I put in some very basic TV listings in Rebot and that seemed to go down fairly well. Slim then pointed out Radio Times which has a very nice straightforward set of TV and radio listings. I went a little crazy with this stuff and put in some mad TV/radio stuff into Rebot.
First off, we have a basic tv listings feature. The command is just 'tv' and if you don't give a time, it returns what's on now. Optionally you can give it a time in 24 hour format. Here's an example;
rebot tv 01:30
BBC1 (1): Sign Zone: The Life of Mammals, BBC2 (2): Getting It Right, ITV1 London (3): Doomsday Virus, Channel 4 (4): 4 Music: Carling Homecoming, Five (5): NHL Ice Hockey, Discovery Channel (6): Scrapheap Challenge, E4 (7): Faking It, Sky 1 (8): Andromeda, UK Gold (9): Spooks.
Now here's the clever bit, see the numbers in brackets? Well what I've done is cache the unique channel and program id values for any listings display or search. So you use the findlisting command followed by the number, and you'll get a bunch more information about that show. Witness;
rebot findlisting 9
Spooks on UK Gold 12:40am to 1:50am Thursday 30 January:
Drama series set behind the scenes of the modern British Security Service. Anti-capitalist demonstrations are growing in intensity as President Bush prepares to visit the UK. MI5 hero Peter Salter, in a joint operation with MI6, aims to infiltrate a known anarchist's group - but is he really working for the sake of his country, or has he fallen under the spell of an entirely different cause?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/spooks - Spooks.
Not only that but we also have search features! Search operates for radio and television with findradio and findtelevision commands respectively. Let's take a look;
rebot findtv ER
1. 'ER' on E4, 9:30pm-10:30pm - Thursday 30 January.
2. 'Trauma: Life in the ER' on Discovery Channel, 12:00am-1:00am - Friday 31 January.
3. 'ER' on E4, 12:00am-12:55am - Friday 31 January.
4. 'Wildlife ER' on Animal Planet, 8:00am-8:30am - Saturday 01 February.
5. 'Wildlife ER' on Animal Planet, 9:00pm-9:30pm - Saturday 01 February.
It will show a maximum of 5 hits. The results are cached in the same way so we can obtain some further information for the hit we have;
rebot findlisting 1
ER on E4 9:30pm to 10:30pm Thursday 30 January:
Drama series set in the busy emergency room of a Chicago hospital. Gallant gets upset over the callous treatment his colleagues give to an elderly patient under his care, and confronts Pratt for reporting a suicidal army ranger whose secret Gallant promised to protect.
http://www.nbc.com/er - Official ER site.
Cool eh? I haven't done current listings for radio yet but I'll get around to it. However the search stuff and further listings are available for radio just the same;
rebot findradio funk
1. 'Craig Charles Funk Show' on BBC6 Music, 7:00pm-10:00pm - Friday 31 January.
2. 'Craig Charles Funk Show' on BBC6 Music, 6:00pm-9:00pm - Saturday 01 February.
3. 'Norman Jay Funk Show' on BBC6 Music, 8:00pm-11:00pm - Friday 07 February.
4. 'Craig Charles Funk Show' on BBC6 Music, 6:00pm-9:00pm - Saturday 08 February.
Can't say fairer than that!
Thursday, 30 January 2003
Further adventures in house buying [venusxl]
So continuing our theme from yesterday, yet more further proof that this country is full of back stabbing judas cocklords.
Today my solicitors, Shitstain & Co, finally got our searches back and were ready to exchange. Horah - bake a fucking cake. SO I chase up the chain and they say 'horah, we are all ready to move next week' so I let my buying know, she wires her cash at some expense so we can go fot it pronto after such a long wait, and the wheels of ineptness again begin to turn.
Her solicitor releases the paper to mine, mine to the next one and so on. Then we get to the the person beyond the house I am buying and the backstabbing twats change their mind about the date and now want the 28th of Feb!
FFS that's miles away - I'll be in Pink Pimp mode by then and need to be nearer London etc. Half our house is packed already and we have been hanging around for months. Now I respect that they have the right to insist on four weeks but how selfish is that? There are three other parties in the chain all chomping at the bit to move and have been preparing etc and these selfish shits hold it up.
This whole house buying and selling system is royally fucked up. We found the house we're buying, and sold ours, back in October and we'll be moving on the cusp of March. No end of hassles and stress over paper chains etc. Pfft.
This country!
