The Blog of Harald

I’m not entirely sure what to think of this:

* [H]ard|Forum – Matrimony Mod

He built a computer to propose to his girlfriend; the case (and interior!) are decorated in a bridal theme. It’s actually pretty cool as a craft project, but a _computer_? I dunno…

I guess the important part is that she said yes :-)

As usual, “Chuq nails it”:http://www.plaidworks.com/chuqui/blog/001248.html:

bq. Why the US is heavily subsidizing sugar growers while artificially limiting access to global sugar to prop up prices, while at the same time planning to heavily spend on new programs to fight obesity, caused in at least way by too much sugar in the typical US diet?

This in response to a “plastic article”:http://www.plastic.com/article.html;sid=04/01/22/07233695 . It seems the WHO is trying to reduce world sugar consumption, as we learn that it is a contributor to obesity. The US response seems to be the same as their response to global warming: “There’s no evidence!”. William Steiger writes:

bq. that there is no robust evidence linking sugar consumption to rising obesity levels and that diet has to be a matter of personal choice. Steiger wrote ‘There is also an unsubstantiated focus on ‘good’ and ‘bad’ foods, and a conclusion that specific foods are linked to non-communicable diseases. The assertion that the heavy marketing of energy-dense foods or fast food outlets increases the risk of obesity is supported by almost no data.’

I always thought that this is exactly the kind of thing that governments should be meddling in. Sadly, people do need to be protected from themselves (with education, if nothing else), and goverments are in a unique position to do that. And, after all, the same governments tax revenue is paying all the health costs of obesity, so you think there’d be a bottom-line incentive too. (Well, ok, there is, but it involves re-election, not tax dollars.)

I guess I’d make a lousy libertarian :-)

“Extreme Tech”:http://www.extremetech.com/ recently published “a review of four Linux LiveCDs”:http://www.extremetech.com/print_article/0,3998,a=117223,00.asp, which was linked to by “slashdot”:http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/01/25/0340221.

The distributions were:

* “Knoppix”:http://www.knoppix.com/ – daddy of ’em all
* “Feather Linux”:http://featherlinux.berlios.de/ – very small, light, and minimalist.
* “Gnoppix”:http://www.gnoppix.org/ Gnome-only version of Knoppix (which is KDE-based).
* “Mepis”:http://www.mepis.org/

The reviewers liked Knoppix best, with Mepis a close second. They had trouble with Gnoppix (and I have to agree; I did too when I tried it), and Feather is too minimalist for casual users (but might be great for power users).

I cary a Knoppix live-CD around with me, and I’ve used it for a couple of emergency rescues already, as well as for repartitioning an evil Win2K box a while back.

The slashdot comments add pointers to others:

* “Damn Small Linux”:http://www.damnsmalllinux.org/ it’s specialty is to fit on a 50mb business card CD.
* “MandrakeMove”:http://www.mandrakesoft.com/products/mandrakemove/ implements USB keys for storing configuration and profiles, so that you can quickly turn any bootable PC into your personal desktop.
* And of course: “Linux Live”:http://www.linux-live.org/ allows you to create a LiveCD from any linux distribution…

I might make a DSL business card CD, just for the fun of it…

I find toilets that flush themselves very annoying. I suppose it’s good when you work with inconsiderate louts that are incapable of flushing for themselves, but my experience with them is that they flush when I don’t want them to, a cold experience…

Automatic faucets, on the other hand, are good; there’s a sanitation advantage, in that you don’t have to touch dirty tap handles with your freshly cleaned hands. They’re much better than the old push-button, temporary flow kind. Those old ones accomplished the goal of saving water, at the expense of convenience.

Anyway, we have yet another new WC innovation: waterless urinals. Even better, it’s a very simple, low maintenance design, with no moving parts…

Falcon WaterFree Technologies | How does it work?

