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Below are the 25 most recent friends journal entries:

May 12th, 2008
06:18 pm zaitcev [Link]	John Carmack and Linux VT Says John: Our flight computer now has a display screen to show the current status to a pilot. My first inclination was just to mmap the framebuffer and pretend I was back in the days of DOS, but I decided to try and be a good linux programmer and use ncurses. It took me longer than I expected to get it working properly for displaying on the VGA for an application launched from a telnet session, and the performance was very bad. I wound up writing directly to the terminal device myself, spitting out all the escape sequences manually, but it was still quite appallingly slow. I have it working acceptably by only updating the various display items in a scanning fashion to avoid slowing it down on any individual frame, but I should have just followed my first thought and gone with a direct memory mapping. I'm a little disturbed by the above, because I consider his application essentially equivalent to what Hercules does, and I never saw any performance issues with it. We all know that ncurses is a pig, and of course he should be using Slang instead of ncurses, but since he says that the result was slow even for the raw sequences, certainly this is not the issue. Weird. It would be awesome if he posted his code somewhere. Tags: linux (Leave a comment)
06:17 pm crackmonkey [Link]	Fork ( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. ) (Leave a comment)
05:09 pm wakko [Link]	Twitter cross-pollination. 00:09 @EvilCouch - I am indeed left handed. Let the jousting begin! # 12:53 drool www.catalystgamelabs.com/ # 15:41 Raar. Pushing patches upstream is sometimes like stepping into the role of Sisyphus. # Automatically shipped by your mom, using LoudTwitter (Leave a comment)
12:44 pm jwz [Link]	the collected jwz bicycle wisdom I posted most of this as a comment in someone else's LJ who was thinking of buying a bike, but perhaps it is of more general interest. I've been using a bike as my exclusive transportation in SF for about ten years. I've always ridden, but that's when I stopped driving a car except under extreme duress. Here's how to begin your adventure as a commuter-bicyclist in San Francisco: Never take bike advice from anyone who owns bike shorts, clip shoes, a messenger bag, or a fixie. That's like taking car advice from someone who enjoys rebuilding carburetors. (Update: If you are this person, you need not reply with your indignant "corrections". You are not the person to whom this advice is addressed.) "City bikes" and "road bikes" are designed for some Jetsons-slick hypothetical future city that I've never seen. Or maybe for the bike paths in Los Altos or something. Here in real cities, roads are shit, and if you want your wheels and tires to survive curbs and potholes, you need a hybrid. They're a little heavier and a little slower. Are you racing? No? Then you don't care. So, get the cheapest hybrid you can stand. Shocks are a waste of money. You should be able to get a pretty nice brand new hybrid for $370 or so. You can probably get a used one for a hundred bucks. If you feel like you want a lighter bike so that it's easier to carry up stairs: don't bother. That's optimizing the wrong thing. You'll get used to it (by which I mean: become stronger). Get a bike that's the right size for you, and has properly adjusted handlebars and seat. The shop will adjust it for you. If they won't, or if they tell you it doesn't matter, go to a different shop. Get a u-lock. Lock through the frame and the back wheel. Your bike will be stolen, so don't get too attached to it. This also means, don't waste your money on junk like baskets and lights. Just get a backpack. I always replace my front wheel and seat quick-releases with $2 worth of hardware store bolts, and then bend the ends over. This might have some negligible effect on theft. I refuse to be one of those people who lugs around 3 chains and disassembles their bike every time they park, so that's the trade-off I make. The bike-nerd at the bike shop will try to give you smooth, high-pressure (110psi+) tires, because they are more efficient. But if you don't air them up weekly or more often, you'll get pinch-flats every time you hit a pothole, which is always. Also, the gas station air pumps often only go up to 60psi anyway. Get knobby low-pressure (60-80psi) tires and they'll last a lot longer. (If you do end up with stupid tires, you might