Transfer aborted: Instance not found

I appreciate it is not easy, I really do. It is not easy having so many users, and not easy launching any sort of software or service.

But Blizzard are not new to this - they have launched upgrades many times, and WoW has been going 10 years. They should know how to make it work properly.

They have run public beta servers. They have multiple realms/servers so that the whole system should scale well. Not so many users on each server at once, etc.

The vast majority of the "work" is in the client - the server has to manage the NPCs and interactions, and quests and stuff, but the client does all the fancy graphics.

They collect a lot of money from subscriptions and so really should be able to cope, in my humble opinion.

To explain the picture here to those that don't play, or have not tried the expansion yet. This location is my garrison. It is a new feature where each player has their own "home town" almost, with a separate garrison hearthstone. The garrison is an "instance" that is for that player. Instances are not new - they are used for dungeons where a group of players play together and independently from other players to complete a quest.

Here, lots of people have come to their garrison - it is key to progression of many of the quests and some of the new features with garrison "followers". Everyone expects to find a very quite place with a few NPCs and some buildings they have constructed, and the next "quest giver" that will move them on to the next stage.

However, the system is broken, and not for the first time today (we are talking working hours in UK and much of EU, so should not be busy, yet!). Yes, I was off because of air-con install, so have been playing! So what has happened is that everyone is in one generic prototype garrison which does not have what they need, just lots of people.

It has also gone buggy where people cannot even dismount, or mount, or even logout properly.

The chaos is kind of special, as there are constantly new people arriving, wondering why the place is full. Most assume the quest giver is there but surrounded by so many people that they cannot see it, and hence are calling people idiots and asking people to dismount so that they are not in the way.

Earlier today this happened, and the effect was that after some waiting, suddenly, I moved to my own garrison and for me everyone vanished. This time, it is basically broken, so more and more people arrive, unable to progress a chain of quests and kind of stuck waiting, and yelling at each other!

This is what we pay for :-)

P.S. Game just exited as I type.
P.P.S I guess they rebooted it - did not help - everyone re-appearing one by one in same state!

Update: It worked, I was able to progress at the garrison, only to hit this saying the same!!

19:00 And still a picture of chaos, with basic game play screwed as well in some places

The only way to watch the news

I do rather love the idea of watching a live news event, via comic strip!

Well done Randall. xkcd

Daft idea

Make a server.

Have it accept a "registration" packet which includes a geographic location and a channel number. Until a later "logout", it gets sent a constant stream of live audio (maybe RTP based).

It can, at any time, send to the server an audio stream.

The audio it gets is a mix of all incoming audio on the same channel where the level (amplitude) of the audio included is based on the relative proximity of the geographic location from which the incoming audio streams arrive and the listener.

What have you got?

CB/Ham AM radio simulator over IP!

Anyone want to make an RFC?

Could this be the new twitter? Imagine the phone app, push to talk, always streaming audio, location update as you move...

Turning to the shiny side...

I now have a iMac desktop. There, I said it! I feel like I am at an A[&]A meeting...

It is still something I am getting used to, and has been a complicated decision to make.

Perhaps I need to elaborate on some history of what I mean by my "desktop" and what I have used as a desktop in the past.

For many years my "desktop" or "main machine" was pretty much my only machine. I started with a TRS-80 at home and used an RML 380Z at school.  I do recall, in sixth form, taking a black and white TV set and TRS-80 on the back of my bicycle, to school, more than once.

I progressed to BBC micro, and even did some commercial work on a ZX Spectrum, but never used that as my "desktop", more of a doorstop (literally). I went through every feature of BBC micros, even 2nd processors. I then moved on the Acorn Archimedes. I still have BBC micros and Archimedes in the loft!

But ever since then, and that is around two decades ago, I have used linux in one form or other. I have used linux since the days that the install was a small number of floppy disks, and "X" was somewhat newfangled.

That is a very long time to use the same basic desktop. Times have changed massively. Machines have changed, monitors have changed, desktops have changed, even vim has changed, and oh! how hard disks have changed. These days, well, until this month, I use a Debian distro and a nice 30" Apple monitor. But the theft in the office caused some changes (nicked my monitor!). I tried a 4k TV at work, keeping the 30" at home. That is not as good as I would like - size and resolution are OK, but quality of pixels on some colours, no.

For many years I have used laptops. I have used some windows laptops, briefly. I have even used linux laptops, but they did not work well. I think they are somewhat better now. However, Apple make some damn good laptops. So I am used to those.

For some time I have used a nice Apple MacBook Pro on my desk in the front room, and when away from home/office, but my main machine in my study is still a linux desktop. I am only properly working when in the study, and use the laptop to ssh to that machine for much of my work. The laptop is the "front end", doing browser, email, and terminals to ssh.

