Had my first session of validating firewall rules on Monday and Tuesday, wohooo that’s an experience. My previous installations were of small systems, so I have previous experience in ‘drafting’ the firewall rules, putting it in and letting it go live. Testing and validating the firewall essentially meant sitting there in front of the firewall server and watching traffic, tweaking issues as they became known.

Firewalls are the quality of the walls between buildings. The higher grade your firewall, the higher probability your building isn’t going to burn down, should the building next door go up in flames.

The quality of the construction material of your firewall is just part of the toolkit for minimising danger to your building, you also need to ensure that there’s no open passage for the fire to enter your building while avoiding your firewall barrier. One building that went up in flames had a decent firewall, but they had large ventilation shafts between the building and the next building, leading directly to highly combustible material. Fire from the adjoining building spread into our building through the ventilation shafts and the building came down, while the firewall held firm.

The burnt building looked like the aftermath of a bombing, the inside collapsed in soot while the firewall stood alone.

Lesson 1: Physical firewalls have the same limitations as their electronic / communications firewall counter-parts. They are only as good as the material their built with, and the ventilation shafts between your side of the firewall and the next.

Unless you want to burn your firewall to test it, the general idea is to test the materials and the process of producing your firewall.

With our computer firewall firewall, we have existing best practise procedures for designing and building the firewall, and we’re now in the stage of testing the “ventilation” shafts built into our firewalls to validate whether the rules we’ve set up for what to allow in and out through the ventilation shafts behave as we expect.

I haven’t heard of any automated tools for doing the testing, so if you’ve heard of one please do tell us.

At the moment the process of testing the open ventilation shafts (in computer speak “open ports”) is to set up a simulated network on either side of our firewall and generate network traffic trying to get through the firewall in both directions. Unfortunately, the generated cannot be purely random, each “open port” or “potentially open port” has to have a specific test.

Unless you have the money, you can’t really duplicate your live network in this test environment, so you end up spending a lot of time doing the network configuration dance, continuously readjusting your various test machines to simulate other machines and providing different services as well as simulating trying to get through the firewall to the other side.

Lesson 2: You really want a set of command-line tools for doing this. Windows greater user-feedback (GUI?) is nice, but it can really use up your time when things don’t work as expected (and how often is that the truth in a test environment.)

This is when it’s good to have several machines on an independent set of networks (i.e. at minimum you’re testing the firewall with two networks) but just as importantly several monitors, keyboards, and a cool smooth swivel chair to spin around in.

Don’t bother doing this using terminal/ssh connections, that is just a recipe for frustration and avoiding configuration options you need to consider (because often enough changes you need to do will throw you out of your terminal/ssh session)

Lesson 3: Physical hardware is way cooler than the virtual world on its own.

Most of what we tested only needed testing a direct connection to the server, but our last test before quitting for the day last night was to test whether a connection from a connection would go through on a virtual connection (VPN.) Woo hoo, that wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t as hard as initially expected (since we’d done similar stuff previously.)

If you’ve got almost the cash, where you can’t afford a full simulated network, but can afford a good size beefy duo of machines for either side of the simulated network, then you would probably go with using a network of virtual machines on either side of your firewall. Now, that would be way cool, but I don’t think my laptop is beefy enough (yet)

Oh yeah, my preferred firewall ? OpenBSD with PF, of course. For user VPNs, I’m doing pretty good with installing OpenVPN.

You don’t here it as often these days, but one of the oft cited errors with Microsoft’s Operating Systems was what became generally known as “DLL HELL”

The problem summary: When a user installs an application on their machine, most of these applications do their “thang” through libraries they either create or source from someone else.

As MS Window’s popularity grew with software developers, so too the need for libraries to do their “thang” and subsequent fixes/tweaks to these libraries to do their “thang” correctly, add that extra feature, fix that extra feature ad-nauseum.

The problem, in the MS Windows ecosystem, as has come to *Nix, are the incompatibilities between different versions of these libraries and their proliferation on users machines.

In the beginning, there were weak guidelines where certain types of libraries went here, and others went in the “application” space. Disk use outgrew disk space for a time, and consolidation of space was required. Today, it seems disk space is well beyond general user requirements.

The solution we begin to see in the MS Windows ecosystem, is for applications to install all their libraries within their own space (there’s enough disk space, just use it) to minimise picking up the ‘wrong’ library.

