The Flying Toaster

Closing the Doors

2007-10-13T14:15:00.000-07:00

To all 8 of you out there who're subscribed to my feedburner feed, thank you. It's been great. Okay, that's probably a lie....but seriously, thank you for keeping your RSS software pointed at my feed in the unlikely event that I'll post something.

You may have noticed that the frequency at which I've been posting to this place has dropped to less than a trickle. In fact, I've done almost nothing in any of the online spaces I supposedly inhabit for quite awhile now. It took some time, but I've slowly realized that some thinking needs to be done about this. After some stewing, simmering, and slow pressure-cooking on this subject, I've decided that the time has come to withdraw from this particular scene.

Some things of (possible) note:

I first launched into "this blogging thing" at the end of 2003. This was not long after I'd adjusted to college life, and had access to high-speed Internet access 24/7. I was a very different person back then. I cranked out 13 whole posts before the New Year rolled around.
I posted 265 times in 2004. It was never a consistent flow, and I was pretty much all over the map. That's what happens when you grow up and evolve, I guess. Man, I was a serious monster in February.
2005 was a bit more reasonable, and better spread out. Still no real coherent vision though. But hey, it can be somewhat liberating to just write one's thoughts.
Early 2006 showed some evolution and focus in this place. Somehow I drew the notice of GeeksAreSexy, and was brought on board as a contributor, and as a kind of co-editor after awhile. A lot of the techie musings and whatnot that had been emerging over here pretty much migrated over there. It was a good thing for [GAS], but probably not so hot for my flying kitchen appliance.
Right around the time I had two forums to post my thoughts, the frequency of thought and the energy to digest and render them in writing waned. It's a little ironic that this "height" corresponded with the beginnings of the end, though I didn't know this yet.
2006 also saw me purchase my own domain and web-hosting. I fully intended to move this blog to a new home over there, including all prior posts, but I never managed to make the time to do so.
This post is only the 6th one that's made it out for 2007. The last post prior to this one was in April. Since then, a number of noteworthy things have happened (passed orals, graduated from Whitman, got a full-time job in IT) that for whatever reason didn't make a blog post happen. Do you see the trend?

I've come to the realization that this just isn't my thing anymore. I'm a different person now, with different priorities, energies, and time constraints. As those of you who know me personally will attest, I love to share (and sometimes knowledge-vomit), but I can't make it happen here anymore. It takes too much time and energy to distill my swirling brain-waves into a semi-coherent, semi-polished blog post. There are too many other things that demand my attention, both on- and off-line.

I'm now refactoring how to push information out to the people I know care about listening. More signal, less noise. More two-way conversation, less shouting into a dark and echoing void. It's time to migrate and evolve.

Peace.

Bah. I don't like dead-ends either, so I'll leave you with a link to my ClaimID profile: http://claimid.com/mattpearson. How very meta of me. See you around the web.

Cake for Breakfast

2007-04-21T13:05:00.000-07:00

22 years ago today, I ceased being a parasitic organism, and began my existence as an independent human animal. As such, I find it entirely appropriate that my breakfast today consisted of cake.

While on most occasions this would be great cause for happiness and celebration, the best word to describe my feelings over the last 24 hours or so would be "complicated." This is mostly associated with Thesis.

Our show went up in the Sheehan Gallery over this past week. The gallery opening was last night. It was good....and very much a relief. All that's left now is to survive/pass orals (mine is on this coming Monday). This was unfortunately overshadowed by the blazing critiques that all of us were subjected to by the "visiting artist" that was brought in to judge our stuff (it's part of some traditional award-thing that we have to be a part of through no real choice of ours or our faculty's). Nothing like a bit of harsh criticism that, despite its relevance and validity was poorly and impersonally delivered with almost no tact whatsoever, to blast away any self-confidence we had left....right before we presented our work to the world. Needless to say, the evening was not the wash of relief it should have been.

Thankfully, the above uncoolness was heartily balanced by awesomeness and warm-&-fuzzies. Dinner was had with The Parents and The Girlfriend after the gallery opening, with some healthy venting to be had that didn't involve me punching my chair. Later last night, there was a "Yay, the Gallery Opening is Done" shindig at a fellow art-major's place, with some fellow artists and other close friends. Then, this morning (err, afternoonish), I made my way down to the local coffee shop to hang out and get some work done (which so far has amounted to writing this post). Another one of my fellow art-majors works at said coffee shop, and we had a delightful couple minutes of hangout time. The Girlfriend was also randomly lurking in the shop, getting some work done. Our chance encounter turned into hangout time when my coffeeShop-working colleague brought over two ginormous slices of cake.

Having cake with one's Special Someone, courtesy of a wonderful colleague, is a hard breakfast to beat.

There's another shindig later tonight with most of my Close Friends and colleagues, probably involving more cake, a bit of booze (we're all actually of legal age now...scary), and a bad movie. Should provide enough happy-vibes to get me through Orals, after which there'll probably be yet another art-major shindig.

No matter how crappy things feel (or really are, or whatever), life is still good when one is surrounded by the Good Peoples I've somehow managed to find.

I love you all.

Why I "Need" a Giant Display(s)

2007-04-10T00:03:00.000-07:00

I posted a couple days ago about how I am becoming over-saturated with information. Realization just struck as to WHY this is the case, and a person much smarter than I has a number of good blurbs that explain this incredibly well. It also explains my need to surround myself with lots of screens, and to lust after deliciously large displays that make my bank account cry.

Basically, the explanation is as follows:

I have a strong case of N.A.D.D.
One of the symptoms of this is that I think a lot, and thinking is messy. Seriously, my brain's continual somersaulting sometimes gets in the way of sleeping. Rands' two "truths" (consequentially revealed by his N.A.D.D.), fit perfectly in my manifestation of the phenomenon.
My methodology for organizing the chaos has evolved to take advantage of increased screen sizes and resolutions. Giant swaths of screen real estate don't slow you down when you're a keyboard jockey.

If you've ever been curious about the peculiar habits of a nerd you know, the articles linked here should provide some useful insight. Fellow N.A.D.D.-ers will likely smile and nod. There's now a term to point to that might offer an explanation to those who don't manifest N.A.D.D.

Over-saturated

2007-04-06T10:44:00.000-07:00

The two weeks of vacation mentioned in the previous entry, and the subsequent weeks since then have been somewhat illuminating. When comparing the two blocks of time side-by-side, they couldn't be more different.

California time was spent relaxing, on the road, or wandering around. The majority of these two weeks was spent without Internet access. I zoned out. I was unplugged.

Since I've been back, my digital world has wrapped itself around me again, in all it's interesting and overwhelming glory. And of course there's school work and thesis junk that has required significant portions of my gray-matter resources.

In light of these two diverse bits of time butting up directly with one another, I've come to notice something that afflicts not only me, but all manner of other people (whether they realize it or not). I am over-saturated with information. It's everywhere, and in such densities that I'm having trouble absorbing it.

As a full-time student (for not much longer!), it's my job to absorb, parse, and replay as much of the information that's thrown at me as possible. As an information technologist (y'know, that whole web-design/tech-support/techie-manager thing I do), I spend most of my professional and "hobby" time either planning and building systems to manage information, or absorbing/parsing/moving information pertaining to this subject. As a self-professed technology geek, I am a hardcore information consumer. My feed list is rather massive (even after trimming it down), and the volume of audio and video netcasts I suck down and intake sometimes feels absurd. Oh, and I sometimes generate a bit of content as well. Unless an active effort is made to stem the tide, it's not hard to be inundated with this stuff during every waking moment...or risk "getting behind".

Usually it's fun, for the most part. The data I surround myself with is largely stuff I want to consume. I find it interesting, engaging, and potentially useful for me. But recently it's been too much. Unplugging for two weeks not only felt good, it was sorely needed. Further trimming is needed, and then some more quality unplugged-time.

Think about it. Maybe you need some unplugged-time too.

Still Alive Still

2007-04-02T12:46:00.000-07:00

Firstly, let me apologize to all seven of you who're subscribed to this thing. It's been a number of months since I've updated anything here, which is somewhat shameful. I feel like this is the longest lapse-in-posting I've had since I started this whatever-this-is a couple of years ago. But it's okay, because I feel like I've had little worthwhile to say.

Secondly, as is obvious by the fact that I'm writing this, I have not fallen off the edge of the earth. Yes, there is an edge, and it's rather sharp. Because the world is flat. Didn't you hear?

My current state of affairs is as follows:

Last semester of Whitman is close to being over. I have a thesis to do, orals to prepare for, and classes to finish. I am very much looking forward to taking a break from academia.
I'm still involved with IT stuff here at school (teaching a semester-long web design seminar with a buddy of mine, in addition to the usual stuff), and am occasionally putting up things over at [GAS].
I went on an absolutely wonderful trip through California with my house mates (two of whom are native Californians).Considering some of the places we saw, I would not at all be unhappy to end up living somewhere down there some day, though I wish it wasn't so prohibitively expensive in some of the spots that jived well with me. There are more pictures around somewhere, if you know the secret special handshake (or I gave you the address).
I got my paws on a Gorillapod and took some long-exposure night-time photos of down-town Walla Walla. It was an extremely therapeutic experience, and made me realize how much I like this "photography" thing.
The small cat has gotten significantly less-small. She's kind of round now. Cute.
I still have no real "website". I did, however, update the picture that graces the single useless page I do have. I seem to just be using my web space as a "server" for a bunch of stuff that doesn't really need public illumination.
I'm doing the first rewrite of my resume since I applied for my current job...which was 3 years ago. It's being done in HTML/CSS (I like writing rich documents) and is stored in Subversion (for easy branching and stuff). How nerdtastic is that?!

I'm not sure when I'll be writing here next, considering everything else that is completely consuming my time...but I swear this thing isn't dead yet. Even if it's only in my head for right now, this blog (or whatever) is still evolving. Just keep me in your feed list, and you can safely ignore me until something new and shiny happens.

iNerdgasm

2007-01-09T15:28:00.000-08:00

I've been very much in "cave" mode for awhile now. For those who know how my brain works, you'll know that a lot of stuff happens upstairs when I'm in this mode, most of it not great. But, I'm still very much alive, and there are some things that simply don't change.

I adore beautifully-designed pieces of technology that somehow embody a paradigm shift in the way we interact with machines, manage our data, and (most importantly) interact with each other.

Something happened today that has brought me out of my cave enough to write a little. It's called the iPhone.

I've waited a long time for a device like this, and the Big Picture that this represents is largely a...well....awesome one. The nitpicks and technical nuances of this beast will be discussed later, when more is known about it, and more people have gotten their paws on it. For now, I'm just going to sit here in my puddle of drool and relish the beauty, even if it's a superficial thing.

Out of the Bubble, Into the Apple and Turkey

2006-11-23T22:21:00.000-08:00

I've finally once again managed to poke my head out of the Whitman Bubble. However brief it may be, it sure feels good to breathe the sweet sweet air of the Larger World.

It's been a few days since I got back to Washington after mucking around in New York. My fellow senior art majors and I had the opportunity to go on a partially-funded trip to The Big Apple, and see some fantastic artwork. My reactions to the whole experience can be described most simply as "complicated". This isn't to say that I didn't have a good time, I'm just able to recognize that it is nowhere near the simplicity of "fun". It was an excellent, eye-opening trip, and I wish that I had more time to wander around and experience the city.

I may write about these "complicated" thoughts here at some point, I may LJinate them, or I may just tuck them away in my scruffy head. Or, if you run into me, you may be able to coax them out with a little work/bribery.

Also, it's one of those odd American holidays again. So, since I've got my head sticking out of the Bubble at the moment, I might as well wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! Hope the feasting and the merriment went well, and that some serious thankfulness rattles around in your heads for at least a brief moment today. Peace!

The things I find...

2006-10-25T03:33:00.000-07:00

...when looking for graphics to use in a perfectly innocent blog post...

Interesting, to say the least.

Red and Blue

2006-10-25T03:02:00.000-07:00

I'm not dead, I'm just sick, tired, stressed, over-worked, unhappy-with-school, and generally haven't had time or energy to write anything. Neither here nor elsewhere.

However, a couple of recent software releases have brought a brief speck of happy light to Matt-land. I just so happened to have written about this elsewhere rather than here. I guess I could post a redundant picture or two, just in case you people don't feel the need to follow my links. I'll be back later, when my universe is has settled down a bit. Until then, "Rediscover the Web AGAIN!"

And say hello to a new and shinier penguin while you're at it...

Peace.

Molly-Flogged

2006-09-23T11:27:00.000-07:00

Flogging Molly went on tour pretty recently. Last night, they stopped at Whitman.

It was excellent.

There's something to be said about good concerts. The good bands have stage presence and energy that adds an almost undefinable quality to their music. If a band doesn't have "it", the concert is beyond lame. Flogging Molly has serious loads of "it".

