Vi tykte det var lite bilar utafor til å vere midt i fellesferien, men med ein meny som består av hamburgertallerken, pommes frites, slapp karamellpudding og den evinnelege løv”biffen” var kanskje ikkje det så rart. Vi klarte likevel å overtale oss sjølve til å ete der sidan vi var så sultne etter seks timar køyring, noko vi egentleg angrar på no. Sjølv om dei hadde elgfrikadeller som i seg sjølv var heilt greie klarte dei å øydeleggje måltidet med overkokte grønsaker. Pølsa og chipsen dei hadde til barnemeny rann av feitt så vesla fekk dele litt på elgfrikadellene. Etter middagen kosa vi oss fælt med sur kaffe og skitne leiker i leikekroken. Herleg. Det begynte å regne då vi skulle ut i bilen igjen.

Etter gode opplevingar på Espa og Kløfta – begge eigd av Marché – byrjar vi å lure på om det verkeleg er overtaking av utlendingar som skal til for at ein sulten reisande skal kunne få kjøpt seg eit bra mål mat her til lands. Kva meiner DU – finnest det gode norsk-eigde vegkroer her til lands?

The new multitouch trackpad does not come with a physical button, but it can detect “idle” fingers on the trackpad so when resting my thumb I can still use the trackpad as if the thumb was not in contact with the pad. Most of the time. If I am to move my thumb only the slightest – which I typically do when I try to tap-to-click with my index finger – it will start interpreting my movements as multitouch gestures and very diffrent things than I intended will start to happen. Most annoying.

After searching for a software solution to disable the lover one third of the trackpad I got pissed of and typed “I hate the macbook multitouch trackpad” and guess what, I am not the only one. First hit in the result list is Kustaa Nyholms site over at sparetimelabs.com, which on his Multitouch page explains why he hates the trackpad and what he did to fool it into behaving properly. I have to admit, It’s a sexy solution

Now my thumb rests nicely on a piece of former DVD case, and my erranous click rate has gone down to zero. It even looks good, although I will try to get some thinner double sided tape and do a better job with my scissors to get it perfect. Thanks Kusti!

Yesterday at 23:00 I discovered that the cache “The middle of somewhere” was published at 16:16, and that noone had found it, or at least had not posted any FTF (First To Find) logs on geocaching.com. This is a mystery cache, and I had to recall my old geometry skillz from school to be able to calculate the coordinates. Then I downloaded a free GPS waypoint finder program for my iPhone, plotted the coordinates in and went to bed.

This morning the first thing I did was check my mail to see if there had been any finders of this cache. It was nothing there, but I was a bit worried that one of the other regular FTF hunters I know had found it but not logged it on the website so that other FTF hunters would come rushing to the scene just to be disappointed by finding a not-so-much pristine log sheet in the container. A despicable practice, that.

However, after dropping the kid off to kindergarten and the wife off to work I went down to see if I got my calculations right. And after some detours – the iPhone GPS isn’t all that.. – I had to use the hint to start bruteforcing possible cache locations. And I found it! And it was an FTF! There was much rejoicing, and then I went to work

Wondering about the picture? Well, little Halden seems to be a dangerous town, that’s a bullet hole in a sign near the cache!

Enter: Gowalla. This is more of a social networking thing compared to geocaching, it helps you see where your friends are, and their status updates. Gowalla is actually quite similar to geocaching, in that it has geographical spots that you can find, and you can log that you have found them on the system’s website or on a mobile client. However, there’s a lot of small differences. While Geocaching uses various physcal containers that you actually have to get a hold of in order to write something in the enclosed log book, Gowalla only reqires you to be in the proximity of a spot in order to log – or Check In to – the spot. This means you can find and log the spots without even getting out of your car, and you don’t need to worry about getting a cache muggled which may result in unwanted attention from law enforcement and so on – a great advantage in urban areas. Also placing spots is a lot less hazzle with Gowalla – there’s no formal requirements for placing a spot and no approval process. So anyone can play Gowalla very easily. Geocaching also has this more or less unwritten rule that one should only find a cache once, while Gowalla encourage you to find the same spot multiple times by introducing a leaderboard for each spot. Gowalla even has virtual “cache content” (swag) that’s trackable like Geocaching’s travel bugs. But I can’t say I’m really into that part of Gowalla -yet.

Of course, Gowalla is a more virtual game, and is as such not really much suited for the family sunday trip with kids – the instant reward of having your toddler/child finding tupperware treasure chests in the woods is something Gowalla just can’t provide

For the Norwegian readers out there this piece on NRKBeta has more about Gowalla. Translated version here.

Fosshaug burde blitt bura inne i tillegg, men ein kan ikkje få alt ein ønsker seg her i verda.

Aftenposten ITPro Domenebloggen Dagens IT

Tidlegare har eg i alle fall prøvd å vere påpasseleg med å ikkje legge ut fødselsdatoen min på heimesida mi, Facebook, MSN og liknande. Då eg no vurderte å registrere meg som brukar hjå Eniro for å få skrudd av fødselsdatoen min blir eg møtt med dette bruksvilkåret:

Ja, jeg samtykker til at de personopplysninger jeg har lagt inn kan gjøres tilgjengelige i denne og andre søketjenester fra Eniro Norge AS.

Trur ikkje det, nei.

Denne saka har fått stor merksemd på Twitter under taggana #eniro og #enirofail, i tillegg til at nettavisene no ser ut til å hive seg på.

digi.no digi.no VG Dagbladet

And now I finally got a round to buying an iPhone 3G. And I try using BluePhoneElite with that as well – and it turns out it wasn’t the Nokia that was teh crap, it’s BluePhoneElite. And I bought a license for that piece of shit. Well, that pretty much concludes the whole use-laptop-as-phone-handsfree idea. Does not work. Am I doomed to be switching headphones for the rest of my life?

Enter AirPhones. Instead of using the laptop as a headset, I can now use my iPhone as speakers! It works pretty much like AirTunes, only you can not use an iPhone as an AirTunes speaker. AirPhones are even better, as they will also stream audio when playing video with iTunes ((Altough, it is rumoured it does not play the audio from VLC )) . As long as your Mac and your iPhone is on the same network – typically WiFi ((If you do not have wireless where you are you can always set up an Ad-Hoc wifi network. That works as well)) – you are able to use your iPhone as a speaker with either the built in speaker or headset. And when the phone rings AirPhones takes a break while you talk, then comes back. Pure bliss.

One little trick is to turn down the volume completely on your Mac before you start AirPhones. That way, when the phone rings you will not suddenly get music out of your internal speakers.

All in all, the best money I ever spent on the iPhone appstore. Thanks AirPhones! And remember – do the fancy dance.