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December 31, 2003
Cooler Heads
It was called the 5GHz Project. It required liquid nitrogen. Find it at Tom's Hardware.
No rest for the wicked, I have much to do before the end of the day so I gotta go.
Aloha!
December 30, 2003
Abby Nurmal
Sorry, today is a normal(tm) day so I gotta go.
Aloha!
December 29, 2003
While We Were Sleeping
While we were misdirected and watching Sadam's mouth being probed the President was signing into law what is euphemistically called Patriot Act II. The President and his Republican run Congressional allies slipped through sweeping new governmental controls massively concentrating dictatorial powers into the Executive branch of the federal government.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is now free to gather financial information from almost any source without the requirement of judicial review and warrant. Heretofore, the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution protected U.S. citizens from unreasonable search and seizure. The Amendment was passed to thwart the abuse that comes with absolute power, even if used for what some would describe as beneficial purposes.
The new law does away with this protection by allowing the FBI to require entities to provide all your financial information by simply sending them a letter. Once the business receives the letter, they can not inform you of the inquiry and must provide everything listed in the letter.
In my opinion, this is yet another indication that the Bush administration has an agenda to create the most powerful, some would say Imperial, centralized government in the history of this country. An agenda that they will push forward using any means possible.
I fear we will all live to severely regret ever having elected these people into power.
MovableType Atom Template Install How-To
As always, this information is provided as is, without any warranty of any kind (inset disclaimer here). You use this at your own risk. YMMV.
If you are using Movable 2.64 and recently upgraded to 2.65, you may know that there is a new template available. The template is for the Atom syndication format feed. Note that if you did a clean install of 2.65, you can probably skip this entire post as I assume everything is configured for you. But, if like me, you did an upgrade install and want to enable the Atom feed, you may want to read on.
In general, there are two things you need to do to enable the Atom feed. The first is to get the template from MT. The second is to edit your Main Index to include an "auto discovery" link to the feed.
The Atom Template
1. Go to the MT site and look for and click on the the link to the Atom Index.
2. Highlight and copy all of the text, making sure to scroll down to the bottom of the window.
3. If you aren't already, login to your MT installation.
4. Click on Manage Weblog.
5. Under Manage, click on TEMPLATES.
6. Find and click on the link to Create new index template.
7. Under Template Name type in Atom Index (I'm not sure what the full installation official name is so if anyone knows what it is, feel free to leave a comment below. Although, you could just as well use Atom 0.3 Index instead.).
8. Under Output File type in atom.xml
9. Leave "Rebuild this template automatically when rebuilding index templates" checked.
10. Leave "Link this template to a file" blank.
11. In the Template Body input box, paste all of the text you copied from the MT site default Atom index in Step 2.
12. Click on the SAVE button but do not rebuild the files yet.
13. If you aren't there already, click on TEMPLATES to get the listing of your default templates.
14. Check to make sure Atom Index is now listed as one of your templates with atom.xml shown as the Output File.
Main Index Template
15. Go back to the MT site, default templates page, Main Index by clicking on the link here.
16. Look for the following line: <link rel="alternate" type="application/atom+xml" title="Atom" href="&@60;$MTBlogURL$>atom.xml" />
17. Highlight and copy that line. Note where this line is in relation to the other lines of the template because you will need to insert it into your own Main Index template in the same place.
18. Go back to your MT page that lists your templates (logging in again if you need to - see Steps 3, 4, and 5 above).
19. Click on your Main Index template.
20. Find the location in your template where you need to paste the line you copied in Step 17. When you find it, copy the line in.
21. Click on the SAVE button and Rebuild your indexes.
Validation
Now that you have everything installed, you may want to check to make sure it validates. Now, I have no idea if there are other feed validators out there nor if this one is the best. All I can say is it is the one I used.
In any case, you need to type in the full URL to your atom.xml page. For example, www.foo.com/mt/atom.xml That last part where you include the atom.xml page is important if you want to validate your Atom feed. Otherwise, the validator will probably, by default, check for your regular RSS feed instead even though it's supposed to automatically find the atom.xml file based on the line you copied into your Main Index.