It was also amusing to watch the crowd-surfers. Dudes, how did you not see all the signs? Getting to see your drunk/stoned butts tossed out of the concert brought amusement to me, but it must suck to be you. You idiots missed out on some serious awesomeness.

Regarding Facebook's Privacy

2006-09-11T17:33:00.000-07:00

A few minutes ago, I sent a "Facebook private-message" to a friend/ex-dorm-mate of mine. She started a (one of many) Facebook group/event-thing centered around some of the issues raised by Facebook's latest, greatest, most controversial releases, and had asked me to shed some light on it. By the time I'd finished my reply, it had kind of mutated from a correspondence-type note into a small brain-dump of information that I feel should be out in the open. So, here's the meat of the thing, for your consumption...

My impression of the Facebook Development thing is that it is almost an attachment to the Facebook API (Application Protocol Interface, I believe it stands for). Basically, the API is the published interface to the Facebook website software that allows other software programs to interact with it, and the "Facebook Development Platform" is the API in combination with all the information that can be accessed through it.

The Terms of Service does outline what people should and shouldn't do with the Development Platform, but it is only a legal agreement. It does nothing to actually prevent people from doing bad stuff with it.

Bottom line: if someone's concerned about their privacy, they should uncheck the appropriate checkbox in the My Privacy > "Everyone" page. It makes their profile less useful to users of 3rd-party facebook software, but I for one don't care about that at all.

Now, about the feeds and stuff (which is also a concern). Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook's owner/founder) wrote a good blog entry in response to the massive amount of feedback on this subject.

http://blog.facebook.com/blog.php?post=2208562130

They obviously handled the release of these features badly (any nay-sayers on that don't have a leg to stand on. They're simply wrong.) He acknowledges it, took the proper steps remedy the situation, and was even polite enough to let us know about it.

*Everyone* should take a moment to go through the My Privacy > "Feeds..." page. It lists very clearly what DOES and DOESN'T get published via the feeds, and allows you to configure exactly what is allowed to go out on the feed published by your account.

Finally, we all need to remember that ALL of Facebook is on the public Internet. It's something that almost nobody seems to think about, let alone understand. It doesn't matter how much "security" is built into the website itself. It is still hosted on publicly accessible machines that we have no real control over. Any and all information that we put on there should be considered completely public. It can go literally anywhere at literally any time. Who knows how many people have access to Facebook's backend databases? We have absolutely no control over where this information goes or how it is used. We can only trust that Zuckerberg & Co. actually do what they say they do, and that any future owners of Facebook can be similarly trusted. And this goes not only for Facebook, but also for every single website, web-service, and web-application anywhere.

Now, I don't want to sound like I'm completely bashing Facebook. I'm not. I actually somewhat like them. In fact, compared to, say, MySpace, it's pretty damn good. MySpace is an ugly, sketchy, bloated piece of crap. I admittedly have an account with them, but I refuse to use it for anything other than a location to point people to better places on the Internet.

Take note of the last quoted paragraph. It isn't meant to scare anyone, but if you cruise Teh IntarWebz and aren't at least aware of this, you're living in a clouded haze of faux comfort. Know where your information is going, what could happen to it, and act accordingly. It's as simple as that.

New Shiny Phone

2006-08-27T18:50:00.000-07:00

I got a new phone. I got a phone that's pretty much been my dream phone since the original model line was launched. But the phone I got my hands on is waaaay better than all those other sexy-looking phones with the same model name. V3? V3c? Sorry folks, your phones suck. Unlocked V3i is the way to go.

I wrote all about why exactly, this particular phone is cool, at ye olde Geeks Are Sexy. The real reasons probably aren't what you'd predict them to be, though the picture here (sucked directly off the phone onto my Linux box) might give you a clue.

I also throw down a little Matt-with-cellphone-history too.

And for those who knew me (and my ringtone) from freshman year, Super Mario is back, and way more awesome than before. Totally orchestral, baby!

It IS too early.

2006-08-10T23:58:00.000-07:00

I wrote a post, not terribly long ago, talking about the Hollywood response to the World Trade Center attacks of 2001. I questioned when (if ever) it is "okay" for Hollywood to take a tragic event and turn it into a blockbuster. The more I've pondered and talked about it, the more I've come to believe that these movies aren't true "tributes." They're simply shallow, wasteful attempts to exploit a tragic event for political or monetary gains. I'm not the only one who thinks so either.

On Creation Science...

2006-08-04T10:24:00.000-07:00

Creation science has not entered the curriculum for a reason so simple and so basic that we often forget to mention it: because it is false, and because good teachers understand exactly why it is false. What could be more destructive of that most fragile yet most precious commodity in our entire intellectual heritage -- good teaching -- than a bill forcing honorable teachers to sully their sacred trust by granting equal treatment to a doctrine not only known to be false, but calculated to undermine any general understanding of science as an enterprise? fragile yet most precious commodity in our entire intellectual heritage -- good teaching -- than a bill forcing honorable teachers to sully their sacred trust by granting equal treatment to a doctrine not only known to be false, but calculated to undermine any general understanding of science as an enterprise?

written by Stephen Jay Gould:
10/02/05
03:51am
via chrisbeach.co.uk

! Important: Update Your Feeding !

2006-07-31T23:38:00.000-07:00

I made some tweaks as part of my attempted attempt at moving myself to a real website. Firstly, please update your RSS Feed settings (I know there are a few of you out there somewhere who subscribed to this silly blog). The blogger feeds will remain around as long as I live at Blogger (won't be forever) but my FeedBurner link will stay the same. There's a link in the sidebar of every page (I fixed the broken nature of that link), and I just now embedded the link in site's header region, so those with auto-discovering feedreaders will see it too. More info about this shizzle can be found at http://feeds.feedburner.com/FlyingToaster. This would be an especially great link to click on if you have no idea what RSS is.

PLEASE update your feed reader to point to my FeedBurner URL. Like I said, it will live on, the blogger ones won't.

I also added a link to my ClaimID profile. It basically connects several pieces of my presence on the IntarWebzs together in a central location. Sites that I have direct control over can get "verified" as mine, and anything out on there in the digital jungle that supposedly comes from me should be considered fake unless it's noted in my ClaimID list. There's also a little button in the sidebar for this linky-link as well.

As always, if I mucked something up, hit me with a comment (or email, if you know it). I'm tired, and funny stuff sometimes happens when I'm tired.

A Clever Joke

2006-07-31T01:04:00.000-07:00

My good friend Ig recently sent me the following joke:

A Texan walks into a pub in Ireland and clears his voice to the crowd of drinkers. He says, "I hear you Irish are a bunch of hard drinkers. I'll give $500 American dollars to anybody in here who can drink 10 pints of Guinness back-to-back."

The room is quiet, and no one takes up the Texan's offer. One man even leaves.

Thirty minutes later the same gentleman who left shows back up and taps the Texan on the shoulder. "Is your bet still good?" asks the Irishman.

The Texan says yes and asks the bartender to line up 10 pints of Guinness. Immediately the Irishman tears into all 10 of the pint glasses, drinking them all back-to-back.

The other pub patrons cheer as the Texan sits in amazement. The Texan gives the Irishman the $500 and says, "If ya don't mind me askin', where did you go for that 30 minutes you were gone?"

The Irishman replies, "Oh... I had to go to the pub down the street to see if I could do it first."

He's qualified to generate such jokes too. Good Irish blood floweth in his veins. Thanks buddy!

Hi Wanda!

2006-07-29T23:53:00.000-07:00

The most excellent thing happened to me two seconds ago.

I was sitting on my bed, tapping away at my computer (doing a bit of late-night telecommuting, I'm ashamed to say), and my phone rang. I thought it might be one of my good friends who tends to call me late at night, so I flipped open my phone. But I didn't recognize the number. When I picked up, I didn't recognize the voice either. After a long series of "hello?" "hello...." "hello!" "....hello hello?" exchanges, we came to the realization that she had the wrong number. But the conversing continued. It turns out her name was Wanda, and she runs an escort service in Yakima. She had a nice voice, and I must say that the couple minutes of chit-chat was fun.

So I guess this is a blogosphere shout-out to Wanda, from that "really nice and polite" guy who "works in IT." Thanks for very nice and very entertaining wrong-number phone conversation!

People are Idiots

2006-07-26T21:21:00.000-07:00

In the wake of "Explodey Day`," as I refered to it in jest, I was not at all pleased. My parent's house was almost burned down. I'll get to that shortly.

I sincerely value my freedom. I am insanely thankful that I can blatantly say that President Bush is an asshole, that his right-wing fanatical "neo-conservative" cronies have the good-will of rabid sewer rats, and not have any worry that federal agents will make me disappear. Even better, there is no restriction to engaging in logical discourse about said asshole and sewer rats. This "freedom" thing is an important part of the American psyche. The problem is, with freedom comes power, and with power comes responsibility. All together too many people have proven that they don't deserve the responsibility. They don't have even half the common sense to weild the power they have. They wield their "freedoms" in such moronic and dangerous manners (to such an extent that they are a danger to others) such that they aren't even deserving of those freedoms. I have no problem with the setting off of fireworks in joyous celebration. I don't even have much of a problem with people being too stupid to realize they don't know what the hell they're doing, decide to play with explosives, and blow various limbs (or other things off). It's sad for family and/or loved ones, sucks for whoever has to pay the medical bills, but people are still free be idiots and pick up as many Darwin Awards as they like. They're just not allowed to hurt other people or things while they do it. That's not part of the "freedom" thing.

I'm ranting about this because the asshats who live at the base of the hill that my parent's house sits on decided to set off a mess of fireworks for Independence Day. They did this despite not knowing how to do it without getting the hillside caught on fire. They did this, knowing full well that everything around them was very flammible. And then, when they inevitably caught the hillside on fire, they continued to launch explosive projectiles into the air.

Allow me to repeat. The asshats incompetantly set off explosive projectiles in an environment that is almost impossible to catch on fire. Then, when it caught on fire, they didn't stop to put the fire out, the kept trying to light it on fire some more. I'm not making this up. My mom sent me a few pictures.

City fire truck in the driveway.

The toasted hillside the next day. The asshats live in the house right next to the charred area.

I found out that the hillside was on fire only a few minutes after I'd gotten back into Walla Walla. I'd been visiting my parents for the weekend. The only reason the house is still standing is because we saturated the brush immediately surrounding our property with water as a precautionary measure. We do it every year. The Granger Fire Department also responded to my mom's frantic 911 call impressively fast. Kudos to them. I didn't post this until now because I wanted to have a semi-clear head to write with. Plus I've been insanely busy at work.

This is an example of how complicated the issue of "freedom" can be. It is never as simple as "people should be able to do whatever they want." It should be obvious to even the dimmist of intellects that humans are not uniformly capable of being responsible. Sometimes people need to be protected from their own massive levels of idiocy because they are simply too stupid to not cause collateral damage. Law shouldn't unnecessarily restrict freedom, but nor should it be lax enough to allow the idiots to burn down hillsides. Think about that the next time you consider something like gun control, or campfire restrictions, or any other "freedom-restricting" legislation.

Sorry kids, there is no black or white....only shades of gray. Except the charred plant remains on the side of Cherry Hill. Those are mostly black.

Happy Explodey Day

2006-07-04T13:36:00.000-07:00

So today is Independence Day here in the U.S. A friend of mine wrote today about how stupid it is that we all call it "the 4th of July" instead of a meaningful name that actually describes this particular holiday. I must say that I completely agree with her. This falls right in line with the arguments for writing semantic markup, though that's a whole other can-o-worms that many people smarter than me have already argued at-length. Short explanation: It's really dumb to take a meaningful thing (like a holiday or a header) and encase it in a meaningless container (like the day of the month, or a named). There is no legitimate argument against this. We're all just idiots with this "4th of July" thing.

Speaking of idiots, I get sick and tired of all of the faux-patriotism wafting around this country. Maybe I'll talk about it later when I'm more coherent and I'm not on a laptop whose battery is rapidly depleting. I'm sorry, but lots of flag-waving, song singing, and Bush-supporting only hurts your case for being American Patriots. You people are special idiots, whose idiocy far exceeds the rest of us. Stop obsessing over who-diddled-who and how we're "spreading Democracy with the War on Terror" (that entire phrase is actually bullshit), and take the time and effort to learn about (and then worry about) the important things. Like the function of government in our society, the stinking idiocy of religious extremism (all forms!) that contrasts with the value of rationalThought and ethics inspired by religious texts in guiding how we live our lives, and what the word "freedom" means in all manner of different contexts and languages.

I'm probably sounding rather bitter about this holiday now. But you know what? I'm not bitter. I am very fully aware of how awesome it is that I can say this stuff. It is my right as an American to make my voice heard in a public medium. And as long as certain right-wing (and probably some left-wing) nutJobs don't get their way, there isn't anything anybody can do to shut me up. It is a truly awsome thing. Exercising my rights to openly criticize the assholes in Government, to fairly support the less-assholes, to contribute to the electoral process in this country, and to engage in thoughtful intellectual discourse for the preservation and betterment of this nation (and humanity as a whole) is so much more patriotic than the combined flag-waving and sing-songing of all faux-patriots put together, it's almost not funny. But that doesn't stop me from occasionally chuckling. It's my friggin' right to do that too.

