Talisians - Talis People Past and Present

Speaking of death

2011-11-19T01:01:37Z

It is a dark time of year. And we have festivals that bring us light along with crimson red poppies against black to remember. It starts with the ghosties and ghoulies. The saints attempt to appear but they don't have the charisma to blot out the darkness, the mists and the mystery. I like it. I like the winter approaching and the cool and the regular bright twinkly starlight.

This evening speaking to one of my oldest friends, we found ourselves discussing death. He is a half orphan and I am a total orphan. Strange and unreal terms to use for either of us. And yet it is true.

Even though for both of us the departures were several years ago, there are times when that deep pang comes forward and very present. When you want to cry out

" I want my Mummy"

or

"I want my Daddy"

For those that have been lucky to be loved I don't believe these feelings ever go away completely.

That is not to say its always sad either. Sometimes in the midst of something amazing happening there is a desire to share it very particularly with one or other parent. The thought skips across the brain like a child on the way home from school with a picture. And then you remember...

When the orphaning is new so many people report thinking they see a loved one in the street. Sometimes its a garment or the way the head is held, their gait, sometimes even a smile can take you there. When it is raw when it is new, it cuts you up inside, slays you. But later there is a strange unreal comfort from this and even amusement.

Looking around at siblings and the children around you, you see the missing ones. It might be in a glance, a turn of phrase, an attitude to life, a laugh, a bark, a dark one liner. Sometimes "stuff" appears to skip a generation and new people who did not know Our Originals, are manifesting things they could not know about. Where has it come from? Is it coincidence?

Then there might be that special shared look of those who are connected to the ones that went before, as together they observe what makes sense to only them and is an invisible bond between all of them through time.

And we know they are not gone.

Tooling About

2011-11-19T00:10:12Z

I'm a bit of a tool fetishist, both with software and real-world stuff. As well as accumulating them, for various reasons I like making and using my own tools. The most valid reason is that it's usually fun, though some of the other reasons are rather spurious. It often seems the time spent learning to use someone else's piece of software effectively could be better spent writing something from scratch. In itself that usually turns out to be a mistake. Likewise, most of the time making a real-world tool turns out to be an inefficient approach, given the time and money that can go into it compared to simply buying a good quality mass produced version. Sometimes the extra value that comes from having a result that's more exactly fit for purpose than the alternatives is good justification for DIY tooling. A more common benefit comes simply from creating something that's more personalised than the off-the-shelf version and because of that more pleasing to use. Making things is satisfying, making things that you use to make other things doubly so. Within reason. I suspect I may be crossing the line with my latest little hobby project.

Very low down on my list of priorites, I need some new business cards. Ok, half an hour's design tops. But I've got some pieces of (European) boxwood I collected a few years ago, nicely seasoned now, and for a while I've been thinking about things to make with them. Boxwood is lovely stuff, very hard, tight grain, nice appearance. One of its traditional uses is block printing (it's what Bewick used for his animal prints).

Right, so I'll block print some business cards. That means carving the letters, and I haven't really tried lettering before. First big question, which font? The obvious answer is of course to design a new one, optimised for woodcarving. A big factor there is taking into account the shape of gouges, aiming ideally for a minimum number of tools and a minimum number of cuts. FontForge seems a pretty good piece of kit and you can use images as guides for the typefaces. This gives me an iterative process: print out a typeface I like, try carving it with a limited set of tools, note what works and what doesn't. Photograph the results, use them as a template for a revision on the computer.

Earlier today I started on this, and almost immediately hit a snag. While I can more or less get away with the larger gouges I've got for the design part of this, I don't really have the shapes among the smaller ones, the ones I'd need for business card proportions. This is despite having about 85 gouges/chisels/knifes at hand (I got them all out on the bench earlier, couldn't resist counting). This figure might sound evidence of serious obsession when, say, 5 decent gouges/chisels is plenty for most projects, but traditional woodcarvers would often have a lot more (Grinling Gibbons is reckoned to have had about 300). They all come in handy somewhere and just turn up over the years - junk shops, inherit, even occasionally buy new.

Coincidentally, the other day I was reading about using hook tools for woodturning (Robin Wood, author of the remarkable The Wooden Bowl uses them on a pole lathe) and it turns out you can make them yourself using a blowtorch, masonry nails and a big hammer. I'd always assumed you needed a forge or oxy-acetylene to work hard steel. Aha! Earlier today I tried the technique, made a little chisel (woodcarving chisel, slightly different than regular woodworking chisels). It's a bit wonky but perfectly usable. Took maybe an hour, including making the handle (boxwood). So while I play with the typeface design with the aid of existing larger chisels, I plan to make some smaller ones for business card purposes.

Oh yeah, and over the years here, whenever I've seen an oak apple I've taken it home, with the vague idea that one day maybe I'll have a go at making some ink. Then of course I'll need to make a press for the paper...these business cards may take a while.

Media, Freedom, and the Web

2011-11-17T20:30:28Z

Originally appeared on Kasabi’s Blog:

This last weekend, I found myself wearing a lab coat, meeting people working on some of the most interesting projects on the web, while in the queue to an entirely free espresso bar. And, I kept seeing human-sized foxes walking about and dancing. I was fairly sure I needed to wake up.

In fact, I was at this year’s Mozilla Festival, so all the interesting people I was meeting were gathering in London to hack and learn. The lab coat was because Chris and I from Team Kasabi were “Human APIs” at the event, and Kasabi was involved and partnered with the Mozilla Foundation. The espresso? That was because the event organisers were saints, and I’m still not sure about the giant foxes…

The themes broadly covered data-driven journalism, education, and multi-media web tools; and the Festival was organised into learning/sharing sessions and design challenges. In the lab coat, Chris and I were able to dip in and out of many different sessions, and try and help people with any questions they have. As a result, I got to see people hacking the news, writing a data guide for journalists, and playing with an eight-bladed helecoptor-camera with Popcorn.js (I hereby coin the word: octopoptocoptor).

The hacks and learning/teaching sessions covered a lot of ground, and touched on many aspects of using the web to further society, tell stories, and uncover the truth in journalism. Data played a central role in this, especially around data journalism, and it’s a topic that needs even more coverage over the next year, I think. Many of the ideas and projects planned this weekend will need to develop strategies for dealing with vast amounts of data, and to get the most out of it! The Mozillian organisers seemed very keen on keeping the momentum rolling, too, with plenty of emphasis on this being a kind of kick-off for projects to develop, grow and mature, so I think there’s a lot of scope for great ideas getting traction.