want to get one of these.) Likewise, make sure the tubes you get have the kind of connectors that the gas station air pumps take. Bike shop nerds like to fuck you with goofy connectors sometimes, out of sheer mean-spiritedness. Bike maintenance: don't do it, ever. It's not worth your time. Just take it to the shop. Getting them to replace a flat for you costs $20 and takes 10 minutes, including the tube, and you don't get dirty. Safety: I follow the Zodiac approach: always assume the cars can see you perfectly, and are trying to kill you. If an intersection seems iffy, use the sidewalk and crosswalks. If big streets like Market and Van Ness freak you out, there are always less traficky ways to go, or just stay on the sidewalks. Grocery shopping: yes, you really can do it with a single backpack. The trick is, shop small once a week instead of big once a month. If you try to dangle bags on your handlebars, you will die. Cross train and trolley tracks at a 45° angle or more or you will die. You really do need to tuck in or roll up your right leg. (You won't die, but you'll shred your pants.) You don't need to ride up Haight. Take Fell or Fulton and then go through the Panhandle. The City is only 7 miles across. Nothing is as far away as you think it is. Update 2: Oh great, here comes the peanut gallery. Thanks, Cory, srsly. I'd recommend against reading the comments here unless you're the type who reads comments on Youtube. Or maybe you just want to hear a bunch of fixie-hipsters with sand in their vaginas tell me how wrong I am and how you should spend a fortune and do all your repairs yourself. Current Music: Rasputina -- Brand New Key Tags: bike (108 comments \| Leave a comment)
01:48 pm spot [Link]	747 and 767 aircraft are referred to as "heavy" by air traffic control My brother just finished his PhD at NC State University, and I couldn't be prouder of him. I went down to NC this past weekend for his graduation. Unfortunately, Pam couldn't come with me, but she was along in spirit. My seasonal allergies are back in full swing, although, they're a LOT worse in North Carolina than they are in Boston. Without Claritin-D, I was just completely useless, a drippy sniffly mess. Getting back to Boston was rather painful. First problem: I used my United miles to fly to RDU, and while I have stated it before, I will reiterate that I am not a fan of United Airlines. Getting to Raleigh was straightforward enough, I connected through Washington Dulles with 15 minutes to spare. However, on the return trip, United bounced me through ORD. Of course, this meant that I picked up 3 hours of delay in Raleigh. When I finally got to O'Hare, I'd already missed my connecting flight, so I got rebooked onto a later flight. A much later flight, it turned out, as we didn't leave Chicago until around 10:30 PM. Now, I'm well aware that the delays weren't United's fault entirely, but there are a few key items worth noting: 1. Lots and lots of United customers needed to be rebooked in Chicago as a result of delays and cancellations. This is something that I knew would be true at noon, and yet, the United customer service center in O'Hare had TWO people working a total of 10 stations. 2. I asked the Raleigh United gate agent to rebook my connection, when it became obvious that I would not make it. She was incredibly rude and condescending to me in response, and informed me that "she was just a gate agent" and couldn't do that. Funny, American gate agents can (and do). 3. We sat on the ground in Chicago waiting 45 minutes for United to find... pilots. Seriously. In the interest of full disclosure, the United gate agent in Chicago did upgrade me to business class when I asked for an exit row seat, so I enjoyed free drinks and comfy seat on the two hour trip to Boston (767), but I didn't arrive home until after 2 AM today. I finished reading "Bonk", by Mary Roach (who is my favorite science writer), on the plane flight home. Very good stuff, I highly recommend it. (5 comments \| Leave a comment)
08:05 am jonabbey [Link]	SNL (ad sponsored) - A Message from Hillary Clinton (1 comment \| Leave a comment)
06:29 pm max630 [Link]	nokia n8*0 что-то я читаю спеки и не могу понять - а чем nokia n810 лучше n800, ктроме выдвижных кнопок? 2 SD в неё не вставишь, экран у неё меньше, процессор/памить те же... (2 comments \| Leave a comment)
11:55 am max630 [Link]	State-of-art web standards http://www.nokiausa.com/A4946184 Web Browsing ... * State-of-art web standard support including JavaScript 1.7, AJAX, Mouse-Over events, DOM Level 3 (речь идёт о браузере для КПК) (Leave a comment)
