February 2003 Archives

Tim Bray has started watching his web server's access_log file. He's got a nice description of what's in the file along with an account of how word spread about his site when he brought it up. Pretty interesting. Watching the access_log file can be somewhat hypnotic. I usually have a small window in the bottom corner of my screen with it running. I like seeing what kinds of things people search for while hitting my site.

Caterina.net mentioned Oulipo this morning, which I thought was a very cool sounding word. While trying to find out just what Oulipo is, I found another interesting site to read called Everything Burns. And it ends up he links to my friend Lukas' blog. Interesting how small the world can be.

Hopefully I'll have contributed to the burst with this.

Prices for in-Starbucks WiFi service slashed by T-Mobile
T-Mobile is droppping the price of WiFi inside Starbucks sites, according to this CNET story. Starting this Saturday, all-you-can-eat 802.11b will reportedly drop from $40 to $30 per month, and "day use passes" will cost $6 (24 hours of use inside any of about 1,200 2,100 (Thanks, Glenn) wireless Starbucks). Link to Glenn Fleishman's analysis, Link to T-Mobile service plan details, Discuss [Boing Boing Blog]

You know, for $6 I'd consider going and sitting in the seats that are right outside of Starbucks in the Garage at Harvard Square and hopping online. There are times when I just need to get things done and I'm way too distracted by all the toys I have in my house. Sounds like a good move to me!

While browsing around this morning I followed a link off of Jen's blog and read about The Saga of Devil Bunny. After finishing the story I was browsing around the site more and ran into the most terrifying thing ever: Hello Cthulhu. You can start from the very beginning if you want to test your sanity.

And in other news, did you know that there is a musical called A Shoggoth on the Roof?

A year or so ago I bought a cheap Canon scanner (the 650U I believe, it's currently in the closet). I keep checking back on their web site for OS X drivers, but for the last 4 months it has just said: Available December 15, 2002.

Hello? Is anyone home over there? What's the word? I hate when companies can't keep their web sites up to date. It's fine being a month or so out of date, but they're going on two and a half months. And when it comes to support issues, people expect information that is as fresh as possible.

Kottke.org posts about a very cool site that has a hypertext map of Manhatten called New York Songlines.

To this end I offer these as the New York Songlines. An oral cultures uses songs as the most efficient way to remember and transmit large amounts of information; the Web is our technological society's closest equivalent. Each Songline will follow a single pathway, whether it goes by one name or several; the streets I plan to follow from river to river, while the avenues will at least at first be read only in part, focusing on the upper Downtown/lower Midtown part of the island I know best.

I browsed through a few of these and was impressed at the work that had gone into it. Parts of it were a little confusing, but the detail was really interesting. The cool thing would be to find a way to load this into a PDA when you went to go do the tourist thing.

Douglas Adams: "I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by." [Quotes of the Day]

Lukas is musing about how RSS feeds "should" be configured.

A number of blogs have recently been discussing how RSS feeds should be configured. Some of the questions that frequently come up are:

• Should feeds contain the full content of posts or just an excerpt?
• Should additional content like user comments and trackbacks be included?
• How many days/posts should be included?

Rather than try and come up with answers to those questions that would satisfy all my readers, I've decided to provide the full range of options.

I'd been thinking about this a bunch because when he first added in comments it was driving the aggregator in Radio crazy. We actually were just talking about this a few days ago too. I don't think there is necessarily a "should". Though, I could see a few reasons to want to keep it to just posts or an excerpts. Though they all tend to apply to larger sites.

The primary one has to do with bandwidth. If I'm a newspaper who is syndicating stories, the bandwidth requirements aren't as much for me if I just do excerpts. Remember that RSS is a bit different from a normal web page in that most aggregators are hitting it every hour (or less) and downloading.

You could get around it with some kind of database and dynamicly building the feed, but I think you might end up with some steep resource requirements. Though in the case of most personal blogs that wouldn't be an issue.

For now I'm just offering a base feed that includes the full post. One thing I'm thinking of doing is using MT's 'Extended Entry' area for extra long posts. That would help break up what is on the front page, when I have ones that would go on and on and on.

I replaced the built-in searching that is in Movable Type with ht://Dig. I think it gives much better search results and is much faster that what is built in.

Ripped a few more CDs today.

• Thomas Dolby - Best Of, Retrospectacle
• Devo - New Traditionalists
• Devo - Pioneers Who Got Scalped: The Anthology (2 CD set)

Not that many this time. The next batch is a bunch of Depeche Mode, so I figured I'd do it all at once. I love the Devo anthology. It's got some great tracks that I'd never been able to find before (like them covering Head Like a Hole). As of right now I have 2900 songs, the equivilant of 8.6 days of music.

Since I slept most of the day I've decided that I should have breakfast for dinner.

I like some of the blurbs we get from Daypop's Word Bursts. There's nothing like a bit of out of context quoting.

Beaver:: so anyway, the cowgirl attributes an upskirt b shot to me to the detriment of the actual artist, so i get a lot of windfall traffic today (hello!). - Radio Free Blogistan [Daypop Top Word Bursts]
(links added by me)

Today I've been asleep a good half of the day at least. I'm just exhausted. I'm not sure what's happened, but I feel like my body is craving rest. Which is just fine because up till recently I hadn't been able to sleep that much at all. I guess four nights of almost no sleep does eventually catch up to you.

At the same time I feel like I need to be more productive so I've dragged myself out of bed to finish up the last few steps on a consulting project.

(Please excuse my random rambling, I blame the Tussionex cough medicine the doc gave me).

One thing I like about this whole blog thing/web thing is that you really never quite know who is out there reading your blog. I remember way back when I first got back onto the Lung Transplant list Adam wished me good luck on his blog. I was kind of blown away for a moment. Adam Curry read my blog? But when I thought about it, it wasn't that astounding. I had lots of random people that read my blog. I'd linked to things he'd posted about in the past so I'm sure he'd found my site. One difference may be that people who are part of/have been part of the public eye may hold themselves back sometimes.

The thing that made me just about it this morning was Adam Gaffin's comment on my entry about Movable Type and mySQL. When I glanced at his site I found it was Network World Fusion, which is the online site for Network World magaine. The cool thing about this is that this definitely answers my question. Someone was using MT for a 'real world' application and just happened to stumble across my blog and let me know that it worked well. It's one of the things I like about weblogs. Oh and you should check out Network World Fusion, they've got some cool blogs there. I like the Cool Tools one myself. (Hmm, and they are located in MA. I should keep an eye out to see if they are hiring at all ever (gotta network every chance I get these days!)).

The other thing I learned more about in the last day was Octopuses. Thanks to comments on my post about the one that can open up a jar. See, it pays to post about random things, you never know who will respond or what you'll learn.

'Mister Rogers' dies at age 74

PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania (CNN) -- Television's "Mister Rogers," the cultural icon and kindly neighbor to generations of American children, died Thursday at the age of 74.

Growing up I was a PBS kid. It was one of the few things my mom would let me watch regularly. I remember watching Sesame Street, Mr. Rodgers Neighborhood, and The Electric Company regularly. I still remember so many bits about the show now. There was the trolley that went to the Make-Believe land, and Mr "Speedy" McFeely (the mailman). I'm not even sure if PBS even still airs old reruns of the show, but I hope they do (it appears they do). I actually think I even have the record from the show on vinyl. Goodbye Mr. Rodgers, you'll be missed.

Update: Here's the New York Times obit.

Is anyone I know using MT with mySQL. What do people think of it? Does it scale well? I can imagine there being a point when the normal installation might end up slowing down some, and mySQL might end up being a slightly better choice.

Benjamin Franklin: "They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." [Quotes of the Day ]

A few days ago Phil Ringnalda posted about a new plugin for Movable Type that let you have threaded comments.

