To: "Skunkworks forum" <skunkworks(a)lists.my.co.ke> Date: Sunday, July 5, 2009, 8:35 AM Hi Sam,For the simplest mailing list (presumably for communication only) you may be interested in setting up a *group.Common examples are googlegroups and yahoogroups :) Check this: http://www.ehow.com/how_4505623_set-up-google-group.html -----Inline Attachment Follows----- _______________________________________________ Skunkworks mailing list Skunkworks(a)lists.my.co.ke http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/skunkworks Other services @ http://my.co.ke Other lists ------------- Skunkworks announce: http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/skunkworks-announce Science - http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/science kazi - http://lists.my.co.ke/cgi-bin/mailman/admin/kazi/general

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SETTING UP A MAILING LIST
by SAMUEL EYINDA M. 05 Jul '09

05 Jul '09

Hallo skunks, I wish to set up a mailing list just like the skunk works one for the purpose of communication between members of the ROBOCON team U.O.N. Any ideas how i can go about this? Regards, Samuel Eyinda http://edsamich.blogspot.com

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Obama’s New Media Strategies for Ghana
by Gakuru Alex 05 Jul '09

05 Jul '09

What Kenyan bloggers will miss http://whiteafrican.com/2009/07/02/obamas-new-media-strategies-for-ghana/ Daudi?

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Proposals to force new "non-disclaimable" warranties on software licensors
by Joseph Wayodi 04 Jul '09

04 Jul '09

Hi people, Check out these articles: < http://www.freelock.com/blog/john-locke/1/software-be-bug-free-guaranteed>; < http://arstechnica.com/open-source/news/2009/05/microsoft-linux-foundation-…>; and <http://lawandlifesiliconvalley.com/blog/?p=240>; which talk about proposals by the American Law Institute (in their "Principles of the Law of Software Contracts" project) to, in essence, force new "non-disclaimable" warranties on software licensors (and arguably, also on contributors). The warranties would, in addition to making software licensors (and developers?) liable for infringing on patents and copyrights, also make them liable for material defects in the software. Is this a tsunami in the offing? Joseph. NB: The Principles of the Law of Software Contracts project "presents legal principles to guide courts in deciding disputes involving transactions in software and to guide those drafting software contracts": < http://www.ali.org/index.cfm?fuseaction=projects.proj_ip&projectid=9>.

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On swine flu screening - A rant
by Lmwangi 04 Jul '09

04 Jul '09

Hi, On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 12:58 PM, Phares Kariuki<pkariuki(a)gmail.com> wrote: > fibre, which GoK had to be kicked from the back and pulled from the front to > implement, what else is going on? Not much.... As an aside, you should see the half comical, half hysterical and not useful at all way of screening for swine flu at JKIA. When you get to customs, you bump into a bunch of people milling about, filling forms on the floor, or using the walls as a writing surface. These poor souls are squinting at forms photocopied to death and illegibility (I presume there's a toner scarcity). So you being a good person, you get your form from a health official who's shouting, has a mask covering her mouth but her nose is exposed and is doing everything in her power to be frightful. In calculus-speak as her audio output increases, the more convinced you are that she's a banshee. Anyway, you look for your spot in the milling crowd to sit, practice the arcane arts of esotropia/strabismus and finally fill the form. The questions are - Name - DOB - Physical address - Postal address - Phone - Are you suffering from fever(NO),coughing(HELL NO), joint paints (The cabin was cramped)... etc Of course am not going to say Yes to any of the above. I mean, agreeing to any of these might cause a stampede and I definitely do not want blood on my hands. So off you go to customs, get your passport stamped and give the passport ctrl officer the form whereupon the kindly lady tells you that you were supposed to give the form to the health officials back there. (Oh! So I could have just walked out... How silly of me for being a conformist). Anyway, Amble back to the HO, give the guy a form he doesn't look at, he rips my (?counterfoil?) part of it using his hands and gives it to me. I walk out free... That's the swine flu screening going on. If it was up to me? I'd - Get 20-30 digital thermometers, - Have 6 HO's stand 3 layers deep - As you get your passport stamped, get a temp reading - 2 reserves sterilize the used thermometers. - If you have a fever, go to a quarantine section for further tests FAIL! : http://www.get.co.ke/files/get/43

