So the new place to bookmark is blog.boyet.com, and the new feed to subscribe to is here.

This original website will remain in stasis, with all the action happening on the new blog. See you over there!

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What you do is to create an account (it makes it easier later on), and then tell it what music you like by specifying an artist, a band, an album, or a song. From that, and from some metadata on what the music is all about, Pandora then creates your own personal "radio station" selecting and playing songs that are similar in vein to the information you provided.

Easy enough. I created a radio station based on Massive Attack and another on Thievery Corporation as an experiment to see what it could do. Blimey, it ain't 'arf good at it. The music it's been playing has been very interesting and some of it makes me pause to see what's playing. This is supposed to be background music, dammit, to help me work, and instead I'm checking to see what's playing.

Worse than that, some of it I like so much, I end up buying the album. Hence the blog.

Every time this happens, I'm spending another $10 at Amazon's MP3 store. Help!

Here's some examples of what I've purchased since listening to Pandora using these two "radio stations". None of these artists I'd heard of before, but I certainly like what I've bought very much.

• Freaks & Icons by dZihan& Kamien
• Reflections by Paul van Dyk
• Vertigo by Groove Armada
• Far Away Trains Passing By by Ulrich Schnauss
• A Heap of Broken Images by Blue Sky Black Death

I will note in passing that these artists are all British or European. Hmm.

Anyway, I certainly recommend you trying Pandora if you want to spend a nice chunk of cash if you want to want to listen to music that you like.

UPDATE: One of my readers in Germany (hi, Joe!) tells me that Pandora is US-only at this point. Their license agreement does not extend outside the US. Bummer.

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Being as I'm yer actual CTO with DevExpress, one of if not the biggest third-party VCL component vendors, I get to play with the new toy before many others. Several times a month, in fact. Betas are popping out like rabbits in a lush green field. To say Delphi R&D have been going through smacking bugs in the bug reporting system like Orkin does with the ants in my garden is an understatement.

Only a couple of days ago, some of us were asked to discuss Tiburón publicly after we'd used it for a while. Well, "a while" for me is a couple of recent evenings, playing with it using my particular codebases.

I duped a nice clean Windows XP virtual machine (VM) and installed the latest beta on it. OK, it was a VM and, to alleciate that a little, I do have a fast four-core 64-bit monster of a machine, but the install was nevertheless nice and rapid. Delphi 2007 was a little slothful, shall we say, about installing, but Tiburón was decidedly snappy. So much so, that your intrepid reporter didn't even make a note of how quick it was to install. Doh! I did some other simple work that was on my plate and the next thing I noticed was the install was complete. In the order of 10 minutes, perhaps. Now, agreed I didn't install the C++Builder personality, nor was there any help install with this particular beta, but this was certainly a major leap in the right direction.

I then loaded my venerable EZDSL library into the IDE and recompiled it.

One hint, no errors, and that was it. It was really boring. Honestly, I was flexing my mental and authorial muscles ready to desk check my string usage, modify it, and then talk at length about it, but there was nothing to do. Damn.

So, apart from adding another compiler option block for Delphi 2009 ($IFDEF VER200, don'tcha know), all I had to do was remove the word "packed" from a single record type definition. To be honest I don't think even that was needed, so I've got a query on the internal newsgroups about it.

Well then, er, sorry, but there's no big story about burning the midnight oil on this one. EZDSL works with Delphi 1 through Delphi 2009, at least in my VM, without very much ado at all.

The test programs though, gaak, what a mess; compiler warnings all over the place. To be expected somewhat since I'd been mixing short and long strings willy-nilly in there, so next time I'll talk about how I fixed all that. And of course, I'll be porting my book's code as well, so stay tuned.

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No matter how I look at this, it has scam writ large all over it, even on the front.

1. The postage was paid for in Florida, but the company is in Missouri.
2. It has a big red band with "Final Notice" written on it. Funny that I don't recall receiving any prior notice.
3. The company name, "Dealers Warranty" is to make me think this is part of the network of dealers for my car. Except I have two cars, of two different makes.
4. Nice random GUID-like customer number there. Maybe the "-07" means July?

Turning to the back now. Man, it's looking bad for me. "Final" is all over the place, in red again, and to make it more urgent, it mentions 48 hours and 20% discount. Twice. There's a special code too! Oh, noes! I'd better do something right now. Except...