After napping a bit tonight (No, I didn't go out to the club. Right now if I breath funny I start coughing endlessly, so I decided to stay in), I decided to try popping the plugin in and seeing how well it worked. It's actually pretty damn cool. It reminds me a lot of how LiveJournal comments work as far as threading. Though even more now I want to change the templates for the individual entry pages. But that'll be for tomorrow after I sleep some more.

kottke.org reports that "Paul McFedries, who runs the excellent Word Spy, has received a letter from one of Google's lawyers concerning his citation of the word google". McFedries has a web site called WordSpy, that is "devoted to recently coined words and phrases, old words that are being used in new ways, and existing words that have enjoyed a recent renaissance." He recently added the verb "google" to the site and it seems Google isn't happy with his definition.

Something about Google's attitude just rubs me the wrong way. Plus, I'm not sure how much ground they have to stand on in this case.

I was just looking at the system logs on my G3 and I saw the strangest thing in them. There were these random entries that said:

Wearly I sit here, pain and misery my only companions.

Pardon me for breathing, which I never do any way so I don't know why I bother to say it, oh God, I'm so depressed.

Would you like me to go and stick my head in a bucket of water?

Do you want me to sit in the corner and rust, or just fall apart where I'm standing?

My capacity for happiness, you could fit it into a matchbox without taking out the matches first.

I'm not getting you down at all, am I?

Funny, how just when you think life can't possibly get any worse it suddenly does.

Ha, but my life is a box of wormgears.

Funny, how just when you think life can't possibly get any worse it suddenly does.

I stared at this for a few minutes then went to check the past logs. It was there too. I started to grow a little bit worried and looked around online to see if I could find anything about it. After a bit of looking around I found this thread over on usenet (thanks to Google). Yes, it was the mouse drivers for my system. That makes perfect sense... or not. Though it is nice to know that the folks at Logitech have a good sense of humor.

Amazing article about two (stupid) people in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Our party-crasher might have been able to guess that he was among law enforcement had he taken time to study the picture of the Framingham SWAT team on the fridge. Or look at the sweatshirt worn by the host. It had the words Burlington Police Academy and a pair of handcuffs stitched on.

Oblivious to these and other clues, Garland struck up a conversation with Gutwill, never knowing he was a police detective.

Thanks to Lukas for the heads up on this.

MUNICH, Germany (Reuters) -- An octopus in a German zoo has learned to open jars of shrimp by watching zoo attendants perform the act underwater.

Frida, a five-month-old female octopus, opens the jars by pressing her body on the lid and grasping the sides with the suckers on her eight tentacles. With a succession of body twists she unscrews the lid. [ CNN ]

I can see this octopus getting into all kinds of trouble now. How intelligent are Octopuses (octopii?) supposed to be anyways?

Way back when I used to read usenet there were a few newsreaders out there that let you set rules for 'scoring'. You were able to tell the program to look for certain words and give them a number value. Then you could say to sort by the scores of posts. In theory the higher the score the more keywords it had that matched your interests. It also ment that stuff you didn't care about would drop to the bottom of the list.

As I start using RSS more for newspaper type feeds I find that I hate sorting through things, or there are regular posts from some newspapers that I really don't care about. It would be great to start scoring things based on things I'm interested in right now.

Well, the Tussionex definitely helped me sleep last night. For the first time since last Friday I slept for more than an hour. I think this will definitely help me recover quicker (along with a little push from some antibiotics).

The parents are coming up to take me out to lunch today. I think it should be a sushi day.

Once again Wednesday rolls around, which means another episode of The Analog Lounge. Last week I was curled up on my couch with a nasty cold that had just hit. This week, I still have a cold, but hope to be able to come out and kick things off tonight with an opening set (even if I do feel a bit sick still). So I hope to see everyone else making an appearance too. Our special guest tonight is Keith Kene, an even better reason to make an appearance. Here's the official word:

Changmian and Dubcoast present

*~The Analog Lounge~*
The relaxed side of things. Join us every Wednesday for a mix of music styles in the lounge at Vertigo. Tonight we welcome:

Keith Kene (formula 409..keep it live) Boston, MA
Keith Kene is one of those Boston DJs who I just don't hear spin often enough. He's been helping Boston and New England get their groove going for around a decade, and tonight he's agreed to come out and play for us. So bundle up and come on out for a night of house that'll warm you up deep down inside (along with some help from a martini or two).

with resident dj's
Gregory Blake (Changmian) Boston
Special Pete (dubcoast music) CA
Peter Ellis (ttb) Boston
Pete Yagmin (Changmian) Boston

Wednesdays
@ Vertigo (upstairs)
126 State St. Boston, MA
617-723-7277
10pm - 2am
21+ with ID
$5 cover (gets you into both the Lounge and Anitya)
No dress code
www.changmian.com
www.dubcoast.com
www.vertigoboston.com
www.mapquest.com (directions)

Upcoming Guests:
03/05 - Qi - madlifted - MA
03/12 - DJ Dres - proton radio/dubcoast/DEKLAB - MA
03/19 - MDR - Changmian - MA
03/26 - Residents Night

To view our calendar online (with support for you iCal and Mozilla calendar folk):
http://ical.mac.com/gblake99/The32Analog32Lounge
And don't forget Anitya, downstairs at Vertigo this week the one and only Hugh Sharpe.

Ambrose Bierce: "Absurdity, n.: A statement or belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion." [Quotes of the Day]

Nasa is reporting that Pioneer 10 has fallen silent.

Pioneer 10, the first spacecraft to venture out of the solar system, has fallen silent after traveling billions of miles from Earth on a mission that has lasted nearly 31 years, NASA said Tuesday.

What was apparently the spacecraft's last signal was received January 22 by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Deep Space Network. At the time, Pioneer 10 was 7.6 billion miles from Earth; the signal, traveling at the speed of light, took 11 hours and 20 minutes to arrive.

When I was a kid I really wanted to go up into space. I remember reading about Pioneer 10 and everything. In some ways it's impressive that they were able to keep talking toit as long as they were. Damn, I still wanna go to space. It's pretty much impossible currently due to my health, but it's a nice dream.

I found out the actual name for the thing where my heart was racing, along with what they gave me to fix it. You can read all about Supraventricular Tachycardia here.

Doc Searl asks: You mean this isn't an Onion story?

I had my quarterly appointment with my pulmonologist. As usual nothing new, but he did give me a perscription for some Tussionex, which is a narcotic cough syrup. So far it is definitely helping. I'm going to lay down and see if I can take a nice nap finally.

Daypop has been busy lately. They recently released a feature called Daypop Top Weblogs, that ranks blogs by their citations. They just released Word Burst, which supposedly tracks what people are writing about (as opposed to what they are linking too). We'll see how well the results are for the next few days.

My new favorite OS X software review site, Perversion Tracker, reviews Opera 6.0. And it isn't pretty.

Using Opera is like slipping on a comfortable pair of shoes, and then discovering that your formerly comfortable shoes have been surreptitiously filled with broken glass. As you make this realization, a troupe of baboons rounds the corner, baring and snapping their grisly teeth. They howl and begin to chase you. Knowing you’re the only fresh meat for miles, you start running from this horrible Ape Menace, suspecting that you have somehow fallen into the hands of the Global Monkey Conspiracy. As the simian horde draws closer, in your desperate panic to get away, you slide into a steep ravine. As you strike bottom, you awake, in bed. It was all a dream. You are safe, asleep, and your computer has only non-Opera browsers installed.

It almost sounded bad enough that I wanted to see it for myself, but I resisted the urge. It's a shame. Opera used to be one of my favorite browsers.

From The Shifted Librarian

Tarot cards made of pictures of lego people. The Empress is a librarian. [librarian.net]

Pretty keen! I love looking at the art on some Tarot decks. I've always wanted to have a copy of the Dali Tarot deck.

Tonight was a night for sitting in front of the TV, munching some popcorn and checking out Shanghai Noon, which I never got around to seeing before. It was pretty entertaining. I don't know that I would have paid for it in the theatre though. Tomorrow I'm hoping to watch The Big Sleep in the afternoon.

This is the one thing I love about netflix. I'm slowly getting to see movies I've wanted to see forever.

