Firebird: Changing the database collation

Recently I have faced a challenge. I had a big database (about 3GB of data, hundreds of tables) and I needed to change the collation for all the CHAR and VARCHAR columns. How to do it it? Is there an easy way?

Firebird and Unicode databases

The first encounter with unicode databases and collations on Firebird may be confusing, as it was for me and it may take some time to grasp the concepts and settings. This article describes the principles and catches and gives the examples how to set up a UTF-8 database in Firebird SQL server 2.5, how to setup ICU libraries and how to use national collations (eg. czech).

Setting up KVM on Ubuntu Server

This article describes setting up KVM on Ubuntu. I have both a Ubuntu server host and guest machine, version 11.10 (oneiric). Guest machine runs network services accessible from the outside.

Building the Qt FireBird SQL driver

The Qt toolkit contains many great SQL drivers and among them is also an InterBase / FireBird SQL driver. But the Windows version of the toolkit ships with SQLite and ODBC driver binaries only. The other ones have to be built by ourseleves. This article describes how to build the FireBird driver using MinGW 32bit version of Qt 4.6 for Windows.

Four Shades of Brown

We had the Festival of European Movies here last week. I love these festivals because it is the only place where I can see beautiful movies that are made in different european countries. It is a shame that these movies are played on festivals only and they cannot be rented in local DVD-rental and they do not play them in movies through the year. It is sad that all we usually get is "the same old story" of "i have to kill my enemies and win my love" which is about the only scenario present in the main stream. Why do people not want to see something deeper? Why do they regard it as "boring" and "not having enough action"?

Maybe it is the lack of empathy, of ability to live other people's sorrows and joy. Maybe all that is left in us are the primal instincts like search and destroy and then get married that are expressed in the main stream. Maybe we do not want to hear that life is not a straight line, that we are not perfect beings, that even simple problems we face may not be easy. Maybe we are afraid to hear that "money" and "success" are not the only things that matter and that there are many sources of happiness and joy, some of them maybe small and strange and available to everybody.

Why do I talk about this? As I have said, I have seen a very nice movie that is named "Four shades of brown" (Fyra nyanser av brunt), it is a swedish movie and I think it is really worth to see.

Live Performances

I love live performances of any kind. It may be theatre, concert, dance, anything. There is a major difference between them and the movies for example or the TV. I love the feeling that I am really there, just a few steps from the stage. I feel that there are really human beings on the 'other side' and this is for real. Anything can happen, an actor may be playing well or badly, he may forget his text, he may do something unexpected. He or she is playing for the people who are there and for them only. It is some kind of exclusivity, of uniqueness of every moment. The air is filled with a strange and thrilling kind of energy. You have to be constantly awake and alert, because anything can happen and you cannot switch it off.

I have seen a very interesting performance this week. It was played by the students of dramatic art. The plot was like this. Imagine that you anticipate a situation in your life that you are afraid of. Maybe you want to discuss some important topic with your girl-friend. Or you want to tell the parents of the girl you love that you are going to marry. Or you just want to try some wild fantasy of how it would be to meet an unknown man in the park for whom you'd be attractive. And now imagine that there is a service that makes all this possible. Imagine there is a kind of simulator-room. You just choose your scenario, choose the level of difficulty, pay the price and enter. Now you can try the situation you are afraid of and if you fail, you can retry it again. Or you can live your fantasy and stop it any moment if it breaks out of control.

It was really nice and breezy but it gave me shivers too. The virtual reality can be of great help but it can also unleash the hidden parts inside of man. But, in the end, this is true for every our doing.