sudocrem in sweden

I noticed a post today on Reddit about Sudocrem.

Sudocrem 1931 invented by Dublin pharmacist Thomas Smith. Sure where would we be without it? Every tub of Sudocrem sold worldwide is still made in Baldoyle.

Well holy god! Isn't that great!

That little grey tub that works wonders on nappy rash and is the leading baby cream in both Ireland and the UK was an Irish invention. I wonder if they sell it here in Sweden? I quick search on Apoteket.se for blöjeksem and blöjutslag shows 3 products available for that purpose. None of them Sudocrem.

• Inotyol - 54kr for 50g (432kr for 400g)
• Bepanthen - 55kr for 30g (733kr for 400g)
• Generic brand Babysalva - 49kr for 60g (327kr for 400g)

Inotyol and Bepanthen seem to be the two favourites talking to a few people and looking at some of the forums. 

I put the price per 400g for a reason. The big 400g tub of Sudocrem on Boots.co.uk is currently £6.25 or about 64kr. Go back and look at the price per 400g for the options available here in Sweden.

Now imagine paying over 10 times the price of Sudocrem for something you're going to rub on the arse of a baby.

Welcome to Sweden.

new scouts.ie website

Before I begin, this isn't a dig at anyone in particular. This is me talking about Scouting Ireland. I'll also state that I'm not perfect nor is neting I do!

Scouting Ireland relaunched their new Scouts.ie website yesterday. This new website will be the public facing, what's scouts about and how do I join for the public to view and get information. This website has also been finished for the last number of weeks, waiting a whole big unveiling at a Group Leaders conference this weekend. So they should be well prepared for their 16:15 launch, which eventually went live at 16:45ish.

I have seen many new websites go live, been involved in many go lives and even had the pleasure of testing, breaking and proofing website before launch. Standard practice, get people to test and look over your website, usability test etc etc. It seems that there wasn't many people left into the inner circle of testing this new website. I will go through some of the things I came up with on a 30 minute quick look through the site last night:

Typos typos everywhere

I found a total of 25 typos on a website that contains about 30 pages. In no particular order:

1 & 2 - On the National Management Committee page.

3 to 6 - On the Professional Staff page.

7 - On the Parental Information page.

8 & 9 - On the Campsite Locator page.

10 - On the homepage page.

11 & 12 - On the Join Today page.

13 to 15 - On the History of Scouting Ireland page.

16 & 17 - On the One Programme page.

18 - On the Cub Scouts page.

19 - On the Scouts page.

20 & 21 - On the Venture Scouts page. 

22 & 23 - On the Benefits of Join page in the Leaders section. 

24 & 25 - On the Why become a Leader page. 

Broken / Formatting Errors

Here are some of the things that I found didn't work as expected or there was a formatting issue

1. That Huge Banner doesn't link correctly. On the home page it links correctly to Beavers, Cubs and Scouts but click on the Ventures Banner and your directed to Rovers and click on the Rovers links to Leaders. The Leaders Banner is usually the first one that loads and it doesn't link anywhere. Also If you miss the banner, there is no way to go back, you have to wait until it goes around again.

On any section page, for example Venture Scouts, the banner rotates with different Venture Scout images and click to find out more (Why would I want to click when I'm on the page?), but they say Ventures and then link to the other sections, Beavers Cubs etc..

2. Section or Recent News. Every section page, Beavers to Leaders has their own Recent news box, which should contain news for that section. In this example, Cub scout news contains Venture Scout news. There is also a Read more Section News, which should bring you to loads of other Cub Scout News, but it fails and just brings you to the article about Challenge 2010.
Ok, there is a lack of news as the site just launched, but there could be a place holder Cub news for their section?

3. Formatting in Other Links. Again, a little formatting hiccup that should have been picked up straight away.

4. Contact Page. This is perhaps the worst designed page on the site. First off they seem to want to SHOUT about GROUP and CHILD PROTECTION POLICIES. Then there is a nice map, but no location placed on it. Sure National Office is somewhere there, but where? Then I only noticed it out of the corner of my eye, there is a contact form (with an missing image). There was no mention of filling out a form on the page, it is just there!

