Even though I blog in English, it is not my native language. My native language is Frisian. What, Frisian…aren’t you Dutch? Yes, I’m Dutch but also Frisian. Bi-lingual by Birth :P

For all those who do not know how Frisian sounds, or are just plain curious, here’s a clip:

This song is used by Omrop Fryslân during this Summer (Summer hit 2008).

Why do I blog in English? Simple really, it’s THE International Language!

With these past posts about my computer you might be wondering: what does it look like?

There you have it, my (main) workspace..yep in the living room!

So I brought my computer in yesterday to have them replace the Seagate harddisk with a Samsung F1 750GB 32MB SATAII and the memory with 800mhz DDR2, all of which they should have put in in the first place (would have saved them loads of time/work and me quite a bit of stress, time and agro too). They also managed to recover the data from my D: drive and put it back too!

I was to have my computer back end of the day yesterday or beginning afternoon today..well it was slightly later (end of the afternoon) but at least all is well now.

I’m happy, no more stress, all is as should…now back to my usual doings.

So yeah, finally Thursday evening my computer was ready and waiting for me to pick it up. Ready? Hmm didn’t turn out quite ready yet.

The DVD drive was replaced already when I got told my Vista Ultimate Disk was damaged, which explains why they could install from DVD’s in that drive, but apparently they had used my Vista disk to test the DVD drive and that’s how it was said to be damaged. They what!? Yuhuh they used a for their customer valuable disk to test the DVD drive, would you do that? I sure wouldn’t! But well ehh altho quite scratched, which they claim was already so when they got the disk from me (not true), my Vista disk appears to be still working. Vista Ultimate was also installed again on my harddisk. So what isn’t ready? What’s the problem?

Problem 1: no trace of my workspace data (drive D:), had they not backed that up too? When I went to ask today they said they’d look at my broken disk again to see if they could access it.

Problem 2: I now have a Seagate HDD instead of a Samsung F1, which rates lower in the Windows Experience Index (WEI). It ranks 5.7.

Problem 3: Instead of 3GB DDR2 800mhz memory they placed 3GB DDR2-667 (333mhz)! Again this ranks lower than what I had, it ranks 5.3.

This is not equal to the system I had, so of course I can not agree to this. I was promised an equal system back! I had a system with a WEI of 5.5, in which all scored a perfect 5.9 except the memory which ranked at 5.5 (lowest subscore determines the final WEI), so I want that back! Is it so hard to understand that I want the same components back in (brand, mhz etc.)? So yea I went back to complain. They had put in another brand HD because they couldn’t get a Samsung one and the memory must have been a mistake. Now I got to take my computer back in next Wednesday to get what I was promised..a Samsung F1 HD as I had and 3GB of 800mhz memory. Having spent ages to get all as I wanted again on this system (Vista settings, software) I asked if this time they were going to clone my disk so I would not have to go through all that again…they said that would be done.

So in the end I’ll get all back as was (minus most likely some data loss), but what would have happened had I not went back to complain? What if I had not checked (ohh how I love SIW). Undoubtedly I would have been left with a lesser system…

On Tuesday morning June 3rd lightning struck and damaged my modem, TFT and brandnew (March 2008) PC.

Specs:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600
3GB RAM Crucial DDR2 800Mhz
VGA (Point) Nvidea GeForce 8800 GT 512 MB
Recom Power Engine 450 ATX
Asus P5K motherboard
Samsung F1 750GB 32MB SATAII
Samsung DVD-RW 20x
Internal cardreader 3,5 inch
(OS: Vista Home Premium NL)

Monitor: Samsung SyncMaster 931 BW

Of the above only the computer casing, processor, VGA and the cardreader survived. Lucky it didn't directly hit at our house but at my backdoor neighbours (only backyard inbetween so 10-15 meters away max.), so I got off with only these damages where they had fire coming out of the wall sockets! They have loads more damage, no person or animal got hurt in the incident *phew*. Also it's a good thing we got insurance but still....

When it happened I was quite shaken/stunned wondering "now what?" I had no means of communications besides my mobile phone. Fist to call is my bf at work, he came home. Next was to bring my computer to the store to be checked out, we have one really nearby but it isn't open till afternoon.... So what next, call insurance agency! As what they need from me, they need expert damage report from computer store. Once I have that I can call back and he'd fill in a damage form and sent that off with the damage report and copies of my original invoices. Next was to send txt messages to some friends so they'd know what happened to me and not worry about me not being online...