Today my solicitors, Shitstain & Co, finally got our searches back and were ready to exchange. Horah - bake a fucking cake. SO I chase up the chain and they say 'horah, we are all ready to move next week' so I let my buying know, she wires her cash at some expense so we can go fot it pronto after such a long wait, and the wheels of ineptness again begin to turn.
Her solicitor releases the paper to mine, mine to the next one and so on. Then we get to the the person beyond the house I am buying and the backstabbing twats change their mind about the date and now want the 28th of Feb!
FFS that's miles away - I'll be in Pink Pimp mode by then and need to be nearer London etc. Half our house is packed already and we have been hanging around for months. Now I respect that they have the right to insist on four weeks but how selfish is that? There are three other parties in the chain all chomping at the bit to move and have been preparing etc and these selfish shits hold it up.
This whole house buying and selling system is royally fucked up. We found the house we're buying, and sold ours, back in October and we'll be moving on the cusp of March. No end of hassles and stress over paper chains etc. Pfft.
This country!
Wednesday, 29 January 2003
So it's war then? [lurks]
I want to talk about Iraq. Now before I do, here's an executive summary of the events leading up to today.
Back in September, a mild mannered 72 year-old Swede called Dr Hans Blix was sent into to Iraq as head of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (Unmovic). There he was to act on the latest UN security council resolutions and directly oversee the weapons inspection process. The mandate of this process was the result of the accelerated response to the US and Britain's demand that there be brought some closure to the existing breaches.
This new accelerated timetable is loosly bound under UN Resolution 1441, and this is important because of Iraq is held in material breach of this resolution, then it wont just be the US and Britain backing military action - the UN Security Council wont really have any option but to ratify military intervention.
What Iraq has had to do in order to comply with Resolution 1441 is to provide full and complete documentation on it's entire military capability. It must also document weapons of mass destruction and prove that these are being destroyed - preferably being overseen by Unmovic. What it did was provide a huge document detailing most of what was asked for with a lot of extra smoke and mirrors. It also failed to account for any of the weapons of mass destruction which were previously discovered in Iraq by weapons inspectors before that process ground to a halt thanks to Iraqi non cooperation.
When we say that it fails to account for those weapons, this includes 6,500 chemical warheads and tons of VX nerve gas. These weapons did exist, they were seen. To comply with 1441 they should have been listed in the document with proof that they had been destroyed or Unmovic informed and asked to oversee said destruction. Instead there was no mention whatsoever.
This is actually a material breach of UN resolution 1441. However various moderate UN members have been dead set against the logical conclusion that this would pave the way for military action. That in itself is not surprising since Iraq has been in breach of a great many UN resolutions for the last 11 years.
Now today, we're at the final stage of the implementation of resolution 1441. Hans Blix has made his final report on the state of Iraqi disarmament. The key thing to remember here is that Hans Blix's teams were not in Iraq looking for WMDs or 'smoking guns' as Western media is calling them. They are actually there to oversee Iraqi's disarmament. It seems to me there's a great misunderstanding on what Iraq has been ordered to do. Hans Blix was not supposed to go looking for WMDs, he's supposed to be overseeing the destruction of those which Iraq possessed at the time of the gulf war.
That's what lead Hans Blix to say today;
'Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptance - not even today - of the disarmament which was demanded of it.'
So where do we go from here? Various people are calling for more time. They'll get it because it's going to be awhile until forces are in place anyway. Nothing will become of this, probably Iraq will start getting antsy and obstructive as they ready for conflict and the weapon inspectors will need to pull out. This is most likely to happen inside of a month.
Now what? The UN security council is comprised of 5 permanent members. These guys have veto, ultimately, in military action. That's the UK, Russia, France, China and of course the United States. Let me tell you what happens. If there is a motion for military action; the UK and USA will go 'Yes'. Russian and China will grumble away and abstain their vote. France will also complain bitterly but ultimately vote 'Yes'.
So that's the permanent five resolved. Now all that is required is the rest of the 9 votes. There's ten elected members of the security council. Given the 3 votes on the permanent five, that leaves 6 more votes required. Here's the other members; Germany, Guinea, Mexico, Pakistan, Spain, Syria, Angola, Bulgaria, Cameroon and Chile.
Without writing an even longer blog on the reasons, here's how I predict how the temporary security council voting will go; Germany will vote no. Guinea, Mexico, Pakistan and Spain will vote yes. Syria will probably vote no. Angola, Bulgaria, Cameroon and Chile will probably vote yes. That's 8 yes votes most likely with the 3 on the permanent 5 as well taking it to 13 votes. Motion carried. War.
