Back in August 2009, I announced the release of a simple script called rypper which I wrote to wrap around zypper and provide the ability to make batch operations on repositories. Here are some example usages:
# list all disabled repos
rypper -d
# list all enabled repos with autorefresh off
rypper -e -R
# list all repos which have anything to do with KDE
rypper -x kde
# list priority and URIs for all repos whose alias contains 'home:'
rypper -a home: l -pu
# enable autorefresh on all OpenSUSE Build Service repos
rypper -u download.opensuse.org -R mr -r
# remove all repos on external USB HDD mounted on /media/disk
rypper -u /media/disk rr
I only got one response so I assumed it wasn’t that useful to other people.
However here I am at BrainShare EMEA in Amsterdam surrounded by like-minded geeks, and in a fit of enthusiasm / procrastination, I have finally got round to learning how to build openSUSE Build Service packages, and so proudly (?) present my first OBS package release: the 1-click install version of rypper. Enjoy!
Ouch. Arrived back home to a nice letter from Orange:
Great news. Every year we invite an exclusive group of customers to join our Premier Service for 12 months – and this year you’re one of them.
It went on to offer me a dedicated customer services and a USB dongle providing 3 months’ free mobile broadband, then 2p per MB after that. Amazingly generous, no? Then I realised why they’re being so nice to me:
I only just realised how lame getsatisfaction.com is:
- You can’t sort search results by popularity
- You can’t restrict search results to answered or unanswered questions
Well, that pretty much renders it totally useless right there, for both customers and companies, unless the community you’re searching is tiny, in which case why would you need the site anyway?
Oh yeah, and the undocumented boolean AND searches don’t work.
Staggering. (I’m praying someone will tell me I’m wrong about at least one of these.)
Update 2010/03/07: got a reply from getsatisfaction on search results sorting – I was right but there is a kind of lame alternative.
I just posted this on Motorola Europe’s facebook page:
Just got a Milestone and am impressed with the hardware but disappointed with Motorola’s attitude towards European customers regarding the closed bootloader. [An official statement from the manager of the technical team behind the MOTODEV program at Motorola] says “This practice is driven by a number of different business factors” but does not explain further – what are you hiding, Motorola? You seem to be underestimating
- (a) the potential of a technology community which promotes collaboration rather than hindering it (why do you think Android grew so quickly in the first place?), and
- (b) the importance of regular, open communication with your customers.
Sadly if this continues, I expect HTC and your other competitors will leave you far behind.
A few days ago whilst browsing the latest news on Quarq power-meters, I discovered that some very smart guys have answered my prayers and written a fabulous new piece of software called Golden Cheetah! Not only is it fully cross-platform and incredibly feature-rich, but it works natively with ANT+ devices via quarqd, and with the Computrainer not just in standard erg mode but also in online streaming mode allowing you train with someone on the other side of the Atlantic 
It’s becoming harder and harder to resist buying a Garmin Forerunner 310XT and a Quarq Cinqo Saturn … But perhaps most importantly of all, it’s free software released under the GPL. The authors really do “get it”:
We believe that cyclists should be able to download their power data to the computer of their choice, analyze it in whatever way they see fit, and share their methods of analysis with others.
If only companies like Suunto “got it” rather than shipping miserable excuses for software such as Suunto Training Manager… *sigh*. Anyway, looking forward to getting my media PC fixed and trying this out soon… maybe I’ll even find some time to help improve it
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