Compiling SVN 1.3 against Apache 2.2 is tricky...

...basically the key to avoid getting "Can't set position pointer in file '/home/public/svn/testproject/db/revs/1': Invalid argument", is to remove the APR and APR-Util directories from the subversion source directory and then ./configure --with-apr=/path/to/apache/bin/apr-config --with-apr-util=/path/to/apache/bin/apu-config --with-apxs=/path/to/apache/bin/apxs

A big shout out goes sussman on #svn (irc.freenode.net) for pointing out that Apache 2.2 and SVN 1.3 use different APR versions.

I've called your village - their idiot is missing

Seriously, you can't make this stuff up.

Sage ACT! support

In general I try to stay away from most Sage software as much as possible, but today we were handed a call with regards to ACT throwing an invalid pointer. We've been told its an error caused by a firewall issue and that we're to check it.

Needless to say, this has left me fuming. An invalid pointer reference occurs when a pointer's value is dereferenced, and whilst changing internal firewall rules MAY sort this, I don't feel its:

  • Appropriate to "fix" problems in this manner,
  • Be accused of essentially being party to causing the problem.

To be technical, one way to create this error is the following example; Take two char pointers (i.e char *p, *q; for this example). Say you do something with p, and q is left uninitialized. When the following is executed: p = q; pointer p will then become uninitialized as well, and any references made to p causes an invalid pointer reference. Hence this is called dereferencing pointers.

Either this error is giving a bad error message (i.e. its telling the user the wrong thing), or the program is poorly written and not checking for invalid pointers on reassignment. Either way, throwing this error message at a user and crashing the program is fucking terrible and shows the poor thinking behind the scenes, especially for a "corporate ready product". I'm fairly sure it's the right error message, and that doing a firewall change, somehow, bizarrely fixes it.

To further piss us off, said ACT! employee has linked to a KB article which requires a login (which we have no access to), and in the view of the customer called us basically fucking idiots because we don't have access to read it. Nice one.

4 Months until LRL 2006

OOoooh, its very excitin'

Garmin i3

Its time to add my 2 pence to the whole GPS / SatNav argument. Friday I went and got myself the tidy little Garmin i3. Unpacking it at work and throwing in a couple of batteries I was only disappointed; I couldnt get a signal. I left it a while then fitted it yesterday, mid way home it suddenly started working! After looking up towards the heavens themselves, I notice that what must have been the extremely heavy cloud had left; since then I've only lost signal once, between 2 high buildings and that was in the middle of Bristol.

For about £130 from Halfords you really can't go wrong with this device. It may not have a built in battery, and it does eat the AA's quite quickly, but I wouldn't expect you to use this outside of the car due to its rather cubiod and pocket-unfriendly nature.