Before the Festival, I wrote about some of the things I’d like to cover at the event:

There is a growing, and important, trend for stories to include more than just words. I’m keen to see more data behind journalism. Partly, this is because it’s more transparent, and encourages wider fact-checking and accuracy. But it also enables a lot more interesting things to be done with stories.

I was certainly not disappointed, but would like to carry on working with people looking to make their data work better, and tell stories from it.

The Mozilla Festival blog has a lot of round-up info, so I won’t try and re-write the whole thing. It was a great event covering a huge amount of ground, and I’m looking forward to catching up about data-driven projects over the next few weeks. I’d also like to hear from anyone who’s interested in journalism and media on the web, to discuss getting your own datasets published, or building on top of others as part of your project.

Hard Bright Lines

2011-11-03T21:41:00Z

As you might know, I now work for SAI Global, one of the world's leading companies providing corporate governance and compliance solutions. As such, we all need to lead by example. I've accepted a company laptop and mobile phone. These are clearly to be used for company business only - anything else could be an ethical violation. And so, I only do work on the company devices. Anything else, such as organising a certain gentleman's stag do, I do using my iPad and personal phone. This was something of a shock after Talis' somewhat more laid back attitude towards these boundaries.

However, it has had an unexpected positive effect. Since I've had to make sure that anything that I can't justify as work-related happens on my personal kit, I have felt much more directly the difference between work and things that aren't work. This has helped my concentration and focus no end. Suddenly, I can feel when my concentration has drifted, and it's much easier to get my concentration back to work.

From now on, this is what I shall do. When I'm trying to work, I'll make sure that I have my iPad with me, and I'll keep drawing hard bright lines between work and play. Work happens on work's laptop, play happens on kit that I own (and it's not like I suffer from a shortage of kit at the moment), and I should remain much more productive. Keep reading here to see what happens. Oh, and please feel free to comment if you've tried this approach, or something similar, and let me know how it went.

Looking in the wrong place?

2011-11-03T14:03:48Z

Watching the dog running earlier this summer from a distance I could sense something was not right. He was lame. As I got closer I looked at his legs as he moved along. He was quite happy, there was no sense of pain, he wasn't frowning, he was accommodating it.

A phrase came unbidden into my head from working with horses. I was taught when I was quite small that you can see if a horse is lame by looking at its head. This seemed bananas at the time, and I think I said so, though probably a little more carefully, she was not one to annoy with flippancy! Anyway a hand came out and pointed to a horse running around and how the head is carried. Easily. There was another - the reason we were there - that has lame. I couldn't spot which leg it was that was causing the lameness. "look at the head" so I shifted my eyes away from looking at feet and looked at the head, the head carriage wasn't the same. This horse was lame.

I still couldn't tell which leg it was that was out, but by shifting my gaze away from one of the possibilities, stopping trying to look and compare all legs at once , I saw the overall shape. I had a good sense of what the horse should look like in movement and by seeing the head and then the whole shape I had a much better idea of where there was something not working right. I was encouraged to use my ears too. I thought my Aunt was a scary genius ( she was!)

So with Primo I reverted to what I could only do at a distance, I looked at the overall shape. I had a good sense of what it should be and sure enough it was easier to choose which leg to pay attention to. He canters everywhere, over and under and through things, simple removal of a thorn twig and off he went, the right shape. Everything was elegant again, even when he was working hard. He had accommodated it. Sometimes as part of his running an alien object is ejected naturally, so the accommodation is a sensible response. With a thorn, that could have embedded and caused all manner of systemic problems.

Recently he had some other bother, (highly sensitive wonder hound that he is) which is now sorted. As he spurted along and charged up behind me demonstrating a fluency, speed and joy that can only honestly be described as beautiful, I realised his ears were floppy and a bit mad again. It's another "tell" which I can now use to see if he is quietly accommodating something he shouldn't be.

Dogs and Horses. My Aunt had shown me a way to look at the whole system to help decide where there might need to be an intervention.

It seems an obvious leap to me to think about how this plays out organisationally. After all Organisations are systems, made up of systems, teams, groups, right down to each one of us. Humans the most magical special systems of all. In teams or groups or even whole organisations, commercial or not, what might be showing as problematic might not be the source of a problem. It also might not be problematic, but naturally symptomatic of something else.

Sometimes you need to have a sense of the OVERALL shape and let your gaze rest on it, your sense of it, go soft - to take in the whole - to pinpoint where there might be something wrong in the system. And sometimes when there are changes happening it is essential to have a sense of what the new shape is likely to resemble so that you can calibrate if it is progressing or stuck. Then you have a better chance of making the right intervention or letting the system right itself.

whats the most useful thing you learned

2011-11-01T13:50:27Z

Nice broad, impossible to answer question there, the best sort.

Why short change your mind by going for something small to attempt to answer?

Recently I was talking to a very good, wise and brilliantly off the mainstream friend of mine. conversation about something completely anodine really, grounded in the practical (linkedin and cvs) and useful we both slid easily into something else probably more interesting to both of ius

Pair Programming

2011-10-30T21:44:24Z

I’ve always maintained that I don’t like pair programming. The reasons for this being self consciousness, resentment because of partners who hog the keyboard, disagreements and tension etc. Having moved to a company, and being in a team, where pairing is strongly encouraged, if not mandatory in some cases, what follows is how to cope with this uncomfortable (for me!) situation.

Regarding the feeling of resentment at someone hogging the keyboard – well if you feel that way just ask to have a go! This is often not easy if you feel that your partner has more experience of the system, more confidence in knowing what to do, or a greater understanding than you. In this situation you could suggest “ping pong” pairing where you take turns to write a failing test and the other makes it pass.

Some recent advice from a wise colleague who told me the following: first of all that he didn’t care if he never touched the keyboard or mouse as long as he had an input into the design. To point out a missing semi-colon or something else the compiler will pick up is trivial – what is important is to listen, to contribute your own ideas and to come to a shared understanding of the design. So, according to my wise colleague, being the “navigator” is by no means subservient to being the “driver” but is a position of great responsibility. If you don’t understand what your partner is doing, and you don’t have any input into the design, then you are wasting your time and you are wasting the company’s time. “You have got to be strong”, he told me, if the other person is going ahead without you then you must always ask questions, make sure that you come to that shared understanding otherwise there is no point. And being shy is no excuse!