I just a moment ago realized that I didn't have comments in my RSS feed anymore when I read a post over on Scripting News. I can't believe I spaced on that. Luckily there was a link to a post with instructions so I could be lazy about it.

Second question for RSS geeks out there. What's the thought on syndicating comments? Is it a good thing? a bad thing? a why bother thing? I kind of think having the link is nice, but I don't know that I want to be continually rebuilding rss files just for comments.

So, after playing around with the software that lets me phone control my computer I got to thinking about using bluetooth for remote controls. With a bluetooth remote control you could have one that did much more complex sets of commands. You also could have learning remotes that just would connect to a device and download their command set instead of having to train it.

Now I just need to convince all the A/V makers to do this.

My friend Lukas just pointed me at this app that works with my phone and my computer called Clicker. From the readme:

Welcome to the first preview release of Sony Ericsson Clicker! Clicker lets you remotely control your Macintosh from a compatible Sony Ericsson phone. Here are some ideas on how to use Clicker:

• Control PowerPoint or Keynote when giving presentations.
• Control DVD Player or iTunes from your sofa or bed.
• Use AppleScript to control anything you like!

Further, Sony Ericsson Clicker has a built in "proximity sensor", allowing you to trigger actions when you leave or come back to your Mac. Again, here are some ideas:

• Pause iTunes when you leave the room, turn it on when you come back.
• Use AppleScript to let your presence (or absence) control anything you like!

This is too damn cool.

"Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever." [Quotes of the Day]

One nice thing that Radio provided me with was very basic site stats. I could easily tell how many people were viewing my home page. It didn't give much beyond that and referers, but it was enough for my needs.

I thought about writing my own, but in the end I found MnM Stats. It's just on version 1.0, but it isn't too bad and does the basics for me. It requires PHP and MySQL, which also works just fine for me. Of course now I want to be able to get even more complete stats for my site. If you're curious about traffic here you can look here

The BAFTA awards were today. I'd never seen this before. It was pretty entertaining. Stephen Fry did a great job hosting. I was psyched to see Charlie and Donald Kaufman get the award for best adapated screenplay for Adaptation. Best Film went to The Pianist (which I still want to see).

Friday Warner Brothers officially announced the cast for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. This one should be really interesting. I can't wait to see what Alfonso Cuaron does with it. I didn't realise that he directed A Little Princess also. I can definitely seem him rocking with this.

Oh yeah, and Gary Oldman is cool casting for Sirus Black.

Last last night a I was talking about 80s music with someone online and Adam Ant came up in the conversation. This morning I skipped ahead in my CD ripping and ripped Antics in the Forbidden Zone. Now I can't stop listening to it. I miss the 80s sometimes.

Jeff Walsh has an interesting essay about blogging and journalism (via GlennLogs, via Scripting News). I think I agree with him the most as far as the connection between the two. I've actually always seen it as a case of blogs CAN be journalism (Wi-Fi News), but they aren't necessarily.

Opinion columnists (and to some extent software reviewers) live in a different world. Their entire shtick is their take on things. It's why their photos appear above their columns, they are clearly building a brand. The photo is there, all of the copy is first person, and they have absolutely no interest in being objective. Fair, sure. But they clearly can say "Microsoft is off its rocker if it thinks any of its millions of Office users want this." No grunt can, at least not in their articles. Not unless they're quoting someone.

So, if there is any connection to be made, I think bloggers are the opinion columnists of the journalism world.

This seems like a much more interesting connection to me (Is writing opinion columns journalism? How is that viewed in the journalism world?). Of course the other issue with this is that everyone seems to have a slightly different definition of just what is a weblog. I go with the very general definition where everything from 'traditional' weblogs to more journal style sites are weblogs.

So I've been thinking about what to do with Radio. I know a few people who run multiple blogs and end up using different tools for each. There are also some very cool features in Radio. I actually really dig the whole upstreaming thing. I like being able to drop something in a folder on my laptop and have it just show up on the web server.

Though, thinking about it now what I really want is something that keeps two folders in sync. So that I can edit or add files on my laptop and they'll feed to the web site. But also, sometimes I need to edit things on the web site and would love those changes sent back to a version of the site on my laptop. Something kinda like rsync (which I guess I COULD use).

Anyway. Back to Radio. I think I'm going to see what interesting uses I can come up with for it, maybe another blog is in the making.

A stench exhumed from the microwave - it was like nothing I've smelled before. It was the kind of odor that had me preparing to lift the wallet off the four-week-old corpse I was about to find. But this stench! This stench was no corpse! This stench was breakfast!

Derek is sick of those "Anti-Drug" Commercials. The one that annoyed me the most was the one where the teenage girl got pregnant while she was high. Um, okay. Why just target pot. It's okay to drink kids, you won't end up doing something you regret then.

As usual with things like this, words fail. I'm hunting around to see if this is a photoshop job or real.

This is just a quick post to check the LJ mirroring.

I've changed blogging systems again. This time I've made the jump to Movable Type. I still like Radio, but it just isn't quite the right fit for me.

The big issue for me is that Radio is powerful. Much more powerful than I was needing. It was also much more complex. In order for me to do anything I really had to go in and start mucking about in the code. And I never really felt comfortable with that. It also has felt like it is on a slightly slower development cycle than Movable Type.

So, I'll still have it on my system. I still have to bring over all my category posts. The old comments are all gone unfortunately. MT doesn't seem to have a good way to bring them over. I was a little annoyed with that, though I think I understand it. The pages beyond this one haven't been converted over to the new look and feel, but I'm going to work on that more later today.

Here we go again!

I've been feeling pretty run down the last few days. Mostly from a cold. But today around early afternoon I just wasn't feeling right. I felt like I was trying really hard to catch my breath and it just wasn't happening. I put on my oxygen and had it going for a good half hour and it just wasn't getting better. It was kind of weird because I could feel my heart pounding. I finally decide that I needed to go to the hospital around 4:30 and quickly found a friend of mine who was online (thanks Hank!) and who could come bring me.

About 40 minutes later I got to Brigham and Womens Hospital. There are ones closer to me, but this is where I've been going for all my lung stuff. I shuffled up to the desk in the emergency room and croaked out that I was having trouble breathing and was quickly wisked away to have my vitals taken. 5 minutes after that they had me in a bed all hooked up to EKGs and more oxygen. It seems my heart was racing at over 200 bpm. Not good. They gave me a shot of something (I honestly can't remember what it was, they told me, but I was kinda lightheaded right around then). The stuff basicly slowed down my heart a bit to let it relax a moment, and after it took effect my heart was beating at a fairly normal rate again.

I guess this is something that can happen to people who have pulmonary problems. I've just been lucky enough to not have it happen at all before. They ran some blood tests, talked with my pulmonologist, and let me come home.

Right now I'm exhausted, but kinda wired. It feels good to not be gasping for breath and feeling like it isn't doing anything. Not something I want to go through again anytime soon. I have to say though that the staff at BWH rocked. They had me right in there and were working on me so fast my head was spinning (even more than it was already). I'm glad I chose to go there.

So I'm okay now, tired, cranky, eating a burger and thinking about turning in a little early.

Because everyone keeps asking. Yes, I'm still sick. This cold is kicking my ass in so many ways it isn't funny. But, the good side is I'm trying to sleep lots and get over it. Insert generic whining here.

Just a few days ago we're in the middle of a massive snowstorm, now it's 46 degrees out. This is crazy. Time to hope that spring gets here soon.

It seems that LiveJournal has been under a DDOS attack since early this morning. This is part of the reason I like hosting my own blog, I don't like having to rely on other people.

I'm feeling a little better, but still in the midst of a cold. I've slept tons since yesterday at around 2pm. I'm gonna grab a bite of breakfast type stuff and then sleep again I think. My head is so stuffed up everything is in a haze.

Sidney J. Harris. "Regret for the things we did can be tempered by time; it is regret for the things we did not do that is inconsolable." [Quotes of the Day]

Hmm, stuffy head, achey, tired, cranky. Shit. I've got a cold. Must run out and get some dayquil.