In my case, it came up with one error: line 20, column 23:url must be full URL (15 occurrences)[help]
Clicking on the help link took me to a page that said I needed to have the http:// part on my URL. In order to do this, I had to do the following:
22. Login into my MT site.
23. Click on EDIT YOUR PROFILE.
24. Find the Website URL (optional) input box.
25. Type in http:// to the already there www.seto.org
26. I rebuilt all pages, although I'm not sure I needed to.
27. Done.
I don't know if adding the Atom feed is helpful to people since, as far as I know, it's not something that is generally supported by many, if any, aggregator programs. Indeed, many people don't even know what this is all about in the first place ( here is a short tutorial on RSS that also lists where to get some of the better known aggregators). But if you do, and are using MT, then you could be the first on your block to be Atom 0.3 compliant.
Aloha!
December 26, 2003
shopping-mode=on; with_SWMBO: yes; traffic-heavy: you_bet
shopping-mode=on; with_SWMBO: yes; traffic-heavy: you_bet
No post today.
Have a Great Weekend Everyone - Aloha!
December 25, 2003
Merry Christmas Christmas in
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Christmas in Hawai'i was celebrated for the first time eight years after Captain James Cook first came to the islands. This first Hawai'i Noel was held in 1786 aboard the British ship, Queen Charlotte, as it lay anchored in Waimea Bay, Kaua'i, the same bay were Captain Cook made his first landing. To treat his crew to a Christmas dinner, Captain George Dixon ordered a pig from the village on shore, had it roasted, and then, in the spirit of the season, concocted Hawaii's first exotic drink by mixing an extra ration of the crew's grog with some coconut milk. The crew of Queen Charlotte's companion ship, King George, went ashore and played Santa Claus, distributing small gifts to the people of Waimea. Though they knew nothing about the significance of the day, the Hawaiians, with their traditional generosity, rose to the occasion. Chief Tyaana, aboard a long double hull canoe, visited Captain Nathanial Portlock, skipper of the King George, bringing him a present of some hogs and vegetables. Captain Portlock returned the gesture, which pleased the Chief very much. It was the first exchange of Christmas gifts in Hawai'i. |
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December 24, 2003
Field of Honor
'tis the season so I am posting what I call the Good News for Modern Man.
How does kicking four successful field goals in a US
football game make you to the goat? Read on and find out.
High school football in Hawai'i is like golf is to Scotland. Indeed, sometimes it seems like high school itself is more important than college (If someone from Hawai'i asks you where you graduated from they are asking what high school you went to).
So you can probably imagine how important high school football in Hawai'i is. And for many years, football in Hawai'i was dominated by one high school in particular: St. Louis High. The little Catholic school on the slopes above Honolulu was founded in 1846 and is a local powerhouse when it comes to football.
So it was the championship game for the year. All the months of preparation and hard work came down to this. Win this game, and you were on top of the world. Lose it, and there's always next year. But in this, in this game, it came down to one play.
The score was St. Louis 26 and cross-island rival Kahuku (itself founded in 1893 and now has students predominantly from Mormon families) 27. Time was running out. With 19 seconds left, St. Louis tried a 55-yard (~50m) field goal. The snap from the center spun on its axis in a lazy almost slow motion arc into the hands of the waiting holder. He placed it down perfectly and watched as the kicker stepped forward and kicked the ball towards the hopes and dreams of his team, family, and alumni. But 55-yards was 10 yards too far and the ball fell short of the goal post uprights. The Kahuku players and fans go wild, screaming with joy over their victory.
But wait, there's a flag on the play. A defender tackled the kicker after the punt was on its way. The foul moves the ball 15-yards (~14m) closer to the goal. Again, the teams line up. Again, all eyes are on the young man in the red and blue uniform. A young man who has already successfully kicked four field goals earlier in the game. The ball is snapped. The kick is away. And again . . . he misses. But this time, there is no foul and there is no time left. Game over. Kahuku wins and St. Louis loses.
Pandemonium breaks out again as the Kahuku players and fans celebrate their hard fought victory. All of the Kahuku players that is, except for two. These two see the St. Louis kicker still down on one knee, devastated by the loss. One can only imagine the mental anguish that must have been going though the kicker's mind as his head hung down, dejected. These two Kahuku players, seeing the pain of their opponent, come over to console the player only moments before they would have glady run into the ground.
Afa Garrigan, a 17-year-old Kahuku senior, is on the left, his head bent close to Santiago like he's saying something.
"I told him, 'You did good, brah. You did really good in this game," Garrigan said.
Mauhe Moala, a 17-year-old junior, is on the right, his arm curled around Santiago in a gesture of support.
Both Garrigan and Moala said they acted out of respect for the talented player Santiago is and the knowledge of how heart breaking the loss must be.
"I don't know him," Garrigan said. "All I know is that he's a really, really good kicker."