May 11th, 2008
10:10 pm katzj [Link]	Time for a spring century As some/many of you know, May is National Bike Month and this coming week is Bike Week. Earlier in the week, one of the guys I ride with started circulating the idea of doing an 80-100 mile ride this weekend. After some discussion, Sunday was decided on as the more likely day and then it was circulated to a wider group. I was still a little on the fence about doing it, but managed to wake up and get out the door on time and headed down to the shop. There ended up being ten of us to start out, which was a pretty good number I thought. We started off at a good clip, averaging about 19 mph for the first 30-35 miles. At this point, four people needed to turn off due to time pressures and the climbing really started. The six of us left continued on and took our next stop in Sterling as there were some people needing water at that point. The stop ended up being a smidge longer than my legs wanted and then we headed off towards Princeton and the climb. I actually have to say that the summit wasn't actually as bad as I was expecting -- even with a 12-25, it was very doable. The way back had a few dodgy sections of road, but overall wasn't bad. I dropped off on a hill around mile 78 due to some cramping, but Emily was still behind me, so I waited up for her and we headed back largely straight up 62. After Concord Center, I noticed that the time was getting on the late side for me to get back by when I said I would, so I pushed a bit up Rt 2A to make it back in time. Map of the route Elevation profile Overall distance was about 101 miles and the riding time was just over 6 hours for an average speed of 16.4 mph. Not bad given the mountain in the middle and the headwind heading back. And about 7000 feet of climbing. Overall, a nice early spring century and also some good climbing. And a nice way to start out bike week, even if I might be a little sore in the morning. Tags: cycling (Leave a comment)
11:33 am jwz [Link]	mixtape 030 Please enjoy jwz mixtape 030. This one's almost all new stuff, to make up for the fact that the last three have trended toward the old. Generally I've been aiming for the mixtapes to have about 1/3rd new stuff (where "new" means "released in the last three years or so") but that doesn't work out so well when I'm doing goofy themes like "reptiles", or obsolete genres like "vaguely industrial breakbeat". Do you tend to prefer the mixtapes that are mostly newer stuff, or the ones that are mostly older stuff? I'm guessing that since I've had so many comments from people saying "I've never heard any of this before", most of you don't notice the difference... Last time I asked whether you thought of this as compilation albums or a radio show. One big difference is that if it was a radio show, I wouldn't be trying as hard to avoid ever playing the same song twice. Current Music: as noted Tags: mixtape, music (20 comments \| Leave a comment)
09:45 am fenikso [Link]	USB fun Со вчерашнего дня началось вот такое счастье с мышкой: регулярно USB-порт отключается и включается через полсекунды. Соответственно, эти полсекунды мышка не работает. ============ May 11 09:43:32 miracle kernel: [ 268.533755] hub 3-0:1.0: port 2 disabled by hub (EMI?), re-enabling... May 11 09:43:32 miracle kernel: [ 268.533766] usb 3-2: USB disconnect, address 44 .. May 11 09:43:32 miracle NetworkManager: [1210488212.617266] nm_hal_device_removed(): Device removed (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_47d_1042_noserial'). May 11 09:43:32 miracle kernel: [ 268.673637] usb 3-2: new low speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 45 May 11 09:43:32 miracle kernel: [ 268.842951] usb 3-2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice May 11 09:43:32 miracle NetworkManager: [1210488212.892485] nm_hal_device_added(): New device added (hal udi is '/org/freedesktop/Hal/devices/usb_device_47d_1042_noserial'). ============ Лекарства пока не нашёл, по всем support-ссылкам, утверждается что всё дело в мышке. :-\ (4 comments \| Leave a comment)
09:07 pm jwz [Link]	Guilt-free download! Jane Jensen just posted 160kbps MP3s of her awesome (but out of print) 1996 album Comic Book Whore. I love this album a lot. Go get it! Current Music: Jane Jensen -- Highway 90 Tags: music (6 comments \| Leave a comment)
05:08 pm wakko [Link]	Twitter cross-pollination. 17:32 @annetrent - now you just gotta convince. Sig to get one ;-) # Automatically shipped by your mom, using LoudTwitter (Leave a comment)
