Lavonardo

Steve Ballmer, the Microsoft head honcho, has been making noises about “Linux violating Microsoft’s intellectual property” for a long time. The pace of claims has only intensified after the Microsoft-Novell deal.

Showusthecode.com dares the Redmondians to come out with the facts. By may 1st. This year.

So in a few months’ time we’ll see whether Microsoft can back these claims, or whether they are full of hot air like SCO.

Randomly selected surfing destinations for the selective traveller.

• An amazing collection of geographically alternate earths. A lot of science, very little fiction, pretty maps. Worth a peep.
• If nothing else, Joel Kotkin launches half a dozen new words in his article on superstar cities.
• A nice selection of textbook disclaimers (yes, this is an anti-intelligent design page).
• Kickassclassical, for those awkward moments when you cannot recognize a piece if classical music featured in media (odds are 2.21 to 1 that it’s Carmina Burana anyway).
• JPG magazine, looks like best-of-flickr on paper. Which is not a bad thing at all.
• Angry Alien produly presents: 30 second editions of popular movies, as acted by animated bunnies. The hotel room wrestling scene of Borat is deeply disturbing even in this format,
• Boo hoo, bad microsoft, allegedly turning e-mail back five years by replacing the HTML-renderer in Outlook. Here’s a clue: no HTML in e-mail. Have two, actually, they’re pretty small.

Recent pickups or changes on the blogroll.

• Katuoja attempts to move into daily article mode.
• AC/OS, semi-interesting open source-related discussion.
• Emily Short has converted her wide-encompassing pages on interactive fiction to blog format.
• Juha Ylitalo is an old schoolmate - his blog concentrates on photography.
• Original Signal, a cleanly designed aggregator of dozens of other blogs.

Upon repeated prods from interested parties I finally figured out where my old thesis was, and put it up on the appropriate page (which has stood empty for more than three years now).

So - let the Lavonardo HQ proudly present: POSIX/DMX Yhteiskäytön Toteutus DX200-Ympäristössä. Not exactly a title that seductively rolls of the tongue, right?

And yes, it is in finnish. And no, I’m not about to embark on a translating journey. Questions on the subject might get answered, depending on the magnitude of the bribe.

Despite the operative word above being “old”, don’t knock yourselves out laughing. POSIX still survives, and thrives in many different operating systems.

And as an unexpected turn of events, Nokia has unleashed a second POSIX interface to cover the nastiest bits of an operating system. This time it’s for the Series 60.

Next stop: figuring out a way to plonk it into my old alma mater’s electronic gallery. And adding some relevant links into the sidebar of the thesis page would be good as well.

First collection of links in a long while.

• H.P. Lovecraft’s Case of Randolph Carter as hypertext. The interface is iffy, but the concept interesting (seek out Anchorhead for an even better experience).
• An overview of parallel computing. 50+ pages, probably not that light reading.
• Gonegaming’s awards for 2006.
• An absolute treasure trove of unusual articles in wikipedia. In some cases mere “unusual” is definitely an understatement.
• In the beginning (like, seven years ago), there was korsoraattori, now there’s a a new dialect of SQL for the folks from northeastern Vantaa.

South Korea, often touted as the model of a broadband society, has hit an unexpected snag.

The country seems to be held hostage by IE6-specific ActiveX software. And the reason behind this is “security”. All financial transactions must be encrypted with such controls. An approach that was fumbled when the government permanently tied the on-line security to an immature standard that was quickly superseded. A standard that is not supported by the new windows version just about to surface.

Somehow I doubt that Vista will sell like hotcakes in Seoul.

Pop. 7.

Elevation 1069′.

• Bill Gates said that spam would be gone by 2006 - according to a new study it’s back and worse than ever.
• Never was much of a Final Fantasy fan, but the games long history covered in a lengthy article on IGN makes interesting reading.
• Employer2.0, just when you thought the bubble couldn’t get any more inflated.
• ogleearth, a cornucopia of geographic-web- connected things.
• eat.fi, a gourmet/map site of Helsinki.
• A very brave bunny, wouldn’t expect many rabbits to dare to pester a snake like this.
• The new and supposedly authentic chinese restaurant has opened its website.

Something to keep clicking on until the fireworks start embroidering the sky with flash and fire.

• An inspired opinion on Why Vista Security will suck.
• The history of computerized role-playing games starts from the very beginning: the first part covers 1981-83.
• Something to check up on a lazy day: are web-based operating systems viable at all?
• And something for lazy days in the cubicleland (sounds turned off, obviously): best of web games.
• Wired’s annual Vaporware Awards feature both familiar faces and inspired newcomers.
• BBC’s 100 Things We Did Not Know Last Year.

A recent announcement by an irish company called Steorn has raised lots of eyebrows. They claim that they have accomplished nothing less than the invention of an eternal source of energy. In their own words:

We have developed a technology that produces free, clean and constant energy. This means never having to recharge your phone, never having to refuel your car. A world with an infinite supply of clean energy for all.