I've been using Radio to handle my blogging needs for the past year or so. It's pretty cool and I like how it works overall. The thing is, I really don't have the patience right now to dig into it and learn how to do things most of the time.

Also, I keep using Movable Type for lots of smaller projects. Each time I use it I'm impressed more by how well it works. It's definitely easier to jump into and play around with. It also has plugins. Bits of code you can easily drop in that extend how it works easily.

I read someplace that people have been moving away from Radio a little bit. At first I was wondering why, but as I've thought about it more I think I do know why. It just doesn't seem to be moving along fast enough. It does get some cool new features, but it's missing ones I want to use (trackback). Also, while there is a servre part for radio you can use, it kind of feels like a kludge to me. And, I'd have to move my web site to a whole new server.

I have to think about it a bit more, but I think Moveable Type may be in my future. Unless I can come up with some really good reasons to stick with Radio.

Having a few devices that do S-video and have optical audio is great. What isn't great is finding a way to plug them all into my receiver is a problem. Luckily Radio Shack has this great switcher box. It's got six inputs, takes s-video and optical audio, will even do a little bit of conversion for regular video and audio. This is right at the top of my wish list right now. While I'm sure there are devices that do this that are more expensive, I haven't found any others that have all these features yet.

Thomas Jefferson. "The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers." [Quotes of the Day]

Looking for something to do after all this snow? Want to finally get out and have a bit of fun? Tonight at the Lounge we bring you Dino. It's the perfect night to come out, chill with friends, and have some yummy martinis made by our bartender Asia.

Changmian and Dubcoast present

*~The Analog Lounge~*

The relaxed side of things. Join us every Wednesday for a mix of

music styles in the lounge at Vertigo. Tonight we have one of the

founding members of Changmian:

Dino (Changmian) Boston

Tonight Dino will be giving us a special treat. He's getting away

from the goa and psy trance tonight and playing an atmospheric drum

n'bass set.

Also, Special Pete will be starting out the night for us for the first

time in weeks, so be sure to show up early.

with resident dj's

Gregory Blake (Changmian) Boston

Special Pete (dubcoast music) CA

Peter Ellis (ttb) Boston

Pete Yagmin (Changmian) Boston

Wednesdays

@ Vertigo (upstairs)

126 State St. Boston, MA

617-723-7277

10pm - 2am

21+ with ID

$5 cover (gets you into both the Lounge and Anitya)

No dress code

www.changmian.com

www.dubcoast.com

www.vertigoboston.com

www.mapquest.com (directions)

Upcoming Guests:

02/19 - Changmian night w/Dino [Changmian]

02/29 - Keith Kene - 409 - MA

03/05 - Qi - madlifted - MA

03/12 - DJ Dres - proton radio/dubcoast/DEKLAB - MA

03/19 - MDR - Changmian - MA

03/26 - Residents Night

And to view our calendar online (with support for you iCal and Mozilla

calendar folk):
http://ical.mac.com/gblake99/The32Analog32Lounge

And don't forget Anitya, downstairs at Vertigo this week: Greenman (Gnomefatty, Western MA).

Here's the last snow photo. This one is looking down the sidewalk from my apartment at almost ground level.

I found this Visual Theasaurus on a mailing list I'm on, it's pretty keen. Requires Java.

The Bad: There's no way I'm getting my car out to go to Dunkin Donuts. And even if I got there w/out wiping out (it looks like only 4WD/AWD vehicles are on the road right now), I doubt they'd be open.

The Good: Since I'm stuck home I've decided to make a Puff Pancake in Cast Iron and sausage. Maybe some kind neighbor will decide they have extra coffee and offer me some.

Bob Hope. "I don't generally feel anything until noon; then it's time for my nap." [Quotes of the Day]

Photo update as of midnight. This actually came out pretty well for a late night picture. Almost the same view as before, the car across the street on the side street (the first car), is mine, it's pretty much burried right now.

I'm not quite sure how I got to this page about monkeys. I was browsing around and ended up on it, then went to take a nap. Then I couldn't remember exactly I got there.

monkeys scare me.

Dave posts Bob Frankston's comments on Boston Driving.

Just get a car, close your eyes and enjoy the experience. Just remember that green means proceed with caution, yellow means accelerate and red means look both ways for cops.

I have to agree. I don't mind driving in Boston at all. I dove into it headfirst when I moved here. I don't think it is any worse than driving in other big cities I've been in. Yes, there are some weird annoying quirks here. But once you get a feel for where things are it's not bad at all. The fun part is slowly discovering new routes and how close everything really is. Remember, Boston is tiny compared to most west coast cities, most places you'll want to get to are within 4 to 10 miles away tops (even if it doesn't feel like it).

Derek posts about multi-region DVD players.

The Joy Of Region-Free DVD Players. Gizmodo.com recently pointed to an article about region-free DVD players. The article describes the "region issue" very well, but then... [Derek's Rantings and Musings]

I love my multi-region player. It lets me get DVDs from Japan that aren't here yet, and have a low chance of coming out anytime soon (and the ones I get have english subtitles even). I also got one that has Macrovision disabled. This was a big plus because Macrovision is known to reduce video quality.

Here's how things look right now:

It happened! For the third time since I've lived here Cambridge has declared a snow emergency starting at 2pm. For those of you that don't live here, this means that you can't park on any road that is a major artery, and on side roads there's usually one side that is no parking. Luckily I just heard this now and parked my car in a spot both close to my apartment and where it won't be towed. I'm a happy boy.

Because the answer made me laugh and laugh and laugh:

Which Izzard Are You?

Slut Izzard: You'll crawl into any duvet any time of the day. You get to shag everyone, and wear all their clothes. You're concerned with appearances, whether anyone will shag you, or whether you'll shag anyone else. Rejoice!! For you are a fashion queen.

So a Big Snow is supposedly coming. I'm about to zip out to the store to make sure I have hot dog buns, maybe some coffee bags, and some smoked fish for making rice balls. If we get the Big Snow, who's gonna come dig my car out?

The Shifted Librarian says Maybe I Won't Try a TiVo After All. This is somewhat of a silly IMHO. I'd noticed this tendancy ages back. When I'm up late and can't sleep I'll have the TV on with no sound. I noticed it switching way back even when they used to have that little TiVo show that it would record. I personally think it's kind of funny seeing where my TiVo ends up when I turn on the TV (and it is rarely on the Discovery Channel, it's usually BBCA).

On another TiVo note, one of the things on my wish list is now a new TiVo. It looks like they are going to be doing some really cool thing with the Series 2 (including working with Apple for Rendezvous support). Though, if the hardware is basicly the same, I wonder if they'll support people with hacked machines. That would be a kind of cool upgrade to be able to do.

Elbert Hubbard. "Genius may have its limitations, but stupidity is not thus handicapped." [Quotes of the Day]

I picked up a new phone a few months ago. I got the Sony Ericsson T68i. It's a great little phone and I like it a lot. One issue is that there's so many things it can do that I still haven't gotten around to learning everything. Last night a friend of mine told me about a page with themes for my phone. You can basicly download graphics sets that become the default backgrounds. I chose the Trigun one from this page.

It appears that Google just bought Pyra Labs. Pyra is the company that does Blogger.com. I'm sure Evan will have something to say about it soon. It's an interesting direction for them to go in. But I'm not quite sure that I completely get the motivation behind it.

One part of it may be that blogs are starting to become a good place to get information. I have a few blogs I check for news on specific subjects (Wi-Fi News for example). Having a direct feed into a portion of the blogging world would get more people going to Google for information.

I rarely see any posts show up in my aggregator to do with people in animal suits. Yet, this morning there are TWO. The first is a minor one:

People in Animal Suits. My Interesting Day, Part 1 of 3: People in Animal Suits. [Antipixel]

The second one... I'm not sure if I should laugh or cry or run in fear. (It's a pretty big download).

Hip Hop plushies
Matt sez, "a hip-hop video for DJ Format's 'We Know Something' featuring plushies breakdancing. It's the best thing ever." Link Discuss

(Thanks, Matt!)