I found all that a bit of an alleluia moment (and sadly I feel I should have realised this ages ago).

It is, of course, easier to pair with someone who has a similar style to yourself. For example, if you like to take time to understand things then to pair with someone quicker and sharper than you can be stressful. On the other hand to pair with some hot shot young coder who is very sharp, has a good memory, and uses different design patterns from the same tired old way you’ve been doing things for years may be a good thing. By taking you out of your comfort zone it could force you to raise your game a bit. That’s another way of looking at it. When faced with this situation you could try making some suggestions to improve code quality and if your partner is genuinely delighted with an idea that improves the code then this is a very good sign. In spite of their scary self possession it shows a commendable lack of ego, a willingness to learn, and a desire just to write good code and get things working in a nice way.

If you do make suggestions and your partner gets defensive and wants to do things their way then why not look at the way you are suggesting things – does it display a lack of tactfulness or skill on your part. Perhaps you haven’t thought the suggestion through enough to be able to explain it properly. Or maybe your partner has a point. Try not to get defensive especially pairing with someone you’re not used to. Remember you’ve got to take time to get to know people.

Regarding shyness and self-consciousness ask yourself could this be a form of “ego” on your part. Most people pairing with you aren’t going to test you or put you under the microscope, they’re more concerned with getting the job done. “People have better things to do than look at you you know” (as my Mum used to tell my younger self when I complained about feeling shy or self conscious).

So far these are the ways I’ve coped with pairing and I’ve got to the stage where I quite enjoy some pairing sessions. Also when I think “I don’t like pairing” I try and ask myself why, and is it me that’s the problem? Often it is.

My top 5

2011-10-27T11:36:09Z

A few of posts back I shared a link with a site where people post their top 5 rules for life. In the intervening weeks I've given this some thought off and on, as I work through another set of small personal but important projects.

So to break all tradition there is some overt structure to this email - won't be making a habit of this, its my blog to say arbitrarily what I feel like saying when I feel like saying it, how I feel like saying it at the time ;-)

1) What are my top 5 rules ?

2) Are they really rules ?( I dont like rules!) they shape my life.. they do get broken, I feel the nuances at times and appreciate them differently as I get older. I doubt the essence has changed much in the last few decades, but the words I use as I currently understand them do change.

3)These things that arent really rules, what happens when I forget them?... well it ranges from mild unhappiness to serious illness.

It turns out that question number 3 proved to be the test for membership of the top 5. Or to put it another way, when I remember these 5 things, I am a nicer person to know, even for me!

So here they are:

1) Trust your instincts to be true to yourself

Ultimately the only person who influences you, is yourself. It is your voice in your head, even if you have inherited some of the ideas from others and sometimes suffer the emotional contagion of other people's feelings. If you are having a reaction to something it is important to pay attention. Your instinct doesn't tell you what is wrong, it tells you that something is not right. Your observation and investigation might tell you what and why. Your instincts tell you to check it out. This is biology's calibration system, sometimes it is an alarm, sometimes its a big loud "go on" signal. Be respectful of Mother Nature and pay attention

2) Forgiveness is liberating for others of course AND for yourself. A good memory does not make forgiveness even harder, just less accidental and more conscious. What greater compliment than to forgive and be forgiven?

1 and 2 are entwined somehow, inextricable but still distinct. I learned 1 from my Mother and 2 from my Father. Lifelong gifts. Thank you both

3) Remember you are an animal get in touch with your inner animals.. Cats have nine lives cos they are curious, they also sleep a lot! Dogs approach the world with a nose for fun. Toddlers are lovely animals and instinctively seek. It is the best way to learn, aware of the world but not made self consciousness by it.. They just do it and enjoy. Some might call this playing.

I dont know who gave me this one Playing is Joy in action.

4) There will always be a way for you to contribute and be you, find it and do so.

This came from my Granny who saw everything and loved anyway.

5) Spend time under a big sky every day, AND night. Star light and the moon provide a different illumination on life, the universe and everything. It is a place to breathe.

Breathing is good :-)

Note: I used the word YOU all over this. I am talking to myself

A very compact database query language based on binary relations

2011-10-19T16:08:50Z

Kragen thought it through a bit: http://canonical.org/~kragen/binary-relations.html

(God I love people that are cleverer than me)

Queries

2011-10-19T15:20:38Z

Words from Kragen, and I really can't answer this, I hope he doesn't mind me sharing:

[[

I've been thinking about how most queries don't really need to have free variables in the predicate position of a triple — that is, in most queries, you know what all the predicates are going to be, and your variables are only in the subject and object positions. Is this true in general, or is it just me?

I've been thinking about a different query language syntax that takes advantage of this, but it has to fall back on reification when it actually does need a variable predicate.

]]

WhipLEASH experimentation

2011-10-17T17:34:03Z

The Hound excited by his play with his friend the Ridgeback decided to leap over the ditch.

However I was not ready and still climbing under the fence, the lead was inadequately around my hand. He leaped. I tried to grab, failed, but felt the sensation of sinews stretching unnaturally and fast. I now have a VERY bruised left hand. I was told that it would be better if the hound was wearing a choke collar. I demur, I don't like them AND my fingers would almost certainly have been broken had I been using one.

The mistake was mine, NOT Primo's.

I know this pain I've had it from a horse and rein accident too.. It is painkillers and pain and swelling and temporary sausage fingers (UGH!)

I wonder about violin practice, but other practical matters like putting clothes on to go outside are more pressing right now. Tentatively the car was tested this morning. I can drive safely because the middle fingers and thumb are unaffected for gear changes. I won't be driving far though.

Stupid things catch me out, like holding a jar whilst taking the lid off. More experimenting as per a month or so ago, this time through necessity. The natural rhythms are upset. All food making is hampered by my one armed ineffectualness. Typing... hmmm not for long.

Try pulling on and off socks one handed, or putting on a bra! Or taking it off. I can use the forearm as a sort of counterbalance but I find I catch my fingers unexpectedly and I yelp. It makes the animals jump when I do that and I get reproachful looks from them as I disturb an afternoon siesta. Selfish chatelaine, they think.

