Author: Trefor Davies

Liver of life, father of four, CTO of trefor.net, writer, poet, philosopherontap.com

St Patrick’s Day celebration at 24th Euro-IX Forum #peeringweek #Guinness

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Tuesday, 18 March, 2014
No Comments on St Patrick’s Day celebration at 24th Euro-IX Forum #peeringweek #Guinness

What a beautiful sight. Dozens of Guinness’ arranged tidily ready for consumption at the 24th Euro-IX Forum. Elsewhere in the world there is trouble. Planes get hijacked, countries annexed, revolution plotted but in Leeds all is well.

Guinness – not just a drink, an art form.

Other Peering Week posts on trefor.net include:
UK internet history – The Early Days of LONAP by Raza Rizvi
INEX’s IXP Manager – Tools to help manage an Internet Exchange by Barry O’Donovan
Regional Peering in the UK by James Blessing
Co-operation makes internet exchanges future proof by Pauline Hartsuiker
Experience of launching an IXP in North America by Ben Hedges

The bald patch #peeringweek

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 17 March, 2014
2 Comments on The bald patch #peeringweek

Satellite image of a bald patch. This is an anonymous bald patch photographed by a passing spy satellite en route to a help search for flight MH370 missing in the Indian Ocean. GPS coordinates suggest the person in the photo was in the Leeds area at the time although no information is available about his identity.

Speculation abounds concerning whether the bald patch was at the 24th Euro-IX Forum at AQLs Salem datacentre though there is no hard evidence to support this. We shall probably never find out who’s bald patch this is.

Amazing what technology can do now innit?

Photo courtesy of Edward Snowden.

Other Peering Week posts on trefor.net include:

UK internet history – The Early Days of LONAP by Raza Rizvi
INEX’s IXP Manager – Tools to help manage an Internet Exchange by Barry O’Donovan
Regional Peering in the UK by James Blessing

Engineer fun stuff peering

A load of Crapper #peeringweek #peeingweek

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 17 March, 2014
No Comments on A load of Crapper #peeringweek #peeingweek

You can tell when it’s time for a coffee break at a conference. My attention starts to wander and to wake meself up I take to posting unusual or unexpected things.

Because it is ~~Peeing~~ Peering Week on trefor.net I thought it highly appropriate to put up this picture of a very fine cistern in the gents toilet. If you click on the photo you also get to see some excellent copper pipework that delivers the contents of the cistern to the urinals below.

For the avoidance of doubt there was nobody else around in the toilet at the time. That would have been a little on the dodgy side.

The second pic is simply the plaque outside the AQL datacentre. It is self explanatory. And finally there is one of me in front of a green screen. No idea why the green screen was there. I could have gone to the effort of putting up an electronic backdrop but the only one I could find was of Leeds and I could have just gone outside and taken that photo.

Other Peering Week posts on trefor.net include:

UK internet history – The Early Days of LONAP by Raza Rizvi
INEX’s IXP Manager – Tools to help manage an Internet Exchange by Barry O’Donovan
Regional Peering in the UK by James Blessing

@jodam talks 400GbE at 24th Euro-IX Forum in Leeds via Skype from China #peeringweek

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 17 March, 2014
No Comments on @jodam talks 400GbE at 24th Euro-IX Forum in Leeds via Skype from China #peeringweek

Interesting talk on 400GbE at 24th Euro-IX Forum in Leeds by Dell’s Chief Ethernet Evangelist John D’Ambrosia – 400GbE is currently up for discussion at IEEE meeting in China.

John was actually speaking from China using Skype. It was remarkable quality video – no synch problems and showed up perfectly clearly on a large screen.

這是所有鄉親

Flashback to Christmas Eve 2010, Skype outage and Talk Talk traffic surge forecast on Xmas Day

Skype Sold

Net neutrality, Skype and Commissioner Reding

End User gadgets

Google Chromecast available in the UK this week.

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 17 March, 2014
No Comments on Google Chromecast available in the UK this week.

Noticed a piece on the Guardian talking about Google Chromecast becoming available in the UK from Wednesday. Interestingly this review of Chromecast has had 12,578 views since it was written in October last year. Also did a second review a short while later.