So, in true American spirit, I wish you all a Happy Independence Day. And though this day celebrates an event which effectively "flipped the bird" at all of England, I have this to say to all you wonderful British folks out there: Everything changes, and you who were enemies a few hundred years ago are now friends. Know that my middle finger waving your way waves with nothing but love and friendship. To the rest of the world: America is not the center of the universe, despite what some of the Assholes make people believe. There are a good number of us in this country who realize that. The idiots just tend to be the people everyone sees because they're like the angry drunks thrashing around that most folks are a little afraid to laugh at. We're celebrating our holidays, you celebrate yours. The world is flattening (everyone: if you don't know what that really means, do yourself a favor and go read a book), so maybe one day we can all meaningfully share all of our holidays. And to the assholes (and Assholes) and idiots: you're American, so this is your holiday too. Go, celebrate! Seriously! This country wouldn't be the wonderfully exciting (yet depressing?) place it is without you. Feel free to blow your hands off with your crappily-made, sadly-expensive, illegally-used fireworks to your hearts content. This is a free country! Just don't light my house on fire with your stupidity, or heads will roll and asses will be kicked.

Party Hardy Everyone!

Tornado over the Rainbow

2006-07-02T18:37:00.000-07:00

In my previous post, I mentioned the rather large number of site feeds that I'm subscribed to. Some of them honestly aren't updated very often while others tend to be updated daily. Some of the updates take awhile to get through and digest. Others are quick and easy. All of them are great, so don't even think about suggesting I drop some of them.

Anyways, one of the best daily-updated feeds I've subscribed to recently posted an amazing photograph today. If you've never heard of APOD, check it out. Definitely onw of the for-sure-cool parts of my day. Every day!

I'm not dead, I'm buying stuff.

2006-07-02T02:49:00.000-07:00

Earlier today, I wrote the first blog entry that my myspace profile has seen. It was mostly a rant. I don't like myspace. I do have some legitimate reasons, and I have my unjustifiable personal opinions as well. Anyways, the rant I posted was a response to the few "Are you dead? Why aren't you updating?" comments that a couple of my close friends attached to my profile. I've decided to repost that rant here, seeing as how I consider my myspace profile, and the site worthless and not worthy of my time.

Right. So, to the whole....what, two people that keep track of this myspace thing? I'm not dead. I just spend what "free time online" that I have doing other things than worrying about myspace.

I have a LiveJournal account which gets updated sometimes. I dislike LJ, but nowhere near as much as myspace. I have a personal blog (which I created and write in because I want to) hosted by Blogger...though once I get around to building my website, I"ll be hosting it there instead. In the time that's left over, I do what I can to contribute to a technology news blog. Hell, I even have a facebook account that people expect me to use. I also actively keep track of almost 70 RSS feeds, about 30% of which are updated very regularly, sometimes with more than a few new postings. Eight of these feeds deliver multimedia content that doesn't get downloaded and viewed in a couple of minutes.

The vast majority of this stuff happens AFTER I'm finished spending eight hours of my day already staring at computer screens. You see, I'm one of those IT people who does the thing where I make services happen that people take for granted, or fix their computers because they don't know (or don't care to learn) how, or building websites and web applications.

I don't know where a lot of people find the time expose so much of themselves (or their fake selves) to the world on this not-so-great site, but it's time that I don't have. I instead prefer to generate less, but higher quality (and much better-presented) content in more professional, better-looking, less ad-filled, less-sketchy venues.

There may or may not be future posts here. There may or may not be any more information/pictures posted here. I may eventually take advantage of myspace allowing html customization, and become one of the very few bright specs of "not-butt-ugly"ness on this site....but only if I feel like it after my actual worthwhile projects are done.

If people wish to contact me, there is always email. I actually check my email, as it is a critical tool for my work. I don't check myspace messages, and all myspace spam gets slaughtered by my spam filters. Oh yeah, I happen to use IM all of the time as well. In fact, I have a screen name with all four "big players" in the IM protocol world. And amazingly, I happen to have decent 'net etiquette, and actually know how to use an away message to tell you whether or not I'm actually there.

I'm not mad at any of you. I'm mad at this system, and this society. The only reason I have this account is because of peer pressure, and some idle curiosity. There's also the little bit of me that wants to know how it works so I can help people if they break their own myspace thing. I don't like this place, and I never have. It doesn't help that I know details about this site that most people don't, or have ignored. It also doesn't help that I know how a lot of this technology works, what it can do, and what people are using it for.

This is dead. I am not dead. I am very much alive and kicking. Just not here.

[ End Rant ]

And if you managed to get to the end of this post, you deserve something special. How 'bout this? Today (or, more accurately, at 2am this morning,) I purchased my first top-level-domain. Until now, any web presence I've had has either been a profile on some service, a blog of some kind hosted who knows where, or various free ad-driven web hosts plugged into a make-believe "is trying really hard to be" wannabe top-level domain.

Now that I've actually invested some of my (relatively scarce) cash in this, maybe I'll actually do something with it. I'm also setting up an hCard for myself that's powered by an independent ID management service that will help tie a bunch of stuff together. Possibly more on this later.

Movie Trailer Quckie

2006-06-28T01:11:00.000-07:00

Yes, I know what the title phrase of this post could mean. Shame on you for letting your mind go to the gutter like that. Shame.

I'm going to bed in a few minutes, but I decided it was important to point you to a couple of movie trailers.

There's a trailer for Spider-Man 3. Venom. Sandman. More dude-flying-around-on-jet-glider-thing action. And Venom. Did I mention Venom? I can't wait.

And then there's Lady in the Water. I saw a trailer for it on TV tonight, and I must say, it's looking very creepy. I'm not seeing this one alone in a dark room. BUT, I still like the original teaser the best. It's not creepy, but it's has so much more impact on me than the other ones. The music is beautiful, and it reveals almost nothing, which is arguably one of Shymalan's most powerful techniques. And again, the music! I know I'm repeating myself again, but I can't help it. I'm tired. But there's no cheesey voice-over. There are no "whoa! looky at the shiny FX on teh screen thar!" shots. And the way the music builds and then falls away at the end of Trailer 1 gives me goosebumps every time I hear it. Without fail.

The trailers for Superman Returns, in contrast to Lady in the Water, are catching my interest more and more. I must say that I was skeptical when I first heard of the project, but as the release date grows closer, I'll admit that I'm getting excited.

I'm going to sleep now. I have work tomorrow.

The Quandry of Multi-Monitoring

2006-06-20T13:14:00.000-07:00

So after a couple of weeks of the "lots of monitors" situation on my desk at work, I decided it was a little much. Not in terms of the number of screens, nor the number of computers. I have a number of legitimate uses for both an iMac and a Windows box, as most web developers will attest. Curse you, IE6. And hey, who doesn't want a sexy little linux lappy on their desk as well? Besides, it's my personal machine, with all of my current address books etc. No, the problem had to do with horizontal space. My desk is more than large enough for four screens, and could probably handle a fifth if I got a little creative, but more than three screens is a bit tough to deal with stacked horizontally. There's just too much horizontal mouse movement, and head-turning. As cool as the "wrap-around" feeling is, it just doesn't suite me. So what to do? This is what to do:

I made use of the "grapefuit" iMac's most awesome feature, and elevated my OS X environment above the penguin. I honestly believe Apple's decision to no longer use that iMac arm was one of the stupidest decisions they've made (WAY more stupid than making the iPod shuffle). If they made a similarly fluid, clean, and shiny VESA-compliant monitor mounting arm, I'd buy one without thinking.

But anyways, that's that. This new environment is similar to what one of my minions/fellow-interns is doing as well (see right). It's a little limiting when we're left with only 15-inch displays, but between multiple displays and multiple "virtual desktops", there's more than enough space for all of the windows involved in our work (and other stuff).

So why did I post all these pictures? To show off? Sure, why not. Because I like to post pictures? Totally! Who doesn't? But that's not all of it. I'm always trying to expose people to the cool (and useful) stuff that technology can accomplish. Way too many people are still stuck in the "one user on one computer using one screen" workstation model. Even using current technology, it's very simple to go much further. And like it or not, the idea of "using a computer" is well on the way to being blown wide open.

I'm writing a somewhat lengthy post for [GAS] that deals with this mess, in response to a previous post I wrote. I'll probably make a note here when that post is done and online.

My Desk(s)

2006-06-17T23:32:00.000-07:00

So I made mention in my last post that I might possibly post pictures of my absolutely ridiculous desk at work. I did indeed take a few pictures of said desk, and I have finally had time (and remembered to) pull them onto my computer. I also took a picture of the desk in my room, my cave as I affectionately call it, for posting to a special photo album on facebook dedicated to showing what a huge geek I am by only showing the various incarnations of my desk. The album (and pretty much everything on my facebook account) isn't viewable to the world-at-large, so I've posted that one too. Maybe I'll mirror this sequence of pictures on my website....whenever I end up making it. I swear, one day it'll actually happen. Honest!

My Cave. I do get some natural light through the window, thankfully.

My Office.

Despite the abundance of windows (we call this office the "fishbowl"), it still gets pretty dark with the lights off. Bask in that healthy glow!

For the record, I primarily use the middle two monitors. I have a nifty program installed that allows me to have multiple "virtual desktops" on one machine, so I'm terribly hurting for desktop real estate...despite having only 15" displays to work with. The iMac on the left is my testing machine, and handles my IM and calendaring. Because Adium and iCal are just that awesome, that's why.

Summer and Work

2006-06-16T01:38:00.000-07:00

I've now been at work for a couple of weeks. It's good. It's pretty exciting. I'm learning stuff, and I'm also teaching my "loyal minions" quite a bit too. I haven't quite adjusted to the 8-5 workday yet, but I'm getting there. I honestly haven't spent much time in front of a computer in the last several weeks that hasn't involved either work, or some serious spacing-out, which would explain this most recent lull in posting (here and elsewhere). For those interested, here's a brief run-through of what I've been up to (mostly at work).

Set up and customized my personal workstation at work. I took over the Consultant office in the computer lab we interns get to work in (which makes sense, considering it's also one of the labs I directly manage during the school year). A relatively speedy Dell PC and an older "grapefruit" iMac gives me three screens on two machines with one keyboard and mouse (Synergy connection tunnelled over Hamachi) to work with. Might post pictures later. I went through my usual bout of "install all of my usual extra productivity-enhancers" and "configure email and IM clients" craziness. And then there was setting up the web development environment. Apache2, ColdFusion, PostgreSQL, Subversion, Eclipse. Definitely not at all an easy or straightforward task to do on a Windows box....mostly the ColdFusion-connect-to-Postgres part. I think I'll be writing some internal documentation on this too. Fun.
Mapped out some overarching changes that need to be made to the department's public documentation site. Handed that off to a fellow intern for more granular work and oversite of the newbies for the grunt work.
Trained a couple of the newbies for the above documentation work, which will largely be done in a nice crazy-big CMS. Farcry'd!
Trained one of the above newbies for work at the helpdesk, and mentored through the first week or so of helpdesk duty.
Met with our lead web developer, our "emerging technology dude" and a senior member of the faculty to discuss details for the big project (writing a web application to facilitate the organization of a rather complicated yearly campus activity) that I'll be taking part in developing.
Worked on mapping out a "big picture" plan for the summer, spanning both the development work and my lab management duties. Not much headway there.
Decided to get my butt in gear with regard to my finances. Became familiar with Gnucash, and input transactions from my bank statements that date back to late 2004. Still working on organizing that bloody mess.
Freelance web design work for another department on campus, done through one of my professors.

Strangely, despite the above list, it doesn't feel like I've accomplished much. Besides the CF/Postgres thing at least. And in all honesty, there hasn't really been anything going on outside the above mess other than eating, sleeping, and generally zoning out with some friends while my brain decompresses. Hopefully the "settling into a routine" thing will happen soon, and work will generate more tangible results. Then I'll finish that article for that other site I write for that I'm working on, and some other nifty things I've been itching to write about. Stay tuned.

So I did a Stupid

2006-05-24T15:21:00.000-07:00

Not too long ago, I purchased (at the encouragement of a friend of mine) a nerf gun. This wasn't just any nerf gun though...it was an N-Strike Maverick Rev-6. Let it be known that I have become very disheartened with the nerf guns and super-soakers of today. They are nothing like they were in the golden years. Instead of looking badass and being very nicely functional, today's models pretty much suck. But the Maverick is an exception. It's got good distance (for something that throws foam darts), pretty good accuracy, and is easy and intuitive to hold, aim, and use.

I know what you're thinking. No, I'm pleased to say that I didn't do anything stupid with the gun. I'm not that much of an idiot. In fact, this particular (very cheap) purchase was such a great thing, it has become my primary cat disciplinary tool, and the nerfing-love has spread to a couple other friends of mine, as well as my brother's entire dorm room floor.

