Olive Riley, of Woy Woy about 50 miles north of Sydney Australia, began blogging in February last year, sharing stories from her life during the two world wars, raising three children on her own, and working as a station cook in the outback.

Riley was said to be the world’s oldest blogger as she was 12 years older than the previous titleholder, Spain’s Maria Amelia. She was born in 1899 and would have turned 109 in October.

‘She enjoyed the notoriety – it kept her mind fresh,’ her great-grandson Darren Stone of Brisbane told local newspapers.

‘She had people communicating with her from as far away as Russia and America on a continual basis, not just once in a while.’

Riley had posted more than 70 entries on her blog – or ‘her blob’ as she jokingly called it – since February last year. She set up the site with the help of a friend who entered her posts for her.

In her posts Riley delved into her remarkable memory. In June she described washing days when she was a small girl, and recalls finding firewood to heat the large copper tub and having to turn the heavy mangle to squeeze the water out of the clothes.

‘That was my job – and it was real hard work for a small kid,’ she recalled.

Mrs Riley left her home of Broken Hill in the 1920s as a single mother with three children in tow. In 1932 she witnessed the opening of the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

In her last and 74th post on June 26 she spoke of moving into a nursing home and of her ill health, saying: ‘I still feel weak and can’t shake off that bad cough.’

But she added she sang  ‘a happy song’ with a visitor to the home as she did every day and said she had ‘read a whole swag of email messages and comments from my internet friends today, and I was so pleased to hear from you. Thank you, one and all.’

She died in the nursing home last Saturday. However, her blog, The Life of Riley, is still online and keeps inspiring people from all over the world.

While testing WordPress 2.6 on my other blog earlier today I found a small bug in the media uploader. While trying to submit a support request I came across this rather funny error message/page:

More on the error/bug is posted here. I’ll do a follow-up shortly when I get around to update this blog as well…

Feel free to share below if you’ve encountered anything out of the ordinary when updating to WordPress 2.6.

Microsoft is about to launch their Windows Vista Compatibility Center which will provide information on more than 9,000 products (5,500 devices and 3,500 software programs).

Is it just me or shouldn’t this really been out a long time ago?

Maybe the focus on Windows 7 and the possible release of DirectX 11 early next year has taken the focus away from what’s most important – the current OS version and its (future) users?

But then again it looks like if something fails you could always buy your way back. Besides Microsoft’s original plan to lift the corporate image with a $300 million makeover they’ve now also earmarked an additional $200 million for Windows advertising.

I get the feeling that someone (MS) is trying to ship (push) as many copies of Vista as possible (to cover development costs) before they pull Windows 7 out of the hat, possibly as early as next year. I’m not completely convinced the time of worry is over and that moving to Vista is such a great thing. Think I’ll skip a version this time…

What’s your take on this? Have you taken the step and “upgraded”? What about in the office?

Just a quick post to congratulate Spain with their great victory against Germany last night. Winning the UEFA European Championship sure was a sweet one as they’ve not had great success in these kind of Championships in decades. For me personally it was even sweeter as the only goal came after around 30 minutes by Liverpool’s own Fernando “The Man” Torres

I watched the game in the centre of Fuengirola, Spain. Atmosphere and all simply outstanding. Even the police drove around with flags on their cars. Now I can only hope my hearing will return to normal…

Once again – Congratulations!!

In a letter published today Bill Veghte, Senior Vice President at Microsoft Corporation, shares some thoughts on XP, Vista and beyond (Windows 7). A lot of people are watching Microsoft closely these days and wonder what will happen now that Bill Gates resigns.

Today, more than 1 billion personal computers around the world run Windows. Over the years, Windows has been the catalyst for innovations that have transformed the way people communicate, access information, create and share content, and much more, at work and at home. Windows is the platform that most people use to get the greatest value and benefit from their personal computers. Windows is also the platform that brings together the broadest array of choices across PCs, devices and applications. To all of our Windows customers, thank you! To the hundreds of thousands of partners that develop millions of solutions for Windows, thank you.

Read the rest of the letter at microsoft.com.