[Boing Boing Blog

Harry Shearer. "If absolute power corrupts absolutely, does absolute powerlessness make you pure?" [Quotes of the Day]

Uh, this is unexpected. Rurouni Kenshin on Cartoon Network? As part of Toonami? Oh dear, I don't want to see how much this gets edited for TV. I could see Adult Swim, but Toonami?

How. Odd. There's some people you just don't expect to have fan fic written about. I wonder if this will start to become a sign of something. Like, you've made it when you have fic written about you (or maybe it means you're a has been).

Grand Inquisitor and Supreme Arbiter of Earthling Law Lawrence Lessig leaned back in his ultra-schmancy executive chair and sighed heavily. He tilted back the absurdly ornate mitre the Aliens insisted that he wear as part of his robes of office and wearily rubed his eyes.

"Jack, I'd like to help, but I just don't think there's much I can do." he said.

"Please, Larry... Lawrence... Grand Inquisitor: you've got to make them understand. I didn't do anything wrong." said Valenti, falling to his knees, "surely you see that?!" [ Golublog]

[ Via BoingBoing ]

I did find it hysterical to have Valenti begging though.

I was reminded again why I tend to avoid places like BJ's and Costco. I always come out of there with something I really don't need. Last night I stopped into BJ's with a friend of mine because he needed to get a new card and pick up some candy. And I left there with a large bag of pistachios and a box of Rice Krispie Treats.

I already had to hide the Treats from myself or I would have eaten half the box last night. Those things are like crack.

I didn't get around to reading/watching the news much yesterday, so missed this little tidbit.

Shuttle exterior was penetrated during descent: "The space shuttle's skin almost was certainly pierced, allowing superheated air inside the left wing and possibly the wheel compartment during Columbia's fiery descent through Earth's atmosphere, investigators said Thursday. In its first significant determination, the accident investigation board announced that heat damage from a missing tile would not be sufficient to cause unusual temperature increases inside Columbia minutes before it disintegrated. Sensors detected an unusual heat buildup of about 30 degrees inside the wheel well before the accident." [From the Desktop of Dane Carlson]

Abraham Lincoln. "Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power." [Quotes of the Day]

Yes, Flash can read your mind.

This has been posted all over the place today. Pretty nifty, the power of math with a little bit of misdirection.

I'd seen mention of FOAF, aka Friend of a Friend, on a few weblogs, but hadn't known really what it was till I started reading up on it this morning. The idea of it is that you can have a file that says who you are and who you know. Then it's possible to make links between people. One issue I have with it is that it seems to include having your email address. With the amount of spam going around the last thing I want to do is have my email address in plaintext where anyone can just grab it. I think there is a way to store your email address encoded, but I haven't quite figured it out yet. If I do, then maybe I'll look into this more.

Dane Carlson has a link to an article I found interesting:

Are developers programmers or engineers? "'The act of constructing software is, in fact, not an engineering process,' Cooper said. 'Engineering to me is problem-solving, which is very different from solution implementations, which is what programmers [do].' Title inflation is endemic to the industry, he said. 'Web designers are called programmers, programmers are called engineers, and engineers are called architects, and architects don't seem to ever get called,' Cooper exclaimed." [From the Desktop of Dane Carlson]

This is exactly the kind of thing that happened at my last job. I remember having someone there who was at most a web designer. He'd learned HTML and some ASP and that was enough to make him a 'programmer'. The issue was that he didn't have any real programming experience. I think a lot of his had to do with the sudden growth of the dot com world. People were looking for anyone they could get to do programming.

Ogden Nash. "Progress might have been all right once, but it has gone on too long." [Quotes of the Day]

A week or so ago I was using up a gift certificate from "Amazon" and had a few dollars left over so picked up a copy of

Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctrow. I'd heard some good buzz about it and it sounded like a pretty cool idea. This morning I was stuck in the doctor's office for a bit and started reading it. Seventy pages later I'm hooked. Enough so that I'm probably gonna curl up in a few and read a bunch more of it.

The book takes the future, people don't use cash for money anymore. Your net worth as a person is determined by your reputation and is counted in someting called Wuffie. The higher your score, the more valuable you are. It's a neat concept. The main character has just moved to Disneyworld to live and gets caught up in what is looking to be a pretty interesting adventure. So far I recommend the book, it's completely sucked me in, but I'll be sure to post an update when I finish.

Oh, and one other cool thing is that Cory has made the book available for download. That's right, the whole book. Personally, I wouldn't mind sampling a bit of a book that way. But the idea of reading around 200 pages on a computer screen leaves me a bit cold. Though, I guess I could print it out. I just like the feel of a book in my hands.

Last night my friend Susan came over and I made dinner for us. I always forget how much I love cooking for people. We had pasta with this really yummy garlic and herb sausage I got from Bread and Circus, honey glazed carrots (which were also amazing), and salad. I think it all came out pretty good. And I have leftovers, including some leftover sausage that I may try putting into an omelette today for lunch.

Alfred Hitchcock. "Television has done much for psychiatry by spreading information about it, as well as contributing to the need for it." [Quotes of the Day]

Dave Winer is having a live blogging session this evening at Harvard. I was planning on going but my dinner plans from last night got pushed off till tonight. I'll definitely make it to the next one though.

Live blog this evening.

A reminder, tonight we're having a live session here at Harvard. It's not an intro to weblogs for newbies. I'm going to say that right up front. If you don't know what a weblog is, you can hang out, and maybe we'll get around to explaining what they are, and maybe we'll only talk about other stuff. I have a few ideas. But we never know what's going to happen at one of these until it's over. Tonight's session starts at 6:30PM, at Lewis International Law Center 301 on the law school campus, and will run between 1 and 2 hours. After we'll go out and get some food somewhere (cheap) in the Havard Square area. It's a good chance to meet other people in the weblog world in the Boston area. We'll probably do these sessions pretty regularly through 2003 as the blogging activity bootstraps at Harvard.

[Scripting News]

There's a crisp edge to the air. The perfect time to come on out and hang someplace warm with your friends. You know you've got cabin fever.

Changmian and Dubcoast present

*~The Analog Lounge~*

The relaxed side of things. Join us every Wednesday for a mix of

music styles in the lounge at Vertigo. Last time our friends

downstairs at Anitya had a Growroom DJ play, Bon Bons was there for

support. Since he had such a good time upstairs in the lounge we

invited him to play the next time his pals were playing

downstairs. So, this week we're joining together with our friends

downstairs to make this a big 'ol festival of Growroom. Everyone

should brave the cold this week to see:

Bon Bons (Growroom) MA

(you know it's gonna be a good time)

with resident dj's

Gregory Blake (Changmian) Boston

Special Pete (dubcoast music) CA

Peter Ellis - Boston

Pete Yagmin (Changmian) Boston

Wednesdays

@ Vertigo (upstairs)

126 State St. Boston, MA

617-723-7277

10pm - 2am

21+ with ID

$5 cover (gets you into both the Lounge and Anitya)

No dress code

www.changmian.com

www.dubcoast.com

www.vertigoboston.com

www.mapquest.com (directions)

Upcoming Guests:

02/19 - Changmian night w/Dino [Changmian]

02/29 - Keith Kene - 409 - MA

And to view our calendar online (with support for you iCal folks):/>

http://ical.mac.com/gblake99/The32Analog32Lounge

And don't forget Anitya, downstairs at Vertigo every week.

Wernher von Braun. "Basic research is what I am doing when I don't know what I am doing." [Quotes of the Day]

I just discovered iConquer for OS X. It's Risk, with network play. Augh. Risk was one of those games that used to be on the Mac waaaaay back when. I used to play it endlessly when I was on duty in the computer lab.

They actually did a nice job with this release. The game is Rendezvous enabled (of course), and when doing network play it sets you up to chat with the other players over iChat. Anyone up for a network game?

Morgan Webb from The Screen Savers just started up her own weblog using Movable Type. I catch The Screen Savers when I think of it, and her segments are cool (and she likes anime). Hopefully she'll post to this more than she did her LiveJournal.

