wce.80d.org

My father was in town last week to take me to the Sabres/Canes Eastern game 7 semifinals. Very exciting. Our Sabres didn't quite take it but we had a lot of support there regardless. Good time.

With "Sweep" done, Wake Drama and my friend Maciej put another short, tentatively titled "Test," in the can Sunday. It's about a young couple in the midst of a pregnancy test - results unknown. Shot it in one day. If you take a look at my MySpace page and browse through the comments, you can probably see a shot of me holding about $2500 worth of gear, a selection of the equipment we used to shoot it. Afterwards, after Maciej fed us (it was his script :), himself, Rob and I went to see "The Sentinel" at the Blue Ridge theatre. Cool conspiracy theory stuff but a little bit action-cheesy about 3/4 of the way through. Enjoyed it.

Coming up this weekend is CarolinaCon2006 which I am thinking about attending. It sounds pretty neat. If you can go, you should check it out. It's Friday 6p through Sunday morning. It will be relatively geeky and "technology enthusiast" oriented and, for most, rather sleepless. It's at the Hampton Inn, 3621 Spring Forest Rd. in Raleigh. $20 cash at the door. If you want to book a room, call and tell them you're with CarolinaCon. I'm pretty excited about it.

At the greenhouse today Shuhai and I recovered the side of one of our houses with double layered poly, I cleaned the evaporative cooling pads of all the dead alge that grew on them last year, and I caulked all the aspirated air monitoring tubes with silicone to prevent the mist from the high pressure fog system from corroding the contacts and humidity sensors inside. His study is now up and running and things seem to be going pretty well.

Here's a list of speedtraps in Raleigh, NC. (See also Beartraps.com for interstate fuzz.)

There's also a page that shows the cheapest gas in Raleigh, NC which is a direct link to my locale for GasBuddy.com.

For tips on saving money on gas, check out drivefar.org. I gave the author some feedback which he's put up on his pitfalls.html page.

CUTE!!! video. Laughing babies make you smile.

A link to my friends' radio show :: the Twisted Pair radio show with Al and Y0rii. I know them through my local nc2600 group. We meet at BitPlayers in Raleigh on the first Friday of every month. There's a 'gear swap' tomorrow. Bring some technical gear you've been trying to get rid of and maybe somebody will take it off your hands. If you'd like to find the 2600 meeting closest to you, go to 2600.com and look to the worldwide meetings list.

More on the anti-mouse stance. Learn the excellent text editor vim by using this really neat tutorial to radically flatten the learing curve. It's not intuitive in any respect but if you edit any quantity of text on a daily basis, do not deny yourself learning the vi/vim keybindings. You can find a few more resources by googling or looking to my 'learningunix' page. It's worth it and I use it every day.

Happy 5 May!!!

Besides looking for stuff on the web, grown up computer users don't have much use for the mouse.

I once heard an author remark that when you are a child you use a computer by looking at the pictures. When you grow up, you learn to read and write. Welcome to Computer Literacy 101. Now let's get to work.

Learning the command line on unix/Linux/cygwin (a unix-like environment for windows based machines).

If you've ever thirsted to extract the full power of a unix prompt, but were never really sure where to start, check out the link above. If you've ever wondered why you did something with the mouse 35 time in a row and wondered why you were doing all the work and not the computer, the command line is your friend.

One of the best window managers I've ever used is called ratpoison and requires no mouse to operate. Absolue freedom from constantly moving your hand back and forth between keyboard and mouse. While moving back and forth doesn't sound like much of a task, it can be a bear when you've got work to do. Next time you're editing a document think about how much time you spend moving back and forth.

Do you feel safe on that wireless connection you use at the coffee shop?

Most "unprotected neighbor" and coffee house wireless systems are completely open and unencrypted. This makes it convenient for you to check your email, IM chat, or browse the web - no password needed - but also convenient for snoops. Everything you do on the network - for the most part - every image that you download, every word you type in AIM, every sentance of email you send or receive, can be seen by others around you.

