EasyTagger Basic GPS

I was looking for a GPS attachemtn for my camera – a Nikon D5100 – and came accross this http://e-geotag.com/easytagger-basic-gps.html. The official Nikon one is about twice the price for some reason, and doesn’t appear to have that great reviews. I ordered it form China and it arrived within the week. I was impressed with the quick delivery. I’m currently waiting longer than that for my lens hood from Germany! Anyway, it was easy to install as all you need to do is plug the cable in. This was a little stiff and I was a little unsure if I had it in correctly. The camera detected the GPS immediately. I went outside to take my first shots and with a clear view of the sky the GPS was locked on in less than a minute. Looking at the photo on google maps shows it was pretty accurate. It looks to be about 2m away from where I actaully was. Impressive! The only issue I did notice was that it disconnects occasionally. I discovered that thi was due to the cable not being pushed in completely due to the aforementioned stiffness. An extra push has ensure that it keeps it’s connection. As to battery life, I’m not sure. I’ve not ahd it too long, and the camera is pretty new too so I’m not sure how long it would last without the GPS.

For $50 (plus P&P), I really can’t complain.

ERROR: 28035 when trying to sync from the Device SQLCE

Getting an Error 28035 when using SQLCE through Forefront TMG / ISA server? Try disabling “Link Translation” under the properties of the rule. It worked for me! Has taken me about two days to find this out! I eventually got the bottom of it when I found this link http://www.biztalkgurus.com/biztalk_server/biztalk_blogs/b/biztalksyn/archive/2008/08/06/setting-up-sqlce-merge-replication-with-isa-server-in-the-middle.aspx

NAT tables on mobile networks

I’ve been trying to configure csipsimple and sipdroid to be as effient as possible when using my mobile phone. I want to be available on my VoIP network provided by www.pbxes.com but I don’t want to send unnecessary keep alives and registrations for example which would not be great for battery life.. I was curious to find out which was the best way. Obviously, the longer the timeout the better, but what’s the maximum? This will depend on which network you’re on, but I’m on GiffGaff (o2) in the UK and found that a 4 min keep-alive works well. I also have STUN enabled, and have also enabled “wake phone on keep alive” in csipsimple. Compared to the default of 90s, this should significantly reduce the power drain.

Scheduling Tasks with Prime Numbers

I was watching a documentary recently regarding the natural cycles that some animals have being based on prime numbers. Now, the reason this apparently evolved was to avoid conflict with other animals.The cicada was one example stated as such, having a cycle of 13 years. This means that they have very little chance of running into another cicada that has a different prime number life cycle.

So, I was thinking along those lines, and came to the conclusion that to avoid scheduled tasks in SCCM (the delta discoveries) hitting each other, I should schedule them for prime number cycles. Currently I have them set to 5, 7, 11 and 13 minutes. I’m not too bothered if it takes 13 minutes instead of 5 if it reduces the load on the system.

Just a theory.