Momentarily Found in Thought

Best seafood we had was half way down from Genting

(download)

Posted June 19, 2011

Restoran Fu Kua or Bitter Gourd Restaurant

(download)

Posted June 19, 2011

My Samsung Galaxy S Woes

I kinda like my Galaxy S. My wife is a die hard iPhone user as is a very large number of Singaporeans, so I got a lot of strange looks when I said that I was not looking to purchase an iPhone, in fact it was not even in my consideration. Why would I want to carry the same phone as everyone else? Anyway I looked around and selected the Galaxy S when it just appeared on our shores and for a while I would tout its superiority over the iPhone 3GS. This was just before the iPhone 4 came out but after "antennagate". 

While I'm generally happy with it, my Samsung Galaxy S phone has a major problem. After a while, performance lags - badly. I have been reading online but all the solutions seem to require me to root my phone. I don't want to root it, and install a fix which may lock my phone. Was there a non root solution? Who do I ask? I came across justanswers.com. Ask your question, if you are satisfied with the answer, then pay. Ok, I asked my question. I get a profile of the expert and a cost of $23. Ok, I am willing to pay $23 for a non root solution, BUT who is justanswer.com? Are they legit? I expanded my search, read various reviews and comments and some of them were scary. After entering their credit card details, they wait for their answer which never comes and payment is deducted, sometimes more than what was recommended. So, no, I'll give them a pass.

So my question remains, is there a non root fix to the lag issue for the Galaxy S? 

Posted June 1, 2011

I didn't know Gmail could do that!

I've been using Gmail since August 2005. However, up until recently I have been using it strictly like any other webmail service like Yahoo or Hotmail. However last year my company started to move people onto Gmail and I was the "volunteer" for the department, you know, like the canary they send down the mine-shaft? Yea, that's me. Anyway I hated it. I mean Gmail is fine for personal stuff, but for work? You gotta be kidding me. I couldn't organise my emails into folders and it bugged the heck out of me, and I switched back to Outlook as my primary tool and once in a while, would pop back into Gmail to test it out.

A couple of months later, I was "reading" (aka listening to the audio version) "Getting Organized in the Google Era: How to Get Stuff out of Your Head, Find It When You Need It, and Get It Done Right (9780385528177): Douglas Merrill and James A. MArtin" and one particular principle struck me, "Don't organize your information; search for it." Why was I having so much difficulty with Gmail in the office? Because I couldn't organise my emails into folders. Why was I trying to organise them into folders? So that I can better find information. What! Duh! I didn't know Gmail could do that!

I took a closer look at my work Gmail, how does my mind work when it comes to compartmentalising my work-related information, I do it by projects. So I started creating filters for earch project by entering the relevant project name in the filer, "Has the words: ...", I then choose the action, "Apply the Label:" and here I entered the project name, and then I ticked Also apply filter to all the conversations below and finally, I clicked on "Create Filter".

Before I knew it, I had all my emails sorted out by projects and one of the best things is that an email can have multiple labels, so an email that talked about both Project A and Project C would have labels pertaining to the relevant projects, something I could not do in Outlook. When I wanted to see email trail relating to a particular project, I just select the relevant label and the entire email converation is there.

The other key factor which won me over to Gmail is the Search. I was always frustrated when I used the Search feature in Outlook, more often than not, I would not be able to find what I was looking for in Outlook and man was it slow. Search in Gmail is fast and more often than not, succeeds in finding the information I require.

Since then I started applying labels and filters to my personal emails even. Things that I don't read, solicited advertisements, promotions etc that I may find useful later, these goes straight into Archive. Bills are labelled in bright red to alert me that action is due, which is then converted into a task. Try it out, with the email open, click on "More actions", "Add to Tasks". You now have a To Do item that you can easily view by clicking on the "Task" label.

Anyway, here are more Gmail tips, tricks and secrets: 
http://email.about.com/od/gmailtips/Gmail_Tips_Tricks_and_Secrets.htm 

http://www.google.com/mail/help/tips.html 
 

Good Morning Vietnam!

Day 1 Vietnam Trip, SG - HCM - Danang Part 1

2010-12-10_16
The first thing that occurred to us when we boarded the Vietnam Airlines plane was that Vietnam is not the Land of a Thousand Smiles.In fact it was hard to even find a single smile amongst the crew that "served" us. Mind you, they were not rude, but there was no smile, no hellos, no thank-yous, you pleasant little courtesies that you would have expected from any service oriented industry. They were ... officious, and we encountered the same level of service of at HCM airport. I thought to myself, "What's wrong with you guys, you are behaving like communists." Oh, wait, yeah it slipped my mind. Maybe they were treating us like "comrades" rather than "customers"?

We were in HCM only briefly, just long enough to stumble around looking for the domestic airport, then standing in line to get our tickets to Danang and then another security check, oh yeah, we were going through as many security checks as I do ERP gantries.

Then we were on a domestic plane to Danang.What I can say is that the plane has seen better times, maybe like 10 years ago. We were sitting behind this lady with 2 very young children, and the stewardness was just stand overseeing the women trying to strap the two kids in. It was as if her job was to train the passenger to manage her kids and strap them in. I was telling Ting that they were more like security guards then air stewardess.