I occasionally use the Chromecast to watch stuff on YouTube when there is nothing I fancy watching on “normal” TV.

Engineer peering

dearly beloved bretheren – Salem church Leeds #peeringweek cc @aqldotcom

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 17 March, 2014
No Comments on dearly beloved bretheren – Salem church Leeds #peeringweek cc @aqldotcom

Here at AQL’s Salem church for the 24th Euro-IX Forum and Peering Week on trefor.net. AQL have very impressively converted the church into a datacentre. Upstairs and looking down through a toughened glass floor at the racks is a conference centre. It’s a great facility.

I thought I’d put up the header photo because it shows the mix of Apple / non Apple users. Simple really. You can click on the pic to enlarge it. In case you’re wondering there were a lot more people sat on my side of the church – it was where the door was. 110 people have signed up for the Forum which continues to grow.

More as it happens…

Other Peering Week posts on trefor.net include:

UK internet history – The Early Days of LONAP by Raza Rizvi
INEX’s IXP Manager – Tools to help manage an Internet Exchange by Barry O’Donovan
Regional Peering in the UK by James Blessing

Business fun stuff

Editorial job vacancy at trefor.net cc @techjpr

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Sunday, 16 March, 2014
No Comments on Editorial job vacancy at trefor.net cc @techjpr

We at trefor.net are looking for our first member of editorial staff.

trefor.net has been going since May 2008 as a personal blog with opinion pieces covering emerging technologies and platforms. The site is now widely read by people working in the internet technology related industries both in the UK and overseas.

At the beginning of 2014 trefor.net became an independent business and we already have our first developer on board. The ambitions of the company are to grow to become the premier site for comment and information on tech matters in the UK and to extend its reach in other regions.

The site, whilst covering a range of tech areas such as Cloud, Unified Communications, Mobile and Networks also has threads that are of specific interest to Engineers, Business and End Users. The type of content we are looking to provide ranges from deep diving technology subjects, largely expected to come from expert guest authors to coverage of peoples experiences in using these technologies.

We are now looking for a journo to become our first editorial member of staff. You should have a minimum of two years experience of writing for the tech sector and will ideally be based in the London travel to work area although we will also consider candidates wishing to work out of the Lincoln office. The flexibility to write on any tech subject is important as is an understanding of how web publishing works and the general principles of SEO. This is not a 9 – 5 job and although as the business grows there will be deadlines related to specific “focus weeks” this is an ongoing online business. You have something to write? jfdi.

Initial salary on offer is £20k – £25k depending on experience plus an uncapped year end bonus related to company profitability. There is also a budget to cover the acquisition of additional content where it can help to boost visitor numbers for specific keywords.

Drop us a line with your pitch and links to your published work. The right candidate can start as soon as possible. trefor.net is a business that has attitude. The bland need not apply.

End User fun stuff

Not wearing socks, wearing shorts – the bbq season is nearly upon us

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Sunday, 16 March, 2014
No Comments on Not wearing socks, wearing shorts – the bbq season is nearly upon us

It’s traditional for me to start wearing shorts as soon as the clocks go forward in the spring. The British summer is not very long and you have to cram in as many summery activities as you can in a short space of time. The clocks don’t go back until next weekend but today is such a nice sunny one that I have donned said shorts.

I have a regular routine when I put a pair of shorts on for the first time in the year and that is the “now where did I put the shorts away for winter” routine. There’s also the “hmm do I actually have any shorts left from last year” thought that goes through my head. Summer does inflict wear and tear on a pair of shorts, especially when tightening waistbands are involved. The consequence of a barbeque culture.

Fortunately over the last couple of years I’ve been able to pull in 4 notches on the belt so I’m working my way back through some older pairs of shorts. Not quite at the lissome “take a look at my sixpack” stage yet which will be the point at which I treat myself to some new and cool gear. Don’t expect anything soon:)

If this weather continues into next week I’m also thinking of bringing the bbq out of deep hibernation. It’s a Weber 3 jet gas job. There are some purists who won’t touch gas but in my experience it’s far more reliable and the food tastes the same. Less likely to be burnt if anything. By havign a gas bbq we also have more meals cooked outside. Anne likes to know when the kids are going to be fed and the process of lighting a charcoal bbq is very hit and miss where timing is concerned.

