Blog Moved to ty.sarna.org

New Name,
New Look,
New Location,
New Content

(And if you are using RSS, you will also need to update your subscriptions)

AFS Interview

A while back I did an interview on AFS (the Andrew File System) with Emmanuel Dreyfus for Daemon News, which has now been published.

According to the Daemon News summary, "This rare glimpse, explains what you need to do to properly deploy AFS in most environments. You will discover the advantages of deploying AFS in lieu of NFS or CIFS (Samba) and it is actually an enjoyable read."

So read and enjoy!

Hiati

No... not Haiti. I mean Hiatuses, but I like my spelling better.

I stopped writing for a while, because most of my thoughts were about some "life changes", and some of them, like changing jobs, I couln't really talk about at the time. But, that's over, I start a new job in two weeks, and maybe it's time to start writing again. More about all of that later.

In the mean time, perhaps an end to another long hiatus:

From a CNN.com article:

TV rumors: 'ER' moving, 'Futurama' returning

[...]

There also was speculation that Fox was looking to resurrect the animated series "Futurama," from "The Simpsons" creator Matt Groening, on its Sunday lineup the same way that "Family Guy" was brought back last year. The network has an option for new episodes, which currently are being produced for Cartoon Network's Adult Swim late-night block.

[...]

You can hardly imagine my joy of the though of new episodes of Futurama!

"I'm never gonna get used to the 31st century. Caffineated bacon? Baconated grapefruit? Admiral Crunch?" - Fry

Clearing out my notebook

While I'm working on another post, I thought I'd post this item, some random notes about my 2004 election experience in Broward County, Florida, and the controversial e-voting in particular. Timely, I know, but I didn't have a blog for them at a time, and I've been saving this file since then waiting for a forum. Besides which, this is still an issue.

I've worked over the years a couple times with a guy who was a butcher in a former life, and let me tell you, nobody is more picky and suspicious about supermarket meat. Well, as someone who has worked in software for 18 years now, this is NOT an industry I want to trust elections to, unless EVERYTHING is available for scrutiny by the public. This industry cuts a lot of corners, especially when they can do so in secrecy, and security and reliability are usually the first to go. All of the designs, source code, etc. for these systems need to be public record before I will have much confidence in them.

Anyway, on to the notes. Not that there's any revelations here, just sharing data.

1) Parking was wholly inadequate. There were hundreds of cars parked illegally everywhere. I was prepared to cry voter intimidation if I got a parking ticket ;-) In spite of that, there was basically no line inside.

2) touch-screen voting machine UI did not appear Windows-based, and was unbelievably slow rendering text (like, Sun 3/50 prom console text rendering speed).

3) display was large, clear, and bright.

4) touchscreen was very poorly calibrated (.5" or more off), but the checkboxes were large and spaced far enough apart that I don't see anyone selecting the wrong thing by mistake, and the visual feedback was very clear.

5) So, overall, C+ on the input side of the voting machines

6) as for output, I have no way of knowing if my vote was recorded accurately, or even at all

7) The voting place was in a senior center, and they were holding a flea market type sale and selling Dunkin Donut's and coffee at a significant markup on the way out.

8) There was an elderly black woman waving a "W'04!" sign outside.

9) On the way to work, I noticed a 18-wheeler with spinner rims. Never seen that before...

Thought for today

If there was a drug that made your monitor larger, would it be called Diagra?

Nifty user interface devices

This guy seems to work on some really cool stuff!

The Multi-Touch Interaction Research video has been circulating a lot recently, but if you haven't seen it yet, do have a look.

Less widely circulating is the LED Touch Display movie, which demonstrates a neat mutli-touch-capable input device implemented solely using LEDs (as input devices, mind you!) Didn't know LEDs could be used as photodiodes? Well, neither did I...

Finally, Holodust is a fascinating true open-air 3D holographic display.

Step on no pets (especially pythons)

Pleased with the symmetry of the last Python Quine, I decided to try for a different kind of symmetry. Here is the first, as far as I know, bytewise palindromic python quine:


#"""
d='print \'\\n#\\"\\"\\"\\nd=%s\\nexec d\\n\\"\\"\\"\\nd cexe\\n%s=d\\n\\"\\"\\"
#\'%(`d`,\'\'.join([`d`[-x] for x in range(1,len(`d`)+1)]))'
exec d
"""
d cexe
'))])1+)`d`(nel,1(egnar ni x rof ]x-[`d`[(nioj.'\'\,`d`(%'\#"\\"\\"\\n\\d=s%n\\e
xec dn\\"\\"\\"\\n\\d cexen\\s%=dn\\"\\"\\"\\#n\\'\ tnirp'=d
"""#


(Note: it starts with a blank line)

A Python Quine (at least there is symmetry)

Several years ago now, I think, I ran into a webpage with a collection of Quines in different languages. The Python entry was rather disappointing -- too long and unoriginal. I've seen a number of better ones since, but at the time I was inspired to create one that was shorter and used a unique feature of the language. So without further ado:

'print `__doc__`;print __doc__'
print `__doc__`;print __doc__

It can be shortened 5 bytes by using a temporary variable:

'd=__doc__;print`d`;print d'
d=__doc__;print`d`;print d


However, this version is still almost twice as long as the shortest Python quine I know of. So I will stick with the original. It may not be the shortest, but at least there is symmetry.

And so it begins...

So, the Web is coming up on 15 years old this August. I've been on "the net" since before that meant the Internet, back in the days of UUCP. I once had a BITNET address. But I still had no web presence. I was, er, virtually nonexistant.

But PJE and others have inspired me, and now I have a blog.

It doesn't have a name. It doesn't have a graphic theme I like. It doesn't have a coherent vision of what its topic might be. But now it has a post. And you are reading it, so now it has an audience.

Hi!

So, having created an audience out of thin air for a blog with no name, no topic, and only one post... well, that's a lot for one day. Time to knock off.

I will leave you with this thought:

If the aliens are reading our email to learn more about humans, they must have come to the conclusion by now that earthlings are obsessed with the pursuit of pleasure. Further, they have learned about our three most popular forms of pleasure:

• Sex
• Drugs
• Mortgages

PMI-me-harder-ly yours,
Ty

(Tomorrow: A Python Quine)