5. Group Locator page. When you click on a group, you get a nice balloon popping up with details of the group. It is however butt ugly with scroll bars. Format it correctly please!

Final Thoughts

On the design of the site, I think the banner is too big, the duplicating of the groups and ages on the main page takes up far too much space. There is no RSS for the latest news and no social media integration (HUGE opportunity missed here). I believe the correct term is Scouters not Leaders as National Office has drilled up for the past few years, but decided to let it slide on their national website. 

Ok, it is a website for the general public and we will have to wait until next Wednesday to see the amazing my.scouts.ie website for actual members to use. Overall it does its job but there is a lot of really bad mistakes. I've been trying to look at it in the mind of a potential youth member or parent and hopefully it will increase members and raise the profile of Scouting.

nct

My car is due its NCT on Wednesday morning. I had a look at the NCT website and they publish their test stats, showing how many tests took place and the pass rate. What I found really interesting was that it doesn't change from one year to the next. Take a look at the graph I did comparing their data and the consistency between years:

I have about exactly 51% chance of passing first time. If I fail, I will have about exactly 90% chance of passing.
It will be interesting on Wednesday if I am in the lucky 51% or the unlucky 48% (±1%)

somas album

I got an email from Soma a few weeks ago, but i'm only getting around to listening to it now.

Three of my friends, Mezer, Eric and Walshy are in the Band and unfortunately I have only been to one of their gigs so far. I've been listening to their songs all evening, and they're not so bad!

< Begin Press Release >
Soma’s album, “The Somatic LP” is now available to buy for just €5 at the following outlets:

• Music Zone, Carrigaline, Co Cork
• Plugged Records, Washington Street, Cork
• Tower Records, 6-8 Wicklow St, Dublin
• For digital download at downloadmusic.ie/soma
• From the locker/boot of any of the band members!

There are 11 songs on the album cites influences from The Smashing Pumpkins, The Foo Fighters, Ash, Death Cab for Cutie, Jessica Alba and My Bloody Valentine.

The album was recorded from Nov 08 to Feb 09 in various locations in Cork. The album was mastered in April 09 by Richard Dowling in Limerick who as previously worked with such greats as S Club 7, Rachel Stevens, Steps and Busted. (He has also worked with some unknowns such as David Bowie, The Foo Fighters, The Undertones, Jools Holland and Interpol…ahem!)

Try before you buy, you can listen to the songs at: myspace.com/somamusiccork
< /end >

There was a load of free copies to people who knew them, but apparently I don't get one (something about not trusting me...)
Anyway, if you were wondering who is who on the album cover:

• Mezer would be the same as Cindy in the lower left
• Eric is the same as Marcia
• Walshy is where Bobby is
• And lets not forget Dave who is in the same spot as Greg

Head over to their website anyway and have a listen to a few songs!

kisc gmail gadget

If you loved the Kandersteg International Scout Centre Webcam Gadget for iGoogle as much as they did in Switzerland to even mention me on their webcam page:

NEW: ADD THE KISC WEBCAM TO YOUR iGOOGLE PAGES!

Use this fantastic widget to keep an eye at the Centre from your own personalized Google site! To insert the KISC Webcam to your iGoogle, click here! (thanks Darran for creating this widget!).

Well the you will love this! (Thanks for the kudos too!)

K.I.S.C. Webcam in your Gmail!

As you can see, a little version of the Webcam right there in your Gmail, which I have open way more than iGoogle! So here is the step by step guide on how to add it:

1. Click on Gmail Labs in Settings
   
2. Scroll the the bottom and enable: Add any gadget by URL
   
3. Click Save
   
4. Click on Gadgets in Settings
   
5. Paste in the address for the gadget:

http://darranc.googlepages.com/gkiscam.xml

That's it! If you want to move it around, like above chat, go back into Labs and enable: Navbar drag and drop.

Met Éireann Gadget
On the topic of Gmail Gadgets, Peter created a nice Met Éireann Gadget to keep track of the weather!