The Stupid comes from what I did with some of the darts. You see, I bought another one of the N-Strike line, thinking it'd be of similar quality to the Maverick. I was wrong. It rather sucks. But it came with glow-in-the-dark darts, with the gimmick being that a little light in the gun makes them glow on exit, resulting in awesome glow-in-the-dark fun.

So I got this genius idea of "hey! let's charge up these glowey darts and see what they look like being shot in the dark!" My execution of this plan was less than genius. I very expertly balanced all six of these darts on top of lightbulbs in my bathroom, and waited. When I thought they'd had enough light-juice injected into them, I hopped back up on the vanity to retrieve them. But when I picked the first one up, it came away sans-suction-cup. That's right, I had melted all six of my darts onto the tops of my bathroom lightbulbs.

After slapping myself in the forehead a few times, I turned off those lights, and used some cold water to cool down the rubber/plastic dart heads, and managed to scrape them off the bulbs withouth much more damange. But suffice to say, the five darts that still have their heads won't be sticking to anything ever again. Though I must say, the slightly denser heads make a very satisfying "THOK" sound when they hit things. Combine that with the slight modifications I made to the main spring coil in the gun, and I think I came out on top.

Unfortunately though, the supposedly glow-in-the-dark darts barely glowed at all. Even after being melted onto a nice bright light source. Sad.

Warm and Fuzzies

2006-05-21T00:42:00.000-07:00

Go see Over the Hedge. Seriously. Just do it.

Too Early?

2006-05-20T22:56:00.000-07:00

There was a thunderstorm last night. A large discharge of static electricity in the atmosphere caused some power outages all over town, including the movie theater where I was watching the Da Vinci code. As the buddy I was seeing it with put it, "The Church doesn't want us to watch the end!!" Unfortunately, I took the opportunity to run to the bathroom while the theater folks restarted the projector and audio equipment, and missed it. Oh well.

An side-effect of the aforementioned electrical discharge, and the power outage that followed, was that my Internet access died. As a result, I and a number of other unfortunate Charter customers found ourselves without our beloved InterWebz until sometime this morning. I don't know why. But when connectivity was restored, and seeing as how I'm finally 100% done with school work for the semester, I obviously had my priorities in order when I hit the 'net. I went straight to the Apple Trailers page and realize to my glee that mplayer's mozilla plugin can indeed play most of what the site has to offer.

And then it got interesting. There's a new movie coming out called World Trade Center. And of course, this prompted me to revisit the trailer for United 93. Neither of these trailers made me feel good. Neither of them made me feel patriotic. Nor bad. Nor angry. They just made me feel sad. Four and a half years later, and Hollywood is already doing its thing.

How long does it have to be before it's okay to dramatize and movie-ify this kind of stuff?

Rocketboomed

2006-05-15T11:14:00.000-07:00

So, today's Rocketboom issue was filled with simply too many cool things for me to not share with you all. Seriously. I'm putting off writing my last paper of the year (after this, I'm friggin' DONE) in order to share this awesomeness with you people.

Firstly, there's MIDAS. The below was originally posted to [Geeks Are Sexy], but it's simply too amazing for me to not cross-post it for those of you who're too lame to be keeping up on [GAS].

A couple of dudes at MIT have been "working on creating the most elaborate automation system we could envision." I found this not-so-little gem by way of today's Rocketboom, which features a video of the system's "Party Mode" being activated. As Amanda Congdon notes, "this is why geeks have the best parties."

There is much MUCH more information about MIDAS, the Multifunction In-Dorm Automation System, available at the creator's website.

Then there's "Beautiful Art Made With Knitting" I must say that I was very impressed by what this knitter is capable of...and slightly disturbed at the same time. Then again, how can one not laugh at a knitting project that amounts to a teddy bear being skewered by a unicorn?

To my dear sweet "knitting fiend" cousin (who hopefully still reads this blog every now and then), I expect to see the likes "cute pink bondage-wear" and "shark gnawing on severed limb" coming off your needles soon. Just kidding. Mostly.

And finally, there's a nifty "make your own movie" site. Choose your sample, create your subtitles, send to your friends...

I haven't had the time to try it out (as noted previously, you people are lucky to be even getting this much of a blog post today), but the examples shown on Rockeboom were pretty good. It's flash-driven, but hey...if it works, it works. At the very least, it's a fun idea.

The Universal Library

2006-05-14T17:36:00.000-07:00

Originally posted to [Geeks Are Sexy].

There's an article published in the New York Times today that anyone who thinks about the evolution of the Internet should read.

Writer Kevin Kelly from Wired magazine takes a look at the efforts by Google and others to create digital copies of the world's books. This movement is the next step towards preserving human civilization's collective knowledge and creativity in an interconnected, searchable form. This "universal library" would theoretically be a massive bulk of information, of which the Internet we've come to know would only be a module. Think of the Library of Alexandria, multiplied several million times, that would encompass every book, magazine, video, audio recording, broadcast, and webpage on the planet. Calling it "The Wayback Machine's mutant offspring with Google and the U.S University Library System, pumped up on steroids that would've caused the Governator to explode out of his skin" would be an understatement.

But, like most of the forward-looking projects regarding copyrighted intellectual material, there are a lot of complications. Some of the people suing Google over its efforts, for example, are the same people the search giant is collaborating with on this project. There's also the twisted issue of copyright, and the millions upon millions of books that have slipped into the dark, that will be lost forever if these projects don't succeed.

It's a fascinating, very thought-provoking piece, also available online for your reading pleasure.

Many thanks to the friend of mine who pointed me to this article.

Funny doesn't even come close

2006-05-14T12:32:00.000-07:00

A buddy of mine sent me the following link this morning. I nearly fell out of my chair when I saw what the link pointed to, and I must say that my day is "oh so very much better" because of it. If you don't have a sense of humor, please refrain from clicking on the link. If you are a fan of Whose Line Is It Anyway, then you should be hunted down and gang-beaten if you don't click the link. Windows Media (unfortunately) required.

http://www.i-am-bored.com/bored_link.cfm?link_id=6647

Weirddica? Oddica!

2006-05-07T20:19:00.000-07:00

I ran across the following site just after I subscribed to a new blog. If you're interested, and happen to be something of a web-design dork, check out SimpleBits. If you'd rather just see what's up with the picture at the right, read on.

According to the company website, this business operates on a very different model as compared to other "similar" sites. Yes, the company exists to make money...but more importantly, the company exists for the Artists and the T-Shirts. Apparently, the artists behind the T-Shirts get 41% of the net profits this site generates, 41% of other stuff, and 41% of other stuff. I think it's awesome.

Plus, the designs are strange, unique, and cool as well. Check out www.Oddica.com.

Finals Finals....and Finals

2006-05-06T20:43:00.000-07:00

Summer is almost here. I almost think it can't come soon enough. Two more days of regular class, one day off, and then Finals Week is upon us. I thankfully don't have any "real" exams to worry about. Theoretically I'm pretty much in the clear. Oh wait, I forgot about "projects". You see, since I'm a Studio Art major, (yes, it IS a real major....kindly go insert your head into the nearest pile of llama dung) we don't so much have exams. We have large projects...works that take several hours to complete...due all at once at the end of the semester. They are then critiqued, and our grades are based entirely on how our various professors interpret our work.

I currently have three large projects due for my various Studio classes, one of which actually involves three works too. There would've been more, but I worked my butt off hard enough to be essentially done with one class by now. Oh, and there's an Art History paper to fit in there somewhere too. I'll hold off on my true thoughts about Art History until after I've finished that class, and my grades are in.

OH! And a certain faculty member is retiring from the Art Department, apparently on very very short notice for reasons I can't so much discuss....but trust me, it's quite funny. At any rate, said retirement is cause for much rejoicing among my cohorts.

IE7 & IE6 on the same box?

2006-05-06T20:22:00.000-07:00

If you're all cool and stuff...and do the kinds of web-mongering, code-monkeying things I like to do, you'll probably run into the bang-your-head-into-the-wall "I freaking HATE Internet Explorer and Microsoft and Windows and why can't they just do things nicely and cleanly and in ways that work and play nice with how the rest of the universe is trying to do things?!!!!" problem when you try to test your nice and shiny webpage in Microsoft's flagship browser.

And if you're the kind of cool mentioned above, and are still cool enough to have read this post this far, you'd probably be interested in a little blurb hot off the press at [GeeksAreSexy]. IE7 & IE6 on the same box?

[GeeksAreSexy] is Down

2006-05-03T19:37:00.000-07:00

The technology news site that I've just recently become a contributor for, went down today, and is missing in action.

Kiltak informed me this evening that there is now nothing but a big empty hole where http://geeksaresexy.blogspot.com used to be. The last hit came into the site at about 5:55 EST. Now, attempts to reach the site are greeted with a Blogger-branded 404 page. [GAS] has also disappeared from my Blogger profile.

Attempts have been made to contact Blogger Support. More will be posted on this page as things develop, one way or another.

[UPDATE] - The site is back online. Apparently [GAS] generates too much traffic, and Blogger's automated spam-killer decided that we needed to be toasted. More details on [GeeksAreSexy]

Google Calendar Advice

2006-04-30T02:22:00.000-07:00

My second, glorious (and long!) post at [Geeks Are Sexy], written after an entirely too long, stressful, and overdue night of paper-writing.

Stop Design's Douglas Bowman posted an excellent list of tips for using Google Calendar. I also talk about the one unfortunate (but major) issue, or missing feature, that is still preventing me from becoming a Google Calendar user.

Check it out!

[Geeks Are Sexy]

2006-04-26T22:18:00.000-07:00

Besides stating the obvious, what does that post title mean?

Well, my loyal reader(s?), you'd have a pretty good clue if you take a quick peek at the comments in the last couple of posts. A fellow who goes by the name of Kiltak recently offered me the opportunity to contribute to the Geeks Are Sexy - Technology News blog. Needless to say, I was thrilled, and accepted his offer. If you wanted to know a little more about me (and didn't feel like scraping your way through this particular blog) or happen to feel the need to catch a new glimps of...at least part of my face, check out my "Hey! I'm theMatt!" post over there.

As some of you may have noticed, the frequency with which this blog is updated is pretty irregular....at best. How will this new spot to post my musings and news tidbits and tech recommendations and whatnot effect ye olde Flying Toaster? Hopefully, not much. I'll make note of *some* of my Geeks Are Sexy posts here (think like, original articles...not so much the "here's some cool news" bits...at least not all of them), so you few loyal Toaster readers won't totally miss out. But I HIGHLY recommend adding [Geeks Are Sexy] to your "this here's a good site to keep an eye on" list...or better yet, subscribe to the site feed! There's a bucket-load of useful information, nifty tips and tricks, and all-around geektastic goodness that's already been posted...with much more to come!

As for my no-techish shizzle, all of that ain't goin' nowhere soon-like....as it were. [Geeks Are Sexy] is a tech news blog, so all of my angry political rants, angry "I hate people" rants, happy "look what I just did/found/thought-of/am-thinking-about-doing", and "everything else" posts will go on as normal.

And seriously, contrary to popular stereotypes, geeks are indeed sexy. There's a list of reasons why that's true...somewhere around here...or the InterWebz....but I can't for the life of me remember where it is. Someday I'm sure I'll dig it up....

Surveillance and Whatnot

2006-04-19T13:24:00.000-07:00

An interesting yet troubling idea came to me not long ago. Why not put some webcams in strategic places in the offices in I work? This has two benefits. It increases the amount of practical security in those locations, which is important considering the amount of expensive equipment we deal with. It allows us (the management) to check up on problematic minions (of which we have a couple) who might not be showing up and doing their job. And besides the usual budgetary and bureaucratic red tape, it is a trivial matter to set up a wireless camera and connect it to the network. Of course, the camera feeds won't be directly available to the general populace. There will definitely be some access restrictions, and some general "security by obscurity" for these things.

However, the more I think about this, the more uneasy I get, and the less-simple this idea becomes. How would a camera change the environment of the office, or the lab? How will that make the folks who work there feel? It's different in this situation because I am one of the people who will have access to these devices, and will benefit, and thus feel willing to subject myself (and my underlings) to surveillance. They may or may not have similar access, and regardless, may have different sentiments than I do.

Deploying cameras on the scale that my colleagues and I are considering isn't terribly problematic. A few are already deployed, and have been for some time. We are merely expanding this resource slightly. Also, the department is a nice, open environment. My underlings are on fairly equal footing with the management, and our overlords treat us similarly. While there is a defined hierarchy, some of the practical applications of it are loose and fluid. Breathing down peoples' necks is fairly uncommon, and thus the camera issue isn't a terribly large one. But what if this environment were different?