Even when it's "encrypted" it could be easily spied upon or forged. Here's a link to some tools that can be used by nefarious foes to break the encryption or pose as a legit access point, capturing all traffic you unknowingly send through them. Computer security isn't easy. If you have a choice when setting up an encrypted wireless connection, choose LEAP or WPA/WPA2 encryption over WEP when you can. WEP's design is poor and is easily attacked. (And breaking this stuff doesn't take more than a $200 laptop and a wifi card.)

Don't be paranoid, but don't convince yourself that nobody is looking over your shoulder either. Your packets are flying through that coffee sitting in front of you - and flying down the street as well, right out the window and ready for capture. More on how this works. I'm just trying to help make you aware of what's out there... Because knowing is half the battle. :)

(Yes - the yellow address bar in firefox and/or the lock icon at the bottom of your browser can protect your web sessions from onlookers. Use "https://" addresses when you can and read the security popups carefully so you don't fall victim to a phishing attack.)

Holy crap this is funny. Not any one in particular but after a few they are absolutely hilarious. Binge. Be sure to click around once you get there.

Foshata is a website where people add English language captions to random bits of the crazy video we all know that comes from Japan. Crazy Japanese media with English subtitles - by you! Genius!

fsh7HN
fshIQU
fshFT
fsh5NH
fshI2G
fsh5T
fshESB
fsh4SI
fshFCH
fsh6LM
fshBB
fshL89

Put your favorites in the comments. I'm done here.

[reported at thestreet.com]

Apparently the world's 3rd largest PC maker, Lenovo™ will be moving it's headquarters to Raleigh, NC from Purchase, New York. Yes - these are the guys that acquired IBM's PC business in 2005. (I've got a Thinkpad T43 for work and it's wonderful.) Originally named Legend, the small PC manufacturer from a one-story bungalow in Beijing, was renamed to Lenovo in 2003; taking the Le from Legend, a nod to its heritage, and adding novo, the Latin word for new.

Homework late again? You're not a skilled procrastinator. The Procrastinator's Formula explains.

… Once he perfects this gift, this wonderful talent, the procrastinator becomes capable of compressing lengthy chores into a single day. … However, this method should not be attempted by just anyone. A slight miscalculation in the length of time to delay work could prove disastrous, something only the veteran procrastinator knows how to avoid. …

You can also sample some of this author's other labors in the form of wicked eye candy for your desktop. Best. Screensaver. Ever. … though without an OpenGL 3D-accelerated video card, pretty tough to enjoy…they will be too slow to be very much fun. If they run slow for you, "ass-slow," try searching for updated drivers for your card. A similar OpenGL project can also be found for Windows[screen shots] and the GLX port thereof for Linux[screen shots].

Download the Fireflies screensaver for:

• Windows
• RH9 Linux .rpm
• (woody|sid) Debian .deb (Debian, btw, is another flavor of GNU/Linux, should you be wondering....)
• OSX (src also available @ Stephane Sudre's website)

You can also get the Windows Standalone version that allows you do do a few cool things with the mouse and keyboard you can't do with the screensaver. (It requires SDL. See the README for info on installing and mouse/keyboard controls).

Trust me. Really cool screensaver. His name is Matt Perry. He hacks OpenGL; among other things.

Here's what he has to say about his essay regarding, those whom many often refer to as, the slacker: This is an essay I wrote in my high school English class Sophomore year. It's my favorite essay I've written for a school assignment, and also probably the best. In fact, it's quite possibly the best essay ever written, by anyone, ever. Well, maybe not. But it was good enough to score an A+ in high school. So read up and enjoy [The Procrastinator's Formula].

[This post started as a response to this comment, but grew uncontrollably into what you see below. It is also somthing of a continuation of the issues and discussion I introduced in my Don't be scared. Be prepared. (The bird flu may never come.) post from 11/08/2005. Click "read more" at the bottom to see the whole thing. I'd love to hear your feedback or comments, supporting or otherwise.]

