Happy Birthday to Uncle Clive Sinclair. Where would I be today if not for him? Happy Birthday too to Daley Thompson, the man who carried a moustache further, faster and longer than any other athlete in history. Sir, I salute you. And Happy Birthday to Kate Bush. Kate, ah Kate. Ah. Kate.

In almost direct contradiction to my less-power efforts I have, like m'chum John, gone dual-head.

When I first started programming for actual money, the start of the art was a 14-inch monitor running at 640x480 pixels. Once of the first big requisitions I made was for a 15-inch monitor, so I could work at 800x600. Woo!

Last week, I bought a shiny new 19-inch flat panel (ViewSonic VX922 if you're interested) to buddy up with my faithful old Iiyama 19-inch crt. That gives a thumping 2560 by 1024 pixels, which is just mind-boggling really. Over 2 and half million of the little blighters, and they're mine! All mine!

Like John, I have one monitor, the TFT, dead ahead and the second to the left. I'm still experimenting, but at the moment I put email, IM and webbrowser, notes, documentation, and whatnot off on the left hand side, while I work on the main screen. It really is rather good fun and there's less fiddling and moving things around and closing things and opeing them again. And you do feel like saying On-screen.

In an effort to cut down the background noise and heat (topical) in my computing lab (attic), I'm in the process of setting up a little NAS. A NAS is a hard-drive that you plug into your network, which you can stuff all your data onto. It's quieter and cooler and uses less power than using a PC, so hurrahs all round for that.

They're also pretty cheap, considering what you're actually buying is a fully fledged computer in a very small box. If you actually go out to buy a computer in a small box, they tend to cost a fortune. Go out and buy a Sky box, an XBox, a cable modem or a NAS and by jiminy they're cheap.

I've bought a Buffalo LinkStation and I'm now debating whether to risk buggering it up by reflashing it and trying to get it run a CVS server. I wonder if it's got enough grunt to act as an Email toaster? Then I could turn off another box as well.

It is very quiet. It's not silent, but it's nowhere near the clatter of PC. My big box sounds like a jet engine when it's cool, let alone hot, so it's more than drowned out by that :)

I'm still copying all my data on to it, but it seems to do the business. Plug it in, run the initial set up (which you seem to have to do from a Windows box), and off you go. Once it's up and running, you can administer it all through a web interface. It'll run with a static or dynamic address, you set up as many shares as you like with open or restricted access and what-not. Out of the box, it'll do FTP too. It does what it says on the tin :)

If you reflash it, you seem to be able to do pretty much what you like. There are people running SlimServer on it, but I think you'd lose RealAudio streams. LinkStations run MIPS and it looks like the codecs aren't available. I'd like to run a CVS server and maybe SSH. I've seen a report of someone running SVN, so it must be doable. An email server in a box would be top too. And maybe a cool secondary market :)

I bought the LinkStation because it's got a build in power supply, so there's less underdesk clutter. The Maxtor NASes are comparable in terms of features, and they are also nicely hackable.

School fair on Saturday and my Dad-fu was strong. Nattle had volunteered me to do stint on the arts and craft stall making paper planes. Trained engineer that I am, I prepared by mugging up on a couple of easy yet not-playground common designs. On the internet! Woo! So I sat, in the blazing sun, showing kids how to make planes and they all seemed to like it. The planes were, I was repeated told, awesome (largely because they actually flew, I think). I couldn't help but notice the odd Dad hovering and watching while pretending not to watch. Yes!

L33t paperplane skillz are just one way that you too can increase your Dad-(uncle/uncle-by-familiarity/adult-chum)-fu. You could also try one or all of the following -

• keepy-uppy
• juggling
• owning a TVR and giving your children's friends lifts home in it
• making balloon animals
• rolling a pen or coin through your fingers
• twirling a broom or other household tool in one or both hands, as if you a cheap extra in an episode of The Water Margin

As someone who has purchased Operating Systems books, you might like to know that "IBM i5/iSeries Primer : Concepts and Techniques for Programmers, Administrators, and System Operators" is now available in paperback.

Yup.

Following the statement in the House of Commons announcing that more troops would be sent to Afghanistan, Sir Peter Tapsell asked the following question

Will the Secretary of State please convey to the Prime Minister my continuing conviction that sending British troops into Afghanistan is like throwing kerosene on to a burning tent, and that the more troops we send, the higher and fiercer the flames will burn in Afghanistan, throughout the Islamic world and on the streets of this country?

When I heard this on the radio it immediately struck me as a strange phrase - throwing kerosene on to a burning tent. Kerosene? Not the first fuel that springs to mind in the "throwing on to" context, nor for that matter is a tent. Kerosene does burn in a jolly impressive way, though. So do tents. A tent on fire burns so strongly and quickly, that there's no time to throw anything on it. So Sir Peter's metaphor seems entirely at odds with what he goes on to say - the higher and fiercer the flames will burn in Afghanistan, throughout the Islamic world and on the streets of this country. He clearly thinks this is a long term situation which will only be worsened by additional troops. More like throwing a few good solid logs onto a bonfire, perhaps, because that will surely burn longer and hotter and higher. But that's a bit of a mouthful too.

By rejecting the commonplace throwing fuel on the fire, Sir Peter attempts to give his point more weight, and indicate more than usual consideration. It's a small thing, but perhaps his misjudged metaphor betrays a wider lack of thought about this situation?