I wonder how long it will take for this new ‘developer feature’ to be incorporated into *Nix applications (if not doing so already.)

it would sure solve a lot of problems with a lot of Open Source packages if all the dependencies were supplied with the package in installed under /Applications/Uber App.

There’s a new release of Windows Live Writer (a Technical Preview?) so any of who budding authors out there can dribble just as easily as moi?

Windows Live Writer is an application that should simplify your blogging workflow, at least it lets me compose some of my random thoughts while I’m on the train (the lengths we go to seeking sanity within this world?)

I'm running Microsoft Windows Vista - Business Edition on this Tablet PC because it's the OS of choice for this thing, and because I paid the extra cash so I can get a high class Tablet. (Let's hope I don't learn to regret that one)

Now that I'm working in a security paranoid company (well it wouldn't do good to be electronically compromised if your business is providing security for other people.)

One of the key things we do at Nullcube is make sure all laptops have full encryption installed. This means that:

1. When the machine starts, even Windows cannot start without you knowing the humoungously long password I've used.
2. Even if you take the hard drive out of my cold dead hands, you can't get to the data (it's all gibberish without my passphrase)

Since I don't have Microsoft's sanctified OS SKU (Stock Keeping Units) that comes with Microsoft's HDD Encryption tool (bitlocker) I have to look around for some other solution. In my case it came down to looking at two Open Source projects, primarily because they were FREE and been around for a while have hopefully had someone qualified looking at their code.

I've installed both FREE OTFE (On the Fly Encryption) but chose to use TrueCrypt (http://www.truecrypt.org) Both tools are great, but TrueCrypt 5.01 supports full disk encryption of the System (boot) Disk. As per above, this feature means that you can't get into my computer unless you put pliers to my fingers and ask not so nicely.

There are however some serious gaping holes with TrueCrypt that is one of the banes of security. Security is not a product. Windows has this great feature called Sleep mode, where the laptop will go into a rest mode where you can shut the screen throw the thing into your backpack run off to your meeting and open the laptop up to see it staring at you with all those applications still running. Great feature, saves you time of waiting for the inevitable 10 minute boot cycle for Windows.

If you have sleep mode on when someone steels your laptop (and presumably the backpack may have a battery charger with it) then you've just given the thief full access to all that 'secured' data.

Presumably, in a corporate setting your Network Administrator will intrusively get into your Group Profile and set it up so the laptop cannot go into sleep and must power down (whoaa, so much for that feature.) Another intrusive but not so intrusive solution would be for laptop policies to allow sleep mode, but with requiring authentication on un-sleeping. Obviously there still is the problem that your Windows password may not be all that good, but with the newer laptops including biometric authentication mechanisms, this might be more secure?) Of course, if you steal my laptop and cut off all my fingers you can probably get in as well.

LIghtning/Sunbird 0.8 has been released and I wanted to try it out, since it has great potential but didn't really work for me last time (probably because I don't really have a life to calendarise?

I kept getting error messages for calendars that were installed in previous versions of lightning that I couldn't access, so I couldn't remove it.

Short answer:

Storage.sdb

The calendar information seems to be stored in a file called storage.sdb and since I was starting from scratch, it was just a matter of deleting the file to get a working Thunderbird/Lightning again (well, actually it was working previously but with too many annoying error messages.)

Now I have to get the kids calendar back online et. al.

We can sometimes get ahead of ourselves, as techno-geebs. The solutions people generally want rarely needs new flashing lights with special coolant, our priorities should be solving problems, not installing new technologies.

Re: [OT] Pursuing Management to adopt OpenBSD

Chris wrote:

> I been trying (rather unsuccessfully) to convince various clients and
> employers to adopt OpenBSD. Most people, I find, are resistant to
> change and would not use anything they are not familiar with. Others
> would say that if I leave the job, it would be hard to find people who
> can use (or even heard of) OpenBSD and in some places Management never
> heard of OpenBSD and have very little clue as to how good or bad it is
> compared to Linux/ Solaris and Windows thus they will just knock off
> the proposal in 2 seconds.
>
> Is there any way I could convince these people to make the move to
> OpenBSD? Suggestions, tips and tricks along with real life examples
> would be much appreciated. Thanks.

