kikuism – Page 16 – Kikuyumoja

S.M.A.R.T. status: BAD

attention: NERD CONTENT! :-)

Imagine a hard disk being a piece of land that belongs to a farmer. He has divided it into different partitions called C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L (~partitioning) and wants to use each of those partitions to grow healthy stuff. Before he can grow anything, he needs to plough the whole plot (~formatting) and then one day he decides to use partition C as the site for his new house (~place of the operating system, i.e. WinXP).

The farmer grows lots of healthy fruits and good vegetable and even installs a big wall surrounding his house (~firewall) and to prevent it from thugs (~virii) entering his home and stealing his two vehicles, a colour tv set and other goods worth hours of hard work.

Then just one day, the impossible happens and the land upon which his house was built, descents into the ground because, as further studies later on revealed, there used to be a lake right under the house which was filled up with soil and so the heavy weight of the house caused everything to sink into the soil… This tragedy left the poor farmer with a huge shamba that he couldn’t care for because his tractor was sunk as well. The remainings of his house were declared unfit for further use and he had to use all his savings to buy another tractor in order to harvest the fruits of his remaining land…

There’s this 160 GB Samsung SP1614N (7200rpm/8 MB cache) hard disk drive (HDD) I bought in April 2005. Yesterday evening I tried to switch on my computer and all it did was telling me that a certain Mr. Samsung had gone on a longer vacation. I tried to persuade, I begged this harddisk to come back to work but all it gave me was an absent note, saying: "ntoskrnl.exe" not found. Yeah. No problem, just pull out WinXP CD, recovery mode, type in >>expand X:/i386/ntoskrnl.ex_ C:<< et voilà…. Et nothing! That damn config directory wasn’t even available! Huuu….. hakuna matata, then I will have to reformat everything. Takes time. Takes even more time. Stops at 32%. Ah. Maybe a bad sector. I have to run SPIN RITE 6.0 on it then. SpinRite ran the whole night and when I woke up again, it still showed the same screen where I had left it when I went to bed. Uhhhh. 32%….34%. Ah. MAYBE I can still try to reformat it and hopefully NTFS (Microsoft’s preferred file system) will exclude any bad sectors. And yes, it actually formatted the drive this time, though it took about 2 hours. I then reinstalled WinXP on it and once the computer started again, the hilarious S.M.A.R.T. function (Self-Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology) eventually realized that something could be wrong with this hdd. Yeah, as if I didn’t know…"S.M.A.R.T. status: Bad – backup and restore. Doooooooooooooooooh!

So I "just" bought a new HDD and recovered the data from all the other – functioning – partitions. Fortunately, no important data was lost (backups, folks, backups!). However, it still bugs me a lot that a new HDD just fails to work right after 7 months in use… Those folks over at Samsung are in for a goooooooooood explanation!

P.S.: I think one day, productivity will be measured by the time span it takes to get a system up & running again.

Shikwati et al

James S. Shikwati‘s interview on Der Spiegel in July this year actually stirred up some debates over here – maybe also due to that nice but useless Live8 event that took place during that time.
Just two days ago, I came accross this interesting paper Shikwati presented in November 2003 on a workshop called "Campaigning for Free Trade", organised by the Liberal Institute of the Friedrich Nauman Foundation. In this paper, Shikwati gives a summarized overview on what Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) are (Patent, Trademark, Copyright, etc.) and what kind of effect they have on Development in Africa (of course, from his point of view – as liberal as it is). He concludes that "Africa must urgently seize this opportunity of protecting intellectual property (…) to attract more investment".
And the reason I am mentioning all this: Ory‘s covering of the Poptech event as well as her mentioning of the XPrize competition and FabLab make me believe that there are some people out there that do not necessarily just do what the mainstream does (~following guidelines) but who see a real possibility and know that change – and I am not talking about Africa only – will depend on people and not on governments. That we (you, me, everyone) can change a lot and that all those helpful tools are already here – we just need to pick them up and use them.
I just want to get away from this position that there might be "others" on top of us that will tell us or even know what’s good for us if, after all, we all know what governments are capable of doing and even worse what they are not. I think it is about time for us to start our own reasonable projects that will put the people, the beneficiaries, in the focus and give them the knowledge to advance. Be it in a technological or social sense.

as IF i had NOTHING better to do…

I think one day in future, my little niece will be old enough to ask questions – and then she might ask me about the stuff I used to do when "I was younger".
"Well, my dear", I will reply, "when I was about 17, I got my own home computer. An ATARI 1040 STF with an external 30 MB HDD. In Kenya. Imagine this thing running in an environment with frequent power failures – and it worked! Yeah….and so when those x86 / IBM compatible machines became available at an affordable rate, I switched to a Pentium I with 133 MHz and an operating system called ~~Chernobyl 86~~ Windows95 which took some time to be installed and had more bugs than features. However, by that time in 1996 I was able to go online for the first time. …So as years passed by, computers became more and more powerful and operating systems more user-orientated. In fact, my dear, I think I’ve ~~wasted~~ spent the best part of my twenties (and 30s!!) in front of different computers, trying to fix this and that hard- and software problem, trying out different operating systems and trying to understand why things just didn’t work out the way they were supposed to be…I mean, all I wanted to do was actually USE those machines, you know?"

