The other cover of AC/DCs Thunderstruck

One of the commenters was spot on: "One Part AC/DC, one part redneck, one part genius".

Elder Scrolls Online Annoyance Again!

Yesterday the Orsinium DLC for Elder Scrolls Online (ESO) has been released. The patching as such on Monday (evening) went rather smooth, and apparently everything was fine afterwards. Today I was contemplating of purchasing the ESOPlus subscription, partly to support the currently frequent updates and patching even minor glitches in the game, partly to get some crowns, to pay for the Orsinium DLC.

But then the terror started ... the whole Steam (as game distribution platform) -- ESO (the game itself) -- elderscrollsonline.com (as store for purchases for DLCs and in game purchases) is just sooo messed up.

At first I couldn't login, because apparently I forgot the password for elderscrollsonline.com. Not a problem, just reset the password. But lo! before sending an email to the email account I have to enter the answer to security question ... greaaat idea! You really think I can remember that damned security question, when I can't remember my password? Really?

After countless tries of passwords I have used in the past and their variations, I finally managed to login to elderscrollsonline.com. First things things, I am going to change the security question and write it down then. But lo! before making a new security question/answer combination, you have to answer the old one. And that's even if you're already logged in and can change various account settings, you cannot change the so-called security question easily. This is simply bad user interface design. Now what you can do, is to open a support ticket, to get the security question reset. But for that you have a answer a myriad of questions which is exchanged via an unsecured email ... great job of passing along sensitive information and making the whole process more secure.

The the next shenanigan was on the horizon. I was logged in and wanted to acquire an ESOPlus membership for 3-4 months. But apparently since I had acquired ESO initially on Steam, my ownership of ESO is not properly registered at  elderscrollsonline.com, and henceforth I am not entitled (or eligible for) the ESOPlus membership in the shop ..and the whole concept of purchasing so-called crowns in the elderscrollsonline.com shop, for which in turn I can then start the game, and then with these newly acquired crowns buy the DLC from within the game is just a mess of a concept ... but maybe ZOS was a bit too afraid to be sued by amazon.com for their One-Click-Buy patent.

THIS WHOLE SHOP/WEBSITE/SYSTEM OF ZOS NEEDS A SERIOUS OVERHAUL ...and by that I mean a user friendly, non-intrusive way of interacting with the user (and by that I mean: your customers). I wanted to spent so (more) money there, but you are actively preventing me from doing that. Most likely, after I sort the problems out (as described above) I am buying the basic Orisinium DLC, but that's it ...

Other mayor annoyances at the moment:

1. The downtime windows for maintenance are huge at the moment. Last week the hardware infrastructure was upgraded and the whole operation took ZeniMax Online Studios from GMT 08:00 AM to 10:00 PM. Which is a whooping 14 hours of downtime! That's huge! I work in IT as professional consultant, and this amount of time for a online system with several thousand users would not be tolerated by the customers I am working with. And there are ways to reduce these long times of downtime, by either gradually updating the systems and/or putting the new infrastructure in place in preparation and after switching to the new infrastructure, you then decommission the old hardware after the switchover. Yesterday for the Orsinium DLC another downtime was scheduled, this time for another 8 hours ....  can you image an internet shopping site or an internet banking site going down for a total of more than 20 hours in two weeks??
2. Finally the reason I am writing this, is that I have some time at my hands. The ESO launcher came up with an error message of incompatible versions, and I followed the instructions on the elderscrollsonline.com site and deleted a number of files (depot.version, ...) to allow the launcher to repair the ESO installation.  But Io!, they poorly designed interface has the repair option well hidden in the middle of the screen in the tiniest font possible, so accidentally (and yes, for that you could blame me for once!), I hit "Install" in the ESO launcher. And then, instead of asking me the Launcher deleted the whole local installation on my PC and restarted the whole download/installation with 30+ GByte to download ... well done, ZOS, well done!

Disabling the introductory videos in Elder Scrolls Online

In order to disable the two company/introductory videos in Elder Scrolls Online (ESO), you only need to switch one preference in the ESO's user settings file: The file name is

• C:\Users\Documents\Elder Scrolls Online\liveeu\usersettings.txt

The preference you need to set is

• SkipPregameVideos=1

Facebook Shenanigans

Keep those super annoying "top stories" away on facebook by simpyling using the following URL

• http://www.facebook.com/?sk=h_chr

instead of the standard one.

Firefox Upgrades Shenanigans Again!

Did an upgrade from Firefox 24 ESR to Firefox 31 ESR, because various websites (YouTube I am looking at you) keep nagging and nagging about this ... Again as with all of the latest Firefox upgrades .. huge, huge mistake.

All of the annoying updates and "innovations" like stripped down interfaces and hiding information, which may be suitable for mobile devices and such things, but for other users like the ordinary PC users are so infuriating ...


To name a few mishaps and misadventures reappearing are:

• Forced UI changes
• Reordering of menu bar entries
• Missing status bar (Link information in particular)
• Missing Download Manager functionality (no I don't want any mini-windows; I want a decent overview of what downloads are going on at the moment. Gosh ..

Regarding the UI changes, you may say, "OK, but you can change all that to your liking ..". But my answer is "Why, of why, do I have to do this over and over again after each FF upgrade???" This costs me a lot of time each and every time, because developers have found a new "optimal" arrangements of buttons and menu entries.

Again, I have to do a lot of stuff, to make the FF appear in fashion, that I can work comfortably with FF. Includes installing and/or updating:

1. Classic Theme Restorer
2. Status Bar Forever
3. Download Manager
4. Add-Blocker (OK, this one is not affected by FF upgrades, but you get the idea ...)

 Again, I am really, really close to ditching Firefox for good.

Rehearsal of Schumann's 4th Sympony with Herbert von Karajan

The Kraken

"Below the thunders of the upper deep;
Far far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides; above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous grot and secret cell
Unnumber'd and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant arms the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages, and will lie
Battening upon huge seaworms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die."
-- Alfred Tennyson (1830)

'nuff said.

"Please don't go. The Drones need you. They look up to you."