Posts for February 2008
Amazon Unbox: free BBC downloads this month
I'm not a fan of video DRM, but I grudgingly accept it in a couple of places, including Amazon Unbox. And this month, Unbox is giving away free BBC classics downloads, which makes trying out the service especially easy. The free downloads are all classic Shakespeare movies, and they're only available on the weekends (though you have a month to watch them). This weekend is The Tempest. Worth checking out...happy Shakespeare festival!
(Note: in non-DRM related news, my Neuros OSD is AWESOME. I just realized while watching this that I hadn't really given a review of it. I'll have to make sure I do that soon. Even my wife likes it! *grin*)
February 29, 2008 permalink | Comments (2)
CouchDb, or, Language of the Month-time
So I'm grumbling a little bit, but not really. I've been watching this really interesting distributed document storage technology called CouchDb for several months now. I've wanted to start playing around with it, but I was taking the lazy route, and waiting for it to show up in my Debian repository; I remembered to check today, and boom! There it is. Joy.
Time for the grumble...CouchDb is built in friggin' Erlang: a soft realtime, declarative, functional language designed for distributed systems and originally written by the telecom company Ericsson for telco-switches. Erlang was open sourced back in the late '90s...but even geeks think this language is geeky. So *grumble*...but at the same time, a little woohoo! I haven't really been on a language kick in quite awhile, so it could be quite fun. I don't really need to learn Erlang to program against the db, of course; but why the heck not, eh?
And CouchDb itself looks amazing. It's designed for distributed operation (with deterministic, versioned resolution in the case of merge conflicts), has clean atomic updates, can version indefinitely (ie, keep all changes to a document until you decide to compact the db and remove old versions), and has a adhoc schema model (add fields to a document on the fly). The thought of a completely custom contacts, notes, and todo db on a next-generation phone that automatically cleanly syncs to the cloud with proper merging, etc. makes me very happy.
Document databases like CouchDb make a lot of sense for semi-structured data. Don't misunderstand...I like relational databases; in fact, I'm a professional DBA in my day job, and I have done database-backed web development since the mid-90s. But as tools like CouchDb, Amazon's SimpleDB, and Thrudb (a similar service built on Facebook's Thrift framework) continue to evolve, they allow us to explore other options more suitable to the document-db style, while maintaining the transactional reliability and robustness associated with RDBMSs. Lotus Notes was actually a great ahead of it's time
example of this technology, but suffered (IMO) primarily from lack of F/OSSness; this prevented it from gaining hard-core geek mindshare during the 90s and early 00s. As GNU/Linux and company gained traction, partial free software re-implementations were developed instead (hackers scratched their own itches). And now we've got CouchDb, and Notes runs in Eclipse. Geeks really do rule the world! *grin*
So I look forward to playing with CouchDb and exploring some new options for data storage. If I hit anything uber-exciting, I'll make sure you all know first. *grin*
UPDATE: This thing is the freakin' bomb. The Python CouchDb bindings are excellent, but they've got Hello World
examples for about ten languages off of the main wiki page. I already have a use for this thing, too. Criminy! Too cool.
February 28, 2008 permalink | Comments (3)
mairix keeps me off GMail...whew!
Note: I love Google. And I think Gmail rocks; I actually do use it for some mailing lists and unimportant stuff. But I'm wary of putting all my eggs in one basket (Google), and I'm VERY wary of the issues WRT 4th Amendment searches and privacy when one's email isn't really in one's own possession. So I run my own IMAP mail server, in my own little house. They can come with their own little search warrants and serve ME, thank you very much.
But the downfall to that is search. You get USED to the power of the Google; archiving and tagging rather than saving to folders, and powerful search functionality at your fingertips. I knew there must be some tools for me to use, but I kept neglecting to do the *irony* search needed. But ah...thanks, muttwiki (I use mutt as my MUA) for links to mairix!
Da bomb. mairix has full-text search on headers and body, powerful operators, and setup properly, puts the results in a IMAP folder populated on the fly. Perfection!! I kick off a db update nightly (I could do it on demand if I wanted...but it's just not THAT necessary), and I've already used it several times with great results. It integrates beautifully with mutt, too. Totally, totally recommended if you go the roll-your-own mail server
route.
February 26, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
FreakAngels
FreakAngels, the new weekly webcomic by Warren Ellis and Paul Duffield, is looking good. Check it out.
February 21, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Seems like we've been here before...yep.
Wow...great overview and link: Torture, Same As It Ever Was -- Powerful historical references, too: Some denied, on racial grounds, that Filipinos were owed the protective
limits of civilized warfare.