"But why didn’t you use Mac computers?"

"uhmm….."

what a waste!

Red Cross bubudius found on my table today…

Since I never (!) had any Malaria, I regularly donate blood with the Red Cross society. It’s in a good cause and there are those old Mamas in this kijiji here that serve good coffee and good food afterwards. Actually, I think I just go there because there’s this very old lady that always smiles and – currently living in a country with perfect infrastructure and a good quality of life – it’s still not so often that one meets smiling people (why???). My brother-in-law already hit me the other day, arguing that the German Red Cross (DRK) are thiefs since they are collecting all that blood and selling it for a lot of money. Whatever.
What I do not understand, though, are these littles cruxes they are giving away as a bonus on 5th, 7th and 10th donating event. I mean, wth? am I supposed to do with them? Put them on my jacket? Or sell them on eBay?? Hello???! Dumb!!
I can just imagine this little factory over in Shenzhen, China that produces these metal giveaways and the German Red Cross buys them at huge quantities. They’d be better off saving the money and donating it for a good cause. Like the way I do with my blood.
(but do I say?!)

Mshale kwenda msituni haukupotea.

Adding even more personal content to my weblog (ndiyo, Adrian & Hash!) – thus following Nielsen’s weblog guidelines – I just thought about telling you this little nini that keeps on banging inside my head:

The man and his family shown on the above picture (click to enlarge) is non other than Bwana Harrison W. Munyui of Ruaka – who happens to run a succesful taxi business close to Runda estate (yes, that “Krautshill” part of NBO behind Village Market).
Now, this Kikuku* by the name of Lady Kikuyumbuzi* (a.k.a. Mbuzimoja* a.k.a Mandazimoja*), who hails from the slopes of Mt. Bavaria and its great empire (remember Beckenbauer? He’s their Emperor) and who has spent her childhood in Hoima (Uganda) and different parts of Nairobi (Kenya), happens to be Bwana Harrison’s biggest and most persistent customer. She is such a loyal customer that Harrison took her to church last sunday – he asked her to accompany him & his family to “Ruaka Revival Church Centre”.
What she did, of course.

Basi.

Now….as you might have figured already, I am deeply in love with this Tangawizi-Lady*. That woman is strong and – the way it is with love – whenever I think of her, my heart fills with joy and happiness and I can’t wait to see her again. But! – she just dropped me a few lines, telling me that she will stay in Kenya for some more time and currently doesn’t think about flying back to Germany. She didn’t even leave any telephone “namba” under which I could reach her…yani, out of sight, out of my mind? No way! She’s the one that made me think about doing more sports, eventually stop smoking, focusing on my studies and just being more concentrated on the things that will be good for me. But not by telling me (I wouldn’t like that) – instead, she would just inspire me and make me realize it myself (I am an old man who needs some time to realize what’s good and bad and what women actually mean when they say yes or no… :-).
So she left the other day for Kenya and I’m here and thinking: she won’t come back? — then I’ll have to come and visit her! Mapenzi ni kikohozi, hayawezi kufichika. What are you waiting for, dude?

I am waiting to win the lottery which would enable me to buy a plane ticket, I am waiting to find a way of stopping time so I could easily just take a few days off to Kenya without being frightened that I’d miss some important things over here – and maybe I am also waiting for her to tell me that I should just come, no matter what…

Yani, upon seeing Bwana Harrison on that picture and his mobile phone number painted on his cabs door, I had this idea of calling him….what would it be alike?:
“Hello?” – “yes, hello, this is Kikuyumoja calling.. Am I speaking to Harrison?” – “Ehhh….HAhahaha.” -“Ehh…wî mwega?” – “Ndî mega….hahaha” – ( …more greetings here… ) …. (even more) …. – “Sasa, Harrison, me I am having this problem…. I have just arrived at JKIA and I am looking for that Mzungulady who happens to be your regulaaaar cas-tam-aa. You know, the one that has this WangariMaathai powa, the one with that kenyan nose and blonde hair and who just likes to be your guest….” – “Eh…Hahahaaaa” – “..so you know her?” – “Eh…Hahaha…of course I know her, she’s very nice!” – “YEAH, SHE IS! ..Tûrî na mbûri njega*… :-)” – “Where are you now?” – “I am at JKIA and I would like to be your next customer.” – “Wait…me I’ll come”…..t.b.c

What would you do if the person you’re really in love with is some 6600 kms away and you just want to see her again?