Health – canada.com network

bq. New research suggests that the human form of mad cow disease is a lot more complicated than originally thought, and, potentially, much scarier.

bq. Scientists have long agreed that eating cattle tissue infected with bovine spongiform encephalopathy – mad cow disease – can cause the human form of the disease, known as variant Creutzfeld-Jacob disease.

bq. But recent animal tests indicate that eating infected beef may also cause another form of the disease, classical CJD, forcing scientists to re-examine assumptions about the nature of the deadly disease and raising fears that it may be more widespread than previously thought.

bq. The accepted wisdom has been that classical CJD has nothing to do with mad cows. It affects older people, those over 55, and generally occurs spontaneously at the rate of about one person per million per year.

bq. It has been confused with Alzheimer’s disease and there is some concern that because of misdiagnosis, it may be more widespread than the confirmed numbers indicate.

CJD may be going undetected because budget cutbacks mean fewer autopsies, and in many cases that’s the only way to diagnose CJD. Still, I think you’re more likely to get hit by a beef delivery truck than contract CJD from beef, at least here…

Ignore fad diets. Weight loss is a simple concept: Eat Less, Exercise More.

Yahoo! News – Study Tells Overweight Adults to Walk

bq. Participants who got no exercise during the eight-month study gained an average of almost 2.5 pounds. But 73 percent of those who briskly walked 11 miles a week, or about 30 minutes a day, were able to maintain their weight or even lose a few pounds.

bq. The study […] involved 120 overweight or mildly obese adults who were instructed not to diet during the research.

bq. The study confirms that exercise without cutting calories is not the most effective way to lose weight, said Dr. Samuel Klein, director of the Center for Human Nutrition at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

bq. But demonstrating that small amounts of exercise alone can prevent weight gain is significant, given the nation’s growing obesity epidemic, Klein said.

It is reassuring to know that if you really are a couch potato, you’re hosed; while even a little exercise (such as lunchtime walks, or the walk to/from commuter transit) can make a difference…

(via “Teal Sunglasses”:http://www.plaidworks.com/chuqui/blog/001212.html)

A couple of good packages for monitoring the disk space usage on your computer.

JDiskReport:http://www.jgoodies.com/freeware/jdiskreport/ creates pie and ring charts of space usage, and lets you navigate up and down through the directory hierarchy, looking at the relative sizes of files and directories.

“SpaceMonger”:http://www.werkema.com/software/spacemonger.html has an interesting interface. Each file or folder on a given drive is displayed in a box in the main window whose size is a relative comparison to all the other files in your system.

I find both displays useful, for different reasons. SpaceMonger is a better “at-a-glance” tool, but the display can sometimes be cluttered and confusing; it’s hard to tell what level of the filesystem things are at, sometimes. JDiskReport has some useful reports, like the Top 100 and size histograms, but only lets you see detail on one level at a time.

Anyway, I use them both; I thought I’d share…

I think the Martian Planetary Defense Forces sent out the infantry this time:

Scientific American: Mars Rover Stops Sending Data

The Mars Planetary Defense Forces are winning, “20:16”:http://www.bio.aps.anl.gov/~dgore/marsscorecard.html …

Ok, it’s -22°C right now, colder than it was before sunrise. This is getting silly…

I’m working from home today. After last night’s ugly commute, I couldn’t face another day of slippery conditions and idiot drivers. The plows have been by, but it’s so cold that the salt we normally dump on the roads isn’t working. They’re trying sand, but they’re only really doing the highways right now; city streets (especially side streets) are treacherous.

Anyway, it’s cold. I’m sitting in my dining room, with the bulk of the house to my left and a window to my right. I’m pretty sure there’s a 3-4° temperature differential on opposite sides of my body right now…

Fortunately my laptop is keeping my hands warm. I knew all that excess heat would eventually come in handy!

So it snowed all day yesterday. Not a whole lot (between 5 and 10 cm), but it was also cold (around -15°C), so the usual remedy of salting the roads wasn’t working. Apparently I wasn’t paying attention to the weather forecast, because if I had known, I would have stayed home.

It took me an hour to get from work (well, the CNE grounds) to Thorncliffe. That’s almost 16 km/h. Then it took me 30 minutes to get to Lawrence; that’s about 6 km/h. Then it took another 45 minutes to get to the school; less than 3 km/h. No accidents or anything; just traffic volume, slippery roads, and small hills. I felt like I was in Zeno’s paradox; the closer I was to my destination, the slower I was driving…

There were the usual idiots pretending that their SUVs made them invulnerable; passing on the right (in the snow banks), trying (and sometimes failing :-) to corner at speed, tailgating, and similar stupidity. I drove slowly and carefully, and let all of the stupid people get _way_ ahead of me.

