Tuesday 1 April 2008 @9:28
A short video (1:22) of me venting my frustrations about email formats:
Transcript: In the old days, email was always plain text. And hard-core techies like me liked it that way.
Grudgingly, we came to accept HTML email. With hypertext markup, you can have bold-face, fonts, images.
But this is still okay because you can resize the text if you need to, the text is searchable, and Apple Mail on Leopard even recognizes dates and integrates well with the calendar program.
Where I have to draw the line is emails where the entire message is an image. It’s extremely common in our institution to create a full-page flier and then distribute it via email as an image. It doesn’t resize. It’s not searchable. The dates are not recognized. The MIME standard for multimedia email allows for plain-text alternatives in this case, but they are rarely available.
Here’s an even more egregious example, about the availability of our schedule of classes online. The link is blue. It’s underlined. But it’s not clickable. I can’t even copy and paste. I have to type it in from sight.
Just say no to image-based email. (And nevermind the inconsistency of distributing a 4 MB flash applet to demonstrate this simple point! At least I provided a plain text alternative.)
Tuesday 18 March 2008 @23:38
Here’s my synthesized rendition (recorded using my Yamaha digital piano as a MIDI controller into Apple GarageBand on my MacBook Pro) of the first movement of Vivaldi’s concerto grosso in D minor (opus 3, number 11).
Or download vivaldi-cto-11-1.mp3 (possibly by right-clicking). It’s just under 5 minutes and 5 megabytes.
Wednesday 27 February 2008 @11:14
Seems unlikely, but who am I to argue with the algorithm?
Dear Amazon.com Customer,
We’ve noticed that customers who have purchased or rated Computers & Typesetting, Volume B: TeX: The Program (Computers and Typesetting, Vol B) by Donald E. Knuth have also purchased Learning Microsoft Publisher 2007 Student Edition by Faithe Wempen. For this reason, you might like to know that Learning Microsoft Publisher 2007 Student Edition will be released on March 11, 2008. You can pre-order yours by following the link below.
Friday 13 July 2007 @8:45
Somehow we got hooked on the Discovery Channel show Man vs. Wild, where former UK special forces soldier Bear Grylls parachutes into some god-forsaken landscape with just a knife and a windbreaker, and demonstrates how to survive for several days and find civilization again. Along the way, he ingests unspeakable things and gets himself in more trouble than needed — knowingly jumping breast-deep into quick sand, for example — ostensibly to instruct us on how to get out.
It’s a little hard to explain my fascination. I can tell just from the adverts that I’m not the expected target audience. But I think it stimulates some deep-seated survival instinct that we all must have. (And if this effete urbanite has any interest in survival under such conditions, then it must be innate.)
I sense a certain connection to another of my unlikely interests: dystopian literature and film. I am fascinated by the various ways healthy societies collapse, and what it takes to navigate the new world order. Bear’s adventures end the moment he finds a paved road, but I’m much more interested in what would happen when there’s no reasonable civilization to return to. If you can never again be certain of getting your next meal from a supermarket or restaurant, what then? How to organize a new society, and possibly a resistance, whilst surviving in the jungle?
Perhaps these questions are beyond the scope of the show, and the only question needed to explain our fascination is this: When will the Etonian hottie take off his shirt?
There’s also a sense in which I’m waiting for him to fail. Just once, one of his ballsy maneuvers should land him in enough trouble that he needs an airlift. For the sake of realism, of course, not Schadenfreude…
Friday 29 June 2007 @14:06
[In response to a post about Obsession and Pizza…]
There’s a funny story about pizza in NYC: at some point last century, it became known that “Ray’s Pizza” was the best place in the city. This meme became so prevalent that over the intervening decades literally dozens of independent establishments opened and named themselves Ray’s, followed by variations like “Original Ray’s” and “Famous Ray’s” and so on. I’m not sure anyone knows for certain how this meme started, or whether any of the eponymous restaurants is its genesis.
As far as I can tell, none of them is particularly inspired, but they’re certainly abundant.
Monday 14 May 2007 @13:00
The spring semester has wrapped, the grades are in, commencement was last Thursday. I’m still in that transition period between the frenetic end of a semester and the calm agenda of the summer. Maybe one thing preventing me from moving on is the pile of 4000 alumni surveys in my office, waiting to be sent out. I’m putting together a gaggle of student assistants later in the week to stuff envelopes. All in the line of duty (as chair of the outcomes assessment committee).
