That sucks.

Here’s a trick to run multiple OpenOffice.org instances concurrently, all from one single installation, on Windows. Assuming the latest OpenOffice.org 3.x is installed. It’s actually pretty simple — just change the USERPROFILE environment variable! Or HOME on Linux/Solaris.

For example, in Java

ProcessBuilder pb = new ProcessBuilder("c:\\Program Files\\OpenOffice.org 3\\program\\soffice.exe",
    "-accept=socket,host=localhost,port=7999;urp;StarOffice.ServiceManager",
    "-invisible", "-headless", "-nologo", "-nofirststartwizard");
Map<String, String> env = pb.environment();
if (windoze) {
    env.put("USERPROFILE", "c:\\temp\\12345");
} else {
    env.put("HOME", "/tmp/12345");
}
Process ooo = pb.start();

Yeah I am putting this here because the search result on Google is pretty junky. And I just realised that I have not blogged for yonks. Busy buys busy.

WordPress 2.8 “Baker” is now live to the world! http://bit.ly/wordpress28 (spread the good word)

Yup. It is here, and you can read more about the new features here. To upgrade to the latest version using subversion while Automattic haven’t tagged the 2.8 –

1. Go into your previously checked-out WordPress directory
2. Run svn switch -r 11549 http://svn.automattic.com/wordpress/trunk/
3. Navigate to http://yourblob/wp-admin/upgrade.php

Done! You are running WordPress 2.8! Of course some plugins and themes might not work but who cares. You are now using the latest and greatest :) Most new features are admin panel related, but the one that interests me the most is:

• Support timezones and automatic daylight savings time adjustment

Yes — it’s about time!

#!/usr/bin/env python
import re, urllib
r = r'<a  href="/siteinfo/(.*?)"  ><strong>(.*?)</strong>';
for i in range(25):
    u = 'http://www.alexa.com/topsites/countries;%d/AU' % i
    for x, m in enumerate(re.findall(r, urllib.urlopen(u).read())):
        print '%d. %s (%s)' % (x + 1 + i * 20, m[1], m[0].strip())

YMMV. Considering how Alexa has been trying to obfuscate their HTML pages to prevent scrapping, I won’t be surprised that this script stops to work tomorrow…

After its outstandingly successful parent company topped a 100 Best Places To Work survey conducted by the US magazine Fortune, Google Australia has claimed the No.1 spot in a similar Australian poll.

BRW, which conducted the study, said Google had created a legendary corporate culture of perks, fun, appreciation and reward for its staff.

I actually had a privilege to tour the new Googleplex in Pyrmont last Thursday for the Google Partners’ Day. That was quite an experience. Read on to see what I have learnt on that day.

BLAH BLAH BLAH. <Silenced due to an NDA I have to sign with Google>.

Well. I guess I cannot actually say what I saw on the Google Partners Day, but just a few things in point forms (which I hope would not violate the terms in NDA):

• Google Maps sucks (on that day). The Googleplex address on Google Maps was actually around 500 metres North-West along Pirrama Road than what it actually is. It has already been fixed now (thanks Google), but I was trying to navigate myself to there, relying on Google Maps on my Nokia E71, and ended up right in front of a parkland. Google Maps can’t navigate me to Googleplex? Well, at least that was my excuse of being late on the day.

• Great networking time that you have opportunity talking to other Australia publishers — only if I was not that naive. Seriously, an engineer like me felt a bit out of place amongst the publishers, advertisers, agents, etc. I also skipped the after-event drinking networking time because I need to come back for MBF BST.

  Still, I had a short chat with Guy & Bevan from Stateless Systems — great guys.

• Seven plastic guitars — that’s how many they have for Guitar Hero and Rock Band. Cool.

• The best place to work in Australia, only if you are a single unattached geek who prefer marrying social life with work. Lots of freedom there. Lots of gadgets. Lots of social events as far as I can tell. Good food and good coffee machine. Moreover I am pretty sure you will be working with some of the best geeks in Australia over there.

  However if you are married with kids, have a different life outside work, other commitments (church activities for example) — I am not sure whether the Googler-style would be good.

Interestingly in the SMH article, top 5 of greatest places to work are all in Sydney. Maybe it tells us more about the city than those companies :)

• Anna called from her room that she wanted to go to the bathroom
• Got out of bed, went to her room, and then carried her all the way to bathroom for wee.
• Carried her all the way back to her room and put her to sleep.
• Back to my own room. Laid down on my back…
• “Ouch”

Yeah. Somehow I injured my back — to a point that it was too painful to go to work yesterday. Vivian booked me to see the physio at Unigym this morning so I can at least have some “fix” before heading to work. It’s the same physio she visited last week, whom I have never met, nor knew that Vivian and I are related.

So this morning. After filling out the form, she said, “Oh, your wife and daughter been here before?” Yup, that would be Elsie.

“Yeah?”

“She looks just like you!”

“Right… You haven’t seen the other one!”

Told Vivian about how others commented the similarity between Elsie and me when I got home this evening, and she wasn’t impressed :)

Anyway. At the end of the day, I need

• A lot of stretches throughout the day.
• Frequent exercise during the week.
• Good posture when sitting in front of computers.

Or maybe I need to find a job that is not desk-bound…