Had an external reason to be reviewing my knowledge/status information on Multilingual CMS and it was timely to note the blog entry Tom Lazar over at tomster.org

The state of the Union^WLinguaPlone

How well does Plone 3 support multi-lingual content at the moment.

use Plone >= 3.0.6

install plone.browserlayer

use LinguaPlone 2.1/svn

use PloneLanguageTool >= 2.1

don't use the default Language selector portlet provided by Plone

LinguaPlone has come a long way to tackle a truly ambitious problem and I'm very sure, as of today, that Plone will prove to be one of the best solutions for managing multi-lingual content on the web. Again.

Definitely have to get my hands on a new machine that can start hosting something.

www.centrelink.gov.au

Looks like one of the fields in the centrelink claim forms doesn't filter input correctly.

I try putting in 'Ofa for my wife's fist name, and I get errors messages for some other part of the form until I get rid of that leading single-quote. That's so 1990's!!!

Imagine if I had no idea about database query problems and use of quotes and single-quotes (read: that would mean I would be for ever confused about why I can't fill the form in). Or worse yet, what would happen if I was malicious and tried to wipe the database back-end with some sad query 'DROP DATABASE *'

It doesn't help that the website doesn't respond to centrelink.gov.au. Ahhhhhh, the joys of being online.

Got a message from Google (you know, those guys that do the search thing on the INTERNET) and they're letting people set up their websites using Google's services (well, we've known this for a while but they've added a few more services.)

Services that Nomoa.com are making use through Google include:

Start Page  http://partnerpage.google.com/nomoa.com

The Start Page lets you create a unique, dynamic place to preview your @nomoa.com Gmail inbox, your Google Docs files and your Google Calendar, collect relevant information from your organization, and search the web. You can customize the layout and content, choosing from thousands of handy Google gadgets.

Chat / GTalk

Google Talk provides a free and simple way to connect instantly with your contacts with instant messaging and free PC-to-PC voice calls anywhere in the world. You can even exchange files with your contacts using Google Talk, with no file size restrictions.

Chat with colleagues from within your start page Now you can chat with colleagues and friends from right within your Google Apps start page. The new Google Talk gadget also allows for multi-person chat, so you can schedule a meeting or get input from multiple people without switching back and forth between chat tabs. If your administrator has activated the start page, add the gadget by clicking on the "Add stuff" link on the top left corner of your homepage, open the 'Google Apps' category of gadgets, and click 'add it now.'

Web Pages http://web.nomoa.com

Sites http://sites.nomoa.com

Google Sites is the easiest way to make information accessible to people who need quick, up-to-date access. People can work together on a Site to add file attachments, information from other Google applications (like Google Docs, Google Calendar, YouTube and Picasa), and new free-form content. Creating a site together is as easy as editing a document, and you always control who has access, whether it's just yourself, your team, or your whole organization. You can even publish Sites to the world. The Google Sites web application is accessible from any internet connected computer.

Email http://mail.nomoa.com

Email with up to 6 GB of storage per email address, mail search tools and integrated chat, powerful search to find messages as fast as you can search the web, and instant messaging built right in. The Gmail web application is accessible from anywhere, and you can even sign in from your mobile phone. Or if you prefer, you can access email from your favorite mail client like Outlook or Thunderbird using POP or IMAP at no additional cost.

Straight Google GMail, but using @nomoa.com as your base address

Calendar http://calendar.nomoa.com

Google Calendar helps individuals and whole organizations manage their time. Not only can you organize your personal calendar, invite others to meetings and events, and keep track of RSVPs, but you can also create shared calendars that multiple people can view or edit. You always control who has access, whether it's just yourself, your team, or your whole organization. You can even publicize events to the world. The Google Calendar web application is accessible from anywhere, and you can even sign in from your mobile phone.

Google Calendar gallery Many organizations and individuals choose to share their calendars publicly through Google Calendar. Now Google Calendar users can access these calendars through an easy-to-browse gallery. You can find all sorts of interesting public calendars that you can overlay on top of your school or business calendar, so you can keep track of your favorite basketball team's schedule, know when your favorite TV show is a repeat, or follow your favorite band's concert tour. To see the gallery, click the 'Add' button at the top of your list of calendars and choose 'Add a public calendar'

Docs http://docs.nomoa.com

Google Docs makes creating and collaborating on documents, spreadsheets, and presentations simple. Not only can you create and edit your own docs, but you can also have multiple people view or edit together. With Google Docs, you don't have to manage multiple versions of the same attachment from different people. You always control who has access, whether it's just yourself, your team, or your whole organization. You can even publish docs to the world. The Google Docs web application is accessible from anywhere, and you can even sign in and view docs from your mobile phone.