Things never go as fast as you want/wish for and in my case...repairs are taking much longer than needed. My modem is hired so I got a new one from my ISP within a week, no problem there. Computer is another story, it was to be ready yesterday but when I arrived at the store I was told there had been a delay in delivery for some parts, those got delivered just the day before so I got a promise they start workin on my comp that afternoon. Delay in delivery, yea right...I know for a fact they didn't even order the parts till last Friday (been in and out of the store several times to either talk stuff over or bring stuff in) whilst they knew what was needed since the Saturday before already! At 5:30 PM I get a phonecall, they need my VGA Card driver CD. No problem, I bring it over right away, the store is just across the street anyway. I saw my computer being worked on but to my surprise they had put Vista Home Premium NL back on instead of Vista Ultimate EN 32-bits that I gave them to install.

Ultimate you say? Yes, I got Vista Ultimate SP1 English 32 bits (promo cd) from Kip (LiveSide). I was over the moon (and of course thanked Kip many many times) when he sent me that as now I had an English OS, meaning no more being last in line when there's a new SP and even more important: the ability to test software that will work on English OS only! As you all know, beta testing is a large part of my existence. I got promised they will put Vista Ultimate back on as it is a genuine version, I also reminded them that if they'd put back Home Premium I'd have to do an install all over again as you can't upgrade when the languages differ. So what went wrong there? They told me my Vista Ultimate CD was so damaged it wouldn't install! Well I delivered it in perfect condition, I installed from it only once and it went fine then! So if it's damaged then it happened whilst it was in their possession! Knowing my DVD drive was to be replaced to I asked if that had been done as otherwise it might be my DVD drive (reading errors) instead of the CD at fault. It had not been replaced, but they been installing from other CDs and that went OK The CD was in possession of the boss and not there at that time so couldn't check..they'll look at it again.

I also reminded to put back the backup they made of my hd and to my surprise the one working on my PC knew of no such! Turns out the guy who made the backup was a student who no longer works there. Great communications eh, what ever happened to using a piece of paper on which one puts date system brought in, what's wrong and what needs be done? I would have done that if I were them and have the person workin on that system write down with date what has been done to it already, so that incase anybody else needs to take over there can be no misunderstandings...wanna borough my organisation skills?

So you can understand I'm quite frustrated/angry/stressed out at the moment. I surely hope my PC is ready this evening when I go back there and that they didn't damage my Vista Ultimate CD...

At least I can be online for lil bits on my old comp which I modified (save disk space) and moved upstairs when I got my new one, so that's better than nothing. Insurance stuff is out of the way now too. I gotta hold on for a lil bit longer....

It is not at all in my nature to complain or rant esp. not in public but well this just got a wee bit...I just had to get it out of my system...

LYRICS

Your site design is the first thing people see
it should be reflective of you and the industry
easy to look at with a nice navigation
when you can’t find what you want it causes frustration

a clear Call to action to increase the temptation
use appealing graphics they create motivation
if you have animation
use with moderation
cause search engines can’t index the information

display the logos of all your associations
highlight your contact info that’s an obligation
create a clean design you can use some decoration
but to try to prevent any client hesitation

every page that they click should provide and explanation
should be easy to understand like having a conversation
when you design the style go ahead and use your imagination

but make sure you use correct color combinations
do some investigation, look at other organizations
but don’t duplicate or you might face a litigation
design done, congratulations but it’s time to start construction

follow these instructions when you move into production
your photoshop functions then slice that design
do your layout with divs make sure that it’s aligned
please don’t use tables even though they work fine
when it come to indexing they give searches a hard time

make it easy for the spiders to crawl what you provide
remove font type, font color and font size
no background colors, keep your coding real neat

tag your look and feel on a separate style sheet
better results with xml and css
now you making progress, a lil closer to success
describe your doctype so the browser can relate
make sure you do it great or it won’t validate

check in all browsers, I do it directly
gotta make sure that it renders correctly
some use IE, some others use Flock
some use AOL, I use Firefox

title everything including links and images
don’t use italics, use emphasis
don’t use bold, please use strong
if you use bold that’s old and wrong

when you use CSS, you page will load quicker
client satisfied like they eating on a snicker
they stuck on your page like you made it with a sticker
and then they convert now that’s the real kicker
make you a lil richer, your site a lil slicker

design and code right man I hope you get the picture
what I’m telling you is true man it should be a scripture
if it’s built right you’ll be the pick of the litter
everyone will want to follow you like twitter
competition will get bitter and you’ll shine like glitter

if you trying to grow your company will get bigger
design and code right man can you get with it

Source

Starting today you will also see me posting news on LiveSide. I've recently been asked by Kip if I would be able and willing to help out with their news flow. I feel very very honoured that I got asked an now I'm proud to be on the team (as news poster, aiming to post frequently). After all which site is THE news site for all things Windows Live (worldwide)? Exactly, LiveSide! *does a happy dance*

This doesn't mean I won't post on my own website, Sunshine's Web, anymore or on here. Surely I can find stuff to post outside LiveSide too  

My website mainly covers Windows Live Messenger, Messenger Plus! and StuffPlug. This Live Space is mainly meant for testing stuff (in the widest sense of the word), hence the name Experimental Space, might post some personal blurbs on here too but note I'm not that much a blogger in the sense of laying out my personal live to the world.