Consider the large cube-farms and strict, stratified management hierarchies in some office environments. If you have a boss (or bosses) that not only hold themselves very high above you, but also breath so closely down your back that you have condensation dribbling down your spine, how would you feel having them able to watch you (and any number of other people) through a camera? There'd be no "oh crap, the boss is coming", or any time to yourself that would precede the utterance of such phrases. Installing remote monitoring devices is now a trivial task from the hardware and infrastructure perspectives, and in some cases, from the budgetary view as well. All that stands in the way is policy. It could happen, and soon. In some cases, this may already be happening.

Take a step back from even this, and think about the street. If you're out in public, isn't it enough that everyone around you can watch you, and you can watch them? At least in the "work environment" above, you're more or less choosing to accept surveillance as a consequence of working in that company. But on the street, you're in public domain. This gets into the whole "Big Brother" scenario that, scarily enough, is also well on its way towards reality. I don't want to talk about that anymore. It creeps me out.

What I guess the "grand moral" I'm kind of poking at is this: even the small things don't exist in a vacuum. A seemingly tiny, insignificant, and easily-answered question can actually contain many complicated and nested issues, most of which aren't easily solved or answered. Deciding to put up a few webcams to make sure the mounds of very expensive equipment you look after doesn't get yoinked seems pretty to be a pretty simple decision. But then, after just a little consideration, the scope and ramifications of that seemingly small act quickly balloons. It can be bad to over-complicate things, but don't make the mistake of making a swift, blind decision.

IM Etiquette

2006-04-12T01:46:00.000-07:00

Sometimes rants can be informative. I've read a number of rants and ramblings about a variety of things that've gotten me to think about myself and my conduct. Some of the irks I've read about are irks that I share. They may seem petty, but I am far from unique.

Stop Poking Me
If you're new to the world of Instant Messaging, you may find yourself waiting impatiently for the person you're "talking to" to respond. Believe it or not, "poking" me if I don't respond in more than twenty seconds rarely makes me increase my response time. If an away message hasn't been sent, I'm usually still in front of the computer. But often, IM is not the only task I am engaged in. It's possible for me to not only maintain conversations with multiple people (as well as the occassional multithreaded conversation with one person), but also surf the InterWebz and pound out some code. But despite my totally ninja multitasking skills, responses don't always come fast and furious. And strangely enough, further poking won't get a snappier response.

Respect The Away Message
Funny thing about the term "away message".... it denotes a state of awayness. Some people use away messages to reflect their exact physical status (whether they're in front of the computer or not) whereas other people will use them to reflect their inclination to conversation. An away message is much akin to a "do not disturb" sign. Some "away" states on some protocals are exactly that. I frankly couldn't care what an away message's actual content is. It could be very specific and informative, or it could be some stupid quote from some stupid TV show. The state is still "away". Pounding on the door asking "are you there" will either not be seen (because nobody's there to see the message) or will make the recipient hiding behind the message annoyed.

In my specific case, there are times when I really am around, despite my "away" status. Most of the time, I'm doing something else, and can't afford the distraction if five people start trying to talk to me, but at that same task I'm trying to accomplish requires communication with a specific person over that same channel of communication which I'm attempting to ignore. My IM client also tends to be online most of the time so that people can easily leave me messages that'll reach me far faster than something like voicemail.

An interesting twist on the "away" status is the "invisible" status. This status is only available when using certain clients and only on certain protocals. It basically means that you're online, but to everyone else, it appears you're offline. Some clients are even able to maintain normal IM conversations when the "invisible" state is set (though others sometimes throw lots of error messages when communicating with someone who appears to be offline). This can be useful in the scenario mentioned above, but destroys the "leave me a message" functionality of actually being online. "Invisible" tends to be used only for playful stalking purposes, or when someone truly wants to hide but still communicate with one or two people.

Moral of this little section? Feel free to drop someone a message if they're set to an "away" state, but don't expect any response from them. And definitely don't go "are you there? are you sure? pokepokepokepoke..." That's just rude.

Freaking use an Away Message
The flipside of this is the act of setting your client's state. If you're leaving your computer for a decent amount of time, set your status to "away". Some clients are set to automatically go idle after a certain period of inactivity. That's fine, but that's essentially saying "hey, I'm still here, but I'm not staring at my computer screen at the moment." Setting away messages vs. going idle, and the personal uses of the various IM client states are all rather gray and fuzzy. A lot of it is based on personal habit and preference. But the one thing in this area that consistantly proves frustrating is when a client is left on for a significant period of time (read: a day or two) but is always online. Idle sometimes, but never away. Ever. Most of the time, there isn't a person on the other end, but the client state doesn't reflect that. It appears that they're always open for conversation, but that appearance is false. Everyone forgets every now and then to set an away message when they leave. It happens. No worries. But for those of you that never use your "away" state, please look to changing that.

The one exception is a certain someone I know who has his AIM account tied into his cell-phone-on-steroids. In this case, the IM is akin to a text message, and will indeed reach the appropriate reader...which makes the constant "online" status actually valid.

Abbr.-speak isn't l33t, yo
I'm sorry, but unless you can actually type real l33t-speak, "cute" little abbreviated words really aren't cool. I'm not saying that everyone should use perfect grammar and punctuation over IM. It's much more of a conversationalistic medium than a formal written dialogue. Weird words abound, and IMing with some people is scarily similar to actually talking with them face-to-face. But using "net-speak" abbreviations just makes you look like a fool. Seriously. The extra time and effort to type "extra" or "really" (vs. "xtra" or "rly") is negligible, and shows that you have better communication skills than what is becoming the typical socially inept online teenager. Stuff like "brb" or "omg" is arguably becoming a solid part of the evolving online culture (and in the case of "be right back" makes sense from an efficiency perspective), but for goodness sakes...

0 rly? i c. OH AND BTW TYPING IN ALL CAPS STILL MEANS YOU'RE YELLING AND SCREAMING SO DON'T DO IT UNLESS YOU REALLY ARE TRYING TO YELL AND SCREAM AND WHATNOT.

On the other hand, if you really can type in l33t-speak, go for it. Nobody will be able to understand you, but you'll totally earn major cool points. w00t. With capital zeroes. The comment section is open.

Is Easy Security Possible?

2006-04-12T00:51:00.000-07:00

On reading a number of articles pertaining to computer security recently, I've noticed a few things. Seeing as how I predominantly work doing client-side support, my little blabbering reflections tend to come from that perspective as well.

Problem 1: People don't know and/or care
A good many problems, I think, would be largely solved if people payed attention and cared about their security in this digital world. There isn't much the average user would be able to do about the latest/greatest Windows vulnerability, even if they knew that it existed. But that's not the point. The point is, too many people aren't aware of stuff like ye olde phishing scams, the blatant insecurity of email/IM, and the danger that can be posed by even visiting a malformed web page. If people were actually aware of the mess that's out there, hopefully they'd care enough to be careful. Unfortunately, the common notion seems to be that knowing about even basic digital security constitutes "nerdiness" or "geekiness", especially once technical (rather than "common sense") solutions come into play. And I'm not talking about the cool or fun-loving way either.

Problem 2: Difficult Implementation
Unfortunately, some of the technical solutions do seem to warrant the aforementioned "nerdtastic" labelling. It's depressing how many people still try to run Windows systems without antivirus and antispyware packages (though hats off to the folks who manage to do so safely). But what about securing information that is supposed to be transmitted? How does the average Jack 'n Jill secure his/her email or IMs? Sadly, I have yet to see viable solutions for either. It is mathematically "easy" these days, using modern cryptography, to secure information enough to make it infeasible for "the bad guys" to decrypt. But there is yet a standard, universally compatible, easy-to-use method of encrypting these communications. Just as different IM protocals are incompatible, what few encryption options that are available are limited to the contacts with the same client software. The business of getting email encryption working isn't terribly easy, not to mention convincing your recipients to set up the same software, and securely exchange keys.

What I'd like to see is an open protocal for securing the transport of email. To make this "wonder protocal" a viable solution, it would have to be widely (and correctly) implemented, require little or no configuration on the part of the user, and hopefully enabled by default. The same goes for IM. Will this happen? I find it unlikely, considering there is almost no incentive for the "dudes-on-high" to put forth the time/effort/money to make such things possible.

Why don't I do the world a favor and just whip up something like this? I wish I could, but I have no delusions about my abilities. I have no problem saying that I have no idea how to make something like this happen. But I can still sit in my cave and grumble. In the meantime, three cheers for Hamachi and PGP. And to answer this post's title question, no. That's why the security gurus get paid the big bucks to be awesome and whatnot.

Speaking of which, this Security Czar article (via Geeks are Sexy) is a very good read, covering more general security topics in the same vein as the above.

Freedom? InterWebz?

2006-03-23T12:02:00.000-08:00

http://www.freepress.net/netfreedom/

There's shizzle in danger. There've been rumbles about this uncoolness for awhile now, with a lot of "oh you don't know what you're talking about, this will never happen" and "are you an idiot? this is already happening and has been for years!" commentary attached. Corporate greed is a no-brainer here, but you still can't trust everything you read out on the Internet. The linked site above is a good overview of what seems to be slowly evolving into a very ugly mess.

The best menu EVER

2006-03-10T12:40:00.000-08:00

Link courtesy of Mel

"May I take your order?"

And they just keep getting better and better and better.

Recording TTS on a Mac

2006-03-09T02:55:00.000-08:00

If you happen to have access to a Mac, you can use the built-in text-to-speech system to not only "read stuff" out-loud to you, but also to record into a file...except the built-in system doesn't give you a way to actually write out said file. I needed this kind of functionality (mostly for the robotic voice quality) for a project I'm working on, so of course, I turned to the Interwebz and did me some pokin' around. There were a few programs available (non for free that I could find), but that obviously entailed having admin-access on the machines I'd be using....which I don't have. Then, I came across a VERY nifty little gem...in the form of an apple script, that will do exactly what I need.

http://www.manythings.org/mac/

Enjoy.

Cleaning out the Crap

2006-02-02T02:28:00.000-08:00

One of the truly annoying things about doing work for clients is having the client make a decision that forces you to create something...ugly. In the particular case I'm talking about, I haven't even met the client in question. All dealings are being done through a third-party. The client was recently given several design options for a site that we (this is also proving to be an interesting collaborative experience) had been commissioned to do. Unfortunately, the client's preference will have us implement a design that is...well...far from ideal. I am by no means a master web designer, but I think I do a decent job recognizing an effective design vs. the "far from ideal" solution.

Granted, I should be pleased. The design that we'll probably be using is something I could pound out in about an hour or so, if I felt like it. But I'm not pleased. The direction this project could've taken would have been a more difficult, but far more rewarding experience. I was honestly looking forward to trying to implement some of the possible design features.

Thankfully, the next project this group will be working on will be far less constrained. Time to bite the bullet, get this done, and move along.

A side effect of this though, is a bad mood. Interestingly, it's a reflective bad mood. For some reason, I started looking back at the web-related stuff I'd created in the past. Somehow, amazingly, I have crap online that's from the beginning of 2003. It's interesting to look back and see how very far I've come. Right now, it's also rather depressing too. I've thus taken the opportunity to make the InterWebz just a tiny bit cleaner. I'm now down to just this blog, a LiveJournal account that doesn't mean anything, and a couple social networking profiles that only occassionally annoy me.

Security Vulnerability in Humanity

2006-01-06T21:05:00.000-08:00

How do you know if you are affected...

H1.2 Systems Affected
All versions after Homo sapiens 1.3.27.5234a

H1.3 How to determine if you are at risk
- Ask yourself the question, "Who am I?" If answered, the system is at risk.

With the recent muckery of Sony's Rootkit and this week's latest/greatest Windows Vulnerability, I really needed a laugh. I've been of the mindset that "people suck" for a while now, but there's finally a logical, humorous, and sufficiently nerdy explanation.

http://rwanner.blogspot.com/2005/11/human-side-of-security.html

Serious Windows Vulnerability

2006-01-05T17:44:00.000-08:00

There is a serious vulnerability that has recently been discovered in ALL WINDOWS SYSTEMS. If you run ANY version of the Microsoft Windows operating system, you are vulnerable to this exploit. Your firewall won't fix this, your antivirus software won't fix this, all it takes is viewing a malicious web page. Thankfully, there ARE some things that you can do, more information is available at the link below.

http://www.grc.com/sn/notes-020.htm

It is so far appearing that Microsoft will not be releasing a patch for Windows 98/ME and older systems. If you are unlucky enough to be using a Windows 9x machine, check back at the above link periodically, as GRC has pledged to patch the vulnerability anyway.

[EDIT]
It should be noted that this is itself not a virus, or other piece of sofware badness on the Internet that I'm talking about. This is a design "mistake"...a section of code that was intentionally designed the way it is, without taking security into consideration. This "feature" of windows leaves your system open to a specific kind of attack that is unfortunately very easy to do. These attacks take advantage of this particular "feature" of Windows' design so as to allow the attacker to execute their own code on your machine. This can be anything from a "hi! you sucthk" message, to planting one or more programs that make your machine their zombie slave. But that badness depends on the particular attack. This "Windows vulnerability" I'm talking about refers to code that's part of every windows installation that makes these attacks possible. This is by no means the only such vulnerability, but it is the most recently discovered, and what some people are saying is the most dangerous such vulnerability to date.