Back in September, a mild mannered 72 year-old Swede called Dr Hans Blix was sent into to Iraq as head of the UN Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission (Unmovic). There he was to act on the latest UN security council resolutions and directly oversee the weapons inspection process. The mandate of this process was the result of the accelerated response to the US and Britain's demand that there be brought some closure to the existing breaches.
This new accelerated timetable is loosly bound under UN Resolution 1441, and this is important because of Iraq is held in material breach of this resolution, then it wont just be the US and Britain backing military action - the UN Security Council wont really have any option but to ratify military intervention.
What Iraq has had to do in order to comply with Resolution 1441 is to provide full and complete documentation on it's entire military capability. It must also document weapons of mass destruction and prove that these are being destroyed - preferably being overseen by Unmovic. What it did was provide a huge document detailing most of what was asked for with a lot of extra smoke and mirrors. It also failed to account for any of the weapons of mass destruction which were previously discovered in Iraq by weapons inspectors before that process ground to a halt thanks to Iraqi non cooperation.
When we say that it fails to account for those weapons, this includes 6,500 chemical warheads and tons of VX nerve gas. These weapons did exist, they were seen. To comply with 1441 they should have been listed in the document with proof that they had been destroyed or Unmovic informed and asked to oversee said destruction. Instead there was no mention whatsoever.
This is actually a material breach of UN resolution 1441. However various moderate UN members have been dead set against the logical conclusion that this would pave the way for military action. That in itself is not surprising since Iraq has been in breach of a great many UN resolutions for the last 11 years.
Now today, we're at the final stage of the implementation of resolution 1441. Hans Blix has made his final report on the state of Iraqi disarmament. The key thing to remember here is that Hans Blix's teams were not in Iraq looking for WMDs or 'smoking guns' as Western media is calling them. They are actually there to oversee Iraqi's disarmament. It seems to me there's a great misunderstanding on what Iraq has been ordered to do. Hans Blix was not supposed to go looking for WMDs, he's supposed to be overseeing the destruction of those which Iraq possessed at the time of the gulf war.
That's what lead Hans Blix to say today;
'Iraq appears not to have come to a genuine acceptance - not even today - of the disarmament which was demanded of it.'
So where do we go from here? Various people are calling for more time. They'll get it because it's going to be awhile until forces are in place anyway. Nothing will become of this, probably Iraq will start getting antsy and obstructive as they ready for conflict and the weapon inspectors will need to pull out. This is most likely to happen inside of a month.
Now what? The UN security council is comprised of 5 permanent members. These guys have veto, ultimately, in military action. That's the UK, Russia, France, China and of course the United States. Let me tell you what happens. If there is a motion for military action; the UK and USA will go 'Yes'. Russian and China will grumble away and abstain their vote. France will also complain bitterly but ultimately vote 'Yes'.
So that's the permanent five resolved. Now all that is required is the rest of the 9 votes. There's ten elected members of the security council. Given the 3 votes on the permanent five, that leaves 6 more votes required. Here's the other members; Germany, Guinea, Mexico, Pakistan, Spain, Syria, Angola, Bulgaria, Cameroon and Chile.
Without writing an even longer blog on the reasons, here's how I predict how the temporary security council voting will go; Germany will vote no. Guinea, Mexico, Pakistan and Spain will vote yes. Syria will probably vote no. Angola, Bulgaria, Cameroon and Chile will probably vote yes. That's 8 yes votes most likely with the 3 on the permanent 5 as well taking it to 13 votes. Motion carried. War.
Tuesday, 28 January 2003
CENSORED BY #EED [venusxl]
God this country is pissing me off at the moment. Not just the normal shit like Popstars TV shows etc but proper annoying shit. Mainly my solicitor. You see Mrs venusXL and I have been trying to move since OCTOBER and still have not exchanged contracts. When we looked into house buying/selling we knew it was going to be hassle but by being prepared we hoped to avoid it. Foolish children. When selecting a Solicitor I rang around them all and got quotes. As many of you would do, we went with the cheapest. These guys, Shitstains & Co. were half the price of anyone else so it seemed a bit too good to be true. I rang again and asked why so cheap - 'Because we only do house work sir - we specialise and therefore can save cash'. Sounds reasonable so away we went...
Well to cut a long story short - they are incompetent worms. Sub-human scum. Pondlife. They lie and mislead us all the time and have absolutely NO customer service skills. They don't not apply for things when they say they have and then lie about it. You may have gripes with my current employers, but we really are a punter focused company. It amazes me to encounter one so shit at it and still in business. The problem is there is no e-pinions site about these wankers.
