March roundup

March seems to have been busy, even though it feels as if nothing actually got done!

The content of our PoW Camp Summary got a boost, with new information, and the grid references of many of the locations.

Unfortunately, although we can plot location very quickly using lat/lon with our built-in Google mapping, this depends on international WGS84 lat/lon being known, rather than the parochial, local. British National Grid. We have written some code to convert this within the site, and do have modules to convert between coordinate systems, but this was not built into our mapping since we usually only needed one or two points in each case, rather than almost 100 as brought by the PoW Camp page. We tried a quick addition to the code to see if the British Grid figures could be converted on-they-fly and inserted into the existing market plotting function, and by initially limiting this operation to 6 digit NGRs, were able to slot this in very quickly, and add markers for all the camps (and also got the option of plotting 6 digit NGR directly too, without having to do the lat/lon conversion externally).

We haven’t finished this routine, although it works fine, but now that we’ve identified the relevant section of our code that breaks down the NGR into its relevant Eastings and Northings from the letter and number references, we’ll be returning to it so that it can be written properly, and will accept 4, 6, 8, or 10 digit NGRs without the need to tell it how many digits are involved, as at present.

This Blog has gone through a change during March, when the content net was spread a bit wider, and more generalised items were included. This will change again during the coming month, as it was a bit disappointing to find that it attracted adverse comments which had to be deleted, or led to problems arising with the reporting of some subjects.

The Scheduled Event section that appears at the bottom of The Forum reached an important milestone during March, as we reached the point where we started to add interesting dates and events last year (no, it wasn’t March). We decided to delete all the entries that fell into the category of “On This Day” which were being added to the Forum, and transfer them to Calendar Events. This seemed to make sense as it seemed to be a bit silly to be adding the same post to the Forum each year to mark an event which was recurring every year. That doesn’t mean to say no-one should add and event we don’t already have, they should, and we’ll add it to the Calendar Events so that it will appear automatically each year, on the appropriate date. At the moment, the events will appear two weeks in advance of their occurrence. There’s no great mystery about their source, as most of them have been spotted on the BBC’s On This Day feature, although this hasn;t been consulted religiously, and we don’t claim to have spotted every relevant event either, so there’s still plenty of opportunity for additions, and we’re still on the lookout for interesting items.

Mention also for the finalisation of the Discussion option for the site, which directs anyone that hits the Discussion Tab on the Main Site to the Discussion thread in the Forum, and will hopefully prevent the losses of info that we know have happened in the past, when the discussion tab added an all but invisible page to the system, only ever noticed by the Admins, if they happened to look in the right place.

The Discussion thread in the Forum is still being fettled, and will probably be heavily moderated, with irrelevant material being excised fairly mercilessly, as the Discussion is really an extension of the relevant page in the Main Site. The advantage will be that the Admins can add a link between the tow items, so that once established and accepted, it becomes easy to switch between the two, without having to work out what the url/address is.

I’m sure there’s probably something important I’ve forgotten to include, but I seem to be being forever diverted by whatever smote the server at the New Year (now memorialised by references to The Great Forum Disaster of 2008 – which was later found to much wider), as some other file problem pops up out of nowhere.

Currently I’m trying to track down what’s killing the Upload Tab on the Main Site pages. I released this a few months ago, and faithfully tested it was operating properly at the time. However, I’ve recently been alerted by a user that they were asked for a password when they tried to use it (which I would have happily given them, IF there was one programmed into the Upload option). I see someone else has offered to upload pics later, so am trying to track down whatever might have been fouled up at the turn of the year. I’m sure it’s no consolation to anyone trying to upload pics, but you’re not being victimised – even the Admin, who should have unfettered access everywhere, is currently being rejected when trying to upload test pics!

There will be a notice posted if/when we find the source of the Upload problem, but so far, can confirm that the cause is far from obvious.

David Leslie dies in aircraft crash

It was sad to see the news that David Leslie, 54, of Annan in Dumfries and Galloway, was one of five who died when a plane crashed into a house in Farnborough on Sunday afternoon. No-one on the ground was injured.

David Leslie won nine races during his 13 year British Touring Car Championship career, and finished second in the championship behind Frenchman Laurent Aiello in 1999, and had driven for six teams: BMW, Vauxhall, Mazda, Honda, Nissan and Proton, prior to his retiral from the sport in 2003.

His death in the crash of the private jet is the second such event involving a Scottish driver in less than a year, with the loss of Colin McRae in a helicopter crash last September, which also claimed the life of his son and two friends.

Numerous tributes have been paid to the driver by his colleagues, including Sir Jackie Stewart, quoted as saying Mr Leslie’s death was “a great loss to Scottish motor sport.”