But I have now taken the plunge, and switched over to the shiny side. My "main machine", my "desktop" in the study is now a 5k iMac. It is nice! I am keeping the linux machine too, to which I ssh and use vim and the dev tools for "real" work, but my day to day usage of email, web, and all sorts of graphical tools is now on the iMac. I have one on order for the office in order to complete the illusion.

I was impressed to find SyncThing to allow me to have shared (well, synced) files on all machines. That is important, and used to be done using an NFS mounted home directory under linux. My tech staff hated my use of nfs as it caused them issues, but I think it worked well for my needs.

I am using safari as the browser. I did trial MacMail and ended up going back to Thunderbird as it allows multiple identities on a login and also, importantly, GPG encryption.

It seems that more and more open source stuff is built for Mac now. You used to have to do an X server thing but more and more is native OS X.

So far it is working really well, and I have to say the 27" 5k screen is damn impressive.

But there is one other usage, a gaming machine. The idea is that, occasionally, I may relax and head off to Azeroth or some such as a game. Really I have little time. I have a windows machine with 3D monitor, but really, shutter 3D glasses are a pain. More on that when garage finally sorted with new 3D TV. But for now - can the new "desktop" machine manage World or Warcraft?

Well, the answer is yes, but with a caveat. You end up setting low end graphics settings. I found setting hi-res textures was OK but more settings and it slowed massively. So the second iMac is going to have the higher grade graphics card. I'll report on how that goes.

That said, playing on a 5k screen is, well, wow! You can set anti-aliasing, but on a retina display you just don't need to!

So, in conclusion, I have changed my "desktop". The graphics aspect of all of my day to day work is now Apple. I still use "real" machines (linux) for actual dev work, but the graphics is all iMac now. Given that iMac is unix, it may be that we move some of the real work over in time. At the end of the day, linux is a good desktop but Apple have always been that bit more polished - it is almost its trademark.

I'll report back on difference for extra CPU, memory and graphics card when the second one arrives, and I'll, no doubt, blog when something is not working as I need. Interesting times!

This is a good thing, yes?

Just got from BT:

"latest update states the job is fluid in taskforce for gully sucking to be work done which will be issue will be issued asap"

I did a google image search for "gully sucking" (and I don't have safe search on) and I was pleased to see that all the images were indeed large vehicles with hoses plugged in to drains and things. With a phrase like that, you never know :-)

Bluetooth tracker things

Anyone that has used FaceBook will have seen adverts for the "Tile". It seems like they have been advertising forever (maybe it is a year) and it may have been some sort of kickstarter type thing as they are finally only shipping now. I have actually seen a real "Tile" just last week. Even so, their web site says "reserve one today".

What I did not realise is that this sort of thing is not new, and not unique. I assumed that they had patented or something, but clearly not. It is just one of many almost identical devices, some of which have been around for ages.

Even on FaceBook I now see adverts for some other trackr thing that a different style and also some sort of crowd funded thing.

So, I thought I would have a play with one of these devices, and the one I got (based on a recommendation) was a "Stick'n'Find". It is a small device with adhesive sticker on the back, but comes with a keyring type thing to stick it to if you need. Was £50 for two from firebox.

So what do they do?

It seems, from description of the Tile and the like, that they do much the same. You need a phone app, and they work with iPhone and Android. They are themselves a small long life battery powered bluetooth device. They have four basic functions (based on the Stick'n'Find) :-

1. You can range find to try and track them down in the same room. Ideal for keys lost in sofa, that sort of thing. The app give a signal strength indication so you can walk around and get closer to the device.

2. You can make it beep and flash - so it is a modern version of the old whistling keyring (remember them!).

3. You can set alarms, e.g. a simple "leash" which alarms when out of range. The Stick'N'Find can make one or other end (the gadget or the phone), or both, beep when it loses connection.

4. You can report it lost, making it so that if it comes in to range of any phone running the same app, anywhere, then you can be notified. Not tried this yet, but it has the issue that there seems to be no central registry for all of the different makes, so this feature only works if there is a big community of people using the same make of gadgets.

The Stick'n'Find is the one I have tried myself, and it also reports the device battery level and temperature. I would assume it will alert when battery low, but these are meant to last for ages.

Now the challenge is finding uses for them! I always have my keys and wallet, though an alarm for being pick-pocketed would be cool. The only device regularly lost is the sky remote (and it is not me that loses that, it gets "borrowed"), so that is stickered. I did think that an alarm as my suitcase comes round the carousel at an airport arrivals hall would be rather cool. Other ideas welcome.

I am a scammer?

This is a call recording of a call made by someone in response to my standard email offering to settle for junk mailing me...

Recording (wav, MP3) - several seconds of silence at start of recording, sorry... Unedited.