"I remember when I was in Pop Warner," Moala said. "It was our championship game. I was playing hard, and we lost and then a person I was going up against, he came up to me and said the same thing to me. It made a difference."
Garrigan said it didn't really cross his mind that he was consoling an opponent. "Not an opponent," he said, "just another player. That's sportsmanship."
Santiago doesn't really remember what the Kahuku players said to him, only that in that difficult moment, they told him to keep his head up.
"It could have been a really bitter loss. I mean, I wasn't happy that we lost, but because of the sportsmanship that they showed, it made it a lot easier to let go. It really meant a lot to me, " Santiago said. "I don't even know them personally, but it feels like we're friends. I have a lot of respect for the Kahuku players, especially after the support they showed us. They could have been jumping around and celebrating with their teammates, but they chose to talk to me. It's something I'll always remember."
The moment lasted only a few seconds and come next year, the players will be trying again, as hard as they can, to beat each other. But these two players showed, through their selfless action, what true sportsmanship is all about.
Left to right: Garrigan, Moala, and Santiago
Lottery Luminary
Speaking of selfless acts of kindness, imagine how lonely it can be to be in the military and away from families and friends during the holiday season. Imagine not being there to see the kids eyes light up when they first spy the presents under the tree on Christmas day. Imagine missing their birthdays, family reunions, or just being there to comfort your child when they fall and scrape his or her knee. Then imagine the place you are posted to is Iraq. Iraq, not exactly the safest place to be if you are in the US military right now.
Trying to be as fair as possible, and realizing not everyone could be home for Christmas, a New Jersey Army National Guard unit held a lottery to determine who would be the lucky few to be where all of them yearned to be. Specialist Jonathan Hinker, husband and father of a seven-year-old, got a number way too high to realistically have a chance of going home. So you can probably imagine the disappointment he must of felt. To be away in a foreign land where not everyone is overjoyed to have you there. To miss the family festivities. To not be able to hold his wife and son.
However, another Specialist by the name of James Presnall drew a high enough number to go home. But instead of thinking of all of the things he could do with his family, he decided to give up his ticket home and allow Hinker to go instead.
Presnall, a 20-year-old Galloway Township native who is not married, had planned to spend his leave with his parents, Howard and Toni Presnall. While disappointed about not seeing their son, they were overjoyed to learn of their son's selfless act.
"We told him we'd love to see him, but we are proud of him for doing this for a guy with a wife and young child," Toni Presnall said. While she and her husband saw Buffi Hinker at weekly meetings held for the unit members' families, they never told her what had happened because Jonathan Hinker -- who came home on Monday -- wanted to surprise his wife.
Buffi Hinker, a secretary for the Lower Township Police Department, has also been running the family limousine business since her husband shipped out in April. While doing all that work and caring for a young child leaves her little free time, she is not complaining.
"They (American troops) are doing something that's very important, so I'm able to go without a lot of sleep and get it done," she said. "It means everything to me that my son considers (his father) a hero. My husband wouldn't be the man he is if he didn't do this."
What Should Be Done
Big business hasn't exactly had a good reputation lately. In fact, it seems almost every week we hear of another executive charged with looting the very company he or she was entrusted with running. But hard as it may seem to be otherwise, they aren't all like that. Many companies give their employees Christmas bonuses. For some, this may be a gift certificate for a nice dinner. For others it may be a small monetary gift as appreciation for all the hard work employees do during the year. But this business owner was a little more generous.
Harry Stine, the founder of Stine Seed Co. in Iowa, informed his 270 employees recently that they would be receiving a Christmas bonus from the company. This would not be a holiday turkey or a box of candy.
Stine gave employees $1,000 for each year of service to his company - more than $1 million in all.
Hansen said Stine's benevolence was based on his employees' loyalty and on the performance of a cluster of farming and agricultural businesses Stine owns.
"All of these people help me every day," Stine said. "So it's not a be-nice thing. It's just what should be done."
Doing just what should be done. I don't know of a better way of saying it. I am blessed to be here with my wife and my step-daughter. I am blessed to have a roof over our heads, food on the table, and friends to share the ups and downs of life. May you be as blessed and may God bless you every one.
Mele Kalikimaka (Merry Christmas)
Me 'Oe Ka Maluhia (May you have Peace,)
Ke Aloha, a me Ka Hau'oli (Love, and Joy).
Aloha!
December 23, 2003
Blind Greed
Why are there so many variations of the Nigerian 419 email scam? The answer is because so many people fall for it. No doubt millions of these emails flood the globe with its false promise of getting rich quick by laundering money though your bank account. And even if only a fraction of one percent of the population falls for the scam, the senders stand to make millions.