The staff at the school were very nice. Apparently so few people actually _call_ when they’re delayed that those of us who _do_ call are treated well :-)

My wife and I are sitting downstairs in front of the TV. We’re watching CSI off tape (no TIVO here yet), and working on our laptops. I come across this amusing article on Rands In Repose: N.A.D.D. (Nerd Attention Deficiency Disorder), in which I read:

bq. The presence of NADD in your life is directly related to how you’ve dealt with the media deluge of the new millennium. You’ve likely gone one of three ways:

bq. 3) You enjoy the content fire hose. Give me tabbed browsing, tabbed instant messaging, music all the time, and TIVO TIVO TIVO. Welcome to NADD.

Sounds like us, eh? So earlier he writes:

bq. Stop reading right now and take a look at your desktop. How many things are you doing right now in addition to reading this column?

So I check (webmail, reading blogs, writing my blog, ICQ and Jabber). I was reading parts of the article to Michaéla ,and she ‘fessed up: 12 windows! 3 email, 2 MS word documents, a file browser, 2 different versions of the same powerpoint file, Google, and a pop-up ad, MS clip-art, and an online clipart page. All dedicated to the same project, but still a busy desktop.

Now the clincher:

bq. Here’s a tip: If the building you are currently in is burning to the ground, go find the person with NADD on your floor. Not only will they know where the fire escape is, they’ll probably have some helpful tips about how to avoid smoke inhalation as well likely probabilities regarding the likelihood you’ll survive.

The prosecution rests; we’re afflicted….

So the week before Christmas I drove once and took the subway once, and did a hybrid once (I drove down with my wife, then hopped the streetcar over to the office). It was about 40 minutes to drive; the expected 1:20 on the TTC.

This week I’m picking up the kids, so I leave the house around 7:15, and leave work by 16:20 or so. Commute times (door to door, where the afternoon door is Bayview Glen) were:

| |_ Morning |_ Evening |
| Monday | 1 hour | 20 minutes |
| Tuesday | 30 minutes | 35 minutes |
| Wednesday | 40 minutes | unknown |
| Thursday | 45 minutes | 30 minutes |
| Friday | 35 minutes | 35 minutes |

Hardly a large sample set, but it is supporting my hypothesis that driving is much faster than TTC. Sure it’s expensive, and environmentally sucks rotten eggs. But I’d rather spend extra time with my family…

Maybe I’ll pick one day a week to TTC, so that I can get some reading done. :-)

Spaceflight Now | Breaking News | Space station’s mystery leak may be resolved

bq. Space station commander Michael Foale today found a braided flexible hose with an apparent leak in it that may explain the slight loss of air pressure station engineers have been struggling to resolve over the past week.

bq. The hose is part of a system that evacuates air between two of the six panes making up an optically-clear window in the U.S. Destiny laboratory module.

Once they switched off equipment in the Destiny lab, they could apparently hear the leak…

In Marshall Brain’s Blog, we see that Marshall spent 11 hours and 20 minutes fixing and dealing with computer problems in the month of December. I remember reading this and thinking that it sounded about normal.

Today, I went downstairs to discover my old laptop had blue-screened. It turns out that there’s a bad block in the _directory_ WINNT\SYSTEM32\CONFIG. Now the system cannot boot. (The brain-dead recovery process on the Win2K install disk can’t fix this, because this is apparently the directory it looks for when locating a system to repair :-)

Fortunately, I was planning on scraping that system anyway; the cable connecting the screen to the base has an intermittent fault, and the power switch is broken. I was going to take it back to Acer to get those fixed, then re-install. So I had most of my important data backed up already.

But the one thing I was still using that computer for was Quicken…

I tried installing Quicken on a different computer today, but it wouldn’t go. My guess is that I’m triggering anti-piracy code; activation requires connecting to a license server on the Internet, which is probably refusing to activate because those codes are already in use on another system. Of course, Intuit’s tech support is closed on Sundays…

If this continues, I’ll be over 11:20 by the end of the month :-) But I have to agree with Marshall; why does it always have to be this difficult?