Localisation?

And, what does this all have to do with Talanoa Oceania 2008? Well, you can now go to a new Talanoa site @ Google specifically for the event http://sites.google.com/a/nomoa.com/talanoa/Home . The simplest URL is the generic Nomoa.com sites hosted by Google at http://sites.nomoa.com

Talanoa Oceania 2008 - http://sites.google.com/a/nomoa.com/talanoa/Home

Talanoa Calendar of Events - http://www.google.com/calendar/hosted/nomoa.com/render

Of course, you're not going to see anything on the Calendar until you page through to September ~ October.

I'll try to keep the Talanoa Calendar and Talanoa Details/Site up to date. When the event goes, we'll hopefully have some interesting information (videos?) we can put up on the 'NET for the rest of the world to see.

Had the need, and wandered the Ether to find Mail PassView

Mail PassView v1.42 - Recover lost mail passwords
Copyright (c) 2003 - 2007 Nir Sofer

Mail PassView is a small password-recovery tool that reveals the passwords and other account details for the following email clients:

It saved a phone call to customer support, which is another whole story of its own.

Thanks Nir for a great, working, product.

The regular problems taking for ever and a day to resolve happened again when I tried upgrading (due to security warnings) to a more current version of Gallery2.

Unfortunately, the upgrade coincided with Tonfon deciding to give me a hard time with Internet connections.

Clear problems from the upgrade.

FailedLoginsMap

Login fails due to a missing table row, unfortunately the error message isn't too intuitive unless you've been bashing Gallery2 code. The error is apparently caused by a failure in the following query:

select g_info from nomoa_gallery.g2_Schema where g_name='FailedLoginsMap';

If you install Gallery2 and have a login failure with an error message referencing FailedLoginsMap, then try the above query on your database. If you get an empty result, then you probably need the solution I found (from someone else's backup which was indexed through google.

INSERT INTO `g2_Schema` (`g_name`, `g_major`, `g_minor`, `g_createSql`, `g_pluginId`, `g_type`, `g_info`) VALUES
('FailedLoginsMap', 1, 0, 'CREATE TABLE DB_TABLE_PREFIXFailedLoginsMap(n DB_COLUMN_PREFIXuserName varchar(32) NOT NULL,n DB_COLUMN_PREFIXcount int(11) NOT NULL,n DB_COLUMN_PREFIXlastAttempt int(11) NOT NULL,n PRIMARY KEY(DB_COLUMN_PREFIXuserName)n) DB_TABLE_TYPEn/*!40100 DEFAULT CHARACTER SET utf8 */;nnINSERT INTO DB_TABLE_PREFIXSchema (n DB_COLUMN_PREFIXname,n DB_COLUMN_PREFIXmajor,n DB_COLUMN_PREFIXminorn) VALUES(''FailedLoginsMap'', 1, 0);nn', 'core', 'map', 'a:1:{s:15:"FailedLoginsMap";a:3:{s:8:"userName";a:3:{s:4:"type";i:2;s:4:"size";i:1;s:7:"notNull";b:1;}s:5:"count";a:3:{s:4:"type";i:1;s:4:"size";i:2;s:7:"notNull";b:1;}s:11:"lastAttempt";a:3:{s:4:"type";i:1;s:4:"size";i:2;s:7:"notNull";b:1;}}}');

Image Block.

Got upgraded during the install as well, so you have to specifically 'upgrade' the plugin as administrator.

Image Thumbnails

For some reason, new thumbnails weren't getting created correctly. And I obviously just had to rebuild all the thumbnails to verify (i.e. now the whole gallery had no thumbnails.)

I checked my Graphics Toolkits and they all had the correct references (i.e. toolkits point to the right files on disk) and all tests from the forms worked out ok.

I think I resolved this by just reallocating things around, but that shouldn't(?) have been a solution?

Open Workbench is touted as the "Open-Source Project Scheduling for Windows"

Open Workbench is an open source desktop application that provides robust project scheduling and management functionality. Already the scheduling standard for more than 100,000 project managers worldwide, Open Workbench is a free and powerful alternative to Microsoft Project.