Mark Frauenfelder posts that he's now got some sample experiments up from his book Mad Professor. There are three sample experiments: Goon Goo, Comeback Can, and Martian Volcano. I actually put this book onto my wish list a week or so ago because I thought it looked like lots of fun. I just wish my nephew was a little older so that I could do some of these experiments with him next time he visits.

They're all pretty simple experiments too. I remember doing the Volcano one when I was a kid. That was one of my favorites. Though in my case we were using soda bottles and hoping to make them explode. Sometimes I miss being a kid (well, okay, more than sometimes).

Yow, slept late this morning due to not realizing the power went during the day the other day. I almost never look at the clock next to my bed, I just know that when it goes off I have to get up. Of course this means that if it went off at 3:43 in the morning I'd get up then too. What can I say, I'm a creature of habit.

I've actually got a pretty full todo list for today, which feels pretty good. Now I just need to make sure I get all of it done.

My initial reaction to TrackBack when I first heard about it was: Huh? I didn't get quite get it. I didn't see the real use of it. But this weekend something clicked. Comments work fine for some situations. Someone posts something to their blog and you want to say something quick about it. But what happens if you've got a lot to say on the subject, or it ends up pushing you on a bit of a tangent. In my case it is times like that when I want to make a post to my own blog. The thing is, how do I tie that in to the page that inspired me?

In the past I had just put in a comment about the post and referencing the post I made. But there's something about TrackBack i find more interesting. It helps promote traffic to places that might not ordinarily get it. For instance, I get a reasonable amount of traffic on this site, and I'm not necessarily looking for more. At the same time, when I post thoughts on someone else's blog it is nice to know that there is a some way to connect those two posts and share that with people who read the original.

Here's an example. I posted some thoughts about Safari and Opera the other day and did a TrackBack over to a post on Surfin Safari. Now, normally that post would have been made, and the people who read my blog would have read it. Dave Hyatt, the author of Surfin Safari, might have noticed in his referer logs that I had referenced his post. Other people probably wouldn't have stumbled across it. This time with TrackBack, people have been hitting that page continuously. While nobody has commented, the connection between the two posts is more solid. It would be cool for someone to write up a site that tracks this kinda stuff and graph out the connections between posts.

So I think I give Trackback a thumbs up for now. I'd like to see Radio equipped to handle sending out pings. Maybe I'll give it a try myself and see if I can figure out how to make that work.

Robert Orben. "Sometimes I get the feeling the whole world is against me, but deep down I know that's not true. Some smalleer countries are neutral." [Quotes of the Day]

It's been a bit since I posted on the progress of ripping CDs. That's because I haven't been. Today I finally got around to it again. I don't have too many left and should just finish it up.

• Duran Duran
• Duran Duran - Rio
• Duran Duran - Decade
• Echo & the Bunnymen - Porcupine
• Electronic
• Electric Skychurch - Together
• Thomas Dolby - Astronauts & Heretics
• EMF - Schubert Dip

Posted without any extra comments.

When Hubert, 85, Met Mildred, 73. Love stories may be a dime a dozen, but odes to love affairs like this one, begun on the borders of life's end, are rare. By N. R. Kleinfield. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

So I've been reading up on TrackBack a bit this morning and found a standalone implimentation of it. And I think I've got it integrated into my web site. Pretty cool. I'm still thinking of bundling up a set of generic tools for people who use Radio and are hosting their blog on a linux box. There's a version of rcs done in Python, but that's not really what I'm looking for. I just want something that is fairly easy to snap into a unix box that will handle things like comments and trackback (and make them easily configurable).

So if you're a trackback user, try giving this a ping so that I know it all works well.

Tangled Up in Spam. Those unwanted messages have become the bane of the Internet. Why we can't just say no. By James Gleick. [New York Times: Technology]

Just the other day I was saying "Bah, Spam". So, I was most interesting in hearing what James Glieak had to say about it in the NY Times today. I just didn't realize some of it was this bad:

The harvesting of e-mail addresses by spammers is relentless and swift. Investigators for the Federal Trade Commission recently posted some freshly minted e-mail addresses in chat rooms and news groups to see what would happen; in one case, the first spam came in nine minutes.

I guess I should be happy that I lasted a year without getting any spam at my primary email address.

Isaac Newton. "Tact is the knack of making a point without making an enemy." [Quotes of the Day]

Dave Hyatt has has a post titled A Night Away From the Opera. He points to John Gruber as having "an excellent blog up about Opera's potential withdrawal from the Mac platform". I have to agree with lots of Gruber's points. Opera's comments about Apple and Safari sound to me like an excuse. An excuse for taking forever to come up with a stable (Is the current release stable? I think they have a non beta release out) version of Opera for OS X. And one that hasn't been able to compete much with any of the other browsers.

On a somewhat related note, I found the last paragraph of Gruber's post interesting.

And thus there is a difference between when Apple steps on the toes of cross-platform developers like Opera and Netscape, and when they do it to Mac-only developers like Karelia. Watson is exactly the sort of third-party software Apple needs for the Mac: original, useful, fun, and only for the Mac. Opera is exactly what Apple doesnât need: exactly like the Windows version, but six months behind.

This is related to my post of a day or so ago about an interview with the CEO of "The Omni Group", Ken Case. I actually think people that say Apple is stifling other developers could learn something from this interview. Let's look at the case of Watson. yes, Apple released the updated Sherlock that had much of the functionality of Watson. But how much have you heard about it since? There's an SDK kit out, I think that's all the news I've heard since it was released. I just pulled up the home page for Watson and you get the feeling that there's a lot of stuff going on there. The Sherlock page doesn't look like it's been updated since it was released.

Today I did something I never do, I parked in a handicapped space. I don't have my placard yet either. I figured I'd been good for over two years about it and I'd mailed in the application and why not just park there real quick while I ran into a store in Harvard Square. Of course, upon coming out 5 minutes later there was a ticket. I should have know that you just don't do that kind of thing in Harvard Square.

Beyond being irked at myself for doing it, I just found myself generally annoyed at the world. I always tend to look and see if someone parking in a handicapped spot has a placard or license plate for it. You may or may not be amazed to know that at least half of the time the person parking in one of those spots doesn't. And many times they park in such spaces and never get a ticket. It just annoys me to no end that I just had bad timing, am actually someone who will be getting a card and I'm the one who gets a ticket (and it isn't a cheap one either). Fuck.

Okay, whining over. We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.

"Adam" is talking about BitTorrent again. This time about using it with RSS. This would definitely be a cool way to do things. I'd love to have a small little app that I could use to subscribe to an RSS feed of announcements of new anime digisubs. I could then even have it set up to automaticly download certain things. Maybe based on a search string or a number of different criteria.

The anime digisub world has really grabbed onto the whole BitTorrent thing like mad in the last few weeks. There are numerous sites tracking new downloads as they become available. It's nice, you have things like BitTorrent for the brand new stuff, and then you have things like Direct Connect for anything that's been out for over a week. They each have their strengths in that sense.

One place I'd love to see BitTorrent in place is with software downloads. Wouldn't it be cool if it was an option for downloading large software updates from places like Apple? The download for iPhoto and iMovie took way too long IMHO, maybe I'm just spoiled. But I could see using it for large demos of game software especially, since usually once those come out they are being downloaded like crazy.

Oops. When setting up WebDAV early this morning I screwed up and made it so that my comments were password protected. It's fixed now.

I can see it now, two young girls in their room, running around, tearing pages out of their dairies that contain incriminating evidence. One of them yells out "Hurry up! Mom's coming!" as the other stuffs the paper into the Hello Kitty Hand Shredder, turning the crank as fast as she can.

When I first sad this j-list, I glanced at the picture and thought, "EW. Why would someone want to shred their hand?" I wonder just what their target audience is with this one. After some of Antipixel's recent Hello Kitty postings I just had to share this one.

My TiVo knows me so well. I have the TV muted and just looked up to see Freakazoid! on. Sure it is one I've seen, but I love that it thought I might like to watch it.