The latest documented case is this Florida retiree who sold his stock, got a second mortgage on his home, and hocked his two cars. For more than a year, he gave virtual strangers $300,000. In essence, every dollar he had or could borrow. He even bought them gold pens, cell phones and a laptop computer.
The saddest thing about this episode is that to this day, this guy does not think he was scammed. He ignored police warnings that the deal was bogus and instead blames his losses on corrupt foreign governments. He has not filed a complaint with authorities. He is well and truly blinded by greed. A greed so strong that if he could, he would give them more money.
If only the right official were paid off. If only he didn't have to pay so many fees. If only he didn't have to hire an "attorney" in West Africa to help grease the deal. If only he had not fallen for one of the oldest scams out there.
Melmac Comeback
One of SWMBO's favorite TV sitcoms from the 1980s was ALF. So I'm sure she will be pleased that there will be a new show starring the hairy one on cable TV. "ALF's Hit Talk Show" will start airing early next year on the Nickelodeon cable network.
Spiraling Out
My wallpaper for this week is from the European Southern Observatory. They did three images of the spiral galaxies NGC 613, 1792, and 3627. The images come in three resolutions (up to a whopping 2702 X 2301, 3.4MB full resolution) and were produced by the EOS Very Large Telescope array consisting of four 8.2m reflectors.
December 22, 2003
Copy Right
There is a useless tension between customers and the movie/recording industry. As customers, we purchase CDs and DVDs and expect that we may use them how we wish as long as we don't make copies and sell them. Broadly speaking, this is called fair use and is a long settled concept. But recently, certain Hollywood groups have been trying to change the equation by making fair use a thing of the past.
So I am heartened by a Norwegian court that recently upheld fair use by ruling that a customer may do with a DVD as he or she sees fit. Up to and including writing a program that removes a copy protection scheme so that he could watch the DVD on his Linux-based computer.
As long as the courts are free, there is hope. But I wonder how long it will remain so before the DarkForces corrupt the courts and turn them into lap dogs to do their every bidding.
On the work front, the Salary Commission continues on its break neck pace of meeting every two weeks so there is very little time for me to do the work they need me to do in the time available. So, I gotta go.
Aloha!
December 19, 2003
Wallpaper of the Week
My wallpaper this week is
from the Cal Tech/NASA/Jet Propulsion Lab Spitzer Space
Telescope.
Launched Aug. 25 from Cape Canaveral, Fla., the Spitzer Space Telescope is the fourth of NASA's Great Observatories, a program designed to paint a more comprehensive picture of the cosmos using different wavelengths of light.
While the other Great Observatories have probed the universe with visible light (Hubble Space Telescope), gamma rays (Compton Gamma Ray Observatory) and X-rays (Chandra X-ray Observatory), the Spitzer Space Telescope observes the cosmos in the infrared.
See the full article from RedNova here.
What a Country
The fight is not yet over, but I am proud to be an American when a U.S. court stands up to the President and Secretary of Defense and says, in effect, No, you are wrong. You are not above the rule of law, even if there are enemies out there, the ends do not justify the means:
As this court sits only a short distance from where the World Trade Center stood, we are as keenly aware as anyone of the threat al-Qaida poses to our country and of the responsibilities the president and law enforcement officials bear for protecting the nation..."
But presidential authority does not exist in a vacuum, and this case involves not whether those responsibilities should be aggressively pursued, but whether the president is obligated, in the circumstances presented here, to share them with Congress..."
See one article on the ruling here and the entire ruling (186K pdf) here.
Have a Great Weekend Everyone - Aloha!
December 18, 2003
Doh!
For you Lego lovers out there comes this site that shows what the little plastic building blocks can do when you have 10,000 of them and two weeks on your hands. So what did he build? The scultpture of Homer Simpson stands four feet tall (~1.2m), that's what.
The Blue Devil You Don't Know
Chevrolet is trying to come up with its own FordGT by pumping up the power in a Corvette code named Blue Devil. The article on the new Corvette goes on to say the answer to all is more cubic inches. In this case, 427 cubic inches (~7 litres) of supercharged power (625hp). The conept car, if it ever goes into production would be out in 2006 and cost about $100,000USD.
Aloha!
December 17, 2003
Out! Out! You Demons of Stupidity!
President Bush signed the "anti-spam" bill yesterday. I have it in quotes because it actually makes legal what would be illegal under tougher state law. For example, I understand that California has a new law that requires opt-in rather than, under the federal law, opt-out.