Ciao Amigo!

Read a post with a picture of a fire pit in it here.

End User fun stuff

Ideas at the weekend #1 – wear odd socks

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Saturday, 15 March, 2014
5 Comments on Ideas at the weekend #1 – wear odd socks

All week you’ve been sat in that office in your grey suit, stripy tie dangling from your white collar bound neck, shackled to your desk by the oppressive chains of conformity. Bowler hats may no longer be the mode but routine still binds. The 7.25 to Waterloo is still the 7.25 to Waterloo. There are leaves on the line and signal failures at Clapham Junction remain a blight on your ever lengthening commuter day.

The weekend is here. The suit now hangs safely out of sight in the wardrobe and the pair of jeans has made it out of the drawer for its weekly outing. It is spring in the Kingdom of Elizabeth II. The cherry blossom is out and it is time to add some colour to your drab and uneventful life¹.

The time has come to break free.

Engineer peering

Next week is Peering Week on trefor.net #IXP #euroix #internet

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Friday, 14 March, 2014
No Comments on Next week is Peering Week on trefor.net #IXP #euroix #internet

To coincide with the 24th Euro-IX Forum being held on Monday and Tuesday in Leeds (England) we are having a peering week on trefor.net.

Last month James Blessing provided us with a primer on how ISPs provide internet access using Peering and Internet Transit. Every day next week we are going to be featuring guest posts by experts from amongst the top Internet Exchange Providers (IXPs) in Europe.

Look out for posts from all the UK players – that’s IX Manchester, Leeds, Scotland, LINX and LONAP together with contributions from various European centres of excellence including Holland, Ireland, Italy, Germany.

Stay tuned. You won’t want to miss a single word 🙂

Other peering posts – The LONAP AGM and my first Banksy.

End User social networking

A Twitter death

I woke up in the middle of the night, took a spin round my phone and noticed that someone I followed on twitter had died.

I had never met this guy but at one time he had been a fairly frequent tweeter and you got his whole life story. He was out of work with a broken marriage. It looked as if he had been prone to aggression and had an alcohol problem. Then he kicked the habit and seemed to be pulling himself together.

At some point he disappeared off my timeline. I didn’t really notice. I follow 1,772 people at the time of writing. A lot of them come and go and many of them hardly tweet at all. Also it doesn’t take much of a change in your personal habits to not be looking when they are tweeting. I don’t try to read all the tweets in my timeline.

So last night when I saw someone mention that he had died it came as a surprise. I took a look at his timeline and he seemed to have gone quiet on social media platforms from around the middle of last summer and he died in the autumn. There was a reference somewhere to intensive care.

I have no idea what the story is. I’m not really interested and it is really none of our businesses. What is interesting is the fact that his life was in some small measure played out online. I have over the past few years been researching my family tree (hence the mention of me buying the History of the Welsh Baptists in a previous post). I’m at a point where there isn’t much to go on. It’s all hard slog in records offices in West Wales.

However any descendant of my twitter friend, indeed your descendants and mine, are likely to have a wealth of information about our day to day lives like never before. In some respects we are planting trees that will only be enjoyed by people that come after us. Much of what I post is private and shared only with the family, which could be an issue downstream. The family is a specific named set of individuals so my details could be closed to 4G grandchildren (for example). This might require some thought re sharing rules but the principle is there and in any case my Twitter timeline is open for anyone to read.

We are also here relying on the continued existence of today’s social media platforms and their data bases far into the future which is by no means a racing certainty.

It doesn’t really matter anyway. I’ve waxed on long enough.

RIP my twitter friend.

Take care now…

End User travel

Poignant moment on train

On the way from Lincoln to Manchester yesterday for the Convergence Summit I changed trains at Sheffield. A man got on and sat opposite me.

The bloke looked a bit stressed. He was dark haired with a little beard and wore a shawl around his shoulders that gave away the fact that he was from somewhere in the Middle East.

He was continuously on the phone and regularly frowned at his iPhone when the signal kept disappearing. We are on a train I thought to myself! The signal is going to be crap!

The person at the other end kept ringing him back but then seemed to give up. We were through tunnels and out into the Pennines.