"UNTIL THIS IS REPAIRED BY MICROSOFT, ANY ATTEMPT
TO DISPLAY A MALICIOUS IMAGE IN WINDOWS COULD
INSTALL MALICIOUS SOFTWARE INTO THE COMPUTER."

This includes not only email attachments and the like, but also websites. This is browser independent, so it doesn't matter if you're smart (using Firefox etc.) or stupid/ignorant/stubborn (using IE).

If you have any questions about this stuff, or want some clarification, feel free to respond to this post. And definitely read the page I linked above.

Happy New Year

2006-01-01T12:36:00.000-08:00

Welcome to 2006!

(Random festivities picture from ye olde Internet)

Basic Windows Security

2005-12-26T13:04:00.000-08:00

Okay, here's the thing. This is a bit of a rant, but it's an educational rant, and it's for everybody's benefit. And if you don't read the linked article in full, I will not be responsible for me slapping you upside the head.

A clean Windows installation is not safe on the Internet. Period. There's lots of bad crap out there that will infect your system in a matter of minutes, unless you take the proper precautions. I'm sure I've posted about this stuff before, and I know I've reiterated it dozens of times to a very large list of people. It's what happens when you do IT Support. And yet, I'm continually surprised and annoyed by the blank looks and the widened eyes when I say in so many words "no, you are not safe when you just plug the thing into the 'Internet' and never bother to patch your system" etc etc. If you're going to spend the money to buy a computer, or be given the privilege of using one at work/school/whatever, the least you can do is educate yourself a little and be aware of the world you are operating in.

I just happened upon the following article that does a very good job of clearly saying the same things I've been saying for a long time. Read it. All of it. If you have any questions, feel free to contact me either by email (see my crapTastic website, url is in the sidebar of this page) or here in the comments.

Microsoft Windows security for computer illiterates

Mozilla Seamonkey

2005-12-23T15:36:00.000-08:00

So, If you've been cool enough to have used Mozilla since the days before Firefox, there's a possibility that you might miss the "single app" approach that the software company used to build. YOu'd have your browser, email, and in some cases your chat client, all happily bundled into one nice integrated package. I for one am more of a fan of the more modular "Firefox - Thunderbird - SunbirdLightningCalendar" model, but that's just me. If you're wishing for the good ol' days, fear not...the open source awesomeness that is Mozilla is still making available (and developing?) the original package. Even though it is no longer an official mainstream mozilla release, it is still a supported piece of software...it's now just supported by a different subset of people.

Anyways, the 1.0 beta of Seamonkey was released on the 19th of this month. I downloaded and installed it a couple of days ago so as to have a secondary browser that doesn't eat puppies and bunnies (just say no to the big blue E, save our cute furry friends!). I haven't had a chance to really use it much, but installing and starting the application was as painless as it should be. And it's still the same awesomeness that was the old Mozilla uber-app.

Crazy Fog Pictures

2005-12-22T23:20:00.000-08:00

Some crazy crazy fog-action happened tonight. I whipped out my tripod and camera, and tried to capture some of the awesomeness. The images (all digital) were taken at 10 and 16 second exposure times, with automatic ISO settings (courtesy of the untweakability of non-SLR digital cameras).

SERENITY on DVD

2005-12-22T02:45:00.000-08:00

Not much more to say. Go get it. Now.

Bush Authorized Domestic Spying

2005-12-16T10:42:00.000-08:00

If you've read this blog much, you've probably figured out where my political feelings tend to be. The following article, however, is something that EVERYBODY should be aware of. I don't care if you LOVE Bush, or hate the guy, this is something you should be concerned about.

Bush authorized domestic spying, sources say

"This is as shocking a revelation as we have ever seen from the Bush administration," said Martin, who has been sharply critical of the administration's surveillance and detention policies. "It is, I believe, the first time a president has authorized government agencies to violate a specific criminal prohibition and eavesdrop on Americans."

As always, keep an open mind, think critically of everything you read in the press, yadda yadda. If you're smart enough to be doing that already, you totally don't need to be reading this last crap paragraph.

Craptastic Movie Mood

2005-12-14T22:33:00.000-08:00

You know how sometimes you feel the need for a movie that isn't good? Sometimes you need some mindless entertainment that is just insulting to your intelligence rather than stimulating to it. Sometimes you're in the mood that simply demands the absolute worst that the movie industry can provide.

I've been in exactly such a mood for the past two days. Now that my finals are essentially over, I've been able to give in to the call. I watched War of the Worlds yesterday. The visual effects were beyond amazing, and I really liked the tripods and their alien pilots. I was almost not depressed afterwards because of all the shiny CG in the film. But Tom Cruise will always be Tom Cruise, and the rest of the cast (with the glorious exception of Tim Robbins) was extremely irritating.

I also grabbed Stealth the same night, and I must say....wow. No, not the good wow...more like the "I've just been punched in the gut by a muscle-man wearing an iron gauntlet" wow. The special effects looked like they'd been well-done, but there was so much camera shaking that a lot of it wasn't very visible. The acting was annoying at best, painful at worst. The story was lame and pretty predictable.

Then tonight was a night of zombies, romance, and guns. Suffice to say, Land of the Dead was worse than bad. It was on par or worse than Stealth. It was lame, gross, relatively boring, predictable, and pretty much just dumb. It honestly wasn't even that great of a gore-fest either, which any self-respecting zombie movie should be. It was just the same head-popping and guts-pulling over and over.

Mr. and Mrs. Smith, on the other hand, is just plain fun. As long as you don't try to take the movie seriously, there's really no way not to enjoy it. Hilarious acting, wonderful dialogue, and loads of silly over-the-top shooting and face-bashing. FunTimes.

The Right Desk

2005-11-24T00:56:00.000-08:00

For those of you who don't know, I'm lucky enough to be moving off-campus into a house next semester. I'll be living with two very good friends of mine, not too far away from the world of academia, and I won't be on food service anymore. But the best part, is that I finally get my own room. Don't get me wrong, having a roomie can be pretty awesome, and I have thankfully had the privilege of living with three very high-quality individuals since I became a college dweeb...but having my own little cave that's really truly my own will be nice.

This new living situation also puts me in the position of needing some furniture, since this house I'll be living in is very much devoid of such things. So I did a little hunting, and found myself a desk. When I showed this desk to a couple of people, the response was a very strong "this desk is SO you!!". But, because I'm paranoid, I wanted to make sure it'd fit in my relatively smallish room. So, in typical nerd-tastic fashion, I whipped open my favorite 3D design program, threw together a VERY simple model based on dimensions obtained from the house via tape-measure, and started trying to arrange my bed (which I'm getting from home) and this dream desk...and found that if fit!...only if I decided I didn't want to have my nice rolling chair in there too....or maybe if I declined to keep the functionality of my door and/or closet.

Then my brother came home. I showed him my plight, and he offered a couple very good suggestions, one of which resulted in the following image.

I'm pretty much decided now. I'm getting this awesome desk (rather than my second choice, which happened to be half the size for twice the price), and it WILL fit in my room. And it will be awesome. Oh, and don't ask what the giant pink cube under the desk is supposed to be. It's nothing "weird" or anything I swear...but trust me, this is a nerdy enough post as it is. If "that which is a giant pink cube" actually comes to be, it will most assuredly be written about here.

Dugg Toast

2005-11-16T17:48:00.000-08:00

Even though I have been surfing Digg.com for quite some time now, I've been entirely too lazy to get me a profile and add my 1-cent's worth. But I finally have. I also took the time (not much of it really...) to add a nifty javascript-powered feed to this site's sidebar. Every news article dugg on digg.com will be automatically dropped into that list. A list of stories I myself have dugg can be found in my digg profile.

photoFacebooking

2005-11-14T23:57:00.000-08:00

If any of you have an account at theFaceBook.com, and have actually managed to check your profile (or other people's profiles) within the last week or so, you've probably noticed an explosion of pictures. Photos, images...they're friggin' everywhere! How cool is that?!

Well, my answer to that question is actually rather complicated...and I'm not sure I really have one yet, to tell the truth. Some of my friends are rabid about it. I have heard more than a few stories of "OMG I SO just wasted like, SOOO much time putting all these photos on facebook! It's like, crazy!!" And I must say, they weren't lying. The number of photos in my profile soon skyrocketted. Then I started uploading a few pictures of my own so I wouldn't feel left out or something.

But wait...didn't I just mix up those last two sentences? Actually, no...I really didn't. How the crap does that work?

The Facebook's newly-launched image/photo/stuff module is on the whole, very well-done. I must say that I'm honestly a very big fan of the technical execution. The gallery/album organization is slick and simple, the upload system is very shiny (and redundant if the shiny java applet part doesn't work), and the ID tagging system is unbelievably easy to use. Which brings us to what makes me a little squeamish.

Any image that's uploaded can be tagged with a person's identity. In fact, anybody in the picture can be picked out and ID'd by the poster. Those who are "cool" enough to have a Facebook account...those tags will be automatically connected to your profile. Still sounds cool? You bet! So what happens if you happened to have a picture snapped at some crazy party one night...and somebody decides to post that craziness online, and tag everybody who was crazy enough to be crazy on that crazy night...then one day, when you apply for a job of some kind, or the administration at your ultra-conservative scary religious school goes surfin', and a Facebook "background check" of you is done? Oh poop-monkeys...you're fired/not-hired/suspended/expelled/whatever. Yes it's happened...this is not a fictional "what-if".

Yes, you can remove tags associated with you if you so choose. There would be many angry emails sent to the Facebook admins if this were not the case. HOWEVER, this system works on an "opt-out" model. You have to watchdog the network to make sure nothing "evil" gets posted and tagged to you, then manually remove that tag. This is not cool. A system like this really should operate on an "opt-in" model...in order for something to get linked to you, it has to be manually (or even automatically, given the existence of a toggle for the feature) approved by you before the tag gets applied.

Do stupid crap in front of a camera....at your own risk, I guess.

Boycott AIM

2005-10-12T21:19:00.000-07:00

The newest incarnation of the AOL Instant Messaging client may be all pretty-looking and whatnot (at least to some people), but that's all it really has going for it. As always, I continue to say "don't even think about touching any software made by that terrible company." Unfortunately, a lot of people out there who engage in the activity known as IMing will find that most of the population is very stupid (and by that I mean "they use AIM"). If you don't use AIM, you can't talk to your friends. Or can you?...

A new site called boycottaim has lauched, and gives you the quick and simple explanation about why the AIM client sucks so much poop. It also has links to some very good alternatives that will not only let you talk to those (L)AIMers, but also MSNers, and Yahoo-ers, ICQers, and most other protocals under the sun.

But best of all, they're all free (with the exception of Trillian Pro...but there's a free version of Trillian as well) and they don't force you to look at ads...or install pure molten evil on your machine.

Be nice to your computer, do a favor for the Internet, and for goodness sakes, do something good for yourself. Boycott AIM!

[edit] The site now appears to be offline and dead. What a shame. But still, AIM blows complete monkey (insert random piece of anatomy). Just say no to the badness.

Serenity

2005-10-03T11:40:00.000-07:00

I have now seen it twice. I haven't seen it enough. If you've even heard of Firefly, you MUST go see this movie. Boost its take at the box office! Let's get us a sequel!! But even if you don't care about that, you should go see it anyway. It's a fun, entertaining thrill ride that will pull tears from your eyes, make you laugh hysterically, and everything in between.

The Hat of Jayne

2005-09-28T01:32:00.000-07:00

My most wonderful cousin Annemarie sent me something in the mail that made my otherwise craptastic day just shine. I am SO wearing this thing to Serenity.

Really Slick Screensavers

2005-09-26T23:09:00.000-07:00

If you have a computer with any form of muscle, check out the free pickings at www.reallyslick.com. My current machine is too weak to get any real shininess out of them, but I have confidence that my laptop (should be here soon) will have what it takes.

Clickify and enjoy.

Blogger Spammers

2005-09-04T02:52:00.000-07:00

I have just witnessed a surge in comments posted to this blog. Ordinarily, I'd be happy...almost nobody comments on the junk I write about. Unfortunately, the source of these most recent comments is an unknown number of spam-bots. I've restricted commenting to Blogger users for now, but I doubt that'll have any impact on my typical swath of zero comments per post.

I wish I had the time to hunt some of these cretins down and have a "chat" with them, but I don't...and it's not worth it...there's too many of the scum out there. I guess I'll just stick with being annoyed.

Secure Instant Messaging

2005-09-03T16:24:00.000-07:00

It recently occurred to me how very insecure Instant Messaging really is. Sounds like I'm going to launch into some technobabble-riddled hype-lecture-thing. Sorry to disappoint, but there's an actual story to this one, and the big point at the end of it all has nothing to do with technobabble.

