Status-Q

...from my recent trip to the Pyrenees.

Regular readers will know that I was hoping for some update to Apple's Aperture software to be announced today. And sure enough, Aperture 1.5 will be a free upgrade later this week, with lots of nice new features.

As always with Aperture, there are video tours and tutorials including one which shows you what's new in this version. (Here's a direct link to that movie.)

Almost everybody I know is on AIM, so for regular IM chatting I use iChat, with the occasional audio or video link to other Mac users. But Skype has always been better at getting through firewalls than iChat, and this could make it a better video solution, especially if the quality is as good as iChat.

Manka Johnson has a few interesting thoughts on airport security. Like the fact that, while you aren't allowed to take water on board, you are allowed to take KY jelly. Mmm.

I often configure SSH so that I can log in from one machine to another without typing a password. Those who have done it, though, will know that this takes a few steps and it's easy to make mistakes.

I wrote a little script to help, and found I used it rather often. So with due humility I offer sshput to the world in the hope that others might also find it useful.

On Thursday, the Bush administration committed $3bn to projects tackling climate change issues. The following day, Richard Branson did the same.

Neither of these gestures is exactly philanthropic in nature; both Sir Richard and the United States of America need to find alternative fuels, and realise that heavy investing in this area probably makes long-term economic sense. But, as someone who can't even afford a Prius, I can't help thinking that it must be nice to wake up and think, "America's doing this. Maybe I'll do the same thing."

I like Claes-Frederik's ideas on a way to reduce road-rage and make traffic more friendly.

A Japanese animation which outlines the life of a "typical salaryman". It only takes 30 seconds. If you just watch it once, that is...

Normally, I detest VPNs. They're a good idea in theory - make you look as if you're on your office network when you're somewhere else - but my experiences of them at three different organisations has not been good. Fortunately I'm geeky enough to find alternative solutions using things like SSH, VNC, SFTP and WebDAV, which generally have performed much better. These days, though, if you have many mobile workers, it can be better to put your company services out there on the internet (with appropriate security measures, of course) where they can be accessed from your own network and from elsewhere.

However, more peer-to-peerish solutions like Hamachi could be very useful if, say, you want to back up your mother's PC or print on your brother's printer. As well as Windows support, there are console versions for Mac and Linux, and a new version with a GUI for Mac OS X.