My sister, made me laugh out loud on Skype in the coffee shop this afternoon, with her comment about how much the earth needed my violin playing. Even digitally delivered in words I heard the tone of voice. This was not a comment hidden by the post modernist cloak of "irony."

This was first order Sarcasm similar to the honesty of my other sibling who said he wanted me to practice for a very long time before he wanted to hear me!

To them I say two things - in order.

THANK YOU and Bassoon.

;-)

A Role Model of Consciousness

2011-10-15T19:59:10Z

Past few weeks I've been on pause, my head not working properly. Finally got around to seeing doctor yesterday, now waiting for antidepressants to take effect. I haven't totally wasted my disconnected time, watched a lot of stuff. Including a Midsomer, a couple of Bargain Hunts and a geeky-great vid on poker bots (have I said I really like Berlin? This is a Chaos Communication Camp production, wonderful material). Simulating an actual poker player is really hard, but it got me thinking about the similarly hard problem of what consciousness is, appropriately mental for my state of mind.

Caveat, I'm not up to date on theories in psychology or even AI. Last big thing I read anywhere near this was a lay-reader book I think with "Intelligence" in the title, about what humans are really good at is predicting the future - pretty good hypothesis IMHO. Maybe someone can enlighten me about current thought (I'll cc Planet RDF). But the thing that has been on my mind is more old-school, the internal model bit I think was popular around the 17th century, gone downhill since. Although it may well be rubbish as human stuff, something makes me imagine it might be worth thinking about for machine stuff. I really like the agent metaphor.

Ok, generation 0, we have an agent (A) in a universe (U), and it just sits there. It's a rock. It's surrounded by other agents (which might also be rocks).

Generation 1, we have an agent capable of interacting with the environment, but its interactions are pretty minimal, starting somewhere around a pebble on a beach that has a wander with each tide up to a living creature that has built-in stimulus-response maps along with learnt ones. Kinda Behaviourist. I'm starting with the pebble because interaction with the environment can take a lot of forms, and there's quite a history from at least the Neolithic of generally anthropomorphic agency views of facets of the environment (weather etc) through the Bronze Age deities up to the modern-day religious mythologies.

Generation 2 we approach the Enlightenment and/or Smalltalk. The agent in question has an internal model of the universe containing the agents outside.

On generation 3 we come to the bit that I'll call novel until someone points to an 18th century philosopher who already suggested this. The agent in question has had all its sensors and actuators geared up to the outside world for a while, as well as sensors (and actuators) connected internally. By the mechanisms of Intelligent Design, Natural Selection and copy, paste and tweak a bit, it notices parallels between interactions with the external agents and interactions with itself. It develops a sense of self as another model very similar to the models it has for external agents. Here's the novelty - first the agent becomes aware of external agencies, only then by analogy it becomes aware of itself.

Like all the great (as in most entertaining) theories this is of course unverifiable. But I like the notion that the local stuff only appears after some level of comprehension of the remote stuff, feels like it might be useful somehow.

Comments to the big G+

This just in from the 'Rod For Your Own Back' department

2011-10-08T19:00:00Z

Following on from a previous post in which I banged on at some length about how useless questions about the ISO 7-layer model are, I went for an interview where that was the first question. That'll teach me (or perhaps not).

As such, I decided I'd explain somewhat. You may find the Wikipedia article on the OSI model helpful. A crucial point to remember is that the OSI model is key to the whole Open Systems Interconnection effort, which was a way to standardise communication between computers. A good way to judge the success of that effort is that you are reading this using TCP/IP, which owes nothing at all to the OSI.

When I was studying for my first MCSE, under Ian Cunningham, I was taught a somewhat simpler model, having three layers. This is based on TCP/IP, and thus corresponds more to what we do in the real world. (I'm doing this from memory of around 14 years ago, so I apologise for any mistakes in advance).

The lowest layer is the Physical layer. This is the cable you plug in, or more likely these days, the basic wi-fi connection from your computer to the access point. That allows signals to move between computers, and without that, you haven't really got a network at all.

The middle layer is the Protocol layer. These days, the protocol layer is always TCP/IP. Now, TCP/IP is in fact two layers, but for the purposes of this explanation that doesn't really matter. TCP/IP defines network addresses on the Internet, usually one per connected device. The machine you're using now, whether it's a laptop or a smartphone, has an IP address, and that's how it talks to the Internet, and to this blog server.

The top layer is the Application layer. That defines what you're saying to the machine on the other end of the connection. HTTP is an application, and it's the way that computers send web pages back and forth. SMTP is another application, used for sending emails. And so on.

That's basically it. Obviously the whole process of how a web page gets to your computer is a little more complicated. However, this is a basic description of how your computer (or smartphone, or tablet, or…) connects to the Internet and gets information. I hope that helped.

Meanwhile, I'm off to learn those damn layers (may not be 100% true).

Giving The Defaults A Damn Good Leaving Alone

2011-10-08T12:32:00Z

OK, first up, I didn't invent the phrase "A damn good leaving alone", but I wish I had.

But I will admit that when it comes to software defaults, I usually leave them. This is especially the case for operating systems. I don't normally do much to a new laptop or desktop, apart from install the bare minimum of software that I need to use them. My laptop basically has no data on it at all apart from Dropbox and a few apps I've bought from the AppStore. If I feel the need to customise the heck out of something, I install a VM. (This might be why my VMs have roughly the life expectancy of a snot at a hanky convention (other metaphors are available)).

I have always been like this. I've worked in IT for years, which means working on tens of thousands of machines. It means changing laptops at least annually, if not more. In the four years I spent at Talis, I must have changed laptops six or seven times. This just means there's no point carefully honing each and every setting to millimeter-perfectness. Actually, it means working in a way that means I can pick up any machine and have at the task in hand immediately. My list of "must-have" software is quite short:

That's it.

So, when it came to OS 10.7 "Lion", I left the scroll behaviour alone. And I left LaunchPad, Mission Control, and all the other Lion-y weirdness just as it came, in the damn box. I am aware that there are great long lists of customisation options to fiddle with Lion… and I'm having none of it. I use the natural scrolling, and I've got used to it. In fact, I like it.

I can use any Mac, because I'm using the defaults. Same with Windows, same with Linux. I don't need to work out how to replicate my custom environment, because there isn't one. I will agree that for some people, they need their exquisitely-honed setup, but they're not me.