*@Mshairimoja: of course all those are terms of endearment! ;-)

Heute an der Tür…

Da wir hier immer wieder von parasitären GEZ Laufburschen heimgesucht werden, die für dieses öffentlich-rechtliche Inkassobüro Adressen eintreiben und die GEZ ihrerseits lieber jedes Jahr aufs Neue ihre Runden dreht, statt mal gewissenhaft ihre Adressdatenbank zu pflegen, habe ich vor einiger Zeit dieses wunderschöne Bild von nichtlustig.de (THX!) ausgedruckt und an die Wohnungstür gehängt (da hängt noch mehr :-).

Eben hat es wieder geklingelt und vor der Tür standen zwei schmierige Typen in Anzügen. Kaum war die Tür auf, kam schon ein dämlicher Spruch von einem der beiden von wegen "hööö…ich nehm das da" – und zeigte auf eines der Cartoons an der Tür. Ich schaute ihn daraufhin kurz an und schloss wortlos und mich fragend die Tür.
Später stellte sich dann im Gespräch mit anderen Hausbewohnern heraus, dass es sich dieses Mal nicht um die GEZ, sondern um irgendwelche Telefonfuzzis handelte, die ganz tolle Tarife aufschwatzen wollten….

sitini na mbili thelathini

What is this?

It’s the built-in 640×480 (VGA) digicam of my Nokia 6230 mobile phone.
And?

Problem…. I got a short message on my mobile phone and realized that the vibrating motor inside didn’t work. Of course I checked the settings, switched it off and even removed the battery for a cold start. Still not working. Ayaaaa!
I got this phone a year ago and since then I always refrained from opening it further because, well, because it somehow (!) worked. Of course the internal firmware (v05.24) still has some bugs and I already had it flashed with a new firmware some time ago (I used to do this myself on those earlier DCT-3 models and even some earlier DCT-4 phones (Nokia 51xx, 61xx, 62xx, 71xx, 83xx) but those series-40 & series-60 phones require better hardware equipment for flashing the phone’s firmware and it just doesn’t make sense to buy such a machine if a) i am just doing this as a hobby & b) Nokia officially doesn’t like any firmware changes on the user side – not so Siemens, btw). However, this thing was LONGING for a small exploration of its circuits. It silently whispered into my ears: Kiku, tafadhali, saidia mimi…. OH my dear, help is on its way!
I pulled out my TORX6 screwdriver and removed those six screws…..Jeeeeeeeeeesssaaaaas! Nokia engineers – KUDOS to you folks over in that Sauna country – remember those early Nokia phones? YOU’VE COME A LOOOONG WAY and – apart from this firmware business and "occasional" software resets while typing an important SMS – the PCB layout is just awesome. For instance, those internal RF parts are normally sealed with a little metal cover which requires some patience to be opened. Alas, with this phone though, the cover itself is right under the keypad – which means that you don’t have to squeeze or pull anything open when you are trying to dismantle the phone – it just unfolds by itself! Perfect. What’s the biggest part in a phone? The battery..

So I opened it up, cleaned the vibrating motor and corrected some elec. contacts. Curriosity of course hooked me and I consequently removed the digicam of its socket… BAD IDEA … when I tried to put it back, this thing in my head called intelligence somehow went on a little vacation (presumably because of thinking about Mbuzimoja :-) and I inserted it in the wrong way. Well, it looked as if it was okay though – but still, you can even spot the problem in the above picture – those little noses don’t correspond to the metal frame around it. Dumb. Just dumb.
Of course I only realized that once I had everything back in place, so that thing had to be reopened and blablabla…. talking ’bout Murphy’s Law, eh?

The benefits of this little exploration, though: a) a nice view on good NOKIA engineering and b) SPEED! Upon switching it on again, this thing runs much faster now. What is it? I mean, wth? is the connection between the firmware, the acceptance of buggy MMC-flash-card-controllers and a normal hardware cleanup?

Technology sometimes gives me a lot to think about.

tool time at the crack of dawn

Is there anything on the internet that really generates traffic? Especially for weblogs? Ndiyo. Nerd-content and that msn-search-nini I talked about the other day. Huuu….embarrassing.

Whatever.

There’s this jamaaa who lives in St.Petersburg, FL, USA and who’s been schooling with me in NBO. He moved there the other day becos he got a decent job offer and apparently couldn’t stand the rainy weather over here. I think by that time no one had told him about hurricanes (hurry – cane = hakora haraka? :-) – those not-so-occasional diarrheas by the Mungus of water. Ati bwana, wot exactly are u doing there? Ama should I come ova and teach u some manners? Ah…ntz….tz… Kwani?

Because of this:

(..those leafes weren’t included..)

Ati? I really really appreciate this, lieber Mathias, but honestly – would YOU wear this when your gf is around? Wot? She’s the one who picked it out? (yes, I AM AFRAID of wearing this in public :-)

…

I like that tool bag, though. Nice one! :-)

On a more serious note: calling either a fixed line or mobile number in the US from Germany costs around 0,016 EUR (1,59 cents!)/minute. Calling a german mobile number from within Germany costs at least 0,22 EUR (22 cents!). Something is SO wrong with this country (and I haven’t even mentioned the costs of sending short messages…).