Well, it seems like someone is crawling the rcs.userland.com discussion groups for emails addresses. I was stupid when I set up my account there and must have included my email address (or maybe I'm on the mailing list, that's entirely possible). Either way, my email address has ended up being published onto a web page and crawled. I'm kind of pissed. Of course, Ms Helen Baker of Coolstats was nice enough to leave me her email address (If it is really a real address). I'm wondering if I should look into reporting Coolstats. I'm tired though, I'll worry about it in the morning.

I hate that I have to jump through such hoops to keep my email address secret. It drives me absolutely crazy. To the folks at UserLand, please please do things to hide email addresses. Show the first bit of the address maybe and then provide a link to do a mailto (like you can generate within Radio).

I have absolutely no response to this.

I just found this great story on Steve Zeller's weblog to do with switching from Windows to OS X. This echos a lot of my feelings I think. For a long time I used to put my nose up at Apple, and I'm definitely I gave it a try two years ago.

Patrick Beard forwarded me this switcher story link with the comment "This guy gets it". If nothing else, I like the way he writes. Funniest quote:

Executives in the PC business use the word "sexy", in such a way that I'm always surprised to discover that their children aren't adopted, and the Mac interface is not "sexy" or sexy, and it would be grotesque to want it to be. It is, in fact, playful, often well over the line into frivolity. It is not businesslike, in precisely the way that nothing should be "businesslike".

[Steve Zellers' Radio Weblog]

Someone has posted an alternate friday five. I like this one enough that I think it must be answered.

1. If you had to engage in sexual intercourse with a Muppet, what Muppet would you choose? And why? I'd have to say Janice, because there just aren't that many female options when it comes to muppets. And while I like bacon I'm not into pigs that way.
2. What is something you always thought would be tons of fun until you actually tried it and realized how silly it was? Not that I can think of.
3. Do you think Tiny Tim was a musical genius? He was a musical freak!
4. If you were Molly Ringwald in Pretty in Pink, would you choose Blaine or Ducky? Justify your decision. I would have ditched them both and gone after Iona (Annie Potts' character). Because it would have been more interesting.
5. What celebrity couple creeps you out to no friggin end? Why? Oh gosh. I'd have to say Jack Nicholson and just about anyone. Especially his most recent one (runs off and looks it up online and then finds someone else posted it too) Lara Flynn Boyle.

I can't remember where I found this in my RSS feed originally, I deleted the post by mistake. But it seems that Sony has a 20GB file server coming out that uses WiFi. It looks pretty small too. How very handy. How much do you want to bet we won't see this here anytime soon.

Btw, is anyone able to provide some more translation of the site?

OSNews has an interview up with Ken Case, CEO of The Omni Group. Omni produces a lot of really solid software for the OS X. The one they are most known for currently is OmniWeb. I found the first part of it most interesting, where he was asked what he thought of the state of browsers in OS X and Safari. Here's part of his response:

Safari appears to be a great alternative to Internet Explorer as a free web browser which ships with the operating system. It seems to be quite fast, small, and easy to use (much like the new 12" PowerBook), and I'm very glad to see Apple basing their product on standards and open source technologies.

I don't really see Safari as competition to OmniWeb: they're aiming at capturing the entry-level browser user (that currently sticks with the bundled Internet Explorer), while we sell OmniWeb to those who really want the most efficient, powerful browsing experience possible.

This is what I've been saying all along in response to statements that Safari is going to kill off the other browsers out there. With all of Apple's products for OS X they are going for something that does the basics and does it very well. Omniweb lets you configure just about everything to do with the web browser. It's great. If they had a faster rendering engine (and tabs, I love my tabs) they'd be one of the best browsers out there. Currently I rate it down fairly low because it's a little slow for my tastes.

Alan Corenk. "Television is more interesting than people. If it were not, we would have people standing in the corners of our rooms." [Quotes of the Day]

It seems that Jenny is hooked too:

Oh, damn. I'm officially hooked on Graham Norton. [The Shifted Librarian]

Me too! A few of the episodes are just so over the top. I just wish there were more of them. I've seen almost all the ones BBCA has.

This morning I was kind of struggling with how to add in comments to my RSS feed. Radio has its own built in comment system, but I like mine a little bit more (and have plans to extend it a little bit in the near future). One neat thing about RSS 2.0 is that there is an element in <item> called <comments>. With an RSS aggregator that supports commenets you should be able to link to the comments right from the aggregator.

After digging around some, I ran into a page on How to extend Radio's RSS generator. From that I came up with the following bit of code for user.radio.callbacks.writeRssItemElement:

on radioWeblogPost (adrtable, adrpost) {
  adrtable^.["comments"] =
    "http://www.ezoons.com/~gblake/rcomment.php?comment=" 
    + number (nameof (adrpost^))}

So now I just need to run a few more tests, but I think it should work.

Updated: D'oh, you'd think I know which directions the slashes should go by now.

This morning I decided I wanted to put a comment link into my RSS feed. Radio has a built-in comment feature, but that was added long after I had rolled my own. I went into the prefs and turned on comments and gave it the link to my comment system in a way that I thought made sense (and that seemed to fit in with how other things in radio work). Unfortunately, this doesn't work and it looks like I have to dig down into the guts of Radio to make it work (which I really don't want to do). For Radio folks out there (anyone at Userland reading?), is there an acceptable way to go about tweaking the code for RSS? Am I asking for something that's completely insane? help help!

One of the things I like about radio is that you have such great access to the code that runs. And usertalk (the language it is written in) (at least I think that's what it is called) is pretty cool looking. I just wish there were some slightly better overviews of how the whole thing was put together and what it is okay to touch and not touch.

Update: There are ways to do this according to Dave and Jon. I'm just not real experienced with UserTalk to be able to do this. Anyone out there feel like helping? I'd be more than willing to document it after, since I know of at least a few people who use non-Radio comment systems.

Please ignore this. Testing the comments in my RSS feed. If you read my feed and see this, post a comment.

Mark Twain. "A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read." [Quotes of the Day]

Last night I brought my camera out with me and took some pictures. It was a pretty crazy night. Also, I've put our upcoming schedule online for everyone to puruse at their leisure. We've got some cool nights coming up with some names that haven't been seen in a while.

Also, supposedly we're in the lastest Improper Bostonian, though I haven't seen it yet. If anyone finds a copy, pick up a spare one for me?

Someone went and paid for a year worth of LJ for me last night. Wow, whoever you are (I have my guesses), thanks. That makes things a bit easier. And I can now have multiple icons. So, thanks again to whoever was so kind.

I've always liked vodka drinks. I tend to try and not drink too much because I'm usually apt to get hangovers. The other week at the Lounge, I was introduced to Pearl Vodka. This stuff is sooo good, and unfortunately it seems that not many bars carry it. I had a vodka martini with it last night and it was so smooth. I found out the club's been going through around one and a half to two bottles of it every week since we started up.

Last night was fun, though it felt like a long night. Both of our guests were lots of fun. I enjoyed Daniel's set greatly, and benny was just benny. It was a great way to send him off (And he played Fury eyes for me, so my night was made).

I think I need to crawl back into bed for a bit though. No hangover, but I'm definitely still hurtin a little.

So, it seems that LJ will be starting some kind of posting limits for free (and paid) accounts most likely. I think I what find more interesting is that they will also have posting limits for paid accounts. I think it will be 3-5 for unpaid users and paid users being around 20.

I can see their reasoning, but it still kinda sucks. My big reason for using LJ is that it is such a closed community. If I didn't forward my posts there most of my friends would never bother reading my blog.

So I've been wanting to put a search feature back onto this site forever. I'm always wanting to find old posts on a subject and never can. So I finally sat down and grabbed htDig. It's not too hard to set up and seems to work pretty well. I even got the results fitting in with the look and feel of my site.