Add this line to the Gadgets page:
http://www.highonsnow.com/metgadget/metgadget160.xml

fake christmas tree

Following on from Dec's post on Christmas Trees, I thought i'd share my thoughts. We have always had an artificial/plastic Christmas tree and I don’t see the problem really. There are many advantages to a fake tree:

• They pay for themselves the following year
• They are safer. They are made with fire resistant materials they don’t go up like dried out trees do
• They don’t loose their needles
• There isn’t an issue with sap (sticky stuff not anything here)
• It is environmentally friendly. And don’t listen to those people who tell you that are from a controlled forest. What happens to your real tree when you’re finished with it? You gotta pay for a wood chopper, or chuck it in a car park/recycling centre and it will set on fire? Right?
• They save time. No need to search for a nice tree
• They are allergy friendly. Nothing on a fake tree will cause you to sniff your way through the month of December if you suffer any allergies!

There are a few advantages to having a real tree (so my argument is kinda balanced):

• Help the local economy
• Cheaper to produce.. yes it is true.. 
• The smell of a real Christmas tree.

That last point would be a very strong reason to have a real one. This however can be artificially created too! Just buy a load of Royal Pine car fresheners and stick them around the tree, out of sight. This will give you the real smell you were looking for, without having to go get a real tree!

Anyway, with trees like the following video ... why would you ever consider a real tree again!

P.S. I notice from a comment that they were first invented by those who make toilet brushes! Classy!

kc's queue cam

Following on from the KISC webcam gadget I made for iGoogle, (which can be found here) I made a similar one for the K.C's Queue Cam.

I know how lazy people are when it comes to things:

• Finding the K.C's site and webcam page
• Getting the address of the webcam image
• Search for a webcam gadget to allow you to put in the address
• Adding that to your Google homepage
• Then edit it so it shows the KC's Queue Cam

So i've done all the hard work for you. With this gadget you can add it directly to your iGoogle page or to your own site/blog. Enjoy!

cork lan

With just about two weeks to go, I suppose it is time I mentioned Cork LAN.

Another boring Saturday?

So what is there to do on your average Saturday Night? Go to the Pub, go to the cinema, go to a club or go drinking in a field. That pretty much sums up for your average Cork person. Now here is an option to do something else, something different, and the only reason it is going to fail is because people in Cork don’t like the idea of not going out and including one of more of the above mentioned activities.

Cork LAN is a Local Area Network Party, held for the first time in Cork. We are unaware of any big publicly available LAN parties available in Cork before, so we are gonna claim that this is the first! (Feel free to let us know, and then explain why we weren’t told about it!)

What is it?
A Local Area Network party or LAN party is where a group of people come to one place and hook up their all their computers together and play games and the like. This has also spread over to the gaming consoles with the new network ready machines and online play. A LAN party is a chance for all these people to get together and play games, hang out and have fun.

When?
In two weeks, on Saturday the 11th of October there will be such a party happening in the Cork International Airport Hotel. Doors open early at 10am, but show up whenever you want on the Saturday. We will be kicked out of the room the following morning at 10 making it a 24 hour event!

Open to all!
This is not just for die hard gamers either. We will have Wii’s and Rockband and Guitar Hero too for the casual gamer!

Why not give it a try?
So the main things to take from this post are if you’re into hanging out, playing games, have a free evening and want something different to do, come along and bring a telly, Xbox and a few games! It doesn’t take that much to pack them into the car, we have do it many many times! Bring a group, it's always more fun with friends!

Check out the website for more information and register your interest to get €5 off!
http://www.CorkLAN.com/

my cv

I'm in the job hunting game these days and no better way to get my CV out there than to put it on my blog! After all, whoever is about to hire me will probably just Google my name and find it anyway!

So if you or someone you know has a job opening and looking to fill it, please take a look at or forward on my CV! I'm interested in anything in the Cork area or beyond and involving IT and/or Business.