One small point, apart from the "use any machine" argument, is that Apple (and Microsoft, and others) all have lots of engineers, making mostly sensible decisions about the design of their software. As such, I think that I should think carefully before changing the defaults, because those defaults have been thought about carefully.

So, next time you set up a new machine, why not have a think about how little you need to customise it, rather than how much.

SuperUser

2011-10-08T12:24:00Z

As part of my strategy to get a new job (and cling to the remains of my sanity), I've started answering questions on SuperUser, part of the StackExchange network. I've managed to get quite far, and I'm having some fun. I'm basically working on the principle that the best way to learn about something is to try to teach someone else about it.

Why not join me at SuperUser?

Sell Out

2011-10-06T19:48:17Z

A couple of days ago I got another mail from someone wanting to put links here to their client's. Unusually this seemed written by a human, so I didn't immediately bin it. Insert our links in your old posts and we'll give you some dollars (the figure I think was $50 a link), and the targets will be either relevant and/or to educational resources. Given that I'm in the red right now, and given my recent amount of enthusiasm for paid work, I said ok, bring it on.

It would have been better if I'd been able to do Sebastian Trüg's approach, having a real project to which to donate, but bugger it, I've added a donate button to this blog. Now go visit my sponsor.

A couple of days ago I got another mail from someone wanting to put links here to their client's. Unusually this seemed written by a human, so I didn't immediately bin it. Insert our links in your old posts and we'll give you some dollars (the figure I think was $50 a link), and the targets will be either relevant and/or to educational resources. Given that I'm in the red right now, and given my recent amount of enthusiasm for paid work, I said ok, bring it on.

