Back home again after 8 weeks in Oman. Same crew, different block.
This block is completely different to the last – gravel plains and some jebel, but very little that is really exciting.
Operationally parts of it are quite difficult – some very rugged sections.
The crew deserves credit for getting through there without so much as a twisted ankle.
There has been a lot if criticism of BGP over the years, some of it justified, but they have developed and are now at a stage that I would put them up against any of the other major contractors. In many ways they are better.
Their biggest failing is probably technical support, but sadly that is lacking in many companies these days. It’s what happens when accountants get to run companies.
I’m going back early next month, should have around 6 weeks to finish up the job.
After that, who knows?
For those interested, some updates to software:
Uphole2 has had some major fixes:
• On first load of a file that has no Project associated with it, you are now forced to complete the header sections.
• You can now change headers – IE hole names etc.
• The PIK files now contain the depth for that level, so it will be suggested when re-picking
• You can now create a File depth Assignment in Excel and copy/paste into the FDA section
• Print has been added to the Interpretation page
• On the interpretation page:
• Holding down the ALT key while moving cursor over a point show information about the point in the title bar
• Holding down the SHIFT key while clicking on a point changes it to an X and excludes it from calculations
• Holding down the CTRL key while clicking on a point deleted the point from the display and excludes it from calculation
There are still a few things to do –
Report needs to be finalised
There is an issue when changing to different types of down hole tools on the same hole IE going from 5 receivers to 1.
These will be fixed in due course -IE when I get more Upholes to work with.
SMT Analyser has some minor updates
‘Stats Only’ now calculates last month as well as the current month
Fixed an issue with ‘Statistical Comparisons’ crashing
Still need to update for the different possible date formats of the SMT300 which brings me to today’s rant:
Why the hell can’t manufacturers decide on one date format and stick with it?
We have basically 3 formats:
The correct, proper, sensible date format is (CDF) ddmmyyy
The mindless American format (MAF) mmddyyyy (whoever came up with that needs the rough end of a pineapple inserted where it most hurts)
Database format yyyymmddd (for computer use, probably the most sensible)
The problem of course lies with the CDF vs the MAF. How can we tell what the real date is if it is presented as 9-4-2010 or 09/04/2010?
Thinking people would assume it as 9th April 2010, but in America it would be 4th September 2010
This would be manageable if the manufacturers specified what format they are using and stuck with it.
Sensor are one of many that don’t.
It would also be manageable if they identified the date format somewhere in the file header – something like:
DATEFORMAT=MAF
Or
DATEFORMAT=dd-mm-yyyy
That would make life a lot easier for all concerned and me especially.