A few nights ago, I was sitting at my computer, doing my usual thing after a particularly hectic and stressful day. Needless to say, my brain was still in overdrive. I see a good friend of mine's screen name pop online. I say hey, she says hey, just as almost every IM conversation starts out. Then she says "Come over, I need to talk". I know it's hard to replicate the nuances of speech in a text-based medium, but it is possible. People have told me that some of my humorous and quirky spoken mannerisms do indeed carry over into my IM conversations. The phase my friend had just sent me told me that something was wrong. In typical Matt fashion, I hopped on my bike and high-tailed it to her place, realized I'd forgotten my cell phone (which has that building's key combo stored in it), found out that the phone by the door doesn't work, biked back to my place, retrieved my phone, and retraced my steps again. When I knocked on her door, I was greeted by her usual pleased greeting, and complete bewilderment at my mention of the IM conversation.

It turns out her younger brother had gained access to her IM account on his computer. Her settings had innocently been saved there, he'd been too lazy to create his own, and had proceeded to entertain himself by pretending to be his sister. Needless to say, I was glad that nothing was wrong...but very VERY annoyed at the little brother (who happened to think the entire thing was hi-larious).

But this isn't a rant about the sucky ending of a bad day. This little incident exemplifies the grossly insecure nature of digital communication on this planet. This applies as much to email as it does to IM. There are two major problems that I can think of at the moment: interception and delivery.

Interception is the easy (and largely technical) one. Somebody sits quietly between the sender and the recipient, keeps their ears (figuratively) open, and listens in on your conversation. IM bursts and email messages travel in clear text...that means that anyone who is in a position to "sniff" your network traffic, or has access to your mail server, or virtually anything between a transmission's Point A and Point B will see anything and everything you say. This problem can theoretically be solved simply by encrypting the conversation. Issues in software design and implementation make this by no means a clear-cut solution, but it's obviously better than clear text, and such issues are way out of the scope of this blog and the capacity of Matt's brain. Some software exists today that can allow you to encrypt your email and IM traffic, but it is far from widespread, and in some cases is rather difficult to implement.

Delivery is easily the stickier of these two ideas. Secure delivery of a message requires authentication. You need to know that you're really sending your message to the person you think you're sending it to. In my benign yet annoying experience detailed above, I lacked any form of good authentication. I thought I was talking to my friend, when in reality I was talking to her little brother. The use of a "unique" screen name offers only the illusion of authentication...these kinds of things can easily be compromised. The frustrating thing is that countering this cannot be done by pure technology. My friend's screen name was compromised simply because nobody bothered to delete it from her brother's computer. Beyond the screen name, there's no reliable way to know for sure that you're actually talking to who you're intending.

I sincerely hope technology will evolve to bring some measure of security to our digital communications. Some is already available and slowly maturing. Others, such as identity authentication for Instant Messaging, seem barely feasible.

But what am I trying to say? To a large degree, security is an illusion in our digital world. Technology can only solve some of the problems. It's up to YOU to be careful what channels you trust, what information you pass along less secure ones, and be aware enough to at least account for the problems technology can't handle.

MacIntel Boxes

2005-08-19T16:01:00.000-07:00

An interesting article at Wired.com. I applaud the efforts of those who've made OSX more widely available, though I don't approve of where the hacked code originally came from.

Mac Hacks Allow OS X on PCs

Jarhead & Dead Lappy

2005-08-12T13:06:00.000-07:00

Linkificated to me by my buddy IG. The teaser is good, and the cast has me drooling. At the moment, this is the biggest thing the movie industry's got going for it in Matt-world.

In other news, my laptop died a horrible little death a couple of days ago. Details might be found in ye olde LJ (if I actually get around to posting about it in the midst of the craziness that is my day/week/month etc.), but suffice to say, a nice big I/O error early in the boot process after overheating is not a good thing.

Luckily (yet VERY unluckily as well), my good buddy Mel recently suffered a similar fate, so I don't feel so alone anymore. She's thinking of starting a support group for us dead-lappy people. I think it's a beautiful idea.

From Florida...

2005-08-03T15:03:00.000-07:00

I spent this past week in Florida visiting my grandparents. It was hot and humid...the air was sticky and heavy....a decent number of the people/morons I encountered on the road shouldn't be allowed to drive motor vehicles....but I digress. The visit was good. The food was excellent. And I'm very glad that I got to see my grandparents again.

I took some pictures, some of which might lend themselves well to being stiched together into a panoramic-thingie-picture kinda thing. Considering the ramp-up to the school year that'll be happening soon-like, I may or may not actually get around to doing such things. We'll see. In the meantime, I decided to check out Blogger's now "Blogger Images" feature doodad.

This picture here is a shot of a couple of very interesting hot sauce bottles that I came across at a pier in St. Petersberg. Cover the eyes of your children. And no, I didn't buy any.

The scary people...

2005-07-22T09:55:00.000-07:00

With regards to my brief writing on and linking to the religious scary people website a few posts ago....

After having read it, a good friend of mine put forth the suggestion that perhaps this site was just a gag. A joke. I've since gone back and poked around a little more while I'm not extremely tired, pissed-off, and awake at obscenely early hours of the morning.

I guess I can see the possibility of it being satirical. Some of it is rather....yeah, wow. On the other hand, I'm still not entirely convinced. You see, I actually personally know some people who hold many of the same or similar beliefs as were shown on that website. Yes, even the bits about the dinosaur stuff. I kid you not.

The underlying thing, I suppose, is that stuff like this....literal interpretation and worship of purely human-concieved notions, and the blatant disrespect for all others who don't happen to share those narrow distorted views, the "holier than thou" attitudes that seem to saturate many of these communities...the more I think about it, the more disillusioned with modern religious organization I get.

Serenity

2005-07-22T09:31:00.000-07:00

There's a new Serenity trailer out. What with this whole "working" thing I've been doing, my muckery on the 'net has been...well...almost nonexistant for the past several weeks. My buddy Ig sent me the following link, and successfully yoinked me back into the fantasy world that is the Internet.

But anyways, back to the topic at hand. The trailer is amazing, and I can't wait for this movie to be released. You should see it. In fact, go out, rent/buy Firefly on DVD, watch all of it. Then, watch this trailer. And finally, when September rolls around, watch this movie.

http://www.uip.nl/serenity-trailer.html

Suggestion by Google

2005-07-07T22:20:00.000-07:00

So, yeah...long time no post. I'm still "working hard" at Technology Services in the Walla, and managing to enjoy myself at the same time. I've generally kept up on most of the websites and newsfeeds I tend to frequent, but it's strange...despite all the time I'm spending in front of a variety of computers these days, sometimes with not a whole lot to do (it's hard to get much coding done while staffing the Helpdesk call-center thing place dealy). I have however, happened upon a very nifty piece of coolness that is just so cool as to require a posting here before I fall over and go to sleep (it's Thursday, and thus my stomach is very full).

Google Suggest has been around for a little while now. It's one of those 'behind-the-scenes' projects those guys are working on. The basic idea is that as you a string of text into the search bar, the webpage talks to the Google servers, and spits out a list of popular search strings that match what you're typing. All of this happens without the page reloading, and is manifested seamlessly in a happy little dropdown menu, much like what you'd see if your browser is set to save webform information.

Now here's the most shiny tidbit of all...

Google has recently released some software compatible with Firefox. Until now, use of the Google Toolbar has been limited to those poor saps / dumb tools / unknowing folks stuck using Exploder as I've taken to calling it (thanks to the Whitman Sysadmin). But now, there is a Firefox-compatible version available for free download as well. And it gets better. Two firefox extensions have also been released by Google, one of which delivers the functionality of Google Suggest right into the integrated search field built into Firefox itself.

Good stuff.

See the article from mozillazine for more details and linkage.

I thought they were joking...

2005-06-20T21:25:00.000-07:00

"New Evidence Suggests Noah's Sons Rode Flying Dinosaurs"

...but I guess these people are actually serious about what they're saying. I uh...yeah...wow...

This is one of those things that you really have to read to believe...and by that I mean...uh...how is it that people, with all of the complicated sophistication of the human brain, actually "THINK" this?

The article (click the pic) is almost funny. The forums attached to the site are scary. Very scary.

DRM & Intel

2005-06-11T14:38:00.000-07:00

DRM = Digital Rights Management.
What does Intel have to do with this? Apparently they've got some hardware-based DRM technology in the works. Interesting. Check out a certain security expert's post on the matter for more info and links to elsewhere.

Mac & Intel

2005-06-10T10:56:00.000-07:00

So, Mac will be using Intel chips in the near future. Interesting. I've heard all manner of different responses from various people all over the internet. I for one am rather pleased (MacOSX on a VMWare virtual machine = easy cross-platform testing + happy-matt), though a little bit leary of Intel drifting towards the realm of monopolyism (is that even a word? now it is!). I guess we'll all just have to wait and see how the cards play out.

A small part of Slashdot, however, has what is easily the most humorous response to this news that I've had the good fortune to lay eyes on. Many thanks to Mel for throwing the link at me. For a more serious look at this stuff, check out the BBC, or do that whole Google thing.

I Feed You Now!

2005-06-08T15:35:00.000-07:00

...and yet another fun feature that I've severely neglected since this blog's creation.

There has always been a syndication feed flowing freely from the maw of the Flying Toaster. Those of you cool enough to be using Firefox or another RSS-aware web browser would've known that, but I'd never made it accessible to anyone else. But now, you can happily click on a happy little link, and not only happily subscribe to this site's feed using various free web-based services (I currently use Bloglines), or get the full path of the original site feed (for use in 3rd-party applications), but also happily learn more about RSS feeds and use that happy knowledge to happily subsribe to all number of other feeds. Happy!

Ben Sellon on MySpace

2005-06-05T16:33:00.000-07:00

My old buddy Ben Sellon now has an active MySpace account. Check it out. And y'know, there's always his website to putter around on...maybe buy a couple CDs. Good tunes.

Ben's MySpace
Ben's Website

HitCount and Protect Bloggers

2005-06-02T14:28:00.000-07:00

Blogging is becoming (or has already become?) an extremely valuable form of free speech. Happy technological stuff such as "podcasting" and "audioblogging" makes that literal. And, like all forms of free speech, there are those around the world who try to censor and silence it. Visit http://committeetoprotectbloggers.blogspot.com/ for more.

I've also finally added a hitcounter to this silly little site. Don't ask me why I hadn't done so already. I don't know.

Synergy

2005-06-01T16:52:00.000-07:00

So I was sitting at work today, and in a freak instance had a coinciding moment of inspiration, motivation. In that brief instant of coolness, I got a beautiful thing known as Synergy working between my laptop and WCTS desktop.

Synergy is essentially a half-developed virtual KVM (keyboard video mouse) switch. I say half-developed because there are still certain functionalities available in full KVM switches that aren't available here. The really cool thing though, is that while KVM switches consist of another external hardware device, as well as a mess of extra cables, Synergy is purely software-based. The only requirement is that all machines must be connected to the same network.

Some of you may be wondering "what in the heck is a KVM switch anyways?" or "why would I need this Synergy thing?" To answer the first: a KVM switch allows you to use a single keyboard/mouse/monitor set to control multiple computers. It saves not only desk space, but a decent amount of money as well. In its current state, Synergy is similar in that you only need a single mouse and keyboard. Unfortunately, multiple monitors are still needed...but that adds a new aspect of coolness. Your mouse cursor literally can do the following:

Windows, MacOSX, Linux /Unix compatible. And since there's no proprietary hardware box that makes up this thing, the number of computers one could manage this way is almost limitless.

As cool as this puppy is, I can only say that I'm eagerly awaiting some of the functionality that the author has in mind. Among the long-term goals are full KVM capabilities as well as easy file-transfers.

There are a few things that should be noted however. Installation and setup are not as easy as one would hope, especially in non-Windows environments. Also, it is my impression that all data (keyboard & mouse instructions) travels in-the-clear, meanning that anyone in a position to intercept network traffic would have full access to any passwords or sensitive information you would type. This second point can be dealt with in a few ways. A colleague of mine runs his Synergy connection across a firewire cable. No networking, no worries. Another way is to point a Synergy connection through an SSH tunnel. This can be a bit troublesome to set up in its own right, especially for someone not particularly tech-saavy, or when connecting two Windows machines (Windows doesn't have built-in SSH support, unlike other operating systems). But if you're on your own internal wired network, you should be okay.

This is a tool I'll be keeping around for a while methinks.

Longhorn 3D Graphics

2005-05-22T22:22:00.000-07:00

ExtremeTech just posted a very interesting (though possibly a tad technical for most of my readership...it was even a bit technical for me) article on some of the graphical stuff that's being built into the next incarnation of Microsoft Windows, including some interesting screenshots.

[click here]

2 down, 2 to go

2005-05-19T14:58:00.000-07:00

I'm officially done with my second year of college. Well, I actually finished my last final yesterday, so the timing of this post I guess is a wee bit inaccurate, but whatever.