Any suggestions on warning the world from using these people? There doens't seem to be a opinions site on Legal firms warning you not to use them, yet they provide a important service.
We will be complaining to the Law Society after its all done.
So talking about shit customer service peons brings us neatly onto your favorite firm; NTL. Now Shitstains & Co have finally sorted out our move I can call NTL to arrange to get my TV and net etc all moved on the same day. Call up, listen to robot for option 'Moving house click 4', get through to peon and he needs to pass me off to the moving dept (I thought that was the point of the options!). So wait 11 mins (yes I timed it, it gives you something to do when you call NTL) and get through to lady who takes my details then says she can't help as I am moving to another franchise area!
ARGHHH! This country!!!!
I then politely gave her my opinion in this i.e. I don't care - I called NTL as I have kindly decided not to go with Sky/BT and I want NTL to thank me and arrange it all for me with no hassles. In fact the lack of hassles was the deciding factor in sticking with these worms, I have heard many moans from folks trying to co-ordinate the installation of BT Telephones, Sky TV and then BT Broadband and decided the easier life was sticking with NTL.
So that's the competitive state of play in the UK now - we make choices based on whom we perceive to be least shit!
Pfft.
This blog has been CENSORED by evil [EED]Amnesia who is protecting the vested interests of his CORRUPT profession!
Well to cut a long story short - they are incompetent worms. Sub-human scum. Pondlife. They lie and mislead us all the time and have absolutely NO customer service skills. They don't not apply for things when they say they have and then lie about it. You may have gripes with my current employers, but we really are a punter focused company. It amazes me to encounter one so shit at it and still in business. The problem is there is no e-pinions site about these wankers.
Any suggestions on warning the world from using these people? There doens't seem to be a opinions site on Legal firms warning you not to use them, yet they provide a important service.
We will be complaining to the Law Society after its all done.
So talking about shit customer service peons brings us neatly onto your favorite firm; NTL. Now Shitstains & Co have finally sorted out our move I can call NTL to arrange to get my TV and net etc all moved on the same day. Call up, listen to robot for option 'Moving house click 4', get through to peon and he needs to pass me off to the moving dept (I thought that was the point of the options!). So wait 11 mins (yes I timed it, it gives you something to do when you call NTL) and get through to lady who takes my details then says she can't help as I am moving to another franchise area!
ARGHHH! This country!!!!
I then politely gave her my opinion in this i.e. I don't care - I called NTL as I have kindly decided not to go with Sky/BT and I want NTL to thank me and arrange it all for me with no hassles. In fact the lack of hassles was the deciding factor in sticking with these worms, I have heard many moans from folks trying to co-ordinate the installation of BT Telephones, Sky TV and then BT Broadband and decided the easier life was sticking with NTL.
So that's the competitive state of play in the UK now - we make choices based on whom we perceive to be least shit!
Pfft.
This blog has been CENSORED by evil [EED]Amnesia who is protecting the vested interests of his CORRUPT profession!
Hands off the BBC! [lurks]
We've all had a bit of a moan at the BBC in recent times. It's a dinosaur that increasingly combines the worst of the public sector (horrible inefficiency) with the worst of commercial (dumbing down, ratings driven) broadcasting. Yet for all that, in recent times they've embraced digital television and the Internet and started to bring us services which we do use.
Yet apparently there's a tosspot Labour MP up in leafy lane the sticks which is advocating that the BBC scrap all digital activity. This bloke actually sits on the media select committee, here's a class quote;
'It is outrageous how much the BBC spends, unchecked by its pathetic board of governors, on its internet sites'
Presumably it spends more than the taxpayers does on his site and that can't possible be fair eh Derek?
I don't know what model this imbecile thinks that Britain should follow but clearly he places no value on having a whole range of minority content services in the media supported by the State. He obviously places no value on high quality content at all or at least believes that somehow commercial operators are suddenly going to start broadcasting unbiased news, minority and educational programming and other world-class content on their own account.
I think the BBC definitely needs a clean up. I think it probably ought to be broken up to some degree and budgets more tightly reigned. It think it could benefit from some private sector work ethic but similarly I think that it needs to realise it's not a strictly commercial operator and has certain obligations to uphold. I'm particularly annoyed at the yearly axing of science output in favor of me-too reality TV shite like Fame Academy.
However digital channels and Internet content should be the thrust of the state's subsidy for the benefit of the nation! Let's not let ignorant technophobe labour zombies ruin one of the greatest assets of the country eh?