My Curriculum Vitae in different formats:

• Word Document - DOC
  
• Portable Document Format - PDF
  
• Google Document - HTML

subcard

Yesterday I picked up a SubCard from a Subway. Hurray I thought! They are bringing back a loyalty scheme since they discontinued their Subway Stamps!

Lets look at this new "Collect points. Get FREE Subs" deal:

For every 10p [UK] or 15c [ROI] you spend you will receive 1 point.
500 points gets you a regular 6” Sub, wrap or salad
1000 points gets you a 12” Footlong

That means to get a FREE  6” Sub, you must spend at least €75 or £50, and double that for a footlong!

Now lets compare this to their old Sub Club - Customer Appreciation Card:

From what I remember, you got a stamp for every 6” Sub you bought, and 2 for a footlong. Stick them onto the card and when you have all 8, claim for your FREE  6” Sub.

An average price for a  6” varies from about €2.99 to over €4.50.
So lets say you spend on average €3.50 for a 6”.
Then multiply that by 8 to fill the card.
You end up spending €28 to get your FREE 6” Sub, or the equivalent now of 500 points.

So you now have to spend over 2½ time more to get your free Sub. On top of that, this time they have complete and accurate information on where and what you buy in the store from ordering extra cheese to making it a meal!

For me, I don't want to give them all my eating habits, but when I end up spending €150 a little reward would be nice. Do I even want to know when I reach that amount!! Surely for handing them all that delicious customer data their reward wouldn't be as stingy.

eircom ups my broadband

Eircom finally upgraded my broadband speed!

According to my Router it should be: 3072/384 (kbps)
What I'm getting from SpeedTest.net is only 2633/314 (kbps)
I'll test it again in the dead of night.

That took long enough to get upgraded!

iphone prices worldwide

With the release of the new iPhone world wide on Friday, I have been contemplating should I get one. Afterall my old phone is getting a bit dated!

The offers here in Ireland from o2 are pretty shite to be honest. A €45, 18 month contract and pay €169 for the 8GB model up front! So I started to look online at the other countries offers to see was everyone else getting screwed, and the answer is yes.

I've gotten prices from USA, UK, Canada, New Zealand, Sweden, Mexico, Denmark, Norway, Finland, The Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland and Belgium. This is the 8GB model of an iPhone on the smallest and cheapest contract. You can see a summary below and a break down of each country on my Flickr Photostream.

Some things I've noticed:

• Switzerland is the cheapest place to buy a contract-less iPhone
• Belgium is selling unlocked iPhones with no contract
• Canada has the worst deal, with a 3 year contract
• After Belgium there is Denmark with a 6 month and Norway for 12 month contact

Data-wise:

• The Netherlands, UK and USA offer unlimited data
• Sweden, Norway, Mexico and Finland only have 100MB per month
• Ireland and Switzerland isn't doing too bad with 1GB per month

Price-wise:

• Per month: Mexico, Germany and The Netherlands are all under €30
• Ireland is up there with The USA, Norway and Denmark with most expensive monthly contact
• At the end of the contact, Canada, USA, New Zealand and Ireland are most expensive

You have to take what you get from the contract (datawise, free minutes, sms) with what your going to be paying. Obviously when you live in one country it would not make sense to buy a contact for another country.

All currency conversions done via xe.com. I couldnt translate/understand Italy, Hong Kong or Japan. There is no word from Australia, Spain, Portugal or Austria.

One last bit of information. The i in the iPhone means Internet, as it does it iMac. That holds true in the USA & UK as you can use it as an Internet Phone. It is a pitty that other countries put a cap on how much you can use the Internet on it. o2 here in Ireland gives you no indication of your monthly download and if you reached or exceeded your limit of 1GB.