We remember David Leslie as one of the memorable characters of the BTCC, a serious driver and racer who also had a sense of fun which he brought to the event (which seems all to serious nowadays), and was enjoyable both on the televised events, and the live events we were able to attend when the BTCC was finally encouraged to come north of the Border to Knockhill Racing Circuit.

It seems fitting to close with the comments reported from former Formula One driver David Brabham, who raced with Mr Leslie, and described him simply as a “great guy“…

“He was a very good driver and a distinguished gentleman,” he said. “It is the saddest news, both for his family and for the racing community.“

BBC video tribute from John Fife

Mosquito ban campaign

Looking through some articles in the local give-away paper, it was interesting to see that wherever someone comes up with an idea, someone else will immediately set up a group to oppose it.

Largely met with a positive response (by non-teen shop owners at least) the Mosquito Teen Repellant emits a high pitched sound every 20 minutes, and is installed outside premises to disperse youngsters who loiter at the door, and intimidate customers. The device emits a tone between 17.5 an 18.5 kHz, inaudible to those over 25 years of age or so.

Installed at some local shops, after consultation with police and local community leaders, the owners report that the device has reduced trouble and vandalism at their premises, and that they consider it to be a success.

However…

A campaigning group called “Buzz Off! Mosquito” is calling for the device to be banned across the UK.

(Odd, how these groups always go for the ‘Soft Target’, and are never to be seen going after vandals or gangs.)

The campaign was launched by Al Aynsley-Green,Children’s Commissioner for England, but is being supported by Kathleen Marshall, Children’s Commissioner for Scotland, who started working for a similar ban here last year. She brands the Mosquito as a “teen tormentor”, “teen repellent”, and describes it as an ultrasonic weapon used against children and young people indiscriminately, stating that “Its use would not be tolerated for any other section of our society. Young people have a right to assemble and socialise with their friends without being treated as criminals. There needs to be an outright ban on this device which affects not only teenagers, but also young children, babies and young people with disabilities.”

Your scribe suspects the campaigners don’t live in areas where the device is actually being used, or of what certain groups of young people do when they ‘assemble and socialise with their friends‘ at shops.

Glasgow: Scotland with Style flickrd

I happen to be born and bred Glaswegian, and the first thing I did when I saw the announcement of the Glasgow: Scotland with Style campaign was burst out laughing, then burst into tears when I saw it was serious:

Glasgow City Marketing Bureau is the official destination marketing agency for Glasgow with responsibility for positioning the city across its national and international markets and is custodian of the Glasgow: Scotland with Style brand.

It also operates the Convention Bureau, which is responsible for attracting conferences, meetings, exhibitions and events to Glasgow.

Glasgow City Marketing Bureau has a team of 40 staff engaged in Public Relations, Conventions Sales, Brand Marketing, Events, Events Marketing and Information Technology.

It is a not-for-profit body – funded by Glasgow City Council with contributions from the private sector.

Let me be immediately clear that I don’t have any problem with the aims of the organisation involved (does it take 40 to work through council funds though?), and the problem comes with the name/slogan/logo.

Does it imply that the only part of Scotland that has ‘Style’ is Glasgow?

Does it imply imply that everywhere else in Scotland has no ‘Style’? (And insults them as a consequence?)

The whole concept stinks, and is akin to someone declaring that they are the “World’s Greatest Genius”, or me declaring that “Secret Scotland” was the “Best Internet Site”. You’d laugh, and rightly so.

The only such titles that have any possible credibility are awarded by others, you may disagree with them, but they are at least not be self-awarded. Take for example 1990, when Glasgow was declared the European Capital of Culture. Some eyebrows may have been raised, but by and large, the year went well, didn’t insult anyone else, and didn’t smack of self-glorification.

It seems I was not alone in this thought, as I have just discovered a picture pool on flickr, dedicated to showing the city without the hypocritical slogan, the one they’d rather keep secret from the visitors they’re trying to attract.

Glasgow: Scotland with Style® on flickr

About Glasgow: Scotland with Style®

All photos that are SARCASTIC to the “Glasgow: Scotland with Style®” slogan.

Photos unrelated to the above will be deleted without notice; sorry, but that’s Glasgow.

When Glasgow reinvented itself as Scotland with Style we were amazed that no one was laughing apart from us. Glasgow isn’t populated by architects called Malcom; Saskia and Portia don’t sip lattes in pavement cafes and we don’t know anyone who works in fashion.

The city we know tends to be filled with brickies called Tam; Senga and Kylie drinking buckie behind the off license and we know lots of people who work in Fish and Chip shops.

We want photos of what Glasgow style really means.