1. 48 hours from when exactly? There is no date. The postcard was bulk mailed from Florida, taking, what, 3 or 4 days to arrive?
2. Why do they want the VIN#? Surely they know, since they're part of the dealer network? Can't they track it from my (random) customer number?
3. I've been pre-selected for this exclusive program, so you'd imagine they'd know something about me, like what I drive. Er, that would be no.
4. In short, there is absolutely no mention of the actual car the final notice is all about. Zero, nada, zilch. As I mentioned I have two, neither of which is anywhere near falling out of warranty. So which car is this for again?
5. And I'm supposed to phone at certain times, CST, Central Standard Time. But it's summer and they're presumably in daylight savings time now, aren't they? Why not just put CT? Or is the postcard so generic they could post it in the winter?

So, all in all, this is one postcard I won't be replying to. (More.)

UPDATE: These types of car warranty scam artists are prone to phoning you as well. All you get is a recorded message with "Press 1 to speak to an operator or 2 to be removed from the list". Yeah, right. Dream on. The thing is, there is no list. These are robocalls from some computer system. They don't know who they're calling because they're just calling all numbers in rotation. In fact, they don't know if it's a landline (we're on the Do Not Call list, but they don't have it and wouldn't pay attention to it if they did) or a cell phone (that's illegal).

Here's a list of numbers from which I've been phoned about car warrenty scams. I'd add to it as and when I get called. Since they're paying for the call I generally listen to the entire message.

1. 323 581 3046  (06-Aug)
2. 805 985 4838  (11-Aug)
3. 304 862 3407  (14-Aug)
4. 843 248 9071  (15-Aug)
5. 804 417 1862  (22-Aug)
6. 207 674 2609  (29-Aug)

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I picked one up the other day from a certain well-known auction site. This is the second copy I have of this particular brochure, the first one has a dealer stamp on it, whereas this one is a little faded.

It's a 4 pager, full color, Letter-sized, center fold.

Volvo P1800s 3/1963 brochure, page 1 Here's the front page (click on it for the full version).

It's a very early version, actually a Jensen-built car. The main clues are the red inserts in the wheel hubcaps, and the flash on the C pillar. Nevertheless, the brochure is for a P1800S, which were built in Göteborg, Sweden. Jensen did a pretty crappy job on them for two years, and Volvo moved the production to Sweden after two years, and appended the S to the name. They also made other changes as well.

The photo is taken right outside the Embassy of the United States of America. To be honest I've no idea which one, but it's certainly very, very pre-9/11. (The Embassy in Grosvenor Square in London is now pretty much a fortress, for example.) A great 60s haircut for the lady (I remember my Mum used to have one like that), and a what looks to be a Dior outfit to go with it. The guys, one with cigarette in hand, the other wearing a Homberg, wearing very snappy black suits, straight leg (a little off the shoe in that 60s way), pocket-kerchiefs. We are seeing some very trendy people to go with this very trendy car.

Volvo P1800s 3/1963 brochure, page 2 Page 2 next.

Some nice shots showing the various colors available for the car, red, black, and white. Only one with a real number plate, but I don't recognize the format. The bottom one shows a couple of reflectors above the rear bumper; I don't remember the year they were phased out. (By the way the guy leaning on the car in that picture has some red- lensed sunglasses on, nice). The headline looks to be a thin Helvetica, or very similar classy gothic font (Folio/Caravelle?).

Volvo P1800s 3/1963 brochure, page 3 Page 3.

The interior featuring "three point Volvo safety belts" that "can be put on and taken off with one hand". And featuring a dog on the back seat. Mind you I guess 60s luggage was smaller than it is these days: there's no way I could fit most of my current luggage into that luggage compartment (there's a full-sized wheel in there too, you know). The dashboard still to my eyes is beautifully designed and appointed with light blue inserts and brushed aluminum.

Funny that the picture of the dash doesn't show the rear-view mirror. It's mounted on the dash itself, above it.

Volvo P1800s 3/1963 brochure, page 4 Last page.

The specs and the print dater: 2/1963.

There are some great quotes in here that reflect the changes in car manufacturing and safety between then, 45 years ago, and now. Some of my faves: "Turn indicators front and rear", "The interior lighting is switched on automatically when either of the doors is opened", "Clock" (and it's notorious for not working), "Two-speed electric windshield wipers".

I'll scan the other brochures I have as and when I have time.

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