We all take chances every day; yet everyone worries about "the big one" that has a 1:1,000,000 chance of striking, like lightning, or a plane crash, OR like what recently happened in the Big Easy. People fret about things that happen infrequently, while completely missing the mayhem that is brought upon our people by our nation's highways EVERY YEAR. Our reactionary programming is what causes us to scream about the wintertime front door being open for a second while the basement windows leak heat and waste energy ALL WINTER LONG, YEAR AFTER YEAR.

We have to wonder, what *IS* a legitimate threat? The icicles that form on the gutters above the sidewalk or the nails and glass on the highway surely have a much better chance of seriously interrupting your life than a few sick birds in Vietnam, no??? Do you have any idea what the levels of lead or arsenic are in your tap water you drink, cook with, and brush your teeth with every night? Ever think about the radioactive minerals being released into the air from coal burning power plants? Is your basement full of Radon gas? Have you had it tested? Is the electric dishwasher you open every night after dinner, with wet hands, still touching the earth-connected sink, properly grounded? Are the batteries in your smoke alarms still powerful enough to activate them? Black widow spider in the winter boot you haven't used since last year? Mold spores growing in your pillow or brewing in that humidifier? You want some paranoia???? Do you even lend a passing thought to these things?

One more quote for you, Cyrus.

It will never be possible by pure reason to arrive at some absolute truth. ~Werner Heisenberg

amen.

Standardization can be used to unify - or divide - people, markets, nations, and technologies at every level.

(This node represents a continuation of the discussion on standards from my previous post Get Over!!! discussing how standards, and their sometimes interesting history, affect our everyday lives.)

---

Check out The Standards Blog for interesting insight and discussion on various standards in use (and disuse) throughout the world. Implications of adoption, their effect on business, society, and international trade are all taken into consideration.

Of particular interest, I believe the battle between Redmond and their New England nemesis is sure to be important to our society at large with regards to the free flow of information and the power of monopolies. Potentially even the future of our society and how we on this earth will be remembered and understood in centuries ahead is at stake.

Massachusetts has an annual IT budget of about $100 million, of which a "substantial portion" is spent on software. Even if we assume that a quarter of this "substantial portion" is spent on Microsoft products (and that's highly unlikely, anyway), it would amount to only $25 million -- less than 0.1% of Microsoft's fiscal 2005 revenues of $39.8 billion.
:: Microsoft's New England Nemesis :: Stock Analyst Eats Own Foot ::

Millions of dollars flow from industry every year - perhaps billions worldwide, to one company. And for what? Word processors and spreadsheets. Of course there is more. And the importance of things like (ease of use - Ha!) file servers and information directories should not be underestimated. But, should the state of Massachusetts switch to the freely downloadable OpenOffice and the OpenDocument file format from OASIS, *significant* savings could be had for the state and its taxpayers. Information would also not remain locked away, the only key being an annual license fee to Redmond. Half the world seems to be paying the "Microsoft Tax" to access their own information. Not only do they need to pay to retain access to documents and information they create and store, they pass the torch to anybody else that needs to read those documents. Open formats must be demanded by citizens for use in the public sector to ensure continued innovation, information sharing, and govenmental transparency.

MS-Word is Not a document exchange format
We Can Put an End to Word Attachments
An example you can use...

If you've ever wondered to yourself: "What is an engineer exactly?" Then take a look at this article over at Embedded.com called Worst Case Analysis. It doesn't fill in the whole picture, but might give some idea as to what's going on in the head of your favorite geeky BoyScout-type.

... My wife was somewhat relieved as the dearth of wind flattened the seas. Me, well, I’m an engineer. I can visualize the 28 year old pistons and valves flying around at 1400 RPM for days on end, and can think of hundreds of failure modes, any of which might keep us stranded at sea for days or weeks till the wind returned. ... An awful lot of things have to operate perfectly to keep that diesel running, and I worry about every one of them. ...

