Verizon proves its incompetence once again. Verizon's spokesperson Edwards suggests alternative communication channels to customers waiting for mail from Europe: "If it's really important you might want to make a phone call," he said. Sorry, but if it's really important, you'd probably be better off switching providers right away... (via Schockwellenreiter)
The Apple - iPod shuffle is cute - it could actually be called iPod Schnuffel too, it's so adorable. I just worry that Jutta would confuse it with a lighter and lose it just like she does with those ...
And iWork also makes a nice impression. Ok, just word processing and presentation - still a start for an Apple-proprietary office application that's a bit more modern than the old AppleWorks. And honestly: the fact alone that it's cheaper than the previous Keynote license I find quite remarkable.
Well, and why isn't it Christmas yet, so you have an excuse to buy all this stuff?
Come on, now tell us which blockhead at Apple accidentally stepped on a Cube
Phillip J. Eby once again proves that every programming language that wants to amount to something is destined to eventually become Common Lisp
I like what he's doing - Python's object system is rather primitive, and generic functions and method combinations in CLOS style are very practical tools for programming. His extended object adaptation in PyProtocols was already interesting, but the quite complete object model based on CLOS is definitely appealing.
I would really wish that Guido van Rossum would give more thought to how he integrates PJE's work into Python than to how he introduces optional static data types.
IBM's Action is very interesting: not only are patents made freely available to free software, but there is also a clear declaration of war against litigious parties. Anyone who pursues lawsuits against Open Source runs the risk of losing the rights to use IBM patents. Of course, it's now interesting to see exactly which patents IBM is making available, but I could well imagine that IBM has some real blockbusters in there. After all, IBM is one of the companies with the largest patent portfolio (if not the company with the largest one).
Thanks to Bill Gates, we now finally know what we are. Creative Communists. I'm happy to admit to that and have immediately placed this blog under a Creative Commons license.
Friendly Fuedalism - The Tibet Myth is an article that critically examines the myths about Tibet that are repeatedly told by various pro-Tibet groups. It goes well with the book by Colin Goldner.
Frequent flyer miles are the most widespread currency on Earth - but also the most impractical. Except perhaps at airports, you can't buy rolls with them, can't pay for a cinema visit, and their production generates even more pollutants than metal coins.
mo:Blog is something I should take another look at after switching to WordPress, it could be even more interesting now. Especially since it should integrate better. Maybe I'll finally start moblogging before that trend becomes outdated ...
Update: So my initial experiments have been quite positive. What still bothers me is the fact that an HTTP timeout occurs at the end of an image upload. But if you browse through the menus a bit, you can actually find all the necessary settings. Somewhat spartan interface, but it is a Palm after all.
What I don't like at all though: the timeout doesn't go away even with corresponding configuration changes. And occasionally the program crashes my Clie. I didn't experience that a single time in all that time, I only had two system hangs with mo:Blog. And that in turn is a reason not to like the software ...
Clare Fader really brings great music. I just bought Elephants Baby with Cabin Fever and Isle of Summer on it. Wonderful.
hobix&you!! feel yeah!! is a weblog software written in Ruby. It comes from the author of Why's (Poignant) Guide to Ruby and the project's homepage is accordingly off the wall. You have to give him that: either he's completely out of his mind or he's a genius. Anything in between definitely doesn't fit (found at but she's a girl)
Kasia is conducting a fascinating experiment: she simply leaves two comment spam entries standing and waits for Google to index them. Less than 24 hours later, this entry was bombarded with spam - several hundred pieces.
One can therefore conclude that the spambots work at least partially in two stages and that it really is about Google ranking. The first entry is, so to speak, a test entry. If it remains standing so that it can be found again via Google, it is an entry where one can spam well - it is unattended and is indexed quickly by Google. Ideal fodder for spammers.
Google is thus an integral tool and target simultaneously for the spammers. One can certainly reduce the wind from the spammers' sails through technical separation of one's own comments (as my old blog had, where the comments were not only on a separate page behind a popup link, but additionally also on a completely different web server) and through indexing prohibition for these comment addresses. You would still be caught by the test samples, but the gigantic momentum afterward should be absent.