I'm also offically the last person in The Bunker. I must admit that it's very very depressing. I guess in a way, this gives me even more motivation to get everything all the way packed, and get the hell out of here. My summer spot is awesome. I'm subletting from my homies Andy and Disney, with Andy being my roomie, and Disney's room being my new cave. I'm rather looking forward to it.

I honestly don't know what else to say at the moment. I'm halfway to the end, and I just don't know.

But the important part now is to relax. No classes until...long time from now.

E.S. Posthumus

2005-05-17T16:00:00.000-07:00

If you've watched almost any movie trailer that's done the whole "look at me, I'm a crazy action summer blockbuster", then you've heard the music of these guys. Sounds corny, doesn't it.

The music is the opposite. It's amazing. It's unique. It defies catagorization.

I followed a link sent to me by my buddy Carl, and managed to follow his directions to dig out and download an mp3 track of some music that was used in some of the Spiderman movie trailers. I noticed an artist and album name in the file's ID information. So, I hopped on good ol' Amazon.com and found it. The sample tracks available there were notoriously low-quality, so I thought "hey, let's see if these guys have a website." They do. I wouldn't say it's great or anything, since it's one of those fancy shmancy flash affairs that can cause your computer to puke on itself. However, there's one little bit that's very VERY cool. If your computer and Internet connection can handle it, the site automatically streams entire tracks to you! High-quality streamed music!!

I listened for about 10 minutes, promptly jumped back to my amazon.com tab, and bought the CD.
http://www.esposthumus.com/

WCTS Recommends...

2005-05-17T13:34:00.000-07:00

In an e-mail sent to the entire school population:

WCTS has strong interest in protecting the safety and privacy of your computer.

To this end, WCTS *strongly* recommends that you switch your web brower from Internet Explorer (IE) to Mozilla's FireFox. Many of the current security threats specifically target IE and its proprietary tools, such as ActiveX and Visual Basic Script. The switch should help reduce security problems. In fact, Whitman will be installing FireFox on all public lab computers as the default web browser starting this fall.

See? I may have beaten this issue into the ground on this blog, but that DOESN'T mean I'm blowing hot air. All of the "firefox is smaller faster more-extensible standards-compliant not-lame all-around-cool" arguments still stand, but I know a decent number of people don't give a hoot about that stuff. That's fine. You should, however, be concerned with your computer's safety. IE is a security problem on your computer when used as the default web browser, even with the slightly improved features in SP2. It should also be noted that the majority of security patches from Microsoft are reactionarily released weeks or months after major vulnerabilities have been exploited. So far, Mozilla updates have generally been spat out proactively within a few days of a vulnerability being discovered (notice I didn't say "exploited"). In the open-source world, it isn't rare to see a security patch be released a few hours after a problem is found.

I'm not saying Firefox is perfect. There's NO perfect software. Anywhere. But the mozilla bandwagon is one very much worth jumping on.

Calqulate this!

2005-05-12T22:16:00.000-07:00

So instead of studying for finals, I instead decide to write a worthless blog post for you wonderful people who're actually cool enough to read this crap every now and then. And now, as a reward for your loyalty (or pity), I bring you a little gem of a software application that I found today while reading from the myriad of blogs and websites I've subscribed my RSS aggregator to. Behold Calq.

It's a very happy little calculator program that runs in the background, and can immediately be called into being via keyboard shortcuts, or a little quick mouse-pointing. Originally written for Mac OS X, it's also now available for Windows users. In the short time I've played with it so far, I must say that I'm impressed. Even on my weezing overloaded Windows laptop, the happy transparency effects work smoothly and very responsively, with almost no discernable extra processor load.

http://www.katoemba.com/calq/

I'm a .bak

2005-05-09T20:00:00.000-07:00

Which File Extension are You?

Oh how touching...and maybe a little creepily accurate...but at the same time, ouch.

High-tech fix for anything

2005-05-03T16:43:00.000-07:00

My good ol' CRT monitor was acting up today. Everything was getting all twitchy-like. I thought "maybe the thing is getting a charge built up on it or something" since various items have taken to shocking the fecal matter out of me again. Didn't look like it. Degaussing did precisely squat.

Then my roomie Wes suggested I smack it. Nice and hard.

So I did.

Now it's fixed and happy.

Huzzah.

[edit]: Unfortunately, the problems continue, despite my thoughtful attempts at repairing the CRT (and by that I mean "smacking it more"). More unfortunately, given my plans to build a "dream-machine" after this summer, and the whole "yes you have to pay for food and whatnot" kind of thing, I don't have the money at the moment to purchase a new display device. Humbug.

Serenity

2005-04-26T16:24:00.000-07:00

I just wet my pants.

Whoa

2005-04-24T01:35:00.000-07:00

This, I must try...

http://www.livejournal.com/users/jcmcfee/16153.html

Googling Maps

2005-04-17T12:51:00.000-07:00

I just checked out Google Maps for the first time ever today. I'm hooked. The interface is very simple and easy to use, not to meantion being the fastest one I've ever used. The trip-planning utility is beyond cool. If the little cross-country adventure that's possibly in the works for later this summer ends up becoming a reality, Maps de la Google will definitely be a critical component of planning. Oh, and did I meantion the satellite imagery? Hott!

My one major nitpick at this point: the map itself is not clickable. You have to navigate using searched points or the positioning arrows. Having the map recenter on a clicked point is very very intuitive, and is the one major map-related thing that I prefer, that MapQuest and Yahoo!Maps have, but Google doesn't. It should also be noted that It should also be noted that for trip-planning purposes, there doesn't seem to be any way to string together a multiple intermediate destinations yet. That said, Google Maps is still in Beta, and shouldn't be considered live production software. I'm sure more features will be added as development continues.

[edit] If you double-click on the map, it moves. It moves in real-time. It recenters itself in real-time. This is now by far my favorite online map-app. Hot. [/edit]

Protection

2005-04-15T11:51:00.000-07:00

Wes Woods

2005-04-11T20:20:00.000-07:00

Wes Woods
1945-2005

To an esteemed colleague and great guy...I'm glad to have worked under you, and I'm sorry to that I didn't get to know you better. Rest in peace.

Whitman Campus Community,

I am extremely sad to inform the Whitman Community that one of our greatly valued WCTS colleagues, Wes Woods, died this afternoon as a result of a collision he had on his motorcycle with a Valley Transit bus. Wes was returning to work having been home for lunch.

Wes joined the Whitman staff in September of 1991. He was a dedicated colleague who loved his family (wife Toni, Daughter Jennifer and son James)and he loved his motorcycle, sailing and life. His colleagues remember him, among many other things, for coming in early and grinding and making the coffee at 7:30 every morning, even though he no longer drank coffee. We will remember Wes for his countless projects upgrading our computer systems.

Please keep Wes and his family in your prayers and thoughts.

President Tom Cronin

Special Video

2005-04-11T01:08:00.000-07:00

From G4 Tech TV: How to overclock your toothbrush.

[Click Here] - flash required

I kid you not.

Skype

2005-04-05T04:27:00.000-07:00

www.Skype.com
Join the telephoning revolution.
Hit me at pearson.matt

RFID Kills

2005-04-01T13:42:00.000-08:00

The State Department wants to turn all US passports into terrorist beacons.

And I quote:

"In a misguided attempt to make US passports more secure, the US Department of State plans to put radio frequency identification (RFID) chips in all new passports. This RFID chip will contain the same information currently on our passports, including the passport holder's name, date and place of birth, passport number and photograph"

What does this mean exactly?

"In a dangerous world where Americans are targeted by thieves, kidnappers and terrorists, the RFID-chipped US passport will turn tourists into targets."

Read more and take action at RFIDKills.com
Tip via Blogtopia

Gmail Craziness

2005-04-01T01:53:00.000-08:00

Apparently Gmail has turned 1 today. Happy birthday to the most outlandish (and by that I mean ridiculously awesome) web-based e-mail service I've yet encountered. Apparently the google-folk have decided to give the world a birthday present rather than take and grab and scream with joy in a cloud of shredded shiny paper. They call it, their "Infinity-plus-one" storage plan. Observe the following diagram, provided by google's engineers to the public at large:

But here's the coolest thing of all: it does not appear to be an april-fools-day thing. Check out Gmail's Homepage. They've put up a real-time counter thingie showing how many "megs" each user's account has been given. The sucker is flyin! And yes, I logged in and checked my account quota to see if it corrosponds to the crazy counter. Yep, it appears to indeed corrospond.

Who else wants to join in? Sadly, it's still invite-only. Hmmm...I wonder where one could get oneself invited...

Daniel Ellsberg

2005-03-29T21:25:00.000-08:00

Tonight I had the privilege of attending a lecture given by this man. Anyone who knows anything about the Pentagon Papers and the political snaffu that surrounds them will know this name.

Even though things became somewhat politicized towards the very end, the overarching message was clearcut and based in historical fact. The situation in Iraq is dangerous. The people who are in charge right now are not handling things the way they should. That goes for both parties. The American People are being lied to, and are being grossly mislead. The similarities between the now and the Vietnam "conflict" are scary.

His parting advice: get informed. Dig, analyze, think. Poll data points to a grossly uninformed public in this country. This needs to be changed. Get informed.

I'm sure a decent many of you will poo-poo this as more "left-wing political propoganda" and whatnot. But y'know what? Think about it. Don't listen to me and my "brainwashed Democratic Party lies" as I've been accused by certain individuals in the greater Yakima area (that right there should put my quoted sarcasm in proper perspective). Like the smart man said, GET INFORMED.

I'm working on it.

Welcome to the Island

2005-03-26T20:41:00.000-08:00

Beastly Alarm Clock

2005-03-24T00:22:00.000-08:00

After the snooze button is pressed, the clock, which is equipped with padding and a set of wheels, rolls off the table to another part of the room. Each day, the clock finds a new place to hide.

I'm seeing potential here...

Source: MSNBC via Whitman e-mail

Become Republican!

2005-03-16T22:55:00.000-08:00

For all those disappointed Liberals out there, here's a solution!

The Hell that is Politics

2005-03-14T01:46:00.000-08:00

Some perspective from one who isn't Matt...

Click Here

WOW

2005-03-12T22:54:00.000-08:00

Remote Desktop is AWESOME. No, seriously, it totally and completely rocks my world. I finally got my windows machine set up for this (it really isn't that hard...turns out my firewall was getting in the way), and I don't know what I'd do without it now. I can go anywhere on campus, log into any machine (PC or Mac), and if the right remote software is installed (comes out-of-the-box w/ WinXP...Mac client available for free download), and BAM, I'm all of a sudden working right off my computer back in my room. Instant access to all of my files, all of my software, all of it! Redirected audio feed and everything!! Even works through my NAT router once port-forwarding was set up correctly. And because my 'home' is still inside the Whitman network, everything is nice and fast and smooooooth.

I've heard of remote desktop server apps for Linux...I think the latest Suse might have it...but I haven't tried to mess with it at all yet. Much tweaking will be had!

Happiness!

The "Freedom Tower"

2005-03-12T21:38:00.000-08:00

So apparently there's going to be a "Freedom Tower" built at "Ground-Zero". Yeah, I guess this is old news, I'm serious, the Whitman Bubble is a very powerful force. At any rate, I just figured out this "Freedom Tower" thing today, and I must say that the American People have hit an all-time low. This is stupid. No ifs ands or buts. Stupid. It's just begging to get blown up. Also...wouldn't a park...a memorial...something with living things....wouldn't that be a much more appropriate tribute to those who died? Why do we have to insist on building our giant defiant spear in the sky directly on the spot of the twin towers? "Larry Silverstein, the trade center leaseholder who aspires to replace all 10 million square feet of commercial space lost in the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks" (CNN) Put it on some other friggin site! Doesn't this twot have any compassion, any remorse for the tragedy?!

Now, don't get me wrong...I get just as excited as anybody when pondering the building of one of the worlds tallest skyscrapers. I've been fascinated by such things since I was a little kid. I even think the design of this particular one is halfway cool. But dudes! Have a heart!!

But here's what gets me the most: the name. "Freedom Tower" If we're going to call this thing by a name that so heavily smacks of 'holier-than-thou', at least we could do it with something more sophisticated than a 2nd-grade vocabulary. Whoever let this ridiculous title be approved should be fed to the bears.

Links:
CNN Article
Lower Manhattan Development Corporation

[edit]After checking out the second of the two above links, I feel a bit better about the memorial business. I actually rather like the design idea that was chosen. But still. Freedom Tower? Fed to the bears says I!

I couldn't resist

2005-03-09T18:12:00.000-08:00

Nifty

2005-03-09T01:35:00.000-08:00

Cool little flash animation sent to me by one of my roomies.

http://www.michalevy.com/gs_download.html

It's late, and I'm lazy, so copy 'n paste the friggin link yourself. Blah.