When, during the committee hearings, Senator Joseph Rawlins had asked General Robert Hughes whether the burning of Filipino homes by advancing U.S. troops was within the ordinary rules of civilized warfare,
Hughes had replied succinctly, These people are not civilized.
I wonder what we'll think of our mess in 100 years? Oh, heck...we're on Internet time now. I'll be fascinated to see what history makes of it in just a couple or three decades. Hopefully, I'll be alive to see it.
February 20, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Why telecomm immunity is a bad idea
I don't think I've seen a better explanation of the telecomm immunity issue than this from Brad Templeton (Chairman of the EFF): Whose call is it to say what's legal?. Thanks, Brad.
It's been difficult at times to watch the rhetoric here. When people say that you want the terrorists to win, or you'll make this country less safe in the context of this issue, it's (IMO) dangerous and unfair. As Brad makes so clear, we're not even talking (at this point) about terrorism, or surveillance...we're talking about the rule of law, and how we ensure that the checks and balances in our system of government endure. Legislating retroactive immunity for decisions like these is a really, REALLY bad idea.
February 19, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Welcome to 21st century webdev, Ken!
I've done web development off and on for a long time (1995 or so), and I've done a fairly good job of keeping up on the backend, I think. From CGI/perl to Zope to Apache, mod_python, and Django, dashes of AJAX, with side journeys into .NET/Mono, Rails, and even more exotic toolkits and frameworks. But I'll admit, I've been slow to pick up new tools on the desktop. In particular, for some bizarre reason, I've resisted using Firebug, the web development plugin for Firefox.
And boy, was that stupid! I finally bit the bullet
last night and installed the Firefox 3 beta and Firebug, and wow. I worked on some CSS tweaks for some of my pages today, and got more work done in two hours, with less effort, than probably the last 4 months! Awesome. This is a killer tool, and I'm so glad I finally trusted all the folks who give it a 5-star rating. Heck...you learn something new every day!
February 18, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Book recommendation: His Majesty's Dragon
I just finished His Majesty's Dragon
Recommended. It's apparently the author's first book as well, which impresses me. Her style is very light; doesn't get in the way of the story. It reminds me a bit of the Horatio Hornblower/Master and Commander stuff (the human protagonist is a British Navy Captain that ends up a dragon rider); she does a good job of exploring the era's military and class issues in way reminiscent of those books. But it ends up a fun and easy read with characters I like (even some who aren't that important to the plot...always a sign of a good author IMO).
Book 5 in the series, Victory of Eagles
February 18, 2008 permalink | Comments (2)
SF photo after earthquake of '06
Wow. Amazing high resolution Wikimedia photo of San Francisco after the 1906 earthquake. Amazing. Thanks to Radley Balko of The Agitator for the link!
February 15, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
AWS management drops the ball during failure
Another ball drop for old-school crisis management. Amazon's S3 service was down for a period of time this morning. Bad, REALLY bad. This knocked static file services offline for a HUGE number of web 2.0 sites. But the even worse thing (as noted by ZDNet ) is that as I'm writing this, 6+ hours after the situation was mostly resolved, there is NO acknowledgment of the issue on the AWS blog. Nada. Nothin'. Last post from 4 days ago.
Sure, there's a developer's forum thread that has been occasionally updated, and as always happens in these situations, they state "we're heads down on the problem; no time to chat!". But, um...that's not where J. Random Web 2.0 CTO is going to start when checking on things. This informational black hole is simply unacceptable today...it shows a high-level managerial misunderstanding of the nature of the interactivity that's expected today via our enhanced communication tools (blogging, micro blogs, SNSs, etc.)
There's no technical reason not to throw up a quick post..."stuff is broken, we're working on it. Updates to come." and updating it as you go along. (Heck, just cut-and-paste from ZDNet if you're unoriginal) Nothing except PHBs that don't like information leaving before it's tarted up, properly spun, and moved close to the smoke-and-mirror machine. I'm disappointed, Amazon. Not only does it show a lack of vision, it also allows other sources to get ahead of you in discussing the topic, and take control of the conversation. Which is what we're having about you...even though you're not participating. Funny...we just passed the 10 year anniversary of the The Cluetrain Manifesto
...and sometimes I wonder exactly how much has changed.
February 15, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Check out tor.com...they'll bribe you w/ books, even
Tor books is cranking up a new website at Tor.com, and they're giving away a book a week in PDF form as a promo. Go to tor.com and sign up, and you'll get email links for a Tor book a week until the launch. I just got Mistborn, by Brandon Sanderson, and next week's will be Old Man's War by John Scalzi (which I have in hardcover, and is a pretty good book). Great idea, Tor!
February 15, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
My very own Amazon store!