12:49 am abbra [Link]	Да, nidd -- с Д.Р.! Всё, спать! Tags: lytdybr (4 comments \| Leave a comment)
12:28 am abbra [Link]	Отпуск-2 Вернулись. Почти два часа опоздания чартера, десять долларов "взятки" на стойке регистрации ушлым египтянам в Хургаде за размещение с детьми в двух соседних рядах у окна (сидевшей рядом с нами женщине за те же десять долларов ребенка посадили не рядом, а в предыдущий ряд), попытки объяснить таможенникам, что пастель -- это мел, а потому мелки в чемодане на экране сканнера только выглядят скелетом рыбы, а не являются им. Короче, мы в Москве. 14Гб фотографий еще не разобраны, но чудеса энергоэкономии когда-то ведущая египетская религия уже проявляет:( Read more... ) Остальное -- как очухаюсь... Tags: hurghada, lytdybr, travel (Leave a comment)
May 10th, 2008
07:51 am smitty1e [Link]	Here is an excellent example of the difference ...between 'can' and 'should': http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2008/05/keyboard_pants.html?CMP=OTC-0D6B48984890 Now, with some hat mounted mini-screen and a small backpack computer, the idea of taking emacs with me wherever I go _is_ tempting... Wait: no, it's not. (Leave a comment)
05:52 am deviant_ [Link]	¡Brahmā† bores me! 1. Do you like blue cheese salad dressing? It's the worst way to use bleu cheese. You should try it before bed; it makes for great dreams. 2. Have you ever smoked heroin? No. 3. Do you own a gun? Not right now. 4. What's your favorite drink at Starbucks or other specialty coffee shop? The car's on fire and there's no driver at the wheel And the sewers are all muddied with a thousand lonely suicides And a dark wind blows The government is corrupt And we're on so many drugs With the radio on and the curtains drawn We're trapped in the belly of this horrible machine And the machine is bleeding to death. Starbucks FTL. 5. Do you get nervous before doctor appointments? Yes. Always. Except with Psy{chiatr\|cholog}ists. They're way easier. 6. What do you think of hot dogs? So, so good. Too bad they're made of death. Cheese makes them better. And worse. Try them sliced up in Mac & Cheese. Then try kielbasa that way. Then die fat dumb and so, so happy. 7. Favorite Christmas song? I hate so much about Christianity, it's hard to admit it -- I love Christmas carols. I know, it's weird. It's hard to pick a favorite. Oh Come, All Ye Faithful, Oh Little Town of Bethlehem, or Oh, Holy Night? Or, though it's not actualy even Christmas-related and certainly not a Christmas Carol, despite being played most frequently in proximity to Christmas, the John Coltrane version of My Favorite Things. But that probably can't count, because I like musicals and jazz a bit and, well, simply love most of that musical. 8. What do you prefer to drink in the morning? I've been trying to cut back on that. 9. Can you do pushups? Yes. 10. Favorite piece of jewelry? Not really, though I'm not against the idea per se. 11. Favorite hobby? Yes. 12. Do you have A.D.D.? It hasn't been called that in the literature on the subject in quite some time, but yes. 13. What's one trait that you hate about yourself? I'm completely incapable regarding scheduling. 14. Middle name? Yes. 15. Name 3 thoughts at this exact moment Jill Bob Annestesia 16. Name 3 drinks you regularly drink? Water Water Guiness 17. Current worry right now? Socks. Holes. It's 6:30 Anti-Meridian. 'Nuff said. 18. Current hate right now? Insufficient sampling aparati. 19. Favorite place to be? There's probably somewhere. 20. How did you bring in the New Year? I don't recall. 21. Do you like to travel? 3. 22. Name three people who will complete this? You lose 22 points for not presenting your answer in the form of a question. 23. Do you own slippers? Why, what on Earth do you mean? 24. What color shirt are you wearing? Blue. 25. Do you like sleeping on satin sheets? Yes. 26. Can you whistle? Yes. 27. Favorite color? Yes. 28. Would you be a pirate? I already am, arrrrr. 29. What songs do you sing in the shower? My Favorite Things, Sixteen Tons, Unsuccessfully Coping With The Natural Beauty of Infidelity, some other stuff. 30. Favorite girl's name? Anastasia. 31. Favorite boy's name? Not really. 32. What's in your pocket right now? The Puzzle(tm), 9-May-2008. 33. Last thing that made you laugh? The look on Joe's face when he realized Son Of A Gun isn't a Nirvana song. 34. Best bed sheets as a child? Justice League of America. 