Yet apparently there's a tosspot Labour MP up in leafy lane the sticks which is advocating that the BBC scrap all digital activity. This bloke actually sits on the media select committee, here's a class quote;
'It is outrageous how much the BBC spends, unchecked by its pathetic board of governors, on its internet sites'
Presumably it spends more than the taxpayers does on his site and that can't possible be fair eh Derek?
I don't know what model this imbecile thinks that Britain should follow but clearly he places no value on having a whole range of minority content services in the media supported by the State. He obviously places no value on high quality content at all or at least believes that somehow commercial operators are suddenly going to start broadcasting unbiased news, minority and educational programming and other world-class content on their own account.
I think the BBC definitely needs a clean up. I think it probably ought to be broken up to some degree and budgets more tightly reigned. It think it could benefit from some private sector work ethic but similarly I think that it needs to realise it's not a strictly commercial operator and has certain obligations to uphold. I'm particularly annoyed at the yearly axing of science output in favor of me-too reality TV shite like Fame Academy.
However digital channels and Internet content should be the thrust of the state's subsidy for the benefit of the nation! Let's not let ignorant technophobe labour zombies ruin one of the greatest assets of the country eh?
Friday, 24 January 2003
Decent telly? [lurks]
This here is a blog about television. If you've seen any good stuff on TV that you're enjoying, post it here. I stare at the schedule and nothing takes my fancy at all but I'm sure there's buried gems. I stumbled across a couple over the last couple of weeks.
Firstly, BBC1 has a law drama on called Trust. It's BBC production and it is, bizarrely, corporate law rather than criminal. It's good though, really good. Check it out, I think it's on Thursday night.
Next up, show that was on last night on the Discovery channel called Thunder Races. Reminiscent of Scrapyard Challenge/Junkyard Wars, they give three teams £800 and they have to buy a wreck and do it up into a rally car. Then race the rally car around a pretty gruelling course. Unlike the former programs, the presenter actively riles up the teams (in the same garage) to get a sense of competition going. It works well and I love the way he just comes up to people slacking and gives them shit. It's on Mondays at 8.
Other than that, not much. I see World is Not Enough is on tonight on ITV - doubtless the last half hour interrupted by the News. I see BBC1's Red Cap drama is on tonight as well, it's about military police based in Germany. I only saw one episode and it was so-so, anyone else like it?
So what you lot watchin'?
Firstly, BBC1 has a law drama on called Trust. It's BBC production and it is, bizarrely, corporate law rather than criminal. It's good though, really good. Check it out, I think it's on Thursday night.
Next up, show that was on last night on the Discovery channel called Thunder Races. Reminiscent of Scrapyard Challenge/Junkyard Wars, they give three teams £800 and they have to buy a wreck and do it up into a rally car. Then race the rally car around a pretty gruelling course. Unlike the former programs, the presenter actively riles up the teams (in the same garage) to get a sense of competition going. It works well and I love the way he just comes up to people slacking and gives them shit. It's on Mondays at 8.
Other than that, not much. I see World is Not Enough is on tonight on ITV - doubtless the last half hour interrupted by the News. I see BBC1's Red Cap drama is on tonight as well, it's about military police based in Germany. I only saw one episode and it was so-so, anyone else like it?
So what you lot watchin'?
Thursday, 23 January 2003
Phillips EXP511 MP3 CD player [shedwork]
I'll get the hang of this soon.
OK got this as a replacement for the goodmans the wife got me for xmas. Fantastic player tbh. £75 at amazon.
You can even get firmware upgrades for it! Very neat, reads CDR and CDRW. Stores up to 2000 favourites across your mp3 CD collection. Wee remote has a tie clipon, which goes onto my jacket of course, so you can change album/track easily.
ID3 tags scroll across the face of it to help you keep track of what you're listening too, not on the remote though, but it's not backlit so bit of a prob there.
All in all for the money it's damn fine, audio quality is superb with 480 seconds of anti shock protection. So even in an earthquake I can listen to da blues.
That is all, you have the link see for yourself!
OK got this as a replacement for the goodmans the wife got me for xmas. Fantastic player tbh. £75 at amazon.
You can even get firmware upgrades for it! Very neat, reads CDR and CDRW. Stores up to 2000 favourites across your mp3 CD collection. Wee remote has a tie clipon, which goes onto my jacket of course, so you can change album/track easily.
ID3 tags scroll across the face of it to help you keep track of what you're listening too, not on the remote though, but it's not backlit so bit of a prob there.
All in all for the money it's damn fine, audio quality is superb with 480 seconds of anti shock protection. So even in an earthquake I can listen to da blues.
That is all, you have the link see for yourself!
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