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Removing Viruses on flash
by Mr. Lawi 04 Jul '09

04 Jul '09

Hi Guys, I thought I should post something about removing viruses: Step 1: Run the virus scan on the flash drive. If you dont have an av or feel that it missed something, proceed to step 2 Step 2: The rest There is this virus family that hides all folders in a flash and creates new files with the original folder name and appending a .exe. So if you had a folder called Docs, u will see Docs.exe. If you have not enabled display of file extensions, the .exe part will not be seen. So all you will see is Docs. You double click it thinking its your folder, and that executes the virus. This is what I do: I DO NOT double click on a flash drive directly in My Computer - (actually that's what I do not do) After ascertaining the drive letter (lets say its G:), go to Start -> Run -> cmd C:\Documents and Settings\etc>G: Move to the root of the flash G:\> Type dir /a This shows all the folders (like ls -a in Linux) including hidden ones If you do see autorun.inf you can check what file it activates by typing G:\>more autorun.if (There is more in windows, yey! No less, though :)) >From the output you can see the file/virus being called by the autorun.inf. Autorun.inf gets executed when u double click on the drive letter on my computer. Remove the autorun.inf G:\>attrib -h -r -s autorun.inf This removes s(ystem), r(ead only) and h(idden) attributes. On Linux/cygwin, u can do chmod 777 autorun.inf G:\>del autorun.inf Removing the 'fake' .exe folders dir *.exe - This will list all .exes You can delete all of them by using del *.exe. However, deleting one by one is recommended since you might have a valid .exe file on your flash - like firefox_3.05.exe G:\>del Docs.exe Access Denied If u get the Access Denied error, its most probably of file attributes - sometimes the virus sets them as system files or read only This command resets all the attributes G:\>attrib -h -r -s Docs.exe del Docs.exe should now work Do the same for all .exes Again, if using cygwin (or if removing from linux), chmod 777, then rm -i *.exe should do. Next Step: Displaying hidden folders The folders in the flash were set to attrib s by the virus hence making them hidden from normal view. To see them, do a dir /a. A better way is to a dir /a:s This will show all files with attribute s(ystem) Again, do a reset of attributes for all folders: G:\>attrib -s -h -r <foldername> Guys running cygwin can do this using the chmod 777 -R <foldername> Summary: G:\>dir /a G:\>more autorun.if G:\>attrib -h -r -s autorun.inf G:\>del autorun.inf G:\>attrib -h -r -s <filename>.exe G:\>del <filename>.exe G:\>dir /a:s G:\>attrib -s -h -r <foldername> There are other stuff to consider like SYSTEM, RECYCLER, RECYCLED,etc folders: Going into these will make an already long mail too long. Feel free to explore there and search and delete virus files. Do not delete the RECYCLER folder Disclaimer: The set of instructions mostly work for flash disks. They might work on hdds as well but if a virus is already on a hdd then most probably there is a service/daemon/dll that is running in memory regenerating the virus files. Thats what anti-viruses are for. But they can be removed - manually. It covers only a very small sub-set of viruses/trojans/worms - they mean the same to me:( so an antivirus is still the better option.