35 Worst injury you've ever had? Broken femur. Twice in one summer, at the same spot. 36 Do you love where you live? It's a fun MSA, but Arlington is getting more and more aggravatingly exurban. 37 How many TVs do you have in your house? As many as I want. Or more, or less. They're surprisingly virtualizable. 38 Who is your loudest friend? WHAT? WHAT? NICE BOY, BUT HE'S ABOUT AS SMART AS A BAG OF WET MICE! (Seriously, I'm pretty loud. Hard to compare.) 39 How many pets do you have? None living at the moment. Maybe some will be living some day. 40 Does someone have a crush on you? You'd have to ask them. 41 What is your favorite book? Snow Crash. 42 What is your favorite candy? Eye candy. This is the first pictures google images finds that has nipples and isn't terrifying to even look at. I think we should all be happy about that. 43 Favorite Sports Team? No. 44 What were you doing 12 AM last night? Dunno. 45 What was the first thing you thought of ~~when you woke up?~~ Is it the weekend? †) sorry androidqueen, I couldn't resist. (3 comments \| Leave a comment)
11:19 pm jwz [Link]	The Trucks Dear everybody I know, You fucked up. Classic between-song banter: "We wrote this song while PMSing. I get really emotional, like, TV commercials make me cry -- especially the ones about whales. 'The whaaaales are dyyyying!' And I feel guilty for not having any babies. When I get my period I think, 'Well, that's one more baby I'm not going to have.' Now I call it dropping yolks. Anyway. This next song is called Dead Babies." Tags: music, photography, reviews (8 comments \| Leave a comment)
01:30 am katzj [Link]	PDD Final Presentations Tonight, we had the final presentations for Product Design and Development. Over the course of the class, we were to start out by looking at a few markets to uncover the needs of users, narrow in on a market and a product concept and go all the way to building a prototype and a business plan. As I think I've previously noted, I very intentionally did not go after working on a software product to avoid falling into the trap of doing product development the way that I always do -- instead, I used it as an opportunity to work within a different subject area and you know, do some learning :-) With the final presentations, we were to all do a 10 minute presentation of our product concept with everything from information on the user needs, a prototype and our business plan. We also had a mini-tradeshow with tables for demo'ing our products as well as anything else that we wanted to do within the space of half a six foot table. Along with this was a contest amongst the products -- each team was judged by the faculty and a set of additional judges to pick the "best" of the products presented. With 18 teams, this made for a relatively long evening. But it was amazing to see what all of the teams managed to pull together in the short space of semester. Some of the products had seemed very unlikely from earlier presentations on their concepts, but they were able to pull them together. My team worked on a product for the tea drinker and I did the first half of the presentation. And, at the end of the night, our product was chosen as the best one. Which is pretty awesome. After the presentations and tear-down, a bunch of us headed to Tommy Doyle's. And now, it's time for bed. Tags: sdm
May 9th, 2008
05:04 pm wakko [Link]	Twitter cross-pollination. 15:54 Holy crap. Bike insurance is WAY cheaper than car insurance. # Automatically shipped by your mom, using LoudTwitter (Leave a comment)
12:42 pm wakko [Link]	Open response to Aaron Greenberg. In response to this bunch of spindoctoring and headline grabbing: http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=188658 Aaron - You ask how come Blu-ray did not result in better games? You ask where is the complete 1080p game library we were promised? Simple. Developers are developing for the PS3 and your shitty XBox 360. All of the platform exclusive titles have been better games exactly because of their exclusivity. The platform exclusive titles have been running at 1080p. Unfortunately, for the developers that must cripple their game by putting it on a console that doesn't have the capabilities of the PS3, they're forced to leave content out, or scale features back because the Xbox 360 simply doesn't have the capability or runs the very likely risk of dropping dead from the inability to effectively cool your console. There was even a developer who recently came out and said as much. Is Sony blameless? Hell no. As you accurately point out, nearly every single tech demo from GDC and E3 of years