Not waiting for BigGovernment to "solve" the problem, I've been testing two different spam filters (in addition to SpamAssasin that my host uses). The two are POPFile and K9. Both run on Windows, although POPFile is Perl-based so it could run on any platform that executes Perl. By the way, on Windows even if you don't have Perl installed the PopFile installer will install what is needed so it's fairly easy to get up and running.
After running a little over 1,000 emails through both filters I've found that POPFile is clearly more accurate. Right now, POPFile is at 97 percent. That's 30 errors out of about 1,000 emails. Two of those 30 were real emails that ended up in the spam bucket while the others where spam that made it into the inbox. On the other hand, K9 is at a relatively low 85 percent (i.e., 150 errors) and very slowly rising.
Unless you get so many emails that a Perl-based filter would be too slow, I would recommend PopFile. But whichever you choose, I think relying on only one spam filter is not the way to go. Rather, having a layered approach using different methods to filter the spam seems to be the best that we can do for now. At least, until enough spammers are thrown in jail.
YAB
Okay you browser junkies out there, MYIE2 is yet another browser but this one is based on the IE engine, rather than Gecko. At the same time, it tries to add features and fix the security vulnerabilities found in IE faster than Microsoft. If you need something IE compatible but has more features (tabbed browsing, mouse gestures, privacy protection, popup blocking, etc.) you may want to check them out. Or not, since it is still in beta and has its own set of bugs.
Something Completely Different
A wooden Ferrari? I don't know. To me it looks like a wood veneer but I guess it could be for real. But in the water?
Aloha!
December 16, 2003
Do Not Adjust Your TV Set
K-Meleon - "The Browser You Control" is trying its best to not be yet another Gecko-based browser by being letting you customize the toolbar, context menu, and keyboard shortcuts. They also say that load times are the lowest for any Gecko browser. Other than that, I'm not sure what distinguishes this from its competition but feel free to check it out.
That Sinking Feeling
A 17-year-old New Zealand student recently won the Institution of Professional Engineers award for building his own remote-operated vessel. The 1.5m long submersible has an onboard color camera and external water pumps acting as directional thrusters. The young man already has a couple of businesses interested in his design as well as the NZ Navy. Well done young Steven McCabe. Now get back to your studies and quit cutting classes.
I have a meeting of the Judicial Salary Commission to be held today in the State Capitol building so I gotta go.
Aloha!
December 15, 2003
Sports Shorts
The Honolulu Marathon was held yesterday (link will probably expire at the end of the day) and 25,000 showed up to run/walk/crawl 26.2 miles. Congratulations to all of the finishers. As a side light, I'm waiting for Gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson's yearly account of the race but I assume he's still recovering from his injuries.
Women's volleyball is very popular in OurTown. Especially when the University of Hawai'i Wahine are heading to the U.S. National Collegiate Athletic Association's final four in Dallas, Texas. The Wahine won their regional championship this past weekend by beating a scrappy Georgia Tech team. Just getting to the final four is an achievement but Hawai'i is trying to reach the championship. The four teams playing on Thursday are Southern Cal (33-0), Minnesota (they play volleyball in Minnesota? 26-10), Florida (35-1) and Hawai'i (36-1).
We Got Him!
It was good news to wake up to the announcement that Saddam Hussein had been captured. Congratulations to the armed forces who have been searching for him over the last eight or nine months. From what I understand, it was indeed a triumph of intelligence gathering that led to his capture. I've said it before but I'll say it here again, if you want to capture or kill a particular individual you can't do it the cheap way, by remote control, from thousands of miles away. You have to do it on the ground, and get up close and personal to do it.
By the way, the so called NeoCons, who have been back pedalling furiously over these long months saying the war wasn't about capturing Saddam or finding weapons of mass destruction are now saying they knew all along they would get him and they were just joking when they said it didn't matter whether he was captured or not. I guess they were also joking when they said he was killed many months ago because he sure looks pretty alive now.
Aloha!
December 12, 2003
Onward and Upward
The first steel beam was put in place in the effort to rebuild 7 World Trade Center in New York. The 52-story building is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2005. Using lessons learned from problems identified in the Twin Towers, emergency exit stairwells will be twice as wide as required under the code so that people can exit going down while fire fighters have room to go up. In addition, in order to keep the stairwells clear of smoke, they will be pressurized.
