2011 To Do List

Posted on December 30, 2010 by Martyn
Not resolutions as such, just a list of things that I want to do or achieve in 2011.

  • Take more pictures (aka learn how to use my Canon 550d)
  • Find a simple way to manage all the photos I take
  • Make sure I have sorted out my back pain for good
  • Ride a Segway (Mobi board – Nice)
  • Perfect my Pizza making (and try some of these recipes)
  • Try more wines (more Loire, Bourgogne etc)
  • Start playing squash again
  • Sort out some work related stuff that I can’t talk about here
  • Write more tech related blog posts
  • Read more books
Posted in Tech, Travel, Wine | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Back pain – fixed (hopefully)

Posted on December 10, 2010 by Martyn

The problem
reno nv chiropractic treatment for low spine back pain

For just over 2 years I’ve been suffering from lower back pain. Lumbar region, mainly to the right side. I’m not exactly sure what was the intial cause of the pain. It could have been something self inflicted, for example when I “pulled” my back when sailing in a race in Sydney, or it could be gradual onset due to bad habits or situation (blame having a young child?).

For a long time I was the typical male “it’ll be alright and I don’t need to go to the doctor”, but  when ibuprofen still wasn’t masking the pain I decided I had to do something about it.

I’m currently 99% pain free and hopefully on the way to a permanent fix. To get to here has been a two stage process. Here is what I did.

Continue reading →

Posted in Health | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

Flood in Antibes

Posted on November 21, 2010 by Martyn

A big storm in Antibes last week which saw our house surrounded by waterfalls and a small lake.

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Automating FTP file transfers with Mac OS X

Posted on November 14, 2010 by Martyn

I was recently giving advice to my brother on updating a website and the discussion turned to automating a task that was very repetitive and quite time consuming. For each update a file was edited on the local PC it needed to be uploaded to the webserver using FTP. Although this is only a 5min job to load your FTP client, click around to find the file, upload it, etc. I thought it would be good to just be able to automate it with a single click. Here are the steps required to simplify the process:

Continue reading →

Posted in Tech | Tagged , , , | 5 Comments

Localisation in online advertising, applications and media

Posted on November 5, 2010 by Martyn

For just over a year I have been living in France. This post covers my experience in using online or application resources when your native language doesn’t match the first language of the country you live.

My first language is English. I work in English, I consume entertainment in English. I set my language on my computer to be English. On websites I register with with I set my language as English.

I’m pretty ok with speaking French, I get by in Dutch, but I don’t consume much, if any, content in these languages.

Here are two areas that have I think need some attention.

Advertising

Online advertising is getting more and more advanced in tailoring what gets presented to you. Websites can use various tools to tune what you see. For example, using your IP address to set location or use browser cookie information to match topics from recent searches or website visits.

But I think there are some issues with the use of location based system. Or, at least people aren’t using it effectively.

Continue reading →

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Oktoberfest 2010

Posted on November 1, 2010 by Martyn

Richo and I getting ready to head in to the Hofbrau fest tent.

From Misc

Check out more photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/martynlomax/

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ewanlomax.com – finally updated

Posted on November 1, 2010 by Martyn

Ewan’s website is finally getting some updates. Check out ewanlomax.com more pictures, videos and news.

The first update is some video of him playing at the new Eco’Parc science activity centre in Mougins.

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One click install web apps – How easy is it to install WordPress?

Posted on September 27, 2010 by Martyn

After 12 years of customising websites with manual coding, blogging software and photo management systems I’ve finally decided I need something to do it all for me. At the same time my hosting provider has recently upgraded their servers and transferred me to a new virtualised environment, with a fancy new management front end.

I started looking at at the various content management and blogging “one click install” apps on the system. It had the usual suspects like Joomla, Drupla and WordPress. I decided to go with WordPress as had great install base and it seemed to meet all my requirements.

The one-click install process for these apps promises to guide you through an installation where you’ll only be prompted for a few bits of information, without the need for unzipping and running scripts. I have tested this with a friend’s server and two commercial hosting system (Webfusion and Godaddy). I found some very different results.

Read more about my findings below.

Continue reading →

Posted in Tech | Tagged , , | 22 Comments

Ewan is the ice cream monster

Posted on September 14, 2010 by Martyn

After a few months of being interested in ice cream but being hesitant to try it, Ewan can’t get enough of the stuff.

This weekend in Juan-Les-Pins, he devoured one whilst also being able to spread it over his t-shirt.

From Ewan misc

Delicious! (Imagine that said in a Peppa Pig voice)

Check out more photos here: http://picasaweb.google.com/martynlomax/

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FFG Handicap and REGS

Posted on August 28, 2010 by Martyn

Since moving to France I’ve been playing golf with a group of Expats, called REGS. Regular games (monthly-ish) are played at golf courses along the Riviera. Very nice courses.

The group is an official French organisation and affiliated with the Fédération Française de Golf (FFG). This means you have to sign up to have an FFG license (and insurance, medical – usual French paperwork). As part of the license you get an official handicap.

The FFG show me ranked as 174679 out of 275831 total members. I like that over 100000 people are worse than me.

Due to the FFG handicap system starting at a seemingly crazy 53.5 I am battling to get the handicap down to something reasonable. I declare a handicap of about 28-30, the current cap is 44.5 and each game I drop a couple of points.

At this rate I’ll be in line for a real handicap in about another year or so. Maybe then I can start to get some silverware without being called a burglar or bandit!

See my full FFG history here.

Posted in Golf | Tagged , , | 2 Comments