In The Space Station has a leak… Chuq writes:

bq. Can we just admit [ISS] was a complete and absolute mistake, cut our losses, and hope it doesn’t hit someone when it falls out of orbit and lands somewhere? The Space station isn’t a scientific expedition, but a political one, and one aimed more at pork barrel funding than scientific advances.

Sadly, I’m beginning to adopt this opinion myself. ISS-the-dream was really cool; ISS-the-reality, not so much. The program has been cut back too far; there really isn’t much useful science being done, and I suspect much of it could be done more cheaply in other forms. Short duration experiments were working just fine in the Shuttle microgravity missions. Our robotics are getting good enough that many other experiments could be launched in small, un-manned capsules.

I’m just thinking off the top of my head here. I think a manned presence in space is important; but maybe it’s time to separate _that_ from space science, and do each one separately in a slightly more cost-effective manner…

In a wide ranging discussion about Genesis, M. comes up with:

bq. that doesn’t mean God didn’t _create_ gravity, it just means He didn’t _document_ it!

My friend “Greg”:http://www.third-bit.com/~gvwilson/blog/ tells me that there is actually a simple way to detect small leaks in space structures. Google tells me that the station even has one: “a portable mass spectrometer”:http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/2001/mini.html. This can be used to detect gas leaks with larger holes, but can also be used to detect extremely slow leaks like the one “I mentioned earlier”:. As humidified air leaks out, water ice forms on the surface of the station close to the leak; the spectrometer can easily detect that ice, pinpointing the leak.

There’s also a trick: “watching the station’s orientation”:http://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol35/vol35n3/articles/AirLeaks.html that can be used to detect relatively small leaks (any outgassing will act as a rocket, changing the station’s position in space; by monitoring that position, leaks can be pinpointed).

There are others; google has zillions of links…

In “Challenge to Open Source”:http://www.ftponline.com/weblogger/forum.aspx?ID=1&DATE=12/10/2003, Jim Fawcette writes:

bq. I was originally excited by the idea of open source, collaborative development. But the direction open source is headed seems like a waste. Creating clones of commercial software isn’t impressive creatively. But more importantly, what does it contribute? Why would anyone with excellent computer skills want to work long hours to create code so that millionaire executives at IBM can use it to sell expensive mainframe computers and middleware with six-figure licenses? All for no compensation and little recognition.

I found this perspective interesting and amusing, and there are many areas where it applies. There are organisations that extensively use open source without “giving back” to the community. There are others that aggressively release projects as open source, even when they don’t have to and don’t gain any (tangible) benefits.

I don’t think IBM is fair game in this case. The article is missing a critical piece: all of the coding that is done by IBM employees (and those of other large organisations), which is then released as open source. The obvious example is Eclipse, which represents thousands of man hours of development paid for by IBM, and is now available to any software developer. I’m sure there are many others.

“Chuq has a rebuttal”:http://www.plaidworks.com/chuqui/blog/001141.html that is worth reading too.

Now this is a _cool_ practical joke.

Friends foil Olympia man’s home

bq. nearly everything else in Chris Kirk’s downtown Olympia apartment was encased in aluminum foil when he returned home Monday night from a trip to Los Angeles.

bq. The walls, ceiling, cabinets and everything in between now shimmer with a metallic glow, thanks to a prank by Kirk’s longtime friend, Olympia native Luke Trerice.

They foiled the walls, the furniture, the stuff on the furniture, the bookshelves, the _books_, all the kitchen appliances; basically everything except for a single book (Penn & Teller’s Cruel Tricks for Dear Friends), a picture of his girlfriend, the bed, and a bath mat. They even _individually_ wrapped his loose change.

Amazing attention to detail:

bq. Trerice and his friends unrolled the toilet paper in the bathroom, enveloped the bath tissue in aluminum foil and rolled it back up again. They covered Kirk’s book and compact disc collections but made sure each CD case could open and shut normally.

All of the enfoiled kitchen appliances still work…