Down and Out
The State of Virginia Attorney General announced its first felony indictment of a man accused of sending spam. While I think this is a Good Thing, the article alleges the spammer sent [placing pinkie finger next to side of mouth] at least 10,000 emails a day. 10,000? Is that all? With spam filling up my email accounts I figured it was a few people sending a lot of spam. But if it's true that this guy is number 8 on the top 10 list of spammers, where is all the spam coming from?
The Low Down
This article describes a vaccination strategy that targets the so called super-spreaders. This is especially relevant this year due to the great demand for vaccines due to flu outbreaks in the western U.S. but can be used in any population where disease is spreading but there is a lack of vaccine sufficient to inoculate the entire population. The study concludes that innoculating about 20 percent of a population is sufficient to stop a disease if you can get to the right people.
Have a Great Weekend Everyone - Aloha!
December 11, 2003
A Sign!
Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, Terry Gilliam, Michael Palin, John Cleese and Terry Jones. Monty Python's Flying Circus is the subject of a new autobiography entitled " The Pythons" (St. Martin's/Thomas Dunne Books). One of my top 10 comedy movies of all time is the Python's "Life of Brian" so you know I'll be taking a look at this book.
Speaking of Books, Things are Looking Up
"The Far Side" by Gary Larson is on my top 10 ten cartoonists list so it should not be a surprise that I got the two-volume, 18-pound (~8kg), 1,250-page hardcover " Complete Far Side" last month. I've been slowly going through the pages looking for my favorite panel. If and when I find it, I'll post it. While the book does not have every panel penned by Larson, it has nearly every one of the weird and wonderful creatures that populate Larson's mind.
On a housekeeping note, thank you (I think ;=}) to fellow Daynoter Brian Bilbrey for reviving the broken BackChannel communications. If you are a Daynoter and haven't received the test message you should contact Brian to get this going.
Aloha!
December 10, 2003
Outta Here
I have to get a bunch of stuff mailed out to the Salary Commission members this morning so I gotta go.
Aloha!
December 09, 2003
Bubbling Over
First it was your very own street light jammer. Now comes something that interferes with cell phone usage by jamming the frequencies it uses. I guess I'm behind the times, but I did not know there are such things as cell phone jammers. One model, the SH066PL2A/B, costs about $300USD and has a range of about 30 feet (~9m). There are others, including one that has a 100-ft (~30m) range. Now, before anyone calls their lawyer, I'm not advocating using one of these things because in the US they are apparently illegal. I'm just saying they exist. What you do with them are up to you. YMMV. Use at your own risk. Insert disclaimer here.
Flexing Old Muscles
One of the early professional grade single lens reflex cameras was the Leica line of cameras. If you were a photo-journalist in the 1950s you were probably using a Leica, or wishing you could afford one. Comes now the Leica Digilux 2 that moves the venerable name into the 21st century. As one might expect, given its heritage, there are no automatic controls. That means focusing, aperture, shutter speed, and focal length are all done manually. By forcing you to use your brain to make these decisions, you are potentially rewarded with images that few other cameras can make. Obviously, this level of control is not necessarily for the Sunday afternoon photographer. But if you know what you are doing, there are very few cameras, digital or otherwise, that offer you more control over what the final image will look like. Oh, if you have to ask how much it costs you can't afford it (nor can you get it until February of next year - ed).
Where Do You Want to be Towed Today?
I saw something on TV recently that said the computer systems in new cars were getting so complicated that they were crashing on a regular basis. No, I don't mean the cars were running into windows (pun intended). Rather, the systems would shut the car down due to bugs in the software. So I guess I shouldn't be surprised that the company that wanted to put a Windows PC in every home now wants to put one in every garage.
This story from Yahoo News says Microsoft operating systems are already running in 23 different car models. This includes the BMW 7 series, Daimler, Volvo, and Toyota. It's too easy to make a snide remark about having to reboot your car to get it to run but there you go.
Tell Us It Ain't So
Boeing aircraft had a reputation for building robust products. Indeed, more than one has flown with parts of the wing missing or with the top peeled off. But the one thing Boeing may not survive is bad management. This Slate article lays out the dirty details on how management worked using two driving values: greed and hubris. It is indeed a sad tale to see Boeing spiraling down to 40 percent of market share. It is even more frightening to read that it could be out of the commercial market within 10 years.
Things at work are, as fellow Daynoter Sjon put it "normal." As in situation normal, all fouled up. So I gotta go. But before I go, congratulations to Daynoter John Doucette in his recent marriage. Congratulations and best wishes to John and Emma.
Aloha!
