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Finance::Bank::Barclays now useless
6:27pm, Tuesday 13 November 2007 (Updated 3:09pm, Wednesday 28 November 2007)

Barclays have sent me a PINsentry, a chip-and-pin device which adds two-factor authentication to their online banking service. This is undoubtedly more secure. Yet it's much more inconvenient (I'll need to carry the device with me in case I need to use online banking while out at work or visiting a friend), the login process is more cumbersome and takes longer, and also means that my Finance::Bank::Barclays Perl module is now virtually useless, unless/until someone figures out how to interface the PINsentry to a PC. Robot arm, webcam, OCR...?

Update:

Oh, look: "Simple application to work like a PINSentry using any smart card reader supported by pcsc-lite." Time to acquire a card reader!

Seen elsewhere
11:05pm, Wednesday 14 November 2007

"I used to run my life with military precision, until my friends complained about me shooting them."

Further Barclays irritation
11:22pm, Wednesday 24 October 2007

Dear Barclays,

setting a £1000/day payment limit on your online banking system might well limit your exposure to fraud. It's also going to limit the number of people who want to continue banking with you, when they find they can't pay a decent-sized batch of bills all on one day; or pay a typical credict card bill in a single payment. Fix it!

Blowzabella
11:43pm, Tuesday 16 October 2007

I think the usual suspects know about this already, but...

Blowzabella, Friday 16 November 2007, Corn Exchange, Bury St Edmunds. Starts 8pm. Box Office 01284 769505. Be there or be... Octomento?

Best CD ever
11:38pm, Tuesday 16 October 2007

Bombarde, Ocarina & Organ

I got this on a whim after reading about it in uk.music.folk. It's astonishing. The little ocarina holds its own against the big pipe organ. So does the bombarde (no surprise there). The music is by turns exuberant and atmospheric and the first track ("Dérobée") just blows me away. It made the kids get up and jump around the room. :-)