Remote car opener

Posted on June 7, 2007 at 8:21pm | 0 comments

I’ve had an automatic car opener for a decade or so now. Strangely though, I was walking to my car this morning and for the first time I pondered if pressing my button might also open one of the other vehicles in the car park.

I mean, how do these things work? We take them for granted, assume them to be safe and secure, but know nothing about them.

Do they cause brain tumors like mobile phones were once feared to do?

As always when searching for knowledge, I turned to Google and it led me to How Stuff Works. In summary, the keyring device is actually a small radio transmitter. When you push the button it turns on the transmitter and it sends a code to the receiver.

And to answer my question about opening someone else’s door:

Given a 40-bit code, four transmitters and up to 256 levels of look-ahead in the pseudo-random number generator to avoid desynchronization, there is a one-in-a-billion chance of your transmitter opening another car’s doors.

Remarkable!

Search trivia

Posted on October 18, 2005 at 1:47pm | 0 comments

A Google search for “Alpine Shire election” brings up my campaign site as the second entry.

Pizza puff and stuff

Posted on June 11, 2005 at 6:29pm | 0 comments

I’m on a mailing list for the Australian Monarchists League. I was surprised to read yesterday that a pizza chain has weighed into the non-existent republican debate. The email is reproduced here:

"In today’s newspapers is a report on what could only be termed to be a senseless phone survey conducted by Domino’s Pizza of 1051 customers who were asked the question on whether Camilla should become the next Queen of Australia. Apparently 85% said no and 5.42% said yes which is probably not a surprising return given the apparent lack of intelligence of their customers.

Furthermore, the question is malicious in its intent for there is no intention whatsoever of the Duchess of Cornwall becoming Queen of Australia. Even if the purpose were not that she would be called “Princess Consort”, the term “Queen of Australia” is reserved solely for the Monarch who will be Prince Charles and not for his spouse.

The media reporting of this trivial survey is yet again another indication of their extreme bias against our Constitutional Monarchy.

We can do little about the media, but we can phone the Domino’s Pizza hot-line and complain that they have abused the trust that their customers place in their product to promote their republican nonsense, particularly with a spurious question. Their feedback number to call is: 1800 805 888 and the more who do this, the less likely they are to offend again."

Pizza polling! I’ll have mine without anchovies and politics, thanks.

Anthem trivia and protocol

Posted on June 4, 2005 at 6:20am | 1 comment

ABC has been showing the classic “Carry On” movies in the wee hours, and Juliet’s been video taping them. That’s my unlikely introduction to this piece about anthems.

I commented to Juliet and the big kids yesterday that when I was a boy the TV used to shut down at 11pm and play the national anthem, which until the late 1970s was “God Save the Queen”.

Juliet said it was the same in South Africa (different anthem though) and TV used to close for the night even earlier. In fact, they didn’t get TV there until the late 1970s!

I recall that Gough Whitlam changed the anthem to Advance Australia Fair in 1974. Malcolm Fraser changed it back to God Save the Queen before holding a national plebiscite in 1977. (more…)