Released in December 2005, Open Workbench 1.1.4 provides significant new enhancements and bug fixes. For more information on version 1.1.4, please review the Open Workbench 1.1.4 Release Notes. The source code for Open Workbench 1.1.4 is also available on SourceForge.

Open Workbench provides all the functionality and benefits that project managers expect in a world-class scheduling application:

• Open Workbench can be used and distributed free of charge throughout an enterprise.
• Open Workbench is a stand-alone desktop application that provides robust project scheduling functionality.
• Open Workbench provides the unique ability to generate project schedules based on resource constraints.
• Open source developers will find a ready-made community of business users interested in their enhancements and extensions. The source code and other developer information are available on SourceForge.
• The open source distribution and community development model will now bring quality, innovation and cost advantages to the project management world.
• Open Workbench can also be used in a fully integrated fashion with CA's Clarity solution. Please visit www.niku.com/go/owb for more details.

The only difficulty with the above project is it seems that since it differs in some philosophical approaches to Microsoft's Project Management software, a full use of the system kind of indicates a choice of philosophy. One either chooses the OW way or the MS way.

It also seems that the software was released in 2005, and no clear indication on the website whether it has been updated. Sourceforge file release is December 19, 2005. Documentation files are dated 2005.

Nonetheless, if you want no money software, and you don't want to go the piracy way, then this could be an alternative.

Always good to know information.

Universities With the Best Free Online Courses

No tuition money? No problem! There are many top universities that offer free courses online. This list ranks some of the best free university courses for people who want to enhance personal knowledge or advance in their current field.

I've spent a number of hours listening and viewing a few of the courses over at UC Berkley, and there are definite merits for users.

The University of Southern Queensland is actually on the list, which is interesting since I've recently read a paper on some of their IT Governance and Management efforts.

They even have an online course that should be relevant to many Governments in the Pacific:

Communications, Technology and Policy

Technological change has had major impacts upon the modes of transmission, processing and storage of information and electronic forms of communication. This course explores the social and policy implications of the digitisation of Australian (and international) telecommunications and broadcasting. Specific policy and technology themes and debates will be selected to illustrate the choices facing the information society. The course will also examine media discourses of communication technology.

Course objectives

On successful completion of this course students will be able to:

1. explain how the means of communication are shaped by complex social factors;
2. understand the impact of communication technologies on government policy and planning;
3. understand the impacts of contemporary means of communication on politics, culture and the economy
4. analyse the changing nature of media and communication institutions from a number of theoretical perspectives;
5. engage critically with media discourses of communication and information technology.

Too bad I don't have any major downloads at the moment.

I'm still having problems with DNS and Tonfon.

This time, instead of just failing for a few websites (like commbank.com.au) it is now failing to let me browse any website by using their name (e.g. google.com.) I can only see a website, if I use their IP Address (e.g. www.nomoa.com's is currently: 72.215.205.147)

Simple Windows solutions? (phase 1) reboot (if that fails) reinstall (if that fails) install new hardware (if that fails - blame it on the customer)

Being as this problem continues for me, I of course am not overly enthusiastic about our Internet service at Tonfon.

Oh, I can of course go to Tonfon's website. Like, now that everyone else's website fails, I really have a keen interest in reading my ISPs pages that says they are beautiful and not the cause of world hunger. 8<

Why is this an issue?

E-mail.

Well, not only is my web browsing effected, but now I can't get my email and I am not sure whether email destined for me is coming to Tonga or is in limbo, or worse, just eaten up by the cyber-sphere.

Transactions.

If you use the Internet for anything other than just browsing (i.e. you might be a big BEBO player) then you really need to have these foundations things working at the ISP.

Prayer is a conversation? When's the last time you listened while you were praying?

Finding the freedom within; A prison prayer program strives to give inmates a new outlook on what it means to be free.

"We've been taught that prayer involves talking to God," White said. "It's also important to pay attention to the other side of the conversation, which is listening to God. There are a number of passages in the Bible in which Jesus pulled away from the busyness of the day to go commune in silence."

Maybe Sister Mary White's message needs a little preaching, ooops, listening to here in Tonga?

The devils in the details.

We finished last-weeks yap rounds with an evening of drinks at the Dupinisia Restaurant and Bar. As I recall, I was soo late that the entrees were already finished, and there wasn't anything after that except liquids.

