Corriere Telematico: an electronic magazine from my past

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Exactly 19 years ago I started my earliest experiments writing about technology.
The Corriere Telematico was based on flat ascii file format with a reader that was able to jump to a specific article based on the line number in the file.
I believed that the content was lost given the fact that I was using BBSes at the time and the WWW was not in my horizon but this is not the case.

I wrote, with the nickname Satoru, about the way the cache worked in the early 386 system, about modems when high-speed interoperability was a dream (or a nightmare) due to the number of different standards on the market and about early consumer sound cards with wavetables.

How good a “five star” food is really?

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A few days ago I’ve posted about a very nice crème caramel I had at Mangiari di strada and I defined it “delicious”.

I started to think how to put in perspective the pleasure I had from it.
It was for sure one of the best, if not the best, crème caramel I ever had, but was it worth driving 30 miles for the sole purpose of eating it?

My answer is no and it’s a relatively easy one ’cause I’m more into appetizers and main courses than into desserts.

My reasoning did not stop there and I continued to think of foods and places evaluations based on the distance I would be happy to travel to taste them.
It’s really the complete package of distance plus direct cost that I take into account.

A few examples:
Once or twice a year Lo Dzerby is worth a 200 miles trip.
Mangiari di strada for me is worth a 30 miles trip (even on a weekly basis, given the great number of different great dishes they offer) as a complete eating experience but the single crème caramel is not. Even if it’s five stars without any doubt.

Da servo di Pannella a figlio libero di Dio by Danilo Quinto

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For an Italian the subject is very intriguing and the book generated quite some noise in the press.

At the beginning of my reading I was a bit surprised and almost upset by the fact that the author was citing the Gospel in a book that is not a religious book.

What was even more strange is that this happened to me as I do read also religious books.
It’s like if I’ve absorbed the idea that God should not be part of the normal life hence not part of “normal” books.

The main take home from the book is a confirmation of the fact that the human beings share the same structure and have both strengths and weaknesses.
The second key point is that the power can, and very often does, corrupt.

It’s a common temptation to finger point the weaknesses of the other forgetting our own or, when not failing (yet) ourselves, believing that we resist because we’re ontologically better than the others.

L’incontemporaneo. Péguy, lettore del mondo moderno by Alain Finkielkraut

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In the past I’ve read a few articles written by Alain Finkielkraut and I’ve appreciated his point of view.
This is my fist book written by him: the subject is what got me interested.

I’ve had the opportunity to listen with great pleasure to good readers reading out loud extracts from some of the books of Charles Peguy (“Le Mystère de la charité de Jeanne d’Arc”, “Le Porche du mystère de la deuxième vertu” and “Le Mystère des saints Innocents”)
Fascinated by the content I’ve tried a couple of time to read the books myself, but without success: it looks like they don’t work, at least for me, on the page but only when listening.

This book was a great opportunity to better understand the thinking of Charles Peguy and also the reasons why he’s relegated in a small niche.
Recommended.

Original title: Le Mécontemporain. Charles Péguy, lecteur du monde moderne

Vodafone station issue: round 2

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Today I had again issues with the voice calls using the phone connected to the VF station.

People told me that the my voice recalled them the creature of the black lagoon and that Skype voice quality was way better.
It’s very annoying.

I know that my phone is not directly connected to the PSTN but is actually converted to VOIP by Vodafone’s own router, but this should be transparent to the me as is a VF technical implementation decision and not a hack on my side.

What is interesting is that it looks like the issues started after i got the line upgraded from 7mbit/s to 20mbit/s (not really achieved yet)
Tomorrow I’ll do a test with another phone: if I can’t sort this out soon I’ll revert back to the 7mbit/s and save the money extra money of the nominally better and faster line.

If anyone would like to take a test of the 20 mbit vodafone and share the results it’s possible to join this speed wave

UPDATE: on Friday afternoon (October 19th) the line drown in the black lagoon altogether.
No ADSL and no voice at all for about 30 minutes.

UPDATE: on Saturday evening (November 17th) no ADSL again. Vodafone’s reliability is way worse than what I get with Wind/Infostrada.
To make things worse it’s not possible for the end-user to tell to the Vodafone Station to connect at a lower speed in an attempt to improve reliability.

Crème Caramel @ Mangiari di strada

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Only one word: delicious!
The texture is very nice: it melts smoothly in the mouth.
The caramel is providing mainly an olfactory clue and keeps you able to taste the milk used.

Mangiari di strada is one of my preferred restaurants in Milan.
Is at the end of Via Lorenteggio in a very convenient position for anyone having to do business with Vodafone in Italy.
Lunch time only. Monday to Saturday

They are not updating on a regular base the official site, but have a Facebook page that is more up-to-date.
But what is more important than the online presence is that the food is simply great and never boring.

Just go and test yourself!

Vodafone station issue

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Today my home network had quite a few problems.
First Vodafone’s station decided that for my VOIP line was ok to abandon me in the middle of a conference call.
It turned out that it was not a temporary issue: the interface was reporting that everything was ok yet I was unable to place or receive other calls.