Turns out he wasn’t carrying a ticket. The conductor came along and charged him £25 to get to Manchester Airport. The return was about £34. He considered it but decided only to go for the single. Seemed like a good saving to me. He was clearly planning on coming back otherwise he wouldn’t have asked how much the return would be. Nowt as queer as folk.

As we approached Manchester his phone started to work again and I began to pick up snippets as he occasionally lapsed from Arabic into English. The conversation went like this:

“if …….. my life is finished. I will call you. I will call you. I will try and cross the border. Turkey… Syria.”

Wow. No wonder this guy looked stressed. He was on his way to Turkey and then trying to cross the border into Syria. There’s a big untold story behind those few words. Something we only ever see on the news played out in front of me on the train.

The train arrived at Manchester Piccadilly and I got off. I wish him luck…

London Book Fair 2014 – unsubscribe SPAM

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Tuesday, 11 March, 2014
No Comments on London Book Fair 2014 – unsubscribe SPAM

Yesterday I took delivery of a book: “History of the Welsh Baptists from the year 63 to 1770”. I had to refer to this post for the exact dates – I’m on my way to Manchester, the book is at home and the acknowledgement email cuts the title off at the number 6.

I’m happy enough with the book although the paper has a distinctive odour. Much of it is fictitious rubbish sourced from medieval tracts. It serves a purpose as I am interested in Welsh Baptists in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries¹, particularly from the area between Caerfyrddin and Castell Newydd Emlyn 🙂

The book is a photocopy of an abbreviated English translation of an early Welsh text but it has done the job for me. It’s a print on demand job from India. The service was good.

This morning I woke up to an email from someone called

End User fun stuff mobile apps

The hazards of walking to and from work #runkeeper

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Tuesday, 11 March, 2014
No Comments on The hazards of walking to and from work #runkeeper

Took me an hour and a half to walk to work yesterday whereas it normally takes around 30 mins. Only kidding. Forgot to switch off Runkeeper:) The app seems to be intelligent enough to realise that I’d arrived and was just making a cup of tea, writing blog posts etc.

The other by product of walking to and from work, apart from inducing amnesia, is that it makes your glasses steam up when you get home. Last night I walked in to a warm kitchen and was blinded by the heat. See the header photo. It must be so.

I’m used to it. When I’m in the pool of a morning I usually have to ask an attendant what time it is despite there being a big clock on the wall. There is no point asking any of the other swimmers. After 8am they are all of an age and suffer from the same problem.

That’s all. See you later.

Other good reads
Working Time
Internet routing pedestrian style

Tags runkeeper

End User fun stuff mobile apps

The spare plinth – where Facebook used to tread

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Tuesday, 11 March, 2014
5 Comments on The spare plinth – where Facebook used to tread

Trafalgar Square has a spare plinth. So has my phone, since I ditched the Facebook app.

They let different people exhibit on the spare plinth in Trafalgar Square.

I’m proposing to do the same. Of course not as many people will see whatever is exhibited in my spare spot, perhaps.

You will note that there is no email icon on the front screen. Dont bother suggesting it. Email is relegated to the second division as a means of communication. It’s on the next screen along.

I don’t regularly use all of the apps on the front screen. Mostly Chrome, Camera, Twitter, Phone, Calendar and LinkedIn.

The others are pretty much ad hoc. I only occasionally need the alarm clock. The idea for this post came to me in bed so I drafted a post, title only, using the WordPress app. Oh and I use Runkeeper every day I am in the office.

So there you go. I wonder which app I should display on my spare plinth!?

More good reads:
Facebook intrusion continues with App upgrade
51 years old and still single? Yes and no Facebook.

bitcoin End User

How to buy a bitcoin in the UK – Part1, setting up a wallet

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 10 March, 2014
3 Comments on How to buy a bitcoin in the UK – Part1, setting up a wallet

Just began the process of buying a Bitcoin. Only the one. A small investment but an affordable investment or loss if it all goes tits up.

I’m working with Dan Hewitt of Coinative on this. Dan gave me a little job to do over lunch so that we could crack on when he got back.