Quite a bold statement, right?

To back up their invention, they have now issued a challenge to the science community at large to pick their proposed microgenerator-based idea apart. In public. The challenge was issued in this week’s economist, and it has brought in the crowds - both of scientists and lookenpeepers in general. Ought to be entertaining.

On the other hand, the finnish company claiming to have invented an universal compression algorithm has been met with appropriate disbelief. The whole exercise smells like a guerrilla marketing stunt that got out of hand.

[ Steorn-link via kasa. ]

First batch of links for august.

• Onion has a great Wikipedia-spoof. Obviously, july 25th was the 750th anniversary of the US independence.
• Stephen Colbert, a Daily Show sidekick, famously graduated to have his own show (with a slight
  right-wing bias). After coining the term “truthiness”, he’s now beginning to use wikiality as a new tool to advance the incoherent agenda.
• Turns out that there are cheaper alternatives to the almighty Photoshop to play around with high dynamic range images. As pointered by pinseri, hdrsoft’s products sure merit taking them out for a spin.
• Panography is something I haven’t tried out yet. Apart from a four-to-six image single direction panoramas with the aid of Canon’s photostich-application. But that’s obviously just a sliver of the cake, as shown in the relevant flickr-group.
• Just discovered: a finnish blog of nothing more than book reviews, and they’re looking for additional authors.
• Ok, ok, so blogging and journalism both intersect AND differ, perhaps these five things no longer need to be repeated. Or perhaps they will. Over and over again.
• The Los Angeles Times is not a newspaper I’ve read, on paper or on the web. But they sure seem to have an interesting series about the state of the oceans ongoing. Props to Matti for the link. Definitely interesting, and the article seems unencumbered by any DRM (unlike the New York Times, sadly).
• The annual O’Reilly-organized Open Source Convention is over in Portland. And, as usual, the presentations can be downloaded right now.

Or a mojito, if you’re so inclined.

• William Gibson’s Alien III-script. Which, obviously, wasn’t used.
• An annotated list of non-errors in the english language. Now I finally understand what “splitting an infinitive” really means.
• An interesting article on community sites as games.
• Kyle MacDonald traded up his one red paperclip, and now owns a house. In Saskatchewan, Canada, but a house nonetheless.
• This year’s annual transhumanism-conference will be organized in Helsinki.
• On the very same weekend as Finncon 2006, the biggest finnish speculative fiction-occasion.
• Minutes from the very first Linux file system workshop are available (and now for free at lwn.net).
• A Chinese company claims that it has cracked the Skype protocol.

Things to click, read and bookmark/forget.

• The Tallinn gig is not yet available at livemetallica.com.
• A lengthy interview with Ken Rolston, one of the gaming greats. Concentrates on Oblivion, but the interviewers sneak in a couple of oldskool RPG-questions as well.
• First beta of flock is out. And the site’s rather overloaded. Time to experiment. And to reactivate my flickr-account.
• Suspicious software, part n: an explanation on why Vista will be late.
• 100 awesome music videos as selected by pitchfork. And it does have Röyksopp’s Remind Me, one of the best videos of all time. Beastie Boys’ lauded Sabotage is curiously absent, though.
• Even more music videos, actually 1400 of them, all from the eighties. Quality is variable, and the selection eclectic.
• O’Reilly has the Where2.0 materials available on the web. Decent rainy day reading, I’m sure.

ISAS 2006 registration is open.

Program seems to be decently interesting, and there’s no chance of jetlag when the conference is held four miles away.

It’s been a while - here’s some things that are worthy a look, but not much more writing than a single witty sentence:

• What if Canada ruled the world? Worth1000 tells the tale in a couple of dozen images.
• Coolness in lego: Cthulhu’s island and the Stargate.
• I already subscribe to both Kari Haakana’s and Tero Lehto’s blogs. No surprise then to note that their jointly authored one is worthy as well.
• The annual 101 dumbest moments in business is here again.
• Amazing collection of High Dynamic Range images in flickr.
• Reveal for those embarrassing moments where you don’t remember how and where you’ve been surfing.
• Guy Kawasaki, an ancient Apple evangelist turned venture capitalist has started blogging. Some interesting and useful tidbits among the cubic fathoms of fluff.

New version of firefox browser is out, and the guys have taken a big leap in version numbers (from 1.0.7 to 1.5). I’m sure there’s a reasonable explanation somewhere, but am not inclined to spend the effort looking.

Yah, I must be one of the last to upgrade. Which is weird, considering that some stability problems have surfaced lately with flash-equipped sites. Might be the lack of RAM (half a gig) or just plain bugs.

foxpose looks mighty nifty. Time to take that out on a ride once the dust settles.

Things that have impressed or stupefied this week. Entirely Sony Rootkit-free, that subject has been discussed and dissed to the death already.