It would have been better if I'd been able to do Sebastian Trüg's approach, having a real project to which to donate, but bugger it, I've added a donate button to this blog. Now go visit my sponsor.
2011-10-06T19:47:55Z danja http://dannyayers.com Danny Ayers Semantic Web, Linked Data, cute animal stuff Danny Ayers : Raw Blog</h1> <p>2011-10-06T19:47:55Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>A couple of days ago I got another mail from someone wanting to put links here to their client's. Unusually this seemed written by a human, so I didn't immediately bin it. Insert our links in your old posts and we'll give you some dollars (the figure I think was $50 a link), and the targets will be either relevant and/or to educational resources. Given that I'm in the red right now, and given my recent amount of enthusiasm for paid work, I said ok, bring it on.</p> <p>It would have been better if I'd been able to do <a href="http://trueg.wordpress.com/">Sebastian Trüg</a>'s approach, having a real project to which to donate, but bugger it, I've added a donate button to this blog. Now go visit my <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ">sponsor</a>.</p></div> </article> <article> <h1>This is NOT about Primo at all.</h1> <p>2011-10-06T16:17:42Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">Primo is not sure he likes Robert Redford yet. He was very interested as I approached Mr R and he gave him a good sniff. Mistletoe has met Mr R before and was prepared a long time ago. Squidgey returned to her place under the workbox behind the radiator. Mistletoe looked at the pink ribbon Mr R was wearing around his neck and gave me a look that said "oh really is that dignified even for him"<br/><br/>Dalmatians are interested but sensitive souls. So he stood alert wagging his tail as I ran my hands all over Robert, and tidied him up. Up until this point Primo was prepared to give MR R a chance. And then I pulled the bow over the strings and Primo ran away.<br/><br/>Now that's feedback!<br/><br/>Its funny how things once you start looking for them collide in front of you. Of course sometimes you don't know what it is exactly you are looking for. You've mislaid it somewhere and are on the alert but you've also forgotten what you've mislaid. Like going into the kitchen and making vague gestures with your hands for an implement you need but can't remember the name of.<br/><br/>We all are many people, thank goodness, with the unique essence of us in each of them. We define ourselves by our relationships, (or dangerously others attempt to define us by our relationships) we define ourselves by what we do, our jobs, our aspirations, our feelings. Definitions happen even when we decide we won't define.<br/><br/>An identity I have held in the past is one of musician and every so often it whispers to me. Sometimes. For a long time I was too preoccupied to hear, until eventually the whisper becomes assertive, gets hold of your hands and your fingers and there in front of you is a website that has non copyright musical scores to access. When did they arrive there? Why hadn't I thought to even look.Obviously they would be there, the activity and attitude of the Internet would make that such an obvious candidate.. Why WHY WHY didn't I look before. Just finding them and looking at some of them made me smile inside for over a week. Knowing I could go back and have a quite look whenever I wanted.<br/><br/>Then I stumbled across something else.<br/><br/>So last night I found myself sitting in a room with about 40 other musicians none of whom I had met before. I was greeted by the leader and found myself sitting down in the section with the first violins. How did that happen? Last time I played 1st Violin I was 18 ( A V LONG TIME AGO). Eeek. The first piece of music in front of me after all this time was Schubert's Unfinished Symphony. EVERYONE else in the room knows it and has played it. Bugger its in a minor key, what time is it in, what does that Latin word mean, is that an 8th or a 16th note, which way up is my bow. Oh hell that notes high up, What IS IT? Ooo do I even know this piece, oh that bits familiar, no don't know that bit. So all this is going on in my head. My hands, wisely, choose to ignore it and get on with it. I got through it<br/><br/>The Musician is OUT...(she needs A LOT of practice before she stops being a sonic hazard though)<br/><br/>Of course I am not stumbling. "Stumbling across" is just a short hand for "somewhere part of me was ready to get out and declare herself again."<div class="blogger-post-footer"></div></div> </article> <article> <h1>Check Sums</h1> <p>2011-10-04T20:50:35Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>I was offline last week when the news broke that <a href="http://www.cernland.net/">CERN</a> folks announced they'd found a discrepancy between the assumed speed limit of the universe and the way their neutrinos appeared to behave, <a href="http://arxiv.org/pdf/1109.4897v1">20 parts per million</a>. That's a pretty big anomaly when you consider dogs can detect salami in 9 parts per billion of the kitchen (that paper will be published once I've got 99 other co-signaturies who don't mind their crotches being sniffed). I was offline because I was feeling pretty crap after a boozy weekend, lightweight compared to previous exploits but after the hangover had passed I was left in an ultra-violet funk.</p> <p>Incidentally, for a few days, going to sleep I wound up picking a random, unloaded word that flashed by on my <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cartesian_theater">Cartesian plasma screen</a>, "<em>mink</em>", repeating it as a voiceover in said theatre as a mantra to keep demons at bay. I have since rationalised the word - it's a potential HTML5 <em>rel</em> value to correspond to <a href="http://sw.nokia.com/uriqa/URIQA.html">URIQA</a>'s MGET. But that's by-the-by.</p> <p>The too-fast neutrinos went from CERN to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gran_Sasso">Gran Sasso</a>. After dopplering my funk, I was curious about the constant thing. I knew where CERN was (because I watched <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Champions">The Champions</a> as a child) but though I'd heard of Gran Sasso, couldn't place it. As any good mental illnessity goes, my funk featured a good proportion of guilt (getting sweary on social networks leaves you a bit shamefaced).</p> <p>Now looking on the map my funk shifted back up the spectrum, if you draw a line on the globe from CERN to Gran Sasso it goes straight through this house. Those faster-than-light neutrons came through here (ok, a little underground, but I do leave my empties in the cantina). So how's that for something to feel guilty about - screwing up the model of the universe..?</p> <p>Which is why I can be sure they got their sums wrong. My empties would have slowed them down. You're probably 40 parts per million out guys.</p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Champagne Winner</h1> <p>2011-09-27T12:39:37Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6188811046/" title="Champagne Winner"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4235</h1> <p>2011-09-27T07:32:41Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6188287530/" title="IMG_4235"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4233</h1> <p>2011-09-27T07:32:25Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6188287098/" title="IMG_4233"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4228</h1> <p>2011-09-27T07:32:11Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6187764715/" title="IMG_4228"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4226</h1> <p>2011-09-27T07:31:56Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6188286372/" title="IMG_4226"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Zach Beauvais of Kasabi at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011</h1> <p>2011-09-27T07:31:44Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6187764081/" title="Zach Beauvais of Kasabi at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4209</h1> <p>2011-09-27T07:31:29Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6187763705/" title="IMG_4209"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Canine House Rules</h1> <p>2011-09-26T22:04:14Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">1) It is not possible to get to the top of the stairs before a Dalmatian. This rule applies whatever house you are in and where ever the Dalmatian might be before starting the ascent. The Dalmatian must be at the top of the stairs to wait<br/><br/>2) If a Dalmatian has ascended the stairs for his own undisclosed purposes, a Dalmatian is unable, under any circumstances to descend the stairs until the Dalmatian has heard, clearly, the tinkling of an appropriate amount of biscuits into the Dalmatian's bowl<br/><br/>3) A Dalmatian does not descend the stairs for an inappropriate number of biscuits.<br/>The Dalmatian shall decide what constitutes the appropriate number of biscuits even when the Dalmatian can not SEE the biscuits<br/><br/>4) Wet food whilst acceptable <i>as well</i>, will not be acceptable for a Dalmatian to descend the stairs. Please see rule 2<br/><br/>5) A Dalmatian's duty is to be certain about the contents of the fridge at all times. To do this the Dalmatian will open the fridge when the Dalmatian believes it is most appropriate to do so, to be certain of the contents of the fridge.<br/><br/>6) A Dalmatian shall liberate the fridge of contents which the Dalmatian believes are inappropriate and have been misfiled. For the avoidance of doubt the Dalmatian shall decide what foodstuffs fit into this category of misfiled food.<br/><br/>7) The Dalmatian has the right and duty to dispose of the misfiled contents in any way as the Dalmatian sees fit. Dalmatians are efficient and speedy in the despatch. The Dalmatian shall leave the fridge open afterwards as a silent reminder to the Misfiler of the inappropriate contents of the fridge.<br/><br/>8) A Dalmatian shall take outside any object that might be of use to the Dalmatian for recreational purposes. This can include the previously mentioned misfiled contents of the fridge. Generally however only the empty receptacles of the misfiled contents of the fridge will remain as objects to be observed by the Misfiler on the way to a later walk. This along with rule 7 is part of the Dalmatian's duty to nonviolently point out the error of the Misfiler's ways.