It's a good thing we had a BBQ going at the house, even if I missed out on that one as well. This isn't looking so good.

Briefing

Subject: National ICT Strategy Development to Augment National Development

The National ICT Strategic Planning workshop brought together stakeholders from Government, Civil Society and the Private Sector. Workshop delegates assessed and initiated various policies, programmes, project proposals which they have committed to refining over the next four months. Likewise, Government is ensuring a minimal number of these projects are fully functional, at the launch of the National ICT direction scheduled for mid 2008.

Government having finalised our National Strategic Plan in 2006, have embedded significant ICT within capacity development, service development, and provisioning. In recognition of the interdependency between ICT and National Development, the Government of Tonga has long sought and accepted assistance for various ICT initiatives including the recent SOPAC sponsored e-Readiness Assessment, and the National ICT Strategic Planning workshops held with the assistance of the Commonwealth Secretariat.

Commitments from the Prime Minister and senior Government officials to workshop delegates have strengthened their resolve to pursue refinements of ICT Strategies for National Development. Although various Ministers continue pushing ICT as a significant enabler of National Development, the statements from the Prime Minister at the workshop was the first public direction to stakeholders

Participants have clearly identified human capacity retention and development as a core requirement for engaging the benefits of ICT. Several options are being investigated within the working groups targeting both long-term policies and short-term projects.

Augmenting the National Strategic Plan through ICT, six Working Groups have been formed from the workshop to refine ICT plans for: Education, e-Government, Homes and Communities, Industry, Legislation, Technology and Infrastructure.

“To ensure greater involvement of Civil Society and the Private Sector, Government must be a catalyst in the ICT arena.” says Alfred Soakai of the Department of Communications. “Government recognises and promotes long term economic growth must be led by Civil Society and the Private Sector, this Workshop is one of the initiatives of Government in the ICT field to move us all forward. We can do more, and bringing together all stake holders is an important beginning.”

The Department of Communications, again with assistance from the Commonwealth Secretariat continue to support and direct discourse.

Where to Now ?

Interested individuals and organisations are invited to participate in online discourse at the following addresses:

http://groups.google.com/group/tg-educ/ Education Working Group
http://groups.google.com/group/tg-egov/ e-Government Working Group
http://groups.google.com/group/tg-home/ Homes and Communities Working Group
http://groups.google.com/group/tg-indus/ Industry Working Group
http://groups.google.com/group/tg-legis/ Legislation Working Group
http://groups.google.com/group/tg-tech/ Technology and Infrastructure Working Group
The discussions are public, including various documents, directions related to each group.

Endnotes:

The Tonga Strategic Development Plan is available online at http://www.tonga-now.to/Article.aspx?ID=600

The Working Groups currently meet online using GoogleGroups.

Walked into one of the local mobile phone vendors to get an update (my youngest daughter killed my phone.)

I picked up a cheap TOP$150 Nokia unit although they had a batch of cheap refurbished units. Geez those refurbished units looked real bad.

Who knows how many phones i've bought in the past couple of years, but I think I know the value I get out of the phones and at the moment I don't need a smart phone just so long as it has good reception (it's raining badly at the moment so I don't know whether the bad reception is the phone or the network.)

A little edged black box was in the glass cage so I asked the 'Initia, "do you sell any?" and was I not ready for the answer.

"Ohhh, you wouldn't BELIEVE how well it sells. I bought 65 and there's only a few left. At one time it was the only thing people wanted to see. Now, I sell about two or three a week."

Me: "Wow, that's good for you."

'Initia: "Arghhh, the margin's pretty bad"

Me: "But what good is it without the Internet access?"

'Initia: "I can do that for you. And on all these phones here " (waving his hand over a Nokia N95, iPhone, and other TOP$1500+ phones) "I can get you on the Internet."

Me: flabbergasted and feeling I must have slept when Tonga's mobile phone providers started offering 3G or Data.

Me: confused "but how ...?"

'Initia: "Simple, you just need to have broadband at your house, and you get this little thing ..."

Me: (mind lights up) "Oh wifi, no thanks" [WIFI is setting up a wireless network.]

No thanks, if I'm stuck at home or in the office to use the Internet I might as well jump onto a computer with a large screen.

Anyhow, you can buy your iPhone at Lord's Mobile or Narrottam's and be with the latest hippest people in Tonga. Or, you can be a has-been dork like myself and just get a friggin phone with good reception.