In late April, I gave another instance of my song-and-dance for non-majors, the presentation that I like to call “Adventures in computing.” In this case, it was part of “The College Project,” in which we invite a group of talented high school students onto campus once a week throughout the spring, to interface with professors in different fields. The idea isn’t explicitly to recruit them to LIU, but just to turn them on to higher education in general.
My presentation is just about 1.5 interactive hours (with props!) to convey a flavor of what computing is all about, and some of the “big ideas” that have come from it. Posted here are the slides and three handouts I used.
Friday 16 March 2007 @10:27
I’m a latecomer to this fad, but here’s my entry into the transparent screen phenomenon that was all the rage. It’s far from perfect. But it’s true that the final image is not a composite; photoshop trickery is needed only to create the desktop background image. And even that was fairly simple-minded in my case, because I don’t know how to use any of the perspective tools in Gimp. 
This reminds me: I can’t stand when someone observes an act of amateur creativity and says “he has too much time on his hands.” I guess it reflects the Protestant work ethic: idle hands are the devil’s tools and all that. But in my estimation, it tends to be said by people who spend much of their leisure time parked in front of the boob tube. Who are you to judge that reruns of Friends are more worthwhile than making an Earth sandwich? Personally, I want to live in a world where everyone has the time and inclination to pursue whatever creative outlets strike their fancy.
Thursday 15 March 2007 @8:18
My surname is a common noun, but an uncommon name. So I expect some false hits in my Google space, such as a page for one Christopher Williams — a Welsh football/soccer player — that lists “Christopher’s League Stats.”
But here are some uncanny clips I found via Google this morning:
Christopher League is something I love and look forward to throughout the week.
Aw, thanks… is that from one of my students maybe? Just don’t turn into a stalker!
Christopher League has become such an important part of my life and I look forward to the years to come.
Uh, okay. You turned into a stalker.
There is no better legacy that I can think of than to take the Christopher League to new venues to allow others to experience the thrills, joy and elation…
Woah, that’s spooky. I’m happy to provide thrills, joy, and elation, but what’s with the definite article in front of my name?
Last Saturday I went to the baseball field to begin a new season of Christopher League.
Okay, now I’m seriously confused. When did this become about sports?
The Christopher League is a baseball program for disabled children and is run in conjunction with NYO’s youth baseball program on a “buddy system.”
Ah, got it! NYO is the Northside Youth Organization in Atlanta, Georgia. Presumably, their Christopher League co-opts the name to honor an early participant…?
Anyway, I’m proud to have this organization as a namesake. Somewhere, I’m sure there’s an unfortunate woman with the name Megan Law.
Thursday 15 February 2007 @18:40
Follow-up about BitTorrent: at some point, I read the FAQ and found that for BT to work correctly, one needs to forward ports to overcome the Network Address Translation done by the router. (Would have been easy except that I forgot my router config password and had to reset it.) But after doing that, the number of peers increased significantly, and with it both upload and download rates. That’s more like it!
In my email the other day, I received a message with an image claiming that:
Wow, sounds great, I thought. Where was this when I was doing my thesis research? So is it based on the lambda calculus? I read on:
Ah, that kind of ‘type system’. Come to think of it, the message was from myfonts.com…
Monday 8 January 2007 @17:33
Ah, the League family tree. One of my father’s hobbies is genealogical research. Sometime back I posted about how I am a descendant of King William I, via my mother’s side of the family. Of course, that and $4 will get you a cup of coffee, as they say.
Anyway, the crimes of royals are well-documented, but my father’s side of the family is more… shall we say… colorful? He spent an industrious day at the Maryland state archives last week, browsing police records from South Baltimore during the years 1867–1902. In only 4 hours of research, and looking at a relatively narrow time period and geographical bounds, here’s what they found. Everything below is quoted from my father, so when he says ‘grandfather’, add a ‘great-’ to get relations relative to me.
- Edward League Nov 27, 1895 7:18 PM Disorderly conduct. Fined $1.00.
(I am not sure who this was. I have no record of him in my database. He could be in my database under a different given name. However, I suspect that he is related to us, because he was a League from South Baltimore and every other League I have ever found in South Baltimore is related to us).