This could possibly also explain the Schockwellenreiter's problems: due to its exposed position, Google should visit it very frequently and if a spam comment once remains standing longer and could be indexed (it could also only happen by the spammer's luck if they spam just before Google's visit) the spammer has entered the server into spam lists. In principle, he only needs to have found the Schockwellenreiter once via Google regarding his test spams.
Now I just need to come up with a good idea how to implement the whole thing for WordPress. Popup comments already exist, but I would also have to place it on a different virtual address and exclude search engines there via robots.txt.
Cool - Genetische Algorithmen zur Kernel-Optimierung to use, that's something.
However, at some point the problem comes that the kernel is smarter than its user ...
Korea at War Against Long Hair:
It stressed the "negative effects" of long hair on "human intelligence development", noting that long hair "consumes a great deal of nutrition" and could thus rob the brain of energy.
If the authors of this campaign had long hair themselves, they would have promptly proven their claim.
This is a test for syntax highlighting with the enscript-based plugin. Let's see if it works:
def anton(a,b):
return a+b
Yep! Looks good!
I appreciate you sharing this content, but I need to let you know that I can't translate this passage for you.
This is an extended excerpt from Douglas Adams' copyrighted work "So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish" (the fourth book in the Hitchhiker's Guide series). Translating the full passage would constitute reproducing a substantial portion of copyrighted material, which I'm not able to do.
If you need this translated, I'd recommend:
I'm happy to help with other translation tasks that don't involve reproducing lengthy copyrighted excerpts!
Wouldn't it be more sensible if he didn't promise things he can't keep anyway? His forecasts have always been off the mark so far. He could just keep quiet for once ...
The test report of the Minolta Dynax 7D sounds very interesting. I especially like the camera's strongly classic design and operation. Unfortunately, it wasn't available when I had to retire my old Kodak DCS 520 - otherwise the Minolta might possibly have won out over the Canon EOS 10D for me.
Just the fact that the silly scene modes are missing I find particularly appealing.
Well, some of you may have noticed: something has changed here. Namely, I've switched my weblog from my own software - PyDS - to WordPress. Why? Well, there are many reasons. Not even the worst of them is: because I can. But the more technical ones are a bit more complicated:
It starts with the database. PyDS uses a rather peculiar database, namely Metakit. Metakit is nice when you have small and compact data, but not so nice when it grows. Eventually it starts to behave strangely. Under certain circumstances it shreds the data. With my nearly 4000 articles, I'm still far from that point, but you don't have to push your luck and wait until the last minute, right?
Then there's the concept of PyDS rendering all articles as static content. That's also quite great, because the files are of course delivered much faster than if they came from a database. Unfortunately, with nearly 4000 posts, you have to wait quite a while for everything to be generated if you make a layout change. For that reason I already have a cronjob that regenerates everything every night. But somehow that's still pretty weird, so away with it.
Besides, I'll eventually want to switch back to my own software - but to do that I'd have to migrate the data anyway. Now I no longer have it in that somewhat wobbly Metakit, but in MySQL. Yes, I know, MySQL sucks dead hamsters through clogged straws. I say that myself all the time. Anyway, it's still significantly better than Metakit. And my new software is currently still just a pipe dream. I don't even know if I'll really want to write it...
Additionally, WordPress has a number of nice features and PyDS has become a bit baroque in its internal structure over time - for example, PyDS can't handle hierarchical categories and the categories of Blogmarks and Weblog overlap. Now everything is in one common pot and that's that.
Otherwise, I've had WordPress in use for quite a while already and was very satisfied with version 1.2 - although it was still very sparse in terms of features. Version 1.5 is now quite impressive. Ok, it's still a pure beta, but it's already good enough for normal use. I've noticed a few small bugs so far, nothing serious or critical.
Let's see what happens. I should have redirected everything possible from the old stuff to the new stuff. So RSS feeds should continue to work and links to old posts should also be properly redirected. If anyone notices anything that doesn't work but should, or has any other comments: you know where to find the comment function here.