Hector Berlioz. "Every composer knows the anguish and despair occasioned by forgetting ideas which one had no time to write down." [Quotes of the Day]

Tonight, benny blanco gives his last Boston performance as a resident of this fine city (see my post from yesterday on where it is, everyone should come on out!). In the past few months I've seen a number of Boston DJs move away. Many of them are DJs I saw a lot when I first moved here five years ago. I hadn't really noticed how many had moved away until recently. Having my own night I've keep trying to find people to spin and half the people I think of no longer live here. It also makes me realize I don't know who is still around. Or even what the new names and faces are in the Boston DJ scene. It feels a bit like the end of an era.

At the same time it's kind of exciting. I can't wait to see who fills the spaces left by these DJs. Some new blood into the community probably wouldn't be a bad thing. Once Boston goes non-smoking I'll have to get out more and see who is out there. Anyone got any up and coming Boston DJs to recommend?

It's just about that time. So here's what's up this week. Everyone should come out this week as it is destined to be a great night.

Changmian and Dubcoast present

*~The Analog Lounge~*

The relaxed side of things. Join us every Wednesday for a mix of

music styles in the lounge at Vertigo. This week we've got two guests

for the price of one:

Daniel Spurling (PitchDown sound)

benny blanco (blancodisco)

While this is Daniel's first appearance at the Lounge, he's not a

stranger to Boston. He's already played gigs at the Phoenix landing

and Venu. So come out an be treated to a nutritional mix of music

ranging from the chunky rhythms of minimal house and techno, to the

chugging and percussive pulse of tribal house. Daniel's sound is

always melodic, the basslines always know how to funk, and most

importantly, the music is always aware of its roots.

Also this week we welcome back benny blanco. This will be a special

night as this is one of benny's last appearances in Boston before he

makes the trek down to the big apple to find fame and fortune. Since

benny helped us kick off The Analog Lounge on our first night, we felt

it was only fitting to have him back one more time. Please come out

and help us let him know he'll be missed.

with resident dj's

Gregory Blake (Changmian) Boston

Special Pete (dubcoast music) CA

Peter Ellis - Boston

Pete Yagmin (Changmian) Boston

Wednesdays

@ Vertigo (upstairs)

126 State St. Boston, MA

617-723-7277

10pm - 2am

21+ with ID

$5 cover (gets you into both the Lounge and Anitya)

No dress code

www.changmian.com

www.dubcoast.com

www.vertigoboston.com

www.mapquest.com (directions)

Coming up next week: Shwily B

Upcoming Guests:

02/12 - Growroom night w/ Bon Bons [Growroom]

02/19 - Changmian night w/Dino [Changmian]

And don't forget Anitya, downstairs at Vertigo every week this week..

Earlier today I was wondering how long certain foods keep in the fridge. There are some things I've just never been to sure about. Well, while researching it online I found a page that helps answer the question: How long has this been in the refridgerator?. It lists how long most common food items keep in the fridge. Luckily, I don't think I'm going to die.

I always figured it was possible to do, just never got around to trying it. I how have the ability to use PHP in my .css files. It took a few tries to get it right, but it works perfectly now. I already see interesting ways you could make all this work together. In my case I'm using it to choose a random image for something. Pretty cool.

I used Safari for a bit these last few weeks. And while it is pretty cool, it just didn't work well enough for me to use it full time. There were lots of weird quirks and I just finally got sick of it and have gone back to using Chimera full time.

I also have found that not having tabs was making it a lot harder to keep track of things. I tend to have multiple browser windows, but use tabs to keep "in theme". For instance. If I'm searching for something in Google I open up a window and do a search, then I open up the windows from that search in different tabs. I find it makes it much easier to work with.

The one thing Chimera needs is support for the use of the emacs keys within textarea fields.

Jonathan Swift. "Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed." [Quotes of the Day]

This morning I had to run out and get a new parking permit, since I'd spaced on it (my old one expired Saturday). When I got to the parking office there were all the other slackers like me who'd spaced it waiting in line and I was dreading having to wait. Luckily the line went pretty fast since more than half of the people there didn't have the proper identification to get a parking permit.

This is what amazes me. They have these huge signs all down the hall leading to the cashier's office stating that in order to get a permit you need your registration and a current utility bill (listing which ones are acceptable) or two pieces of mail addressed to you (in both cases it has to be from within the last 30 days). I watched person after person walk up and then be turned away because they didn't have it. And what was even more stunning was that they seemed genuinely surprised. I'm sure one or two of the people were trying to get a permit they weren't supposed to have, but the rest of them just seemed clueless.

I finally updated the graphic in the corner of this page (or for those LiveJournal folks out there, my icon). It took way too many pictures to narrow it down to one I didn't think completely sucked. But I think this one is okay, for at least the next few years.

Spirited Away was just awarded an Annie for best feature in 2002. Pretty cool I must say.

Vilhjalmur Stefansson. "What is the difference between unethical and ethical advertising? Unethical advertising uses falsehoods to deceive the public; ethical advertising uses truth to deceive the public." [Quotes of the Day]

I'm glad I got off my ass and made myself leave the house. It's so hard being motivated some days. There were quite a few people there that I knew. It was good to see Bree, Sara, Hank, Al, Susan, and all the others. I don't get to see most of them often enough. And I got to spin, people danced, and it was good.

I tend to avoid talking about my lung issues here most of the time. But sometimes I just need to bitch and moan and vent about it. I just got out of the shower and ended up coughing for about 10 minutes straight. This doesn't happen often. It usually means I was rushing myself too much (which I was, I'm supposed to be going out tonight and wanted to be able to grab some food and get a few things done before I got out). So I just drank about a quarter of a bottle of cough syrup and things finally feel under control. Of course now I'm in a Robitussin haze. What did that article from this morning call it? Aha, Brain Fuzz. Oh well, I'll wait and try to go to the party a little later.

While waiting for more news I figured I'd do a post or two. jenett.radio listed Linked - Weblog and Journal Database. It was interesting, but I wonder about making weblogs and journals two different things. I still see them as really being the same thing. I know many that are a hybrid of the two (mine for instance). This is one reason I don't like breaking them up. If anything I see journals being a more specific type of weblog, but still a weblog.

Steve Zeller provides a link to spaceflightnow.com, which has Shuttle Status. Not sure how often they'll be updating it. I have a feeling the news will be pretty much the same for the next hour or so. I've turned off my TV already because they're just showing the same clip, repeating the same things, and starting to speculate.

According to CNN (and other sources) the space shuttle Colombia seems to have broken apart while landing. Not too many details are available yet. The above link seems to be updating periodicly though.

Every other year or so this story pops up. What I find so amusing about it is that they seem to think of it as some new thing. I remember kids joking about drinking too much cough syrup long long ago (Stripes anyone?). So now it seems that Teens are abusing cough and cold remedies.

At least 20 students in Brookline and Newton have been treated for what officials fear is a disturbing craze creeping into local high schools: getting high on name-brand, over-the-counter cough and cold medications.

After years of looking out for students who abuse alcohol or illegal drugs, educators in some schools are now confronting teens who misuse substances sitting on store shelves - specifically, the cough syrup Robitussin and the cough and cold pills Coricidin HBP.

Yup, kids are still drinking Robitussin to get high. I wonder if they'll ever stop. Or if it will be the next big health threat... again.

Oh yeah, teenagers get drunk too. In case you didn't know.

It's Feb. 1st. Did you all remember to say "Rabbit Rabbit"?

David Frost. "Television enables you to be entertained in your home by people you wouldn't have in your home." [Quotes of the Day]

Game Girl Advance links to a post about a game design assignment that sounds pretty damn cool.

Can you list every game you've ever played?. Kevin Fox writes about a game design assignment: list every game you've ever played. every game, not only electronic; games... [game girl advance]

I don't know if I could name every game, but I'm sure I could get at least the 150 that this assignment required.

Sleep and dreaming has been something I've been curious about for years. In college I had to write a paper about dreams and dream research. I found this article pretty fascinating. There still seems to be so much we don't know about dreams.

The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Deer. Parasomniacs eat raw meat, bark like dogs, have sex without remembering and maybe even kill. By Chip Brown. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]