Apperceptions

The RichardShow Screencast

Richard made a screencast of ANT. 

All day long I've been griping to the Yahoo Videoblogging Group about the troubles with Archive.org accessability and the Apple Quicktime Fast Start option.

So I went to watch Richard's latest gift to humanity and guess what happened!

It's like waiting for that client call or meeting. 

I hate it.  I hate it.  I hate it.

So I made a screencast of Richard's screencast.  What else could I do?

I love the RichardShow.  I love Scratch Video.  I love ANT (FireANT). 

Thank you Richard.  Thank you Charlene.  Thank you Josh, Daniel, Erik, Jay and Ryanne.

Click the pic to view the vid.  Better if you use ANT, because this is a bit large (10 minutes, 36MB).

Geek!

Funny thing.  My friend Dave Toole had one of those cool looking black Greek fishing caps back in college.  We teased him about it, of course.  We called it his "geek!" hat. 

The word stuck on all of us, especially Dave and I.  We became geeks, independent and in sync with the rest of the world, as we studied at UCSB back in the mid 70's. 

Little did we know that we would both go into an industry full of geeks.  How did we all become geeks?  Who started using that term first in the modern way?  I don't know, but I do know how two guys, and eventually two generations of families, found their passion working with a bunch of geeks.  Geek!

Click the pic to see the geeky gift Dave got special for me.

Thanks to renegade's show and tell video this morning for inspiring my own little Saturday morning version.  Sort of perfect story for "cartoon day" (lot's of toy ad's you know).

Saving Private Data

Funny database messages...

The other day I was looking at some data and noticed that one of the user names was "Jesus".  Natural enough.  But in looking over the logs, I noticed the message "Database has been saved by Jesus".

Once, back in the 80's, I was working with database software on DEC VAX's, using VMS ("those were the days my friend, we thought they'd never end ...").  DEC has just added a new RDB error message that was something like "Truncation Error - Data Dictionary Too Long".  It was necessary for a developer to assign a short code to each error for use in our API (this was in the old #define days in C).  As manager, I had to review these.  I can't recall if we ever decided to change the suggested DIC2BIG to something less provocative.

Dead People Web Usage Is Up

I noticed an ad the other day for a Beatrice Woods' website.  A true Bohemian (and the "Mama of Dada"), she called Ojai her home for many of her 105 years.  She claimed that she owed her longevity to "young men and chocolate".  Apparently her artwork is selling well on the site.  I wonder how many dead people have websites. Obviously, there usage is increasing.  I wonder how they pay for hosting.

Paunch, beard, glasses.

I noticed this old entry on Lucas Gonze's blog today.  Does anyone know what they are talking about?

(I was trained as a Mathematician, actually).

Jim says:

There is a certain group of 50ish computer science types that all have the same paunch, the same beard, and the same glasses. What will my generation look like? 

Lucas' Answer: Paunch, beard, glasses.

Aftermath

This is too funny.  A video of a student escaping out the window from his oblivious math teacher. 

The 80-20 Rule

Kevin Werbach mentions a great quote from Tommy Lasorda:

I've stopped telling people about my problems. 80% of people listening don't care, and the other 20% are glad I'm having problems.

Barbie Does Linux

Technology Insider has an article on BarbieOS, based on Debian Linux.  Too funny.  They also have a very lame article on the Mac Mini.  Here's a much better one from Ben Guild that my friend Eric sent me.

Apprentice TNG?

From Stewart to Star in New 'Apprentice'

Since Stewart is not allowed to conduct business while in prison, Burnett made it clear his deal with Stewart was completed before the domestic mogul entered prison — although he's made monthly visits to her.

Are these considered conjugal visits?