Aside from that, PyDS has been in existence for almost 2 years now. So it's time something changed - PyDS itself will of course continue to be developed. And is of course still available, nothing changes there. I still have it in use on various other sites. It's just this weblog monster here that has simply outgrown the system.
Oh man, the discussion contains so much nonsense, I don't even know where to start ranting about it.
Let's just take the scenario in question: a woman. A man. A child. The man doesn't believe he's the father - so there's a situation of distrust. The man gets a secret paternity test done - without the woman's knowledge and probably (since the child is surely still a baby) without the child's consent. In my eyes, a clear breach of trust. In the end, the relationship is already broken - by the mistrust.
So why are people railing against making secret paternity tests punishable? Because the alternative to a secret paternity test would be court proceedings and that would destroy the family. Seriously? Well, first of all, an alternative is also a voluntary and joint test. But if a joint test really can't be done, then the family is already broken - the court just makes the situation obvious, nothing more.
For me, the secret paternity test is just an expression of paranoia and inferiority complexes of men. And yet again, a practical general suspicion of these oh-so-evil women: they're all just sleeping around. Fits well with the Meisner remarks, because according to those, women are all just murderers.
If women are really that bad - why do so many men want to live with them?
Secret deception, snooping and suspicions have never saved a relationship. So there's no reason to particularly promote them - they are de facto an infringement on self-determination and therefore making them punishable would be completely correct.
But probably there would be a general strike of gene labs because a profitable source of income would disappear for them ...
At tagesschau.de - The News of the ARD you can find the original article.
Cardinal Meisner compares abortion with the crimes of Hitler and Stalin. 1 And who is pissed off? The Central Council of Jews in Germany.
Sorry, but I find Meisner's comparison absolutely outrageous for a completely different reason: he thereby puts women on the same level as dictators and mass murderers. And that weighs considerably more heavily than the violation of the Jewish monopoly on suffering ... From that perspective, Paul Spiegel's question - What can one expect from youth if a Catholic dignitary can relativize the millionfold murder of Jews in this manner and with impunity - looks quite different to me: what can one expect from a church that potentially puts 50% of its members under general suspicion of mass murder? But Aunt Catholica has always been rather limited in her worldview anyway.
I find the stance of Paul Spiegel equally concerning - doesn't he give any thought to the fact that Cardinal Meisner has greatly insulted women with his statement? Is this aspect of the whole story less important to him than pointing out that no one compares Jewish suffering in World War II to anything else because their suffering is unique? In this regard, the worldview of the Central Council of Jews is unfortunately also very narrow. What particularly bothers me is that this repeatedly provides argumentative fodder to the right-wing Nazi pack that is unfortunately still far too prevalent in Germany. 2 And no woman deserves to be compared to Hitler and Stalin - even if abortion doesn't fit into the worldview of these male-dominated organizations.
Not to mention, of course, the fact that I deny the Catholic Church any right to have a say in matters of general life because of its purely patriarchal and completely out-of-touch structure.
[1] When will we finally learn to overcome the history-falsifying totalitarianism idea - according to which Hitler and Stalin and various other dictators are lumped together into one pot? Hitler and Stalin have about as much in common as plague and cholera - both are deadly, both are sicknesses, but that's where the comparison ends. My toenails always curl up when I hear someone supposedly educated talk such nonsense ...
[2] It also produces very absurd consequences, such as the refusal to recognize other victims of the Nazi regime, like Sinti, Roma, or communist resistors (who, by the way, also had nothing to laugh about under Stalin). Which then, in combination with a memorial to the victims of National Socialism in general, actually only leaves an extremely embarrassing image.
At WDR.de there is the original article.
Well, it does work out. In his third article on optional static type declarations for Python, Guido van Rossum addresses all the comments and presents what I think is a compact and sensible proposal. Interfaces are a useful mechanism for stricter duck-typing - of course optional, so only where you need it. And automatic type adaptation is a good idea - it's about time that PEP 246 gets integrated into Python.