<br/><br/>9) The Dalmatian shall guard the contents of the oven as food is cooked within. The Dalmatian shall do so assiduously and the Dalmatian very rarely has reason to ascend the stairs for his own undisclosed purposes whilst the main oven is in use.<br/><br/>10) The Dalmatian is aware of the difference in use of the top and bottom oven. When the top oven is being used to grill toast, the Dalmatian has a personal quest to snatch the toast as it is transferred to the plate. This is to ensure the sharp reflexes of the Toaster. In the event that the garden is not available to the Dalmatian, after the execution of this act, the Dalmatian may ascend the stairs for his own purposes. Please see rule 2, which will apply when the Dalmatian is ready.<br/><br/><br/>N.B.<br/><br/>Please remember at all times that the Dalmatian is demonstrating his service and duty towards you when considering these rules.<br/><br/>Rule 1 is a Universal Law of Dalmatians, as well as a Canine House Rule<div class="blogger-post-footer"></div></div> </article> <article> <h1>External Memory</h1> <p>2011-09-26T19:06:00Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">One of the things I've ended up doing as I've been applying for jobs is technical tests. I've always wondered why employers put people through those technical tests. After all, all they do is check whether I can remember a few dozen facts that I can easily find elsewhere. One question that always comes up is the layers of the ISO 7-layer model. I may have learned that sometime around twenty years ago or so. Since then, I keep that knowledge safely in Google (<a href="http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=iso+7+layer+model+diagram">here you go</a>). I have never ever <i>ever</i> used it since.<br/><br/>So why do people ask this on technical tests? I have no idea. Another favourite is port numbers. People will ask "What port does such-and-such protocol run on?" Again, this is easy to find out, so easy that it isn't worth bothering to remember. Seriously. For some reason, people usually ask for HTTP, HTTPS, SMTP, SNMP, DNS, and one other one, like Kerberos or something. Some are easy, and some aren't. But whatever - you can easily Google this too, or if you're on a UNIX-family operating system, something like<br/><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">% cat /etc/services | grep "^http"</span></blockquote> should show the result you need. Here, that shows me:<br/><blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">http 80/udp www www-http # World Wide Web HTTP</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Courier New', Courier, monospace;">http 80/tcp www www-http # World Wide Web HTTP</span></blockquote>And so on.<br/><br/>And people always ask me to put my iPad away, as "Googling isn't allowed".<br/><br/>The one and only time I had to help assess someone in an interview situation, I asked them to draw a diagram of a <a href="http://www.citrix.com/">Citrix</a> <a href="http://support.citrix.com/product/legacy/mfv1.8/">MetaFrame 1.8 system</a> (yes, it was a while ago). The person I was talking to floundered uselessly for a while, jabbing the bit of paper with a pencil whilst mumbling incoherently. I graded that as a fail.<br/><br/>If I was going to ask someone to do a technical test, I'd let them Google as much as they want. I'd lend them a laptop, point them at the wireless, whatever. Google away. Because like it or not, Google is my memory for some things, and I wouldn't work in the real world without it.<br/><br/>(And yes, I did manage to fail a technical test. No, that's not why I'm writing this. Well, maybe a little bit).<br/><br/><br/><div class="blogger-post-footer"></div></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4201</h1> <p>2011-09-26T11:32:53Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6185100122/" title="IMG_4201"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>John O'Donovan of The Press Association at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011</h1> <p>2011-09-26T11:32:40Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6185099642/" title="John O'Donovan of The Press Association at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Steve Harris of Garlik at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011</h1> <p>2011-09-26T11:18:45Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6185069948/" title="Steve Harris of Garlik at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Martin Hepp of Hepp Research at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:39:31Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184471379/" title="Martin Hepp of Hepp Research at Semantic Tech & Business, London, 2011"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4145</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:39:20Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184992078/" title="IMG_4145"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4142</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:39:12Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184470739/" title="IMG_4142"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4141</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:39:02Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184470419/" title="IMG_4141"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4138</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:55Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184991198/" title="IMG_4138"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4135</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:46Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184990890/" title="IMG_4135"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4133</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:39Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184990610/" title="IMG_4133"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4131</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:31Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184990354/" title="IMG_4131"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4128</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:23Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184990064/" title="IMG_4128"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4127</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:12Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184989630/" title="IMG_4127"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4124</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:38:04Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184468227/" title="IMG_4124"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4123</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:37:50Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184988708/" title="IMG_4123"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4118</h1> <p>2011-09-26T10:37:41Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184467383/" title="IMG_4118"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4117</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:46:53Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184367899/" title="IMG_4117"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4114</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:46:34Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184888090/" title="IMG_4114"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4111</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:46:22Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184887740/" title="IMG_4111"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4108</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:46:11Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184366535/" title="IMG_4108"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4093</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:46:01Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184887024/" title="IMG_4093"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4092</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:45:36Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184886248/" title="IMG_4092"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4087</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:45:26Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184885918/" title="IMG_4087"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_4086</h1> <p>2011-09-26T09:45:05Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6184364527/" title="IMG_4086"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_0591</h1> <p>2011-09-24T13:57:50Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6177513037/" title="IMG_0591"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_0590</h1> <p>2011-09-24T13:57:34Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6178039198/" title="IMG_0590"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IMG_0589</h1> <p>2011-09-24T13:57:11Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/mmmmmrob/">mmmmmrob</a> posted a photo:</p> <p><a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mmmmmrob/6178038252/" title="IMG_0589"></a></p></div> </article> <article> <h1>IPod Divination</h1> <p>2011-09-24T09:08:00Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">Divination is the art of seeing in to the future. Since the Dawn of Time(tm) mankind has used many ways to predict the future. We've examined the entrails of sacred animals, looked at tea leaves, and read Gartner white papers. None of these methods have worked particularly well, but we persevered nonetheless.<br/><br/>Some predictions have worked better than others - I remember being astonished whe. I asked a Magic 8-ball what it thought of the then-new Office 2000. Unsurprisingly, and correctly, it replied "Outlook not so good".<br/><br/>But today, I can unveil a method that actually works. We call it iPod Divination, and the way it works is simple. We ogo out for a drive, then simply put an iPod on shuffle, then plug it into the car stereo, so we can both hear the music. Then, ask a question, and hit next track. The next song you hear should answer your question.<br/><br/>It's about as reliable as any other method of divination. After all, as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yogi_Berra">Yogi Berra</a> once said "<a href="http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Yogi_Berra">Prediction is difficult, especially about the future</a>".