The first step is to

eleanor cross End User

Eleanor Cross statue project – choosing the stone with artist Alan Ward #lincolneleanor

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Saturday, 8 March, 2014
No Comments on Eleanor Cross statue project – choosing the stone with artist Alan Ward #lincolneleanor

Choosing the stone for the new Eleanor Cross for Lincoln project at the CDS quarry in Metheringham Heath.

Last week we covered the launch event for the new Eleanor Cross project for Lincoln. It’s been quite a wait to get the right piece of rock to start carving the statue. The quarry is only digging out new rock on a few days a month and often the pieces that come out are not of a suitable size or shape.

Moreover whilst the giant digging equipment that is occasionally brought can handle them the larger “lumps” are difficult to move using the quarry’s onsite kit and have to be carefully drilled to facilitate cutting into manageable sizes.

This first candidate on the right had already been moved into the main quarry working area. It might

Tags Cross, Eleanor, Lincoln

bitcoin End User

Buying a Bitcoin next week

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Friday, 7 March, 2014
2 Comments on Buying a Bitcoin next week

Planning to buy a Bitcoin next week. The guys in the next room to us have a Bitcoin business. Dan Hewitt wrote a post a few days ago.

The process in the UK is not particularly straightforward as UK banks don’t currently support Bitcoin. All will be revealed next week.

Stay tuned…

How to buy a Bitcoin – Part1

Business fun stuff

One kiss or two kisses – mwa or mwa mwa?

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Friday, 7 March, 2014
6 Comments on One kiss or two kisses – mwa or mwa mwa?

Was at the trefor.net Exec Dinner on Tuesday night. Great time, as usual. If you’ve never been you want to think about coming.

We had one female attendee, Sally Fuller who is Director of Products at KCOM and a top industry person. Now when I meet a woman for the first time I usually shake their hand but if I’ve met them a few times and am starting to get to know them it’s usually a peck on the cheek.

The problem is sometimes a girl will expect one peck but sometimes two – one on each cheek. Being from the shires I’m not totally sure of the etiquette here. It doesn’t seem to be based on how well you know them. It might be a north south thing¹.

Readers of this blog would probably like to know the answer. It’s been quite some time since some engineers have even seen a girl. I’m not counting the one that works at the kebab shop. As they work their way up the technical ladder and perhaps one day even make it to an Exec Dinner the aspiring engineer will need to larn.

Help 🙂

¹ actually in some parts of the north it’s just a full on smack on the lips – ya southern woossies :))

End User fun stuff

Google maps captures commercial jet trying to land in Russell Square

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Thursday, 6 March, 2014
6 Comments on Google maps captures commercial jet trying to land in Russell Square

What’s going on? A plane trying to land on Russell Square? Surely not? If it needed an emergency landing there are better places nearby to do this. Hyde Park for example.

Probably wouldn’t have gone down well with the Royal Family. I’m sure we would have heard about this on the news. It would have hit global headlines. Unless the news was suppressed…

Makes you think doesn’t it? Wasn’t Russell Square closed off for refurbishment for a few weeks one summer? Can’t quite remember. Maybe it was whilst they were repairing the damage to the plants and removing the wreckage, bodies etc. It’s possible…

Maybe there wasn’t a crash. Perhaps the pilot came in low to wave to his mum or girlfriend or someone else. It’s possible. Although I’m not an expert on this sort of thing I don’t think this plane is on a standard flight path so he would have taken a risk to do this. Would have got told off by his boss when he got back to the office.

Before anyone says anything I doubt whether this photo has been photoshopped. Google just don’t od that sort of thing, I think. I certainly haven’t photoshopped it myself.

I have to say I don’t know. I just don’t know what’s going on here. If anyone else has any thoughts on this puzzling pic I’d be glad to hear them.

Thanks to Dan Winfield for pointing this out. He was trying to find out where my hotel was and out popped the plane! 🙂

Android DECT VoIP phone from Gigaset and the all new R630 waterproof handset

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Wednesday, 5 March, 2014
2 Comments on Android DECT VoIP phone from Gigaset and the all new R630 waterproof handset

Android DECT VoIP phone by Gigaset is impressive piece of kit

Probably spent more time on the Gigaset stand than any other. Party because I kept bumping into people I know there and partly because they had a couple of great products being demo’d.