I found it intresting to see the wide differences around the world. I am considering getting the unlocked Beligan iPhone or waiting to see what the prices for unlocked one sell on eBay for. I'm not sure what i'm going to do yet. Lets see how the launch goes 1st!

travel thoughts

Here are some thought and observations from my recent trip to Sweden:
Ryanair:

• It is impossible to hear announcements on board. They always seem to have 4 stewards working, usually 2 native English speakers and 2 non-native. The non-native English speakers will do all the talking into the PA system making it nearly impossible to understand their thick eastern European or Russian (I'm certain it was Russian, he looked like he was with the KGB!)
• If you dress up like a pilot you get free food. Wear a white shirt with epaulets and a ID badge. Sit either in the 1st row or the emergency exits in the middle. Introduce yourself as you board the plane. Always say your new. Then when it comes time for the food trolley to come around, order something to drink and eat and offer to pay with not enough money. They guy I was sitting next to ordered a cappuccino (€2.95) and a slice of pizza (€4) and offered to pay with a fiver. He got his meal for free! Altho he did spill the cappuccino all over his shirt and had to go change! :-)
• They love flight change emails. These are emails they send to inform you that they will be leaving 30 minutes earlier than when you booked the flight. I've received seven so far (I got another one this morning), I even got one an hour before boarding my flight! I wonder when it will stop.
  

Dublin Airport:

• The Secret Door. When flying out to Dublin on a domestic flight to somewhere in the Republic of Ireland, there is another door to security you can go through. This will cut at least 5 minutes or 10 at busy times queuing up to go through security. It is just to the left of the main queue, manned by one person who will check your boarding card. Handy to know!

MAXroam:

• Texts aren't cheap. It was my first outing with my MAXroam sim. I put a message on my Irish mobile number, if people needed me, try me on my MAXroam number. The thing was everyone knew I was going away, no one needed to ring me! I do communicate a lot through texts on the other hand. On my Vodafone sim it was €0.29 to send a text, and it was €0.08 more expensive to send it on my MAXroam sim.
  
• Saying all this I could have saved about €0.04/min to receive or anything from €0.09-0.20/min to make a call.
• It didn't work out too well for me in Sweden. The Vodafone Group are over there making sure they keep costs down for their users. I'm sure in another country the pros would outweigh the cons. I really need to find a dual sim phone for trips!

saint patrick's day

It's Today! Why?

The date of the feast is occasionally moved by church authorities when March 17th falls during Holy Week. This year Holy week starts on the 16th of March, thus the feast be celebrated today on the 15th. Next time March 17th falls during Holy Week is in 2160.

So now you know! Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

In other news, I've been here for 3 years now! There will be cake.

irish jamboree sign and logo

In true Irish fashion, news came in today of the Jamboree Sign was unveiled on site in Punchestown. The fact this news is over 2 weeks old doesn't bother me, there is something in the photo that annoys me even more!

As you can see from the photo, there is our amazing Camp Chief Christy (where is my kneckerchief) McCann and the new sign.

So now anyone attending any event in Punchestown will see that Jamboree 2008 is coming to Punchestown in August 2008.

Our new National Emblem isn't on this sign, which is a shame. So it will cost even more money to take down that sign and replace it with the correct logo.

1st Draft of the Logo

2nd Draft of the Logo

3rd (and apparently final) Draft of the Logo

With it completely over booked, not enough staff to do all the jobs, and the international guests coming to experience an Irish Jamboree separated from the Irish ones with their own programme, the word on the street is that it's going to be great... apparently...

UPDATE: As Des points out, it's nothing compared to the Jamborora One!

heath

Uncyclopedia is an encyclopedia full of misinformation and utter lies. Or as they say, puts the "psych!" in "encyclopedia". Even they draw the line somewhere!

On the subject of Heath Ledger, there was rumors of him getting the Oscar nod for playing the Joker in the Dark Knight. That would add him to a list of 1 other dead person who received an Oscar! From Wikipedia:

To prepare for the role he lived alone in a hotel room for a month, formulating the character's posture, voice and psychology. While he initially found it difficult, Ledger was eventually able to generate a voice which did not sound like Jack Nicholson's take on the character in Tim Burton's 1989 Batman film. He started a diary, in which he wrote the Joker's thoughts and feelings to guide himself during his performance.

asshole

Another Year, another trip to Clon, another year where nobody knows the right/correct/any rules of asshole. So I have decided I'd do some research.