December 08, 2003
Move Along
Sorry. No post today. Things have gone from busy to crazy at work so I won't have the time to do a post. Maybe tomorrow.
Aloha!
December 05, 2003
Feeling Blue
I was working on this post when WindowsXP died in a blue screen of death. I'm not absolutely sure, but I think this is the first one I've seen since I installed XP. The error report said the ATI Radeon video driver is the problem so I will take a look at that (he naively said - ed). Unfortunately, the lockup took with it some of my post so I don't have the time to re-type it. So if you are interested in 360-degree QuickTime VR panorama images, go to this site here.
If you are interested in the old scifi series Babylon 5, check out this short snippet that says a follow-on is coming.
Infamy
The soon to be enemy launched his planes in three waves from their carriers 200 miles north of their target. In all, the aircraft participating in the operation included 81 fighters, 135 dive bombers, 104 horizontal bombers, and 40 torpedo bombers. The plan to hit the target was divided into five distinct phases:
Phase I: Combined torpedo plane and dive bomber attacks lasting from 7:55 a. m. to 8:25 a. m.
Phase II: Lull in attacks lasting from 8:25 a. m. to 8:40 a. m.
Phase III: Horizontal bomber attacks extending from 8:40 a. m. to 9:15a. m.
Phase IV: Dive bomber attacks between 9:15 a. m. and 9:45 a. m.
Phase V. Warning of attacks and completion of raid after 9:45 a. m.
By the end of the attack on the U.S. Navy base at Pearl Harbor, O'ahu, Hawai'i on December 7th, 1941, the U.S. had paid a fearful price:
Twenty-one ships of the U.S. Pacific Fleet were sunk or damaged: the battleships USS Arizona (BB-39), USS California (BB-44), USS Maryland (BB-46), USS Nevada (BB-36), USS Oklahoma (BB-37), USS Pennsylvania (BB-38), USS Tennessee (BB-43) and USS West Virginia (BB-48); cruisers USS Helena (CL-50), USS Honolulu (CL-48) and USS Raleigh (CL-7); the destroyers USS Cassin (DD-372), USS Downes (DD-375), USS Helm (DD-388) and USS Shaw (DD-373); seaplane tender USS Curtiss (AV-4); target ship (ex-battleship) USS Utah (AG-16); repair ship USS Vestal (AR-4); minelayer USS Oglala (CM-4); tug USS Sotoyomo (YT-9); and Floating Drydock Number 2. Aircraft losses were 188 destroyed and 159 damaged, the majority hit before the had a chance to take off. American dead numbered 2,403. That figure included 68 civilians, most of them killed by improperly fused anti-aircraft shells landing in Honolulu. There were 1,178 military and civilian wounded.
Japanese losses were comparatively light. Twenty-nine planes, less than 10 percent of the attacking force, failed to return to their carriers.
The Japanese success was overwhelming, but it was not complete. They failed to damage any American aircraft carriers, which by a stroke of luck, had been absent from the harbor. They neglected to damage the shoreside facilities at the Pearl Harbor Naval Base, which played an important role in the Allied victory in World War II. American technological skill raised and repaired all but three of the ships sunk or damaged at Pearl Harbor (the USS Arizona (BB-39) considered too badly damaged to be salvaged, the USS Oklahoma (BB-37) raised and considered too old to be worth repairing, and the obsolete USS Utah (AG-16) considered not worth the effort). Most importantly, the shock and anger caused by the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor united a divided nation and was translated into a wholehearted commitment to victory in World War II.
MOH
In a related note, there is a new book out called Medal of Honor. The book highlights the actions of most of the living recipients of America's hightest medal for valor against an enemy, the Congressional Medal of Honor. It includes 116 recipeints, each with a two-page spread that includes photos, a brief biography, and an essay on the deeds that earned them the medal. Every U.S. citizen should read this book and reflect on the courage of these individuals. This is courage. This is honor. This is integrity.
Have a Great Weekended Everyone - Aloha!
December 04, 2003
Picture This
You can never have too much money or too many pixels. As in 1.09 giga-pixel image made by stitching 196 6-megapixel photos into one 40,784 by 26,800 mega-picture. The level of detail far surpasses anything readily available to the general public. Of course, stitching together 196 images is not my idea of a fun afternoon but I guess it shows what can be done if you are determined enough.