The first video is a demo of an Android DECT VoIP phone. It’s basically a tablet mounted on hardware that turns it into an useable telephony device with a DECT handset on the side. There is a wired version available.

The phone costs £500 but you have to consider this in relation to the cost of a high end business phone together with the functionality on offer.

Business UC voip

Report from Connected Business show

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Wednesday, 5 March, 2014
No Comments on Report from Connected Business show

Went along with Dan Winfield of Voxhub to Connected Business – the show formerly known as UC Expo. UC is so yesterday isn’t it? Trouble is all they have done is change the name. The content was much the same as ever. Things don’t move particularly quickly in the connected business game (there were a few interesting toys which I will expound on in a later post).

I suspect what will happen is that one day we will look up and the whole world will have changed. A gradual process that we will only be able to observe when looking back, or browsing through an internet archive somewhere (if you have time to do that kind of thing – loser).

Getting the important things out of the way first below is a picture of me and Dan with “the girls”.

End User webrtc

uber cool WebRTC app – appear.in

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Wednesday, 5 March, 2014
No Comments on uber cool WebRTC app – appear.in

Sat in the lobby of the Hilton Metropole yesterday waiting for UC Exec Dinner special guest Alan Johnston when I hear a voice from afar. “Hey Tref wot you doing here?”.

It was Nominet’s Ray Bellis up on the balcony. He popped down and we chewed the fat for a while. Explaining why I was hanging round Ray mentioned a new WebRTC service called appear.in. This is a WebRTC video conference facility free for up to 8 guests.

You might say to yourself so what? This can already be done through the likes of Google Hangouts. Appear.in though is a brilliant ad hoc service that you can fire up in seconds with anyone anywhere through a browser. The site allows you to generate an instant conference room or reuse one you “made earlier”. I’ve bagsed /tref obv.

It just worked. We used Ray’s laptop and my Droid and were up and running. Looked a bit daft me getting up and chatting to Ray from a few yards away. Had to to it to avoid the feedback He was using the hotel WiFi. I had 4G on O2.

I got into a bit of a fluster when my cellular device actually rang whilst we were in the middle of the WebRTC session but hey… Modern day problems eh?

I’d give Appear.in a go if I were you. Let me know how you get on or drop me a note and we can conference in.

Ciao (bebe).

IETF London Wednesday Agenda

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Wednesday, 5 March, 2014
No Comments on IETF London Wednesday Agenda

Popped in to the IETF meeting at the Hilton Metropole on Edgeware Road yesterday. I was meeting Alan Johnston in advance of heading over to the trefor.net UC Exec dinner. If you weren’t there you missed a great night. Some of the attendees already knew Alan by reputation and it was good to be able to hook them up.

The great thing about the IETF meetings is the opportunity to chat with people in the game. Yesterday I bumped into no end of people I knew.

Business business applications

How intelligent are your employees? Do they need managing? Shirley

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Tuesday, 4 March, 2014
No Comments on How intelligent are your employees? Do they need managing? Shirley

The question is whether this van belongs to a company that manages intelligent employees or is it into managing employees intelligently? I’m not sure. Were I the thinking man I could look it up on their website – address prominently displayed (and proudly no doubt) on their van. Nah.

There is a supplementary question and that is at which point does an employee rate as having sufficient intelligence to qualify ~~for~~ ~~management~~ ¹ to be managed. Or is this a red herring? Presumably all employees must have some degree of intelligence.

This could be a tool for HR departments to improve morale. If they were to tell everyone that they were intelligent and were therefore employing methods for managing intelligent employees it might give everyone a boost. Mightn’t it? Even those staff without PhDs. Yes even if the sum of proof of your intelligence is your Cubs Scout 25m swim badge (freestyle) you could start to feel good about it. Yes master.

One does hope that in the course of managing intelligent employees it is done

End User food and drink fun stuff

Best topping for a pancake

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Tuesday, 4 March, 2014
3 Comments on Best topping for a pancake

Best toppings for pancakes on Shrove Tuesday.

Some things are more important than all things technical. Beer for example. Bacon with brown sauce, especially after a night out on the beer.

