Bulk Updates

There are a few things for me to bitch... ahem... er blog about, so I'm just going to list them out:

1) I needed a simple report from my optician for my insurance company. I tried calling him but the receptionist insisted that I visit. So I took an appointment and turned up dot on 10am to visit him. He was ofcourse late and overbooked, so I didn't end up seeing him till 11am. At which point, he looks at me and without so much as a Hello, simple asks "What do you want?". I appreciate he's a good doctor, but a few pleasentries/manners would go a long way.

2) I visited the new Forum Value Mall in Whitefield last weekend and I'm really surprised at how poorly designed the whole thing is. At first glance it looks huge and shiny, that is ofcourse till you realise that it only has 30ish shops, the ceiling leaks because it's a temporary canvas structure with holes, and there's only one escalator & two lifts. The worst things though are the traffic management. The car park is bi-directional, meaning you have to watch out for on-coming traffic - which would be easier if you could see round corners, they certainly haven't provided any mirrors to help you. That is ofcourse if you can find your way out of the car park, several strategic signs, like "Way Out" are missing, which makes the act of leaving somewhat tougher than it really should be. To compound this awfulness, the whole structure is built on a tiny two lane road, which really can't handle the enormous volume of traffic that the mall generates - turning the immediate area into a giant parking lot. The only good thing about the place is the fact that there's a cinema within walking distance! Yay! The McDonalds ?KFC are fattening but nice too :)

3) Ubuntu 9.04 is really damn slick ! Seriously, all the minor Intel video chipset issues aside, it's really really neat. It boots in about 10 seconds and shuts down in half that time. The WiFi manager is just brilliant, far far better than the one in 8.04 and definately alot better than the Windows manager. Most cruicially though, the new display management system is everything I've ever wanted ! No joke. I can finally plug in any monitor and have it do *exactly* what I want it to. Without having to traverse a million windows menu or any brain-surgery-like xorg-editing. Just a simple click on a very intuitive display manager. My advice ? Upgrade. Even though I'll bitch about the Avant Window Manager not working for another month or so.

Kam