<div class="blogger-post-footer"></div></div> </article> <article> <h1>Since When?</h1> <p>2011-09-23T09:02:00Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">As a result of going to <b>a lot</b> of interviews, I've ended up telling the story of how I decided on my career aged 11. So, just in case there's a couple of people left out there who haven't heard this, here's the story in much more detail. Consider it a wavy-lines powered journey to the long-lost past. It's not quite "A long time ago, in a galaxy far away..." Here goes.<br/><br/>When I was 11, my parents began sending my brother and I to summer camps. I know, it's all <i>terribly</i> middle class, but that's how we were then. We went to Millfield School, and spent a week there. The first time we went, we were enrolled on a course called "Gifted Child". I cringe with embarrassment about that to this day. On the course were my brother and I, and several of the kind of kids who could unironically describe themselves as "gifted". Since the only people my brother and I knew were each other, we stuck together. But then, the others were basically the kind of kid who strutted through life, banging on about their mighty brains. Even then, I thought that they could do with a swift dose of reality (oh, the irony). The course consisted of ten half-days, doing all kinds of activities. Three things stuck in my mind from that week:<br/><br/>The first thing I remember was the Biology module. We had to dissect a rat. My brother (who now works in sales) had entirely too much fun nailing small paws to a piece of wood and pinging various bits of rat giblet around the room. I, meanwhile, remember practicing my 'keeping my lunch where I'd just put it' technique on the fire escape. I snapped straight back to this when I smelled formaldehyde during Biology O-level at school, and even now I can bring to mind the contrast of a small, helpless paw, and my brother's inexpert hammering technique. The second thing was the module on economics. My brother wasn't enormously interested, so left me to it. We had some game to play about buying shares on the stock exchange with play money, and then seeing how they went. I won by about two orders of magnitude. I'm still interested in economics to this day, although owning some shares in <a href="http://www.computacenter.com/">Computacenter</a> and <a href="http://www.talis.com/">Talis</a> is about as much economics as I do these days.<br/><br/>The third thing - ah, that. The reason why we're here now. Half a day working on <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_PET">Commodore PETs</a>. I <i>think</i> they were 4016s. My brother took one look at this activity, and went to sleep. I spent a little while learning BASIC programming, and I was <b>hooked</b>.<br/><br/>The logistics of the trip to Millfield were quite bonkers. It's only now as a parent that I realise what my Dad went through. Basically, my brother spent the weekend before Millfield at our Grandmother's, and I spent the weekend afterwards there. My Dad drove the two of us about the countryside for three weekends on the trot. Ouch. Now that I'm a Dad, I can appreciate his sacrifices, and how hard he worked for us. (And Dad, if you're reading this, I am repaying you, just as hard as I can. Ask your grandson!)<br/><br/>And so, following the epiphany that was touching a computer, I spent a week at my Grandmother's. Apparently I bent both of her ears through a full 180 degrees going on about computers. When my Dad arrived to collect me, my Grandmother took him aside and suggested that we needed to talk about this further. And so they did.<br/><br/>Next year, I went back and did a full module (five half-days) working on the then brand-new <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX81">ZX-81</a>s. Ah, those days. One whole kilobyte of storage (for anyone under about 30, that's about six text messages worth), no colour, two different shift keys, four different cursors, and Sinclair Research's bizarre method of entering programs by keywords. I was thrilled. My poor Grandmother received another ear-bashing about computers. So, when my Dad came to collect me this time, he received a stern set of instructions. "This child must have a computer. Buy it and send me the bill!". This, of course, was 1982, and so all of the cool kids had a BBC Micro. We got a Spectrum 48K. Did I mention we didn't have a colour telly? Dad had to buy a colour TV to go with our new colour computer! I was so excited that I woke my brother up at 3 AM to tell him that we must have got the computer because there was a colour TV!<br/><br/>I felt the excitement immediately. Just like with LEGO, the only limit was my imagination. I worked hard on that computer, writing all kinds of programs. I learned Z80 assembler, just to make stuff go faster. I built a game, a library to do proportionally-spaced text, and all kinds of stuff.<br/><br/>When I finally came to do O-level options at school, it was all a bit pointless. I knew then what I wanted to do, and I told the careers adviser so. He told me not to be so stupid, and assured me that no-one would ever make a job out of working with computers. He basically patted me on the head and told me that if I worked hard I could make a good accountant. That didn't kill the excitement - it made me more determined to prove him wrong.<br/><br/>The excitement still hasn't left. I still want to work with computers. If it wasn't my job, I'd fiddle with computers anyway. I want to build cool stuff, I want to continue doing the impossible, and I want to keep doing this while there's breath left in me.<br/><br/>I never managed to explain to my Grandmother what computers actually <b>did</b>. But she knew me well enough to know that computers were important to me. She bought the Spectrum, and later bought me a PC that I needed to do my University project on. I am here now because of that.<br/><br/>I'll end with one more comment: As always, on a Friday, I collected Red Demigod from nursery. A nursery nurse opened the door, looked at me, and laughed. I asked what on earth was the joke this time. She said that they'd been talking to the children about what Mommy and Daddy do. Red had apparently told everyone that Daddy's job was "Making poorly computers feel better". I can't think of a better way to describe what I do.<div class="blogger-post-footer"></div></div> </article> <article> <h1>stupid computers</h1> <p>2011-09-21T22:38:47Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>Train of thought. The world imagined by machines won't ever be a direct reflection of the world experienced by animals. But that's not a bad starting point, go all Plato and have the computers as the shadowplaw. Maybe the current generation of computers aren't capable of doing the 3D of a child's first discovery of a 4-leaf clover. They will though, probably in my lifetime. But there's the map/shadow, and there's stuff we can do well in this world, stuff that the machines are good at. A virtual reality with rules that are consistent with this side, but take advantage of that side.</p> <p>Perhaps I'm getting a little too excited about being back online again.</p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Speed</h1> <p>2011-09-21T22:24:15Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>A passing observation. It's bloody slow this Web thing. I have terrible wire bandwidth here, but it isn't that that is the bottleneck. Me, ask anyone, might be smart but he's slow witted. Not as slow as this thing. </p> <p>Picture a couple of people that know each other fairly well, have a spoken language in common. Say they've been out and are trying to figure out the best way of getting home. Bang bang bang bang, the ideas will flow. The Interwebs know the best way to get a taxi, walk or bus. Augmented by the smartphone. But it don't quite work. Computers + data = knowledge. Not.</p> <p>Even if this machine in front had better than human standard AI, it would still be slow and useless right now compared to a (stupid) talking human. We are missing bits we need to take advantage of the technology. The back end seems to function well, the front end seems like it's as good as it gets. So why do these things behave as if they are slow and stupid?</p> <p>Passing observation, I honestly don't know. But I feel we should be able to find out. How? Dunno.</p></div> </article> <article> <h1>Accidental Neglect</h1> <p>2011-09-20T07:47:00Z</p> <div xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">It's been quite difficult to just get brain space together to do any blogging. So, here's a quick few points that I'm going to try to expand on later.<br/><br/>Thanks to a friend, I seem to have found a bug to do with HTML entity processing in the Twitter iPhone client. I'm not sure how to report it, but I'll post here about how that goes.<br/><br/>I have put OS X 10.7 "Lion" on my desktop. I'll admit to being slightly disappointed with the name - I had hoped that after Leopard and Snow Leopard, I was hoping for "Clouded Leopard", or even "Cloudy with a hint of Leopard". Ah well. I'm slightly disappointed with the performance, but then again, I didn't do a clean install, and I am on the minimum 2 GB of memory. I have also noticed a couple of bugs, to do with how full screen apps behave. Apple has apparently shipped a couple of beta 10.7.2 builds, so I'll wait for that to ship, and report them if I can reproduce them on that. Next task is to work out how to do a clean install, then update my laptop. Again, I'll probably wait for 10.7.2 for that.<br/><br/>I am <i>still</i> job hunting. That's what has taken up so much of my time. I am thinking about what to do, but I will stay in IT. It's what I have wanted to do since I was 11, and it's still what I want to do now.<br/><br/>I have done some work with an old friend on a web site. It's not a secret new web service, but it's still been an interesting project to work on. You can see (warning, includes code I wrote) <a href="http://www.themoroccanmarketofhandicraft.co.uk/" target="_blank">The Moroccan Market of Handicraft</a> site for yourself, if you want, <a href="http://www.themoroccanmarketofhandicraft.co.uk/" target="_blank">here</a>. I'll definitely be blogging more on this soon.<br/><br/>- Contributed using BlogPress from my iPad<br/><br/><div class="blogger-post-footer"></div></div> </article> </main></body></html>