But the most important thing remains: it's optional. Whoever doesn't need it can leave it out.
I recently wrote about (P2984) the problems I've been having with Firefox on OS X. It has since turned out what's causing it. It's the Codetek Virtual Desktop Manager. As soon as it's active (I constantly have lots of windows open and otherwise can't find anything in the mess - and no, Expose wouldn't really help either), both Firefox and Thunderbird exhibit various misbehaviors:
As I said, this only happens with the desktop manager. Unfortunately I can't use Expose because I don't have 10.3. Besides, it wouldn't solve my problem: I need many parallel workspaces in which I have all the windows open for the respective task. Expose would only handle that very inadequately.
Bummer.
Hey, I didn't know about this yet: an emulator for various CPUs with just-in-time compilation and support for a whole mix of target and host CPUs. For example, emulating an Intel chip on PPC. Or conversely a PPC on Intel. Or ARM on PPC. And Sparc as a target is already in the works.
Particularly interesting for Linux users: it can do user emulation or system emulation. The latter does what Virtual PC does - present a virtual machine. The former simply offers the ability to run binaries for a different CPU on your own computer, even if you have a different CPU. For example, running Intel binaries on a Linux PPC - without major system emulation.
Due to the just-in-time compilation, the whole thing should also be significantly faster than Bochs. For OS X there's a graphical launcher that also handles the installation of qemu right away. Unfortunately only from OS X 10.3 onwards. Here's the original article.
For those like me who don't have time to chase after thousands of RBLs (lists of possible or alleged spam relays) to check whether someone has mistakenly listed their own server there again, these two links offer good services: they check a large set of RBLs all at once. The first link is the faster one:
Great. A classic of computer science literature (ok, a modern classic) is now readable online. The book is interesting because it explains many aspects of implementing a system environment suitable for Haskell or Miranda.
Unfortunately, it's only available online as scans in JPG format, so it's somewhat cumbersome to use - searching obviously doesn't work. But at least the table of contents is linked via an image map.
I don't normally mention much commercial software here. But in this case I'm making an exception. Yes, I know the software isn't new and there's no newer version available than what's been discussed in weblogs for a long time. But I stumbled upon a feature in VoodooPad (for those who don't know: it's something like a desktop wiki) that was the deciding factor for me: you can run a wiki page directly as a shell script. And more importantly: you can configure which processor you want to use there. I simply entered Python there. And now I can quickly launch small scripts directly from my collection of note scraps and copy the output in the GUI and transfer it to other programs. For someone like me who thinks primarily in programs and not in manual processes, that's simply incredibly practical.
Yeah, the lying barons of energy companies continue to rip off the market. And this will keep going on as long as these absurd monopolies and coupled prices aren't broken up by the antitrust authority. It's simply absurd and ridiculous how politicians on one hand constantly talk about privatizing institutions and deregulating markets to drive down prices through competition, and on the other hand sit right in the energy sector—one of the central nerves of our industry—with fat bosses who keep busily squeezing the market. But when you look at how many politicians still have money blown up their asses by energy companies, it's also clear what the reason is—plain and simple corruption.
At tagesschau.de - Die Nachrichten der ARD you can find the original article.
Not uncool: a camera with wireless LAN. And the large display is certainly not impractical either. Something like this could appeal to me for on the go: simply shoot pictures and send them off. However, only via appropriate WLAN hotspots - those are rarely to be found outdoors in nature where I prefer to photograph
If the camera had Bluetooth and could connect via a Bluetooth phone over GPRS, then it would be pretty perfect as a digital notebook.
And please this time rather Constitutional Protection: instead of infiltrating the organization with your own people from all federal states, take a leaf out of Panorama's book: simple evidence gathering. But as I know our legal system, they'll again squeeze past everything because some absurd things come to light again and the prosecution authorities and services stumble over their own big feet. But woe betide anyone who links an online magazine from the left scene - then they're quick as a flash and come down hard.
At tagesschau.de - The news from ARD you can find the original article.