She often asks me why we have so many spare parts and tools aboard. Yeah, there’s a spare injection pump in one locker, an alternator in another, and a couple of giant boxes of other engine spares scattered around the boat. ...

Worst case analysis is part of the engineering zeitgeist, and is the reason that so many systems behave so well despite all sorts of unanticipated insults.

We engineers are very much unlike other professionals. Our mode of thinking permeates every aspect of our lives, much to the annoyance of many spouses. "Uh, is that bra really structural, honey?" ...

Engineering is more than a career choice. It’s a way of thinking, a different view of the world, an attitude that leaks across our whole lives. The US Declaration of Independence says "We hold these truths to be self-evident…" But we engineers hold every truth, every observed fact and supposition, to analysis. "Evident, perhaps, but exactly how did you acquire the data?" ...

Take home message: Be prepared. Be very prepared.

If you're at home right now and don't have a bag of spare clothes and a few extra water bottles in your car, do it now. Get one of those spare duffel or pocketbooks from your closet. Grab a few pairs of socks and some old underwear and seal them in a gallon sized ziplock. Do the same with a pair of pants and a shirt. Press out the air and seal. Stuff them in your bag. Add an old pair of shoes if you've got them and there's still room. Now go now to the kitchen and grab a few garbage bags. Add those. Now two waterbottles. Take it out to your car now and throw it in the trunk. It'll come in handy. [Yes. Right now. Your eyes could use a break.]

Don't underestimate what you can learn by just talking to people. Even those who do little more than ask questions can teach you things.

There's often much insight to be had that comes in the form of questions or the desire for advise on any given issue. With questions and inquire comes a deeper understanding of that person's point of view, understanding, and concerns. If you are an educator, these questions and concerns can be worth their weight in gold. "Why has this concept not made it into this person?" If you are a peer, questions can offer a new point of view or a target for an inquiry of your own.

The questioner should be treated with respect and you should do what you reasonably can to impart your knowledge onto that person. It's called information exchange and is the fundamental basis to the modern day human experience. Without those in the know educating others, where would we be? Through time the written word (or stone tablet or what have you) has proven invaluable to increasing the total knowledge of man. Research, academia, and experimentation have made almost every part of modern society possible. These are the kinds of things that give your car or bike a smooth and efficient ride on a round, vulcanized wheel. If you've got knowledge, share it - please.

OK. Now. Be careful with this one. The threat of widespread misinformation dispersal is very real. The threat of one person's politics, religious views, or misconceptions becoming widespread can chill. This behaviour is natural but "only you can prevent misinformation fires." Use common sense and qualify your answers if they are your personal views, you are unsure of your answer, or feel unqualified to present a well-rounded picture of the subject at hand. A qualified wrong is far superior to a confident incorrect answer. If you don't know - SAY SO!

Some history on why we travel on the right side of the road (found at This site on World Standards):

...
In the past, almost everybody travelled on the left side of the road because that was the most sensible option for feudal, violent societies. Since most people are right-handed, swordsmen preferred to keep to the left in order to have their right arm nearer to an opponent and their scabbard further from him. Moreover, it reduced the chance of the scabbard (worn on the left) hitting other people.

Furthermore, a right-handed person finds it easier to mount a horse from the left side of the horse, and it would be very difficult to do otherwise if wearing a sword (which would be worn on the left). It is safer to mount and dismount towards the side of the road, rather than in the middle of traffic, so if one mounts on the left, then the horse should be ridden on the left side of the road.

In the late 1700s, however, teamsters in France and the United States began hauling farm products in big wagons pulled by several pairs of horses. These wagons had no driver's seat; instead the driver sat on the left rear horse, so he could keep his right arm free to lash the team. Since he was sitting on the left, he naturally wanted everybody to pass on the left so he could look down and make sure he kept clear of the oncoming wagon’s wheels. Therefore he kept to the right side of the road.