This is actually kind of jazzy...even beyond using referral codes, Amazon makes it pretty easy to create your own store
from your lists and such. Took about 15 minutes. It's no beauty, but what the heck...here's my Amazon aStore! (yes, a little sparse...I've got plenty of good picks to add, though).
February 9, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Bookmooch receipt: Fooled By Randomness
I am psyched...I just received Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets
And yes, I'm trying out my Amazon Associates referral thingie...if the pop-out thing is irritating, let me know. I'm back and forth on it; I don't actually need it to use the referral link. UPDATE: irritation, though cool, IMO. Took it out. Click through to make me my phat loot.
February 9, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
EFF sues over intrusive traveler searches
Civil Liberties Groups Sue Homeland Security for Records on Intrusive Questioning and Searches of U.S. Travelers -- I am 100% behind this, and very, very proud to be a card-carrying (and T-shirt wearing!) EFF member. Our government's irrational zeal to do whatever is necessary to keep us safe
has gone unchecked and unfettered for far too long. I really appreciate these organizations for stepping up to defend our liberties.
thanks to boingboing for the link
February 8, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
KAZ: Episode 24
Here is the blip.tv page (with embedded player; just click through to listen), and direct MP3 download link for the February 5th episode.
A quick chat on the primary elections today, and then a rant on my thoughts about Microsoft's Yahoo bid.
Links:
- SAI on a better way for Microsoft-Yahoo to work
- ma.gnolia (my links)
- Scroogled, by Cory Doctorow
February 5, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
For now, no machinima
I just want to go on record with this...I'm holding off on my machinima experimentation for now. I have some cool ideas...but I have too many cool ideas right now! Some coding, some blogging, some writing, and machinima to boot. The deciding factor is that all the others are, at their core, text, while machinima is going to require me to bootstrap an entire new tech kit of video, framework, movie direction, etc. It's something I'm excited to do, but I've got to dig in for now and move forward on something, vs. doing prep work on everything. Experience wins, for now.
But not for forever...maybe only six months or so. I've got plenty of machinima links (also at ma.gnolia), and I'm going to keep watching and adding to them. I'll be back!
February 4, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
One in a million: Magnatune
(A Million Flowers post)
Magnatune: To be honest, Magnatune probably should have been my first example, but I think I had Amie Street on the brain the other day. (that's not a crack against Amie Street, though...heck, I think I'll just shut up about this now. I like 'em both).
Magnatune is pretty much the poster child for doing EVERYTHING right in the music space...it's really an amazing label. Magnatune has from day 1 sold all music with no DRM, and they make every format imaginable available; MP3s of various qualities, FLAC, up to raw WAV duplicates of the master CD. You can choose and all of them. You can also re-download anything from your catalog if you need to (computer crash, etc.)...just make sure to give them your email address when purchasing, and they'll re-send you the download link at any time. It's like they trust you or something...
In fact, they do more than trust you. They ask a favor of you; they ask you to share your purchases with your buddies. Yep...Magnatune explicitly asks you to forward along your download email to 3 friends you think will like it! Crazy like a fox...I've had friends make purchases there based on my share, which is of course the point.
Magnatune certainly isn't a mainstream label, but I find that an advantage, to be honest. The founder (John Buckman) sells music he likes...classical, world, ambient, electronica, rock...there's a little bit for just about everyone, though you certainly won't find Britney Spears or The Beatles. (Which is good, imo.) And since you can stream every single song for free, you know what you're getting. Many people just use Magnatune's streams to find new artists and enjoy great background music. Find something there you like, click over to the artist's page, listen to your heart's content, then make the purchase!
Oh, that's right; I haven't even yet mentioned the payment model. For any album, you choose your own price! The range is (US) $5-18...and 50% of whatever you pay goes directly to the artist. You lose nothing by paying less other than karma...you gain nothing by paying more other than knowing that you're supporting a great label and an artist you like. I usually pay $8-10, depending on the length of the album, and how much I like it.
Give Magnatune a try...it's listings encourage exploration and discovery. I predict you'll find something you like.
There's a reason Magnatune is so cool...the founder, John Buckman is a really, really smart guy, with ethics to boot. Buckman sold Lyris (mailing list/email marketing software) several years back, and made his Internet fortune. Like many entrepreneurs, he couldn't stay out of the ring for long, but his ideas about the music industry and experiences with his wife releasing her own CD inspired him to start Magnatune. He hasn't stopped there, though...I also use his crazy-cool book swapping service Bookmooch, I read both his and his wife's blog (she's also awesome, and a very talented musician), and generally think the world of the guy. People like John Buckman inspire me to try great things. Thanks, John.
February 3, 2008 permalink | Comments (0)
Earlier posts -- Later posts