Met up with someone who got a phone that can activate 2 SIM Cards at the same time. Now, that would be a practical telephone for Tonga.

We're meeting this week at the Basilica to try and thrash out some concerted direction for ICT in Tonga.

Knowing in the back of my mind/back, that we went through something like this before, it was only a matter of time for Google to reveal our previous effort "Facilitating National Information and Communication Technology Development Strategies - Tonga National Workshop Report. (PDF report)" Back in 2002.

As with all things relegated to the organic membranes for storage, things got fuzzy over time so it was good to finally see the actual document and to reconcile some of the things we thought we remembered. No, we didn't specify a strategy, yes we specified a number of directions for the approach and YES the whole process bogged down on the one area of conflict highlighted in the report.

Nonetheless, looking back at that 2002 report (seems aeons ago though) some significant progress has been achieved independently of a directed national strategy. The private sector services for ICT has not only grown/expanded, but it has also shown resilience and significant viability. Likewise, the second carrier (data/voice) Tonfon, has also shown viability.

Six working groups came out of that 2002 workshop.

• Public Awareness Task Group did quite a lot of work but floundered after about 12 ~ 18 months.
• Legislation Task Group didn't seem to ever find themselves.
• Upgrade qualifications and skills Task Group followed the Legislation Task Group
• Public Infrastructure Group performed their reporting efforts admirably, but then splintered greatly with some of  the other tasks.
• Government Infrastructure Task Group pursued most of their action items
• Telecentres Task Group (today's Community Centers?) didn't seem to do anything
• ICT Co-ordination Task Force don't seem to have recovered from that final heated break-up of the workshop.

Weird to look back and find that the most effective of the work-groups happened to be the most controversial (at the meeting) of the groups, but coincidentally also the only group that did not have communications costs with external entities.

One thing is clear, the high level bodies within a workshop is not indicative of that workshop being a success. One of the sectors with most senior attendance was education, and they were the worst performing of all the working groups (from my revisionist history.) The most one-sided was Government Infrastructure, and whether the results were successes, seemed to be most effective at pursuing tasks.

I believe the most difficult of the groups was Public Awareness as it required significant communications costs  as well as a broader(?) skillset ?

Quickly lessons from the results of 2002 ?

• Senior leadership (not your average champions) required.
• Motivation factors need to be maintained
• We may do better with smaller or fewer working groups but they definitely need sponsorship
• Communications costs are high for outsourcing, and their high in disparate working groups too.
• National reviews (possibly tied to motivation?)

Weird things happen in the Pacific, consider that Tonga was appointed chair of the regional ICT Taskforce (and I don't think anyone from that leadership group is actually active during these deliberations.)

 

Tonga Leads Regional ICT Taskforce

Tonga was appointed Chair of a regional ICT Taskforce at the Pacific Island Forum Secretariat (PIFS) ICT Policy and Ministerial Meeting held in Wellington NZ last week. The meeting was attended by Pacific Island Communication Ministers’, senior government officials and regional non-government organisations.

The taskforce consists of Australia, New Zealand, Samoa, Fiji, Cook Islands, Papua New Guinea and Tonga. It was established as part of the meeting to investigate and report on pertinent ICT matters within the region and implement the Digital Strategy formulated by PIFS.

What do you think ?

Someone was foolish enough to ask me to come over to Vava'u for today and tomorrow and I am supposed to be brain dumping for some people from the Commonwealth Secretariat, yadda yadda yadda.

I must be losing my touch if people still invite me to these things.

Man, I was really surprised at how good the hosting facilities are. The place isn't five star, but it is functioning well in key areas such as clean rooms, clean bathrooms, good taste decor (which isn't really saying anything since 'Ofa thinks/knows I have horrible taste in too many things, it's a man thing.)

Anyhow, I thought when I walked in. Geez 'Ofa, you should have come along for the week-end and asked your sister to look after the kids.

Anyhow, back to the Conference. There's some cool people to meet here, like me??? ha ha ha.

I'm meeting up with the real people (who can make a difference) and the real people as in the bodies trying hard to not get in the way in Ha'apai and Vava'u as we trample over them with our policy making in Tongatapu.

Oh yeah, we're here for the Commonwealth Secretariat program Commonwealth Connects (url) (I still am not too keyed up on all these meta organisations sprouting from various government todo lists.)