Saturday, November 29, 2008

Go West

Heading off to Orlando, Florida tomorrow. My colleague and I are attending 2 conferences. The ITSEC training and simulation conference and the PowerGen energy convention. Still mortally tired after two mad work weeks, but I think I'll manage to cram in some leisure time ;)
Only worry is the inevitable Christmas shopping that needs to be done!

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Business: the original concept

As in "being busy" which is what I am. Profoundly so - in fact, the past 10 days are the busiest I can remember. Vestas is really an ant's nest and the initial weeks of noobness have been replaced by full-on schedules, very short lunch breaks, and quick decisions. I am loving it. Other places it would be a problem but the nature of my work is so interesting that I am awaking with a smile every morning. Even if I am dropping dead early every evening :)

Thursday, November 06, 2008

Signing up...again

Congrats to the world on the Obama victory!
If you need a downer to quench all the emotional giddiness of having beaten the insane GOP, have a look at Ralph Nader's response. He ain't too impressed - and although I think he misses the point in regards to the tactics Obama needed to employ for that win, it is certainly true that Obama has to deliver before he may be worshiped.

On another note, I have been trying to update my digital signature, a task which is not for the faint-of-heart. I will explain my results here, just so others may accidentally stumble over them in search of happiness.

Problem:
The newer versions of TDC's digital signature are all slick and need to be so in order to 1) use Java for installation, 2) avoid ActiveX problems during installation, and 3) avoid general Windows (Vista) mayhem during installation.
In my case, hating IE like the plague, I wanted to install my new certificate on Firefox. Having received my TDC confirmation code by snail mail, I set out to do this but was quickly stopped by all sorts of odd error messages. If not a Firefox or Java negative, then a Windows Vista negative.

Solution:
TDC is an ailing dinosaur which has not performed well for several years, and this is also the case with the digital signature. While you can easily install the signature through IE, you are effectively stuck with a signature that IE will not export for subsequent import into FF. FF only takes the proper certificate format and IE refuses to hand that over. The digital signature installation only delivers a proxy HTML address for another export process, which - surprise surprise - is not compatible with FF.
So, as far as I can see, there is only 1 solution. The "Eksportér signatur" link on this particular help page will actually let you export the IE certificate directly in the proper format (PKCS12) for later import in Firefox.
I sure hope that page stays up.

They are threatening to change it all to a new kind of certificate soon - one which will actually require a code booklet. You might consider getting the old, simple version. Perhaps it will last a few years and postpone your TDC/DANID agony.