Speaking of Determined
Web page userbility gurus have long talked about what is called the "Three Click Rule." That is, no information on a site should be more than three clicks away. This rule of thumb seems like common sense. I mean, in our hurried busy lives, it seems logical that people want instant gratification, not hunting through a confusing complex of web pages. So, if you have a choice between two sites where you want to purchase something and one of them allows you do that in three clicks and the other takes 25, it seem intuitive that you would shop at the first site.
However, a site called User Interface Engineering did a study on what people actually do and found that people don't leave a site in frustration after three clicks. In fact, the number of clicks don't seem to have any relation to when a person leaves.
Obviously, people go to sites for various reasons so intentions may play a part in this. In addition, expectations may also affect how you perceive the experience.
But in the final analysis, the study says the most important thing is that you are successful in doing what you came to the site to do, regardless of how many clicks it takes. Even if true, it still makes sense to keep in mind what your customers want to do and make it as easy as possible for them to do it because if you don't someone one else will.
Hardware Heaven
When you have the time, check out Wired's gear for geeks 2K3. There's everything from a 3-D display laptop to tube audio amps to over 70 gadgets to make the geek in you glad.
Aloha!
December 03, 2003
Taxing Times
I've been so busy working on the Judicial Salary Commission work that I worked straight through with no breaks or lunch hour yesterday. Even so, its been slow going putting together some salary scenarios in Excel. I can't go into the details but the formulas to determine what a person would make are getting really complex as I nest IF and AND statements. While I think I am good at doing detailed work, this is the kind of stuff where an error can sneak in and ruin you whole day. Sigh. I guess it's better than the alternative...
Speaking of IF, THEN
NetworkWorldFusion is reporting that if you are running a version of the Linux kernel prior to 2.4.23 you may want to check on a patch for a serious security exploit that could allow 3133t hax0rz 2 0wnz U. All distributions with kernels prior to 2.4.23 are affected. The exploit has already been used in the wild so the bad guys are already aware of it and are using it. So, get your patch and install it. Now.
Aloha!
December 02, 2003
Geek Golconda
Things are getting a lot busier and lot faster here at work than even I thought they would so I gotta go.
You know you are a Geek when:
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Someone asks you what languages you know, and you reply Upper Slavic, French, Esperanto and C.
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You can remember your web address faster than your phone number.
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When someone mentions "The Other OS", you think they are talking about FreeBSD.
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You start to get credit card applications for the LinuxCard ("Never start your server without it.").
Aloha!
December 01, 2003
Back in the Day
Thanks to everyone who wrote in about my poor attempt at
using a old, old computer language called BASIC
to inject a bit of humor and let people know where I was on
Friday. Based on the comments, I think I succeeded on one and
failed on the other <G> In either case, it was kind of
fun trying to remember how to mis-use BASIC but I
apologize for the late replies.
In any case, you have to remember that in the mid-1970s, there weren't a whole lot of languages, interpreted or otherwise, available to run (maybe COBOL, assemblers, LISP, and FORTRAN). I think later came FORTH, Pascal/Modula, RPG, etc. but don't write a letters if I have the sequence wrong. The point is you couldn't run down to your local CompUSA or Frys and buy a copy. In fact, since the IBM PC didn't even come out until the early 80s, the usual way to learn a language was to have an account on a timesharing system on a mini or mainframe. During that time, I was in college and had access to a DEC PDP-11/45 in the Math Department and an Apple II (no hard drive) in the Psychology Dept.
I have to admit that I wrote some pretty awful code in AppleBasic but you have to remember, it was pretty advanced for its time. For example, I don't recall too many languages that used color graphics. And if you were careful, you could write structured code. On the other hand, I have to agree that if you've learned BASIC as your first language, you will probably always have problems learning others because they require a completely different mind set. In either case, I used AppleBasic to convert a paper-based psychological test (the Stroop Color-Word Interference Test) into a PC-based version for my senior project. The program was several thousand lines long and was as bug-free as any MS program <G>.
To show just how demented we Psych majors are, the test subjects sat in front of a TV monitor that displayed the test. The subject would respond by pressing the key of the first letter of the appropriate word displayed on the screen. But, at the same time, they were listening, on headphones, to one of four recordings. The first was a passage of a comedy bit by someone I have since forgotten his name. The second version was the same bit, but had the text jumbled up in random order. The third recording was a piece of classical music, and the fourth was silence. Unfortunately, there seemed to be an interference problem between the portable tape recorder I was using and the Apple II so when I ran the actual experiment, the PC locked up several times.
Anyway, I am amazed at how many different languages there are now. But with all its faults, BASIC probably solved more quick and dirty problems than any other language of the day.
Aloha!