Asshole is a card game first introduced by Seb. It is usually played once a year, at New Years and has been played for the last 6 years! Over those years the game has transformed into a hybrid of the original and a game of switch. I want to find the original rules we used so in 12 months time, we can have another argument about them. At least I'll have something that represents the original ones!

First stop, wikipedia. It has a page on the game. Its not so bad, the layout is a bit hard to read, it is an article about the game, not how to play it. So the search continued.

Google provided me with a load of pages with different variations of the game, all hard to read and understand. I tried to read through a few of them, they all mostly had the idea, but each was boring and didn't sound like I was getting the complete game. I then remembered one of the words from the original game and threw that into the search query: Waterfall!

I found the complete, concise and easiest to read rules of Asshole. These guys seem to have mastered the game after perfecting it after many attempts. It covers everything from the general rules & special cards to players rank & terms used! It is the closest thing I've found online to match the original game and it looks like it is fun to play too!

• Rules for playing Asshole - 87C Style

I'll be printing out a copy of this for next year.

2007

Its that time of the year, the end of it. And like last year, here is the wrap up!

Its been a excellent year here, I've moved to a new domain, masking the fact I'm using Blogger, I've written a total of 95 posts which produced a total of 84 comments!

For those statisticians out there, here is a break down of whats been happening here on the site:

Total for 2007:

• 10,222 - Page Loads
• 7,522 - Unique Visitors
• 6,253 - First Time Visitors
  
• 1,269 - Returning Visitors
  

On average, each day:

• 28 - Page Loads
  
• 21 - Unique Visitors
  
• 17 - First Time Visitors
  
• 3 - Returning Visitors

Top 5 posts this year:

1. RTÉ Edits Wikipedia
2. Bebo Badge
3. Global Heating
4. Kandersteg Webcam
5. Emigrating to Canada

Traffic Sources:

• 56.63% - Search Engines
• 32.84% - Referring Sites
• 10.53% - Direct Traffic

Top Countries:

• 29.35% - Ireland
• 19.16% - United States
• 15.20% - United Kingdom
• 6.23% - Canada
• 4.71% - Sweden
• 25.35% - Other (96 including: Australia, Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Brazil, etc..)
  

Top Cities:

• Dublin
• Cork
• London
• Växjö
• Vancouver

Top Browsers:

• 54.85% - Internet Explorer
• 38.01% - Firefox
• 4.32% - Safari
• 2.82% - Other (Mozilla, Opera, Netscape, Camino, etc..)

Top Operating Systems:

• 89.79% - Windows
• 8.20% - Macintosh
• 2.01% - Other (Linux, Playstation 3, etc..)

Total Feed Subscribes: 41

Hope you all had a fantastic 2007 and looking forward to 2008! (100 years of Scouting in Ireland!!) That's it for me for this year, off to Clon, just like old times! Thanks to everyone again for reading, commenting, subscribing and supporting me :-)

Darran.

happy birthday baby jesus

Wishing you all the merriest of Christmases! This is my Christmas card to everyone I know. It saves paper and the environment! Go me! Plus I only have to write this once and saves loads of time on writing cards and emails and stuff. I also get to wish everyone who reads this blog and I don't know a merry Christmas!

IsItChristmas.com is currently showing me a "IS EA" for some reason. Hopefully it will turn into a "YES" in the morning!!

If you don't celebrate Christmas and prefer to refer to this time of the year as holidays or Festivus or whatever, I could say stop leaching off Jesus' Birthday, but then that wouldn't be very nice, after all it is Christmas!


Click Play to watch the True Story of Santa!

google earth update

Google have updated their imagery on Google Earth. This includes more updated images of Carrigaline. This time the photos were taken in April this year.

This is the old imagery from Google Maps. You can see the green space where Dunnes Store will go, and work is started on Lidl.

Then bang! On Google Earth, the new Dunnes and Lidl can be seen as well as a new roundabout! Barry Collins Car park has gotten a face lift too!

If you want to check out the differences, look quick because it won't be long until the update Google Maps!