HarisPhotoBlog.com Migration

With the recent fanfare over the announcement of iCloud and iOS 5, the rumors finally came through. The era MobileMe as we knew it was coming to an end, and it was a long time coming. Being a subscriber of MobileMe since 2004 during it's .mac days - haven't I told you that I'm a Mac fanboy? - the webmail service and other utilities it offered - iDisc especially was pretty cumbersome. And worst of all was iWeb. It was a closed platform and it was only possible to update the site from a single computer! Even if you were to used another Mac and log into the system, you would not be able to enter iWeb. It was a closed - and doomed - platform.

My previous attempt at starting a blog using the iWeb platform were abandoned not once, twice, but three times. I just couldn't cope with the interface. I can't customise the blog, nor can I update it on the fly. That really defeated the purpose of it being a mobile platform. I finally got my act together to start this blog and I have been active since its inception in March 2009 - this was the first entry. I have since had close to 800 blog entries, and the main reason for its longevity if you could call it that was the brilliant web hosting service from SquareSpace. I couldn't speak highly enough of the platform. I can update the blog directly of any web browser, iPhone, iPad, or just through a plain old email.

The longest surviving site I maintained on an iWeb platform was harisphotoblog.com. It was mainly a flash portal from my SmugMug storage. It just needed maintaining every few weeks or so, but even then, I felt the pain every time an update was needed. The upload failure rate was also rather high, and options were limited. I was not able to inject too much code into the system at all.

From next June, iWeb would cease to exist. I therefore decided to bail out, and opened another SquareSpace site. The difference was spectacular. I was able to post the photos and slideshows at HD size. The site was more customisable and the analytics were more thorough. Have a look at the site. You might find it a hard squeeze if you were browsing in a laptop or a mobile device ........

The transfer

Before I went to bed tonight, I decided to transfer all the digital photos I took since 2003 into my FireWire Raid drive for safe keeping. Little that I realise that there were more than 30000 of them and it would occupy a handsome 200 GB worth of disc space. Those not counting the ones I deleted prior.

All my children's photographs were archive both here and on another hard drive as well as in the cloud, on my SmugMug account. Precious they are. According to my Mac, it would take around 2 hours for the files to be transferred. So, good night!

All was up!

Finally, I managed to upload all the photos onto my SmugMug server and linked them all onto my blog. Took me quite a while but it was finally done. I couldn't do it earlier today since I was at work. And being away for about a week had really caused a backlog. For those visiting to see the upload, please ice on the "MSH Photographs" on the top row of the page. That would take you the list of slideshows. There would be instructions there on how to download the photographs. Remember, the photos are FREE.

Next week will be a packed one with the MMed Clinical exams taking place. At least UM was not hosting any - Part I would be in UKM and Part II in HUSM Kubang Kerian. Less work but still I would have to participate on the examiner side, as well as making sure that the thesis presentation went on according to plan. I also had a "Calibration Meeting" to attend to on Sunday. So can't make any big plans for the weekend then.

More glimpses

According to my father-in-law, a military man himself, homemade soap was a treat in MyanmarYou read it right. It was 'Spirulina Beer'. Any excuse to get drunk while taking in something possibly nutritious.Each symbol on the Buddha's sole mean something. Unfortunately, I can't really make out what it said on the chart next to it.More shopping!Me at Shwedagon. Barefooted of course.Every frame tells a story. Or two.I was sure these decorations carry some significance .....Yangon has transformed over the years. The building on the left was the hotel we stayed while at the ground floor of the red building opposite housed a cinema. It was showing Gulliver's Travel and some Hindi movies then.Colonial architecture still fill the city

CNY at Pavilion

For the current Chinese New Year festivities, I did not have much chance to take my camera out for a spin. The only chance I had was on the Federal Territory day when I managed a 30 minutes walk-about around Pavilion.

True to the rabbit theme, there were rabbits everywhere as well as the obligatory tanglungs. The main foyer was well decked out, reds lantern everywhere. There was also drums which visitors were free to try at the main entrance. No dragon dance that day unfortunately.