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Meeting Announcement; Afya Project
by Phares Kariuki 04 Jul '09

04 Jul '09

Hi, Guys interested in the project can meetup at Prestige Plaza tomorrow from 2? You can call me when you get there, contacts as below. Thanks. -- With Regards, Phares Kariuki | T: +254 734 810 802 | E: pkariuki(a)gmail.com | Twitter: kaboro | Skype: kariukiphares |

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Google Trends (July-2-2009) - VB - PHP - C#
by Murigi Muraya 03 Jul '09

03 Jul '09

To my shock Kenya is no.1 for search term queries on 'vb programming' on Google Trends as of today (July-2-2009) http://www.google.com/trends?q=vb+programming&ctab=0&geo=all&date=all&sort=0 After organizing the 1st Microsoft Official Curriculum (MOC) C# training in Kenya over 5 years ago this is very distressing to me. It clearly did not catch on. Thought Kenya deserved a better programming reputation but it seems we have more work to do so ... India tops with most search queries for most programming languages (including the term 'VB.Net'). Interestingly, Pakistan tops 'c++ programming' beating even India. South Africa (RSA) is no.7 (Iran is 6th and Egypt is 9th) for 'c++ programming' queries. Could be their geeks write device drivers for (weaponry?) electronics manufactured in their nations. India tops queries for 'c programming' - RSA is no.8 on this one. Indonesia tops 'PHP'. India comes 2nd here. Czech Republic tops Python. USA tops Ruby. The most interesting thing about the query tem 'C#' is that small but Innovative Israel is no.2 as far as interest in (querying) 'C#' goes. China did not show (top 10) interest in the terms: 'Java', 'VB.Net', 'Php', 'Python' or Ruby. Could be something to do with their language(s) - alphabet. China did however show interest in C# and 'J2EE'. On Queries for 'C# Programming' Pakistan tops, India - 2nd, Iran - 3rd, RSA - 4th, Singapore - 5th, Egypt - 8th. _________________________ Wonder who in the world will take us more seriously because of our VB and PHP (JOOMLA) projects?

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Interview skills from the slopes - have a laugh :-)
by Mbugua Njihia 03 Jul '09

03 Jul '09

Bill Gates organized an enormous session to recruit a new Chairman for Microsoft Europe. 5000 candidates assembled in a large room. One candidate was Njoroge a Kenyan living in USA . . Bill Gates thanked all the candidates for coming and asking those who do not know JAVA programming to leave, 2000 people left. Njoroge said to himself, "I do not know JAVA, but I have nothing to lose if I stay. I'll give it a try'". . Bill Gates asked the candidates who never had experience of managing more than 100 people to leave, 2000 people left and Njoroge said to himself "I never managed anybody by myself, but I have nothing to lose if I stay. What can happen to me?" So he stayed behind again. . Then Bill Gates asked candidates who didn't have a minimum of a Masters in Business Management to leave. 500 people left the room. Njoroge said to himself, "I left school at 15, grade 7, but what have I got to lose?" So, he stayed in the room. . Lastly, Bill Gates asked the candidates who do not speak Serb-Croat to leave. 498 people left the room. Njoroge says to himself, "I do not speak one word of Serb-Croat but what do I have to lose?" So he stayed and finds himself with one other candidate. . EVERYONE ELSE HAS GONE. . Bill Gates joined them and said, "Apparently you are the only two candidates who have all the required qualifications & experience I am looking for and speak Serb-Croat, so I'd now like to hear you have a conversation together in that language. And........" . Calmly, Njoroge turned to the other candidate and in a horse voice said "We mwega mundu wa nyumba?" The other candidate answered softly but clearly saying "Gutiri na oru, no gwethera ciana mutu. . . !!" symbiotic_logo Mbugua Njihia - CEO SYMBIOTIC MEDIA CONSORTIUM | Design:Develop:Deploy [a] Muringa Court - Suite B2:Kilimani- Junction of Kirichwa and Muringa Road [t] +254 20 359 6305 [c] +254 721 668 709 [e] mbugua(a)symbiotic.co.ke [w] www.symbiotic.co.ke [b] http://blog.symbiotic.co.ke/blog/ This message may contain information, which is confidential, private or privileged in nature. If you are not the intended recipient of the message, you are notified that any distribution, use or copying of this message is prohibited. If you have received this message in error, please notify the sender immediately

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