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This is one of the two kids, he is a cheeky little boy. A real handful for the mother.

The we landed in Danang, and were whisked away into a different world where we were pampered by the staff from the Resort the moment we entered the Airport Terminal.

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Check-in consisted of sitting at the lounge drinking Dragon Fruit juice straight from the fruit while the Resort staff prepared all the paper-work. Now this is what I have been waiting for all year. 

Customer Service - 3 misses, 1 recovery

What happens when you think that someone has been tampering with your mailbox? Well, I decided to make a police report. I Google Singpapore Police, went to the website and found their Electronic Police Centre (ePC). I knew they would have one having been involved with the Singapore government's drive to go electronic for the better part of the early 21st century. I made my report, and was greeted with an acknowledgement immediately as expected.  Then within minutes I received another email from a real (I assume) person acknowledging my report. This was followed by another email informing me that my report has been assigned to a certain person. Wow! That's nice. Good stuff. However that was the last time I heard from them  That was over 4 months ago. Singapore Police Force - Fail!

Now I lead a busy life and one of the things that I really don't like doing is standing in line, yet I am also averse to allowing my service providers to automatically reach in and take my money on a monthly basis. I kinda want to maintain the illusion that I have some control over my finances so last month I went into my bank site's website and instructed them to pay Singapore Power. A week later I did a quick check and wasn't sure if it had been deducted so I called Singapore Power.I got the automated service, expected that. I was prompted to select to enter either enter my NRIC number or my Account Number. I selected NRIC number. I entered and was told that as I had multiple accounts associated with my NRIC I must make another selection. Huh! I have multiple accounts tied to my NRIC? Now I was getting worried. I went back and seleted to enter my Account number, after keying in 3 - 4 digits, I am told that the account number was invalid. Now I had open my bill which I had received via email so I was pretty sure it's correct. Never mind I thought, I tried again and got the same message and the I got, "Your call is important to us, pls call back again". What! Huh! After I recovered from my shock I dropped them an email and received the auto acknowledgement. I waited 2 more days and still nothing. I then called and this time actually got a human being to answer my questions. The one question she couldn't answer is who designed their stupid system. Singapore Power - Fail!

Finally the famous rant against Starhub. Friends of mine would know this particular episode. Starhub changed their billing system about 3 months ago. I went to pay my bill through AXS and was not able to because I could not enter the new alpha numeric account number. Oh and also they spell my last name wrong - Fattiselanno. Anyway, I called and the lady seemed very helpful, and when she suggested that I go down to Starhub to make the change, I politely pointed out that I had been a customer since the 1990's and they should have the correct spelling of my name. She agreed and finally she suggested that I drop by 7/11 to make the payment. Ok, issue solved. Come next month, same issues! I still couldn't pay through AXS, I tried paying through my bank without success and the 7/11 next to my office could not scan my bill. Add to that, they still spelt my name wrong. I called up and was put on hold for over 30 minutes! Boy was I mad when the customer service officer came online. To make mattes worst, while not openly hostile she was not exactly sweet, charming or friendly. She made no attempt to diffuse the situation and when she again suggested I drop by Starhub to do the name change, I blew up. Gave her a piece of my mind and more. Starhub - FAIL BIG TIME!

The Recovery? Well, surprise-surprise, it was Starhub or rather starhubcares on Twitter. I twitted my issues, and got a response pretty quickly. Within a couple of days, I was speaking to a customer service officer who explained why I could not pay my bills electronically and adviced me on the solution and she ensured that my name change took effect. How did I know this? I got my bill today and was very delighted to see that once again I'm Pattiselanno. starhubcares - Pass!

 

 

 

Dinner @ in-laws

2010-08-20_20

Best meals are served at home. Hakka feast at the in-laws.

Sent from Samsung mobile

A Bible verse for you!

“An angry man stirs up dissension, and a hot-tempered one commits many sins.”

– Proverbs 29:22

“iTalk to God” comment: Your anger affects others and causes you to sin. Ask God to calm your hot temper.


Sent using “iTalk to God” application for iPhone, iPod Touch, Java, and Symbian phones.

http://www.worldlinkapps.com/apps/italktogod/index.shtml


Sent from my iPod

The Bible and "Allah" issue in Malaysia

I was very disturbed and angered by the firebombing of a church in
Malaysia over the controversy of the use of Allah for the name of God
in some bibles (read
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iXTElj3miGieEBuBdQ1alAqX3jWA).
If the idiots who did it did so in the name of Islam, then they have
done their god no favour for people will see their faith through their
actions. The so called moderate Muslim UMNO have taken a stand that
“Allah” is exclusive to Islam (read
http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/index.php/malaysia/48834-umno-selangor-wan...,
which of course flies in the face of history since the use of the name
Allah predates Islam and was used by Arab Christians as well (see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allah#Pre-Islamic_Arabia).

Some people may say that the bombing was done by a miniscule minority,
but if the majority does nothing, this minority will strengthen and be
embolden to do more harm in the name of their version of Islam. By
playing to the mob, the government has shown themselves to be
short-sighted, self-serving and ignorant. If Christians in Egypt and
Syria call upon God, Allah, why are they not allowed to do so in
Malaysia?