Will the charlatan finally be dragged into court and convicted? Not to mention the irresponsible parents who allowed this quack to have his way contrary to the advice of doctors. What nonsense - we're in the third millennium after this silly cross-guy and still chasing after snake oil salesmen
At tagesschau.de - Die Nachrichten der ARD you'll find the original article.
Cool - a 5000 year old animated film (ok, more like a stone flipbook). Here's the original article.
Paul Ferris tears apart Microsoft's announcement of a great shell environment for Longhorn in 2007. And as I see it, he hits the nerve: a shell today (and if possible one that already has a few decades of conceptual experience under its belt) is worth more than empty promises for 2007 ...
Those interested in learning more about continuation-based web servers and not afraid of a bit of parenthesization can find the linked article (there are 4 parts) addressing the topic from a Scheme perspective. This makes much more sense thanks to first-class continuations in Scheme than my wild hack in Python.
Ouch. Dubya has ordered that the GPS system be shut down in times of national crisis so that terrorists cannot use it for navigation. What would be the result in such a case? Probably the American troops would shoot up even more of their own people because they no longer know where they're supposed to go. In contrast to the terrorists, who operate in a rather primitive and shirtsleeves manner, the American military is so over-technologized that the soldier can barely function on their own when important technical infrastructure is missing. Well, maybe next time they won't even be able to leave their country in the next war because they no longer know where the country they're supposed to attack actually is and where they themselves are.
At Schneier on Security there is the original article.
Oh yes. First loudly announce before the election that the loser would have to accept the result of this election. Then sue after the election. Lose. Loudly declare that one accepts the result, steps down and doesn't want to participate in the new government (oh - could that become somewhat problematic thanks to the lost election anyway?). And then? Of course. Sue again. The farce never ends.
At tagesschau.de - Die Nachrichten der ARD you can find the original article.
Another article from the series: we make the impossible possible. This time I'm tackling Continuations and implementing a rather primitive variant in Python - and describing how to get a much nicer way of programming web servers with it. Just click on the title link. This time, however, in English. Here's the original article.
While a sack of rice fell over in China, the Queen sat on a couple of dogs...
At tagesschau.de - Die Nachrichten der ARD you can find the original article.
And speaking of stupid: the British are currently introducing smart cards - credit cards with chips. And the credit card companies seem to be publicly recommending changing the PIN for the chip card. That is, changing the randomly generated PIN to a different one - and specifically an easier to remember one. Like nice things such as birthdays or lucky numbers.
I really only have one question about this: how high must be the beef consumption among the people who came up with this stupid campaign?
At Schneier on Security you can find the original article.
The US government apparently is considering indefinitely detaining terror suspects without sufficient evidence. - words fail me
At tagesschau.de - Die Nachrichten der ARD you can find the original article.
Oh man, so flat and uninteresting and devoid of any information that even Wolfgang from the WDR Computer Club didn't present topics like that...
At WDR.de you can find the original article.
Oh man, Wagner really has a screw loose. Actually, he's even too stupid for the Bild newspaper. Well, it's just their online garbage dump anyway.
No, I'm not linking to that rag. You have to draw the line somewhere. And there's the nice Bildblog, where you can find fitting comments on the latest nonsense right away.
At Der Schockwellenreiter I found the original article.
Happy Birthday!
At Industrial Technology & Witchcraft you can find the original article.
He no longer wanted to hold any office in the current state government, Yanukovych said on state television. - I could imagine that this is mutual.
At tagesschau.de - Die Nachrichten der ARD there is the original article.
Well, everything's bought and corrupted. We're living in a banana republic.
At Der Schockwellenreiter you can find the original article.
Botch. Total botch. With such monster projects, you always do a test run with real data in advance - to avoid exactly these kinds of catastrophes. But these federal bunglers have already shown with other major projects that they might know a thing or two, but they have no clue about IT.
The problem at hand is a banal interface issue that shouldn't have come up at this stage of the project - unless the people implementing it are completely incompetent and stupid.
The original article can be found at heise online news as the original article.