past has been delayed. But are delays really something to crow about? I seem to remember some truism about people in glass houses. It might apply here. You ask where are the achievements? I ask, why do I need achievements to cover up for a lack of gameplay? I played through all 10 hours of Heavenly Sword. I don't see that I gain anything from repetitively replaying it simply to gain some merit badge that declares my ability to withstand the same content over and over and over again. I would much rather play games without achievements simply because I believe that achievements are a crutch that is employed when the game can not stand on its own without them. Again, Heavenly Sword is a great example of this. Ten hours of gameplay is not worth my sixty dollars. I'm so happy I rented this instead of buying it and subsequently feeling cheated out of my hard earned money. I'd feel similarly cheated by paying normal movie ticket prices for a forty-five minute movie. Achievements are simply not a solution to a short game. It does not enhance your game. It does not add playable content to your game. It simply distracts the gullible from the fact that you've shipped a shorter game. It dupes the buyer into spending the same money for less actual content. I'll take games like Echochrome and Patapon over merit badges every time. Overall, Mr. Greenberg, your questions appear to have been shat out of your word hole without adequate employment of your think-box. You're an idiot who can't see beyond the end of his own nose. With GTA4 out and demonstrating better graphic quality and less pop-in on the PS3, and MGS4 around the corner, we're now seeing the global sales of PS3 accelerating past the Xbox360. Your mediocre console is quickly becoming less and less relevant to the console war. Microsoft took second place last generation. This time around, I hope you guys can be content with dead last this time around. Current Location: @werk Current Mood: annoyed Current Music: Monkey Gone to Heaven - The Pixies (8 comments \| Leave a comment)
03:21 pm kernelslacker [Link]	On reading books. I'm almost ashamed to admit that last year, I think I only read (as in completely, cover to cover) 3 or 4 books. This year doesn't seem to be going much better either. I'm still slowly making my way through my first of the year. The problem isn't that I'm a slow reader. My problem is one of choice. I buy a book, start reading it, and when I'm halfway through, for whatever reason, I'll end up with another new book, and start reading that one, and the cycle repeats. I'm great at starting books, awful at finishing them. I think I must have started reading about 20-30 books last year alone. I seem to only really get through books when I'm traveling. The fact that I don't have a bookcase full of options with me confines me to one or two choices. This is the reason that devices like the kindle, (or any other e-book reader for that matter) are a really bad idea for me. When overwhelmed with choice, my indecision consumes me. (Seriously, you should see me fail at choosing a lunch option when in a new city surrounded by restaurants. Even the infamous google cafeteria was total overload for me. I think if I worked there, my indecision would actually lead to me starving to death before I made a lunch choice). Last November, whilst in Portland,OR I picked up a copy of The soul of a new machine. It's a book I've been meaning to read for years, after countless recommendations from friends. Same old story though, I'm dragging my heels getting through it. It's not that it isn't an interesting book. It's really interesting to me how many parallels there are in the story to things that are happening/have happened at Red Hat. I think I'm about halfway through it. 7 Months. Perhaps I need to travel more. Tags: books, reading (13 comments \| Leave a comment)
09:42 pm fenikso [Link]	Ubuntu Cola Вот такого зверя поймал в объектив камрад _glav_: Current Mood: giggly (6 comments \| Leave a comment)
08:11 am wakko [Link]	YAY! Last night I got my bike back from the mechanic. So, in a few minutes I'll be riding it to work. The bike ended up needing a new chain & sprockets, battery terminal leads, plus a new front tire. Overall, I'm really happy that the repairs were all basic maintenance stuff and nothing major. Current Location: @home Current Mood: excited (3 comments \| Leave a comment)
May 8th, 2008
08:31 pm mihmo [Link]	SVG Source Tags: fedora (5 comments \| Leave a comment)

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