The hiccup of Vodafone’s device also got my dual wan router confused: even having a second WAN line working fine I was no longer able to access the internet.

I felt positive about the VF Station so I have reset everything else first: the PSTN+VOIP phone (Siemens Gigaset A580IP), the dual wan router (Netgear FVS336Gv2) and the network interface on the notebook

At the end pf the troubleshooting a physical power off of the station was needed to bring the service back.
Quite inconvenient as the device is located in a cabinet and not readily accessible and it’s not the fist time this happened to me.

Content of my reading list by amazon (part 4 of 9)

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Hi,
Below you’ll find the fourth part of my reading list and, when available, the related comments I made at the time. with a bit of editing

I continue to move from the older readings to the most recent.

You can read why I’m doing this and can also the first , the second and the third part of the list that I’ve published on this blog.

Wednesday, Jul 7 2010
The world of Null-a by Alfred E. Van Vogt
I liked it, it’s the description of a utopic world that’s an easy and relaxing reading.

Sunday, Jul 4 2010
The Horizons of Liberalism by Maria Zambrano
Recommended

Tuesday, Jun 29 2010
Lateral Marketing: New Techniques for Finding Breakthrough Ideas by Philip Kotler, Fernando Trias de Bes

Ten Deadly Marketing Sins: Signs and Solutions by Philip Kotler
Not much added value in comparison to the books of Kotler I’ve read previously, but may be related to the fact that I’m not a marketing insider.
The book is ok if the reader was never exposed to anything marketing-related

Sunday, Jun 20 2010
Frogs into Princes: Neuro Linguistic Programming by Richard Bandler, John Grinder, Steve Andreas
Interesting read but…
I really think that I need to see NLP in action live to set aside my disbelief about the claimed ability to generate lasting changes so quickly.

Tuesday, Jun 8 2010
Marketing Insights From A to Z: 80 Concepts Every Manager Needs to Know by Philip Kotler
I’ve found the book quite interesting: quick to the point it gives several hints to the reader to compare the behaviors in his current environment and to further explore the marketing subject.
Unfortunately for customers and enterprises it looks like a relevant number of the managers that I’ve met in Italy so far either has not read this book or deemed the content applicable only to someone else.

Wednesday, Mar 24 2010
Mockingbird by Walter Tevis, Jonathan Lethem
Recommended light reading

Sunday, Mar 21 2010
The Stochastic Man by Robert Silverberg
Recommended light reading

Monday, Mar 15 2010
We’ve Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy–And the World’s Getting Worse by James Hillman, Michael Ventura
Recommended: really amusing and enlightening at the same time

Sunday, Mar 7 2010
A New Shoah: The Untold Story of Israel’s Victims of Terrorism by Giulio Meotti
I’ve tried to read this book but I was unable to make it to the end.
The amount of pain and sufferance that is described is great; joining this with the knowledge of the fact that this is happening now and not in a relatively distant past made it too hard for me.
To some extent it recalled me of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn’s work titled “The Gulag Archipelago” but without the somewhat smoothing knowledge that is something of the past.

Live concert in Prague @ Rudolfinum

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I’m just back from the Dvořák Hall at the Rudolfinum in Prague.

I discovered by chance in the airplane magazine that at this time of the year Prague hosts an international music festival so I decided to spend the evening away from the work email.

And it was a good decision even if I was not familiar with the selection of music (from Strauss, Beethoven and Brahms) of the concert.
Live performances are a different and better world than what even the most audiophile stereo system money can buy could ever reproduce.
The Czech Philharmonic Orchestra performance was really enjoyable.

If you happen to be in Prague at this time of the year in 2013 you should take the opportunity.

I’ll do for sure.

If you never went to a live classical music concert give it a try at the first opportunity.
There it is only one golden rule: arrive on time don’t make any noise or chatting during the performance.

Booking online was easy and doable until the day before the concert.
There it is one important caveat!
In the balcony (the most affordable place) there are columns that may completely block your vision: if you don’t see seats directly in front of the one you’re selecting while reserving then you have the column in front of you.
While this can be acceptable for a pure instrumental execution you really don’t want it.

I was unlucky in the seat selection, but then lucky as just in front of me there were 3 free seats and I was able to move from the 790 crowns column-seat in row 5 to the 1490 crowns central seat in row 4.

Firmware upgrade frenzy during the weekend: Nokia N9, Synology DS411Slim, Netgear FVS336Gv2

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The Nokia N9 looked like if it was running on windows 7: over 280MB of updates. Twice.
Hopefully I’m on the most recent version now and, yes, email synch seems to be faster that when unboxed as promised by the update description.

The upgrade of the DS411Slim doesn’t look like has fixed my issues with slow transfer rate from the encrypted volume.
Even worse: I’ve had the time to test with the regular volumes and it looks like they are slow too.
I’ll post more detail on my findings once I’m done with the backup od the encrypted volume and can remove it from the NAS.

The FVS336G was working stable (with the exception of a relevant slowness in managing the WAN interface up-down-up transitions) before the upgrade and seems stable now too.
I decided to give a try at the updated FW (3.0.8.12) : the list of fixed problems in this release was impressing and I was on an 18 months old version (3.0.7-24)