This guy is adamant that I am a scammer, that it is "all over the internet" and that he is going to tell 400 people (as well as Simon, who he is calling) that I am a scammer. Maybe I now have a case for defamation too?

So, a bit of background...

• I, as a private individual, have a number of private email addresses, including one from my mate Simon that owns titanic.co.uk. I pay his company (albeit only £1) for that email address and service as an individual. His company provides communications services to the public, including me. So that means, for that email address, I meet all the rules to make me an "individual subscriber" under the PECR.
• Sending an unsolicited commercial email to that address is a breach of the regulations, and those regulations allow me to claim damages when someone does that (i.e. to sue).
• When I get emails I send a standard response. It is actually a full "notice before action" quoting the details of the breach, referencing the regulations, and the part that says I can claim, and so on. It meets all the rules for such a notice. I have pursued several cases but none to a hearing yet (i.e. people settle).
• The civil procedure pre-action conduct rules for court cases say that I should try and resolve the matter without court, and one such option is discussion and negotiation. So my email offers that, and suggests a starting point for a settlement to resolve this without court. I suggest £200 as a start for negotiation. I based that on googling similar cases.
• So offering to settle for a fee is not a scam, or extortion - it is what I am required to negotiate before proceeding to the court claim. I am not a scammer, I am a victim!

Now, the big issue with these regulations is the level of damages - what damages can one junk email cause. Clearly hundreds of junk emails are damaging but what is one? Well, considering it I know they wind me up - I have gone in to work after a junk email and ended up wasting time of not just myself by colleagues because of a junk email, especially when the sender has the audacity to reply trying to justify their spam! This is time wasted when I could be working, and when colleagues should be working, so costing the company money. However, it is my company, so that costs me! If I delay a feature on the new FireBrick code a day that could lose a £10,000 sale. There is also the very real risk of junk emails cluttering my inbox such that I miss, and accidentally delete, a real email. That happens! That can also cost me, or the company (and so me). So £200 is not an unreasonable proposal for costs for one email on balance, I think.

What we need is the regulations to change, for junk emails and junk calls, in section 30, to have something like "Where the amount claimed is £50, or less, the claimant does not have to justify the amount claimed, only that they are a party inconvenienced by the breach". That would simplify the matter massively and allow a lot of claims for junk emails and junk calls. The courts would not be flooded by these as all cases would be settled out of court because the case is so clear cut.

There is a consultation on junk calls now, the same regulations. Please reply and suggest this simple change.

P.S. by popular demand, this is the current wording of my email:-

NOTICE BEFORE ACTION

You have transmitted, or instigated the transmission of, an unsolicited communication for the purpose of direct marketing by means of electronic mail to an individual subscriber contrary to section 22 of The Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003.

I, as the recipient and individual subscriber, have never given you consent to send me unsolicited marketing emails and I have never provided my email address to you as part of a negotiations or sale by you to me in the past.

Although I am not in a position to offer you legal advice, this is clearly a criminal offence. The Information Commissioner's Office have clearly stated "I would confirm that your understanding of Regulation 22 is correct; that is, if a company sends an unsolicited marketing email to an individual subscriber without their prior consent and/or without satisfying the conditions of the soft opt-in, then they will be breaching the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations"

There is a defence for having taken all reasonable steps to comply, but as you have no way to know that any target email address is that of an individual subscriber, the only step you could have taken is not to send unsolicited marketing emails at all.

For the avoidance of doubt here - this is not a Data Protection Act issue, or one where you have the option of relying on an "unsubscribe" link - sending just one email, as you have, is a breach of the regulations.

Section 30 of the regulations permit me to take civil action to recover damages suffered as a result of your breach of the regulations. It is difficult to access damages exactly but your email has used resources on my computers and my Internet connection, wasted some of my time, causes distress and annoyance which has interrupted my chain of thought and concentration, and so disrupted s/w development work I am doing. Looking in to similar cases for such damages it is clear that claims range from £270 to £750. In this instance I feel that a mere £200 would constitute a reasonable level of damages for the hassle you have caused me by your breach of the regulations.

In accordance with section 8.2(1) of the Pre-Action Conduct Directions of the Civil Procedure Rules, I would like you to consider Alternative Dispute Resolution to this matter by means of discussion and negotiation. I therefore invite your comments and any offer of settlement or other negotiation.

However, if I do not receive a reply within 14 days I reserve my right to issue a claim on the small claims track of the county court without further notice.

Should this matter go to court I will rely on the email you have sent and associated headers, whois data and other resources identifying the sender. If you believe you have evidence that shows I did give consent to the sending of this unsolicited email I ask that you forward this to me by reply.

I look forward to your prompt reply.


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Name&address