To be frank, and with no prejudice to the flickr group, which I think is great, I would usually think twice about including anything which was particularly negative in its outlook, but the Scotland with Style campaign/logo just gets right up my nose, and I think the opportunity to promote Scotland with Sarcasm outweighs the potentially negative aspect of the subject.

On Time and Tourism

Your scribe admits a peculiar Sunday morning, having been out all day Saturday, then arriving home late and heading to bed without seeing papers, computers, or even television. Still, when you then get up so late that most of the day’s gone, missing one of the year’s two ‘Crazy Clock’ days has little actual impact.

It was interesting to see that Dr Mike Cantlay, convenor of Scotland’s first national park, Loch Lomond and The Trossachs National Park, has made a call for clocks to go forward one hour in February, rather than March.

The move is said to be one that would make the streets safer for children in the evening, and is backed by local police, tourism workers, and farmers. It is also suggested that it would be a simple way to gain energy savings, noting that at sunrise, most people are still tucked up in bed.

He specifically notes the daylight hours in the park, with sunrise before 06:00, daylight is already present before that. By the evening, darkness falls by 19:00. Moving the clocks in February would make little difference to the morning, but would yield and extra hour in the evening, benefiting outdoor activities.

Another local activity owner noted that at this time of year, families arrive in the afternoon, but are forced to leave early as darkness falls.

A local farmer observed that the move would allow more time to work with stock in the evenings.

Central Scotland police commented than they believed that more daylight in the evening would cut crime and help reduce anti-social behaviour.

One might wonder why the suggestion stops at February, if the idea of additional daylight at the end of the day, rather than the start, has so many clear advantages. January might be better still, and it may be that shifting the clocks back in October is also too early, and November might be better.

Perhaps it’s time to forget clock-shifting altogether, which was actually introduced as a productivity measure during World War II (and there was even double summer time once). Is there a smattering of smugness on the part of those who hold some sort of pious virtue in boasting about how early they are up and at their work in the morning, and pour scorn on those who don’t do likewise?

Regardless of the reasons, serious or otherwise, it is interesting to see traditional practices, possibly with little reason other than years of adherence, being questioned, and it will also be interesting to see if there is any future result.

Problems problems

I haven’t seen much of the site this week for various reasons, not least of which was a disastrous start to the week thanks to some careless coding in someone else’s part, actually TWO someone else’s to be accurate.

Like most involved in web sites, I have my own preferred text editors and FTP programmes to help maintain it, selected after many hours of frustration while trying to work out what I really want from them. While I may not hand-code everything (life’s too short!) I have no time for most of the software packages that claim to “Build you web site in minutes”, but that’s another story.

Coincidences have been figured heavily around me in the past few weeks, and coincidentally, I discovered both my text editor and FTP programmes had upgrades calling for attention. With no past heartache from previous upgrades, I launched both of these, and carried on happily – for all of five minutes.

First up was the text editor, not expecting any trouble, I ignored the odd start-up and carried on. Things seemed to be in order, it was certainly working AND had the promised php syntax highlighting marking my code nicely a feature not included with the last version. However, although it was working, the first time I went to use the Search Function, I found that the buttons were missing from the toolbar, and no amount of searching for preferences to restore them produced a result. Down went confidence level as I wondered if the problem was only their display, or something deeper.

Next was FTP. While this also fired up as usual, things began to deteriorate after I tried to transfer files. One of the handy options it has is to transfer files between the server and my choice of local text editor transparently. However, electing to edit a file now just brought up the editor’s local directory, and no amount of coercing would let be edit, view, or even open the desired file. So, down went confidence level even further than before.

This was the start of many lost hours, as I tried to work out if the programmes were now incompatible, or had to be installed in a particular order, or if either worked in the absence of the other. Completely deleting complete installation on multiple occasions, and restarting Windows each time to make sure the changes are fully configured can consume countless hours, and get very tedious.

Eventually I determined that both new versions of the programmes were faulty, and the symptoms described above would smite them regardless of their existence with one another.

Things are well though, as I now keep lots of old installations handy, and re-installed the predecessors of each, and both are working away quite happily as before.

I’ll be keeping an eye out for the next set of upgrades, and be scanning the version notes with an extra critical eye to see what’s been done this time, and watching carefully if/when I install them.

Once again, proof that having backups on hand is never a bad idea, even if they are a nuisance, take up space, and are never (ok, seldom) used.

Dounreay cleanup could have benefits

It was interesting to read of international interest being expressed in new methods and equipment being developed as part of the decommissioning work being undertaken on the former nuclear reactor site at Dounreay.