Just wanted to update you all on this.

happy, happy, happy, happy, happy, happy

P.S. don't forget to check out LiveSide and my very first directly posted article: Partnerships for MSN Video with MTV Networks and Sony BMG.

Ever wanted to be kept more up to date with all things happening related to MSN and Windows Live in Europe? Read what they are working on in Europe too, instead of only at Headquarters Redmond? Wanna know what is keeping people busy on this continent regarding all this? Now you can! Recently a new blog emerged called Live in Europe.

Welcome posted on Live In Europe:

Welcome everyone to this new blog! Live in Europe is a new blog that is set up to give regular updates on everything that's happening in Europe that is related to MSN and Windows Live. During recent discussions with colleagues as well as with partners it occurred to us that we could use a more central space to highlight everything that is going on with MSN and Windows Live in Europe, and this is the result.

As you can see in the right navigation, blogging about our services is not new in our organization. Most of the product teams give regular updates on the products and services they are working on and also several colleagues working all across Europe give their local views on all things MSN and Windows Live. This space is where you will find all this together and also a bit more... but more on that later.

In addition to this blog we also set up a Twitter account so if you are on Twitter, you can also follow us there.

So as I said, more to come later, but first things first. Welcome again to this blog, we're all hoping you will enjoy visiting us here and of course feel free to comment. Looking forward to your feedback.

- Kris Hoet (Marketing Manager)

Live in Europe: Live in Europe

On this blog you will find entries by the Live Crew: Kris Hoet, Brian Groth, Mark Garland, Peter Maxmin, Matt Hebden, Ngaire Moyes and others. Also to be found on this blog are links to other European Live blogs in your own language (Spanish, Dutch, French and Italian at this moment) and blogs of Product Teams.

I for one am gonna keep a close eye on this blog and am already very curious about the more...wish I knew. One thing you can be sure of: if I find out, I will report back and share it with all of you!

Friday. Went to the annual party of the company my bf works for (Batavus). This was at Fun Plaza and themed "Las Vegas". There was American food like hamburgers and hot dogs. Of course there were casino games, you could play blackjack and Roulette (if you got the chance)...not with real money, we all got some coins and who had most at the end of the evening would win a lottery ticket....There also was live music (cover band). Also present was Tjalling van den Bosch (Dutch Strongest Man), you could play checkers with him...I played twice! Didn't win but did have a good time, he asked me for the second game! At the end of the evening there was a drawing (like every year) and we won a Kärcher High pressure cleaner! Luck must have been at our side as we rarely win anything...

Saturday. Beta testers got allowance to blog on the new Plus! Live version that is to be released first week of December! Reading that made me happy but unfortunately I didn't have time to write my article until mid afternoon as I had two guys coming over to take a look at the guitar I have for sale (no, I don't play). So yea I feared everybody would have blogged about all of it already before I got the chance to. Turned out pretty good though.

Sunday. Some time out....and working on my Plus! skin...

Quote

Sunshine's Birthday Party

Hosted by: Sunshine Date and time: Wednesday, April 02, 2008 at 12:15 PM Location name: Heerenveen, Friesland, Netherlands View this event on Windows Live

Yep, you guessed it! It was time for some more beta testing, this time for Windows Live Photo Gallery. I won't tell to much about it since this is still in managed beta, but i don't think i'd do wrong by telling you it can be used to upload albums/pictures to your Live Space.

I decided to share some of the nature pictures i had already put on my website.

This is one of em:

(click on this image to go to the full album on my website)

Cute caterpillar that was watchin me whilst i was on the beach (lil beach inside a forrest, there a pic of that in the same album too).

For those wondering about the camera i took those pictures with: they are all taken with my Sony Ericsson K800i

Love Hina

For embed code, url and related videos click on "menu" (or play the video and wait till it's ended)

Couldn't believe my eyes when the mail arrived today. There was a package from the Young Media Group. Didn't ring a bell until......... i opened it and read the letter:

In short for the non-dutch readers: i've won the double DVD of the Grudge 2 in a contest/sweepstake from Movie Passport.

Pretty neat huh! Especially considering i'm usually not that lucky.

Yea yea i know they are rabbids

 First post with LiveWriter Beta.

Wondering if this would make blogging easier i thought i'd give this a go aswell. Sofar it looks very promising.

Some cute pictures i got by email the other day:

(dragged and dropped into LiveWriter)

Just thought i'd share these with you aswell ;)