Then there are pancakes. Pancakes are important. You have to make them yourselves because when bought in a cafe or restaurant they are not as good. Thinner usually. Although there are many recipes for batter mix it doesn’t seem to matter what proportions you use for your eggs, flour and milk. It all turns out ok usually, as long as you use a non stick pan and have it heated to a high enough temperature. The first one is never as good because of the temperature issue.

The most important and thing about the pancake is the topping. This is also what starts more debates. I am happy to inform that the correct topping for a pancake is butter, lemon juice and sugar. No debate.

See below for useful images to help with your topping selection. Usually it would be a Jiff lemon but there is no culinary or scientific reason why this is so. Time was you could only get Jiff. I’m not sure the implied health benefits of this particular brand of lemon juice are any more applicable than any other brand. Freshly squeezed is probably best.

That is all.

Bitcoin in the news again – no VAT & school dinners

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Monday, 3 March, 2014
No Comments on Bitcoin in the news again – no VAT & school dinners

In the news again, Bitcoin. This time HMRC have decided not to charge VAT on transactions. Seems reasonable.

Made me think about coins. In our house when I get in I empty my pockets onto the kitchen worktop (near the radio). The next morning the pile of coins is substantially smaller, reduced by demands for bus fares and miscellaneous youthful expenses.

The kids no longer need dinner money. We pay that directly into an account each of them has at school and each day a relevant amount is debited at the point of sale. Not good to admit perhap but I have no idea how much cash they burn through in this way. I’m sure someone has a handle on it (will that be the usual lobster thermidor or are we going for the steak and chips today son?).

We also pay their pocket money by direct debit into their bank accounts.

What made me think about all this was the

Tags Bitcoin

eleanor cross End User

New Eleanor Cross for Lincoln – a project of national significance

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Saturday, 1 March, 2014
No Comments on New Eleanor Cross for Lincoln – a project of national significance

New Eleanor Cross for Lincoln – a project of national significance with exclusive coverage at the weekends on trefor.net.

Eleanor of Castile, wife of King Edward I of England died in 1290 in Harby in Nottinghamshire. Her body was taken to the Gibertine Priory at St Catherines in Lincoln where it was embalmed and the viscera remove to nearby Lincoln Cathedral.

After four days and nights in Lincoln the body was removed, accompanied by the King and his retinue to London, a journey that took twelve days. Following the burial in London King Edward commissioned a cross to be erected at each overnight stopping point.

Most of the crosses were destroyed by the Roundheads during the English Civil War. A fragment of the original Lincoln cross remains inside Lincoln Castle. A new cross has been commissioned to be erected outside St Catherine’s Church, the starting point in Lincoln of the journey.

In December a meeting was held at St Catherine’s church at South Common to launch the project. The two videos below were recorded at the launch event. The first is with artist Alan Ward and the second is with the parish priest Father Ian who offers some particularly interesting insights into the history of the Eleanor Cross.

Tune in every weekend for updates on this project. Coverage was initially planned for philosopherontap.com but this is interesting enough to merit the wider readership that trefor.net offers.

End User fun stuff

1st daffs of year out on St David’s Day & bandwidth drivers in cafes

Post author By Trefor Davies
Post date Saturday, 1 March, 2014
1 Comment on 1st daffs of year out on St David’s Day & bandwidth drivers in cafes

It’s St David’s Day and I am pleased to announce that the first daffodils of the year are out in the garden. Loads more threatening to bloom but not quite there yet. It’s also a fine day so we may see more before day is out.

This morning, it being a nice day and having no jobs list I went for a stroll into Lincoln’s Bailgate. It’s my custom and practice on occasion to record videos which I normally only share with the family. I do this once the vid is uploaded to Google+.

This morning I recorded one such video in front of the Cathedral in Lincoln and then went to the @BookStopCafe for a cuppa. As I was sat there relaxing to Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto in E minor (a particular fave of mine) and a pot of lemon tea the video uploaded to Goole+ over the caff’s WiFi.

Occurs to me that they don’t need many customers to be doing this to rack up big bandwidth usage. My 26 second video will have been a few tens of megs. It won’t take long for cafes to need unlimited data bundles on their broadband connections. I’d like to bet that most such establishments currently go for a low end package to save on costs.

The changing business landscape…

PS it wasn’t the Farmer’s Market. It was a craft market which for me doesn’t hold as much interest:)