Developed by a company located near Thurso, one example given is that of a specialised camera and pump system created to drain the last of the coolant used in the PFR (Prototype Fast Reactor). Although most of the hazardous sodium coolant had been removed, some 5 tonnes of the original 900 tonne load still remained at the bottom of the reactor vessel. The problem of removing this last remnant was the depth, some 18 metres, and the temperature, around 200°C – the camera had to be cooled using nitrogen, as it would only operate up to 60°C.

Care has to be taken with sodium, as it is a caustic poison, and reacts exothermally with water, oxidising rapidly and producing heat, exploding if in sufficient volume. With a melting point of about 98°C, it was used to cool the PFR and extract heat, as an alternative to water/steam.

The second example given was of grouting using much finer materials than are normally used in civil engineering projects. Dounreay has a well-known shaft where waste material was dumped since 1959, unfortunately without due consideration of what was being dumped, and how the disposed material might combine and react over time. The shaft is some 66 metres deep, and was finally capped in 1977, after an explosion took place within it. In order to prevent ground water seeping into fine cracks in the ground around the shaft, boreholes have been sunk beneath it, and an unusually fine grouting material injected to seal the cracks, and prevent ground water reaching it.

Interest in the method has been attracted from tunnel builders in Finland, and nuclear waste storage sites operators in Finland.

Delays threaten Nimrod

RAF Kinloss in Moray is home to the country’s fleet of Nimrod reconnaissance aircraft, often referred to as ‘ageing’ in the media, it was due to to see the end of its service life in 2003. However, increasing costs and delays in the MRA4 replacement programme mean that it is now some eight years late, and £800 million over budget, leading MPs on the Commons Defence select committee to suggest that an order for eight replacement aircraft might as well be cancelled.

The (UK) Government has responded by stating that it remains committed to the MRA4 Nimrod replacement programme.

The current Nimrod MR2 has become of a matter of concern, with a number of relatively recent media stories referring to problems with the aircraft, and concerns over leaks in the fuel system. In September 2006, 14 crew members died (12 based at RAF Kinloss) when their aircraft crashed in service in Afghanistan.

Although the aircraft has seen considerable upgrading over the years, to extend its life, and the operator has said that it is operating satisfactorily, suggestions that the replacement programme be scrapped, without an alternative, have led to calls that such a move could put lives at risk if the existing aircraft are subsequently obliged to extend their operating lives even further than currently expected.

Inverness Cold War Comms Centre Sold

Part of the UNITER SSIN (Secure Survivable Integrated Network) created for the RAF by GPT (later Marconi) in the late 1970s, a nuclear hardened building which would have held part of the network at Fort George, Inverness, has been sold to a local company operating self-storage for people and business looking for somewhere safe to store valuable and documents.

The building has lain empty since the demise of the Cold War, when its 2 ft thick concrete walls, self-contained facilities such as water, heating, air-conditioning, and secure construction with no windows and steel entrance would have been expected to protect the communication facilities at its core secure for up to three months in the event of an attack.

The Inverness UNITER building can be seen in this aerial view.

Two further UNITER buildings are known in Scotland, one in Dunfermline, next to Knockill Racing Circuit, and the other in Prestwick, next to the airport.

UNITER is not an acronym, but a name chosen to reflect the original project’s aim of replacing disparate comms systems used throughout the RAF, which caused compatibility and continuity problems, and providing a united system which would have been robust if war had broken out.

Forth Road Bridge delays due

Bad weather and high winds have thrown the original schedule given below out of sync:

There will now be no lane restrictions on the bridge and the works have been rescheduled for 11-13 April. You should check locally as we may not be aware of any later changes!

It seems that there is seldom anything to write about the Forth Road Bridge that doesn’t revolve around tales of delays, with the last being caused by by work to remove the tollbooths after the toll was scrapped a few months back. However, unlike delays simply caused by traffic, current stories tend to centre on potential improvements.

This time the warning arises from works to install a new bus lane, scheduled to begin over the weekend of 28-30 March, 2008.

From 1900 GMT on Friday until 0800 GMT on Saturday traffic will be restricted to a single lane in both directions.

From 0800 GMT on Saturday until 0600 GMT on Monday northbound traffic will be restricted to one lane, but there will be no restrictions southbound.

For six weeks, from 0600 GMT on Monday, there will be two lanes open in both directions, but with narrow lanes northbound. The project is scheduled to be completed in mid-May.

During the works, the existing northbound bus stop at the north end of the bridge will be closed and a temporary bus stop will be put 300 metres to the north at the Welldean lay-by. The pedestrian and cycle path on the west side of the bridge will be closed to the public, as will the path from the Queensferry Hotel and the steps under the north end of the bridge. Pedestrian access to and from the temporary bus stop will be via the path which leads from the south end of the Welldean lay-by down onto the B981 and then via the footway on the west side of the B981.

Picture by Simon Johnston.