• A remake of the classic Prisoner show has been proposed. With most of the cool/unique bits removed with surgical precision.
• Sam Peckinpah’s marvellous ode to the end of the western era, The Wild Bunch, finally gets a decent dvd treatment. The current version is an ancient flipper, and this update is much appreciated.
• Hell must be freezing over: an interesting Microsoft Blog.
• The third Ben Schott’s Miscellany book will soon be out in finnish.
• A finnish google maps blog. Now the question on where a hole drilled from Helsinki through the centre of the Earth would surface on the other side can finally be settled.
• A definitive list of 100 best board games ever. Backgammon and go are present among the commercial games, but chess is conspicuously absent. Or my search-fu is weak.
• Someone with a decent amount of time in his hands has implemented a UNIX-lookalike virtual machine in Javascript. It even has a functional vi in it. Redirection seems to be misbehaving, but it’s a hack-y achievement nonetheless.
• Risto Isomäki’s Sarasvatin Hiekka is shortlisted for the Finlandia-award. But with the decision done by our ex-prime minister and all around master grouch, I don’t think that a science fiction book has no chance of success. But who knows, maybe Paavo is a recovering trekkie, now on a serious B5-binge.
• Google analytics started working, but clearly the launch capacity needs were vastly under-estimated.
• The search terms that reach the Lavonardo HQ are lame, when compared to those of benrope.

Ok, so it’s NOT rootkit free, but this image is way too clever to miss out on. Sue me.

The best programs are born of need. Usually a need to do something current solutions are not able to.

Hence the birth of FlickrFS, a virtual file system for Linux that allows direct posting of images by just copying them into a mount point. Coolness gracious, and explanatory blog entries do not diminish the accomplishment. Were I still a Linux user, I’d definitely take this for a spin around the block.

Been looking for a therapy project for a while, but haven’t stumbled on any small enough to figure out in a reasonable amount of time. But then, it’ll be a while before I’m any prolific as an os x coder. Finally installed xcode on gromit - looks rather formidable as an IDE. Installation provided traditional command line tools on the side as well. Was rather mystified by lack of ‘make’ in baseline installation. Got it now, and world’s a tad better place once again.

In the shade of the copyright debacle, do not smile when clicking on these. It would not be appropriate:

• A gloriously long interview with Jon Stewart. The book mentioned, America is a great introduction to the history and civic life of the great nation - an inbetween the lines it illustrates many things that are wrong with both.
• Bunch of semi-interesting links on O’Reilly’s Radar. Not a bad new-tech blog at all.
• One of the things often referred to in the previous is Web 2.0. It’s an interesting, albeit complex and hard-explain thing. Discover had an elementary article about the subject.
• The october issue of Aponogeton is out.
• The magnificently rural bothnian translation of the Lord of the Rings seems to have stalled. But the completed chapters are very worthy indeed.
• Brian Greene’s view on the most famous equation of them all.
• Whedonesque, for those that bow to the new master.

EDIT 25.8.2008: As usual, some of the links are guaranteed not to work.

The irregularly scheduled batch of things recently popping like the weasel.

• Jason Kottke has seen the light, and moved to embed his links in the flow of the text.
• There are never too many pictures of cats. Even of cats in sinks.
• Second issue of Usva is out.
• Rod Smallwood, Iron Maiden’s manager has wise words to say about the San Bernardino debacle.
• The story of the original Macintosh graphing calculator is nothing but amazing in its display of persistence.
• Language policeman has been deployed to improve the use of finnish (and only finnish) in blogs.
• A cruel list of the top cancelled games of all time. A lot of quality has clearly gone down the drain and been replaced by an endless stream of sequels.

EDIT 24.8.2008: The comments on Maiden are no longer at the old URL.

Google has gone on a regular release spree lately.

Haven’t yet given their desktop a spin, but will at work where the disk (and especially Outlook’s myriad folders) are just cluttered with hard-to-find nuggets.

Google Earth is nothing short of fabulous, and an incredible timewaster. Even though I do think that the Golden Gate pylons are upright as opposed to reclining on the surface of the bay…

However, the most immediate impact is felt from their brand-spanking new (and still beta) Google Talk, their interpretation of IM. Eschews bells and whistles and concentrates on what’s really useful, talk itself.

Of course, such a closely spaced bunch of releases (though Earth is old news) always raises questions about where the company is heading. Jason Kottke crafted a well-thought out piece on potential future of no less than the entire operating system domain. His analysis preceded the talk-release, but is thought-provoking to say the least. And despite the hopelessly speculative nature of the article, it’s an enjoyable read - and a head and shoulders above the site’s usual fare. While the remaindered links are interesting - the capacity for thorough analysis on various matters is definitely more to my taste.

And while on topic of these next-gen desktop thingamabobs, I finally got around to checking out konfabulator. And nifty it is indeed. Coding-wise as well, so it’s probably time to hoist the sleeves and get cracking. Even though it’s in javascript which I don’t really like - but the choice of an interpreted language means that any interesting widgets can be dissected to atoms. Which bodes well for shallowing out the learning curve…