- John League (age 33) August 30, 1895 5:15 PM Assaulting with the intent to commit rape on Lizzie Kreamer age 8 years. Released to court.
(This was my Grandfather League’s cousin).
- August Geisler (age 23) Jan 26, 1893 9:34 PM Disturbing public worship. Fined $10.00 and court costs. Committed. Released the next day. In other words, he slept it off in the tanker.
(This was my Grandmother League’s uncle).
- George Geisler (age 19) Oct 24, 1893 being on B&O cars without authorization. Fined $0.50, plus court costs of $1.70.
(This was my Grandmother League’s uncle).
- Thomas League (age 19) Sept 21, 1895 12:40 AM Disorderly conduct.
(This was my Grandfather League’s older brother).
- Thomas League (age 33) Sept 25, 1881 Disturbing the peace, using loud and profane language on the streets. Committed and afterwards released on bail to keep the peace and pay costs of $1.95.
(This was my Great Grandfather)
- George (age 43) & Annie (age 17) Geisler, July 28, 1881. Assaulting and beating Elizabeth Faulk. Each released for court.
(This was, most-likely, my Grandmother League’s Grandfather and Aunt. It could have been her Uncle George instead of her Grandfather, but Uncle George was only 7-8 years old at the time, so I suspect it was his father, George).
- John J. League (age 51 ) May 28/29, 1887 Larceny of three ducks valued at $0.45. Property of Jos Grimm of 611 Light Street. Committed for court. Note: John lived at 317 Light Street. So, after he took the ducks, he didn’t have to walk too far to get home.)
(This was my Grandfather League’s Uncle).
- George H. League (age 23) June 22/23. 1887 Selling a hired wagon, valued at $40.00 with intent to defraud the owner, William Robinson. Committed for court.
(This guy was a very distant relative. Thank goodness, I would not want his actions to besmirch our good name.)
- William League (age 22) Jul 14, 1887 4:00 PM hauling offensive matter through the streets in an open cart. Released for hearing.
(This was my Grandfather League’s cousin)
- James League (age 27) Jul 1887 Disturbing the public peace. Fined $1.00 and released.
(I think this guy was only a distant relative).
- Louis H. Bennett (age 39) Nov 12, 1902 Disturbing the peace at 308 S. Hamburg Street. Complainant John J. League. Charges dismissed.
(Louis Bennett and John J. League were brothers-in-law. Louis was married to John’s sister Catherine. Both of these guys were my Grandfather League’s uncles. By the way, they lived together with their families at this address).
- Thomas League (age 17) Oct 6, 1893 1:27 AM Burglariously entering the store of Samuel Gross at 316 Light Street with the intent to steal. Committed for court. On Oct 17th, he was sentence to 60 days in the house of corrections.
(This was my Grandfather League’s older brother. By the way, at the time of the attempted robbery, he lived at 317 Light Street, which was right across the street from the store he tried to rob.)
- Walter Bennett (age 15) Dec 6, 1893 being on B&O cars without authorization, committed to 30 days in the house of corrections.
(This was my Grandfather League’s cousin).
Filed under
fun
Monday 1 January 2007 @11:41
The holidays were good this year. The fridge is packed with food from last night’s fest. My head is still a little cloudy. I have a stack of new books to read, a new digital SLR camera — maybe I can start posting new photos here more regularly — and several interesting projects to work on before classes begin again in two weeks.
One is the final draft of our paper on type-based compression of XML. It was accepted, so I’ll be going to Utah in March to present. One review in particular was extremely helpful, and I’m looking forward to studying what he/she wrote more closely, and chasing some more references.
I’ll be submitting my tenure portfolio in the Fall of this year. Hard to believe I’m in year 5 already. This past semester was busy as hell — good in some ways, and frustrating in others. There are a few unfinished administrative things — “open loops” in David’s jargon — that are nagging at me. Hopefully I can knock them out of the way and they don’t interfere with the more interesting projects.
And let’s hope that “Web 2.0” (among other things) inspires more students to come back to computing in ’07.
Friday 15 September 2006 @19:04
By the way, the iPod-in-car setup is working out great for the commute. I love having what is essentially a portable TiVo for public radio.
Of all the shows I’m listening to lately, the highlight has definitely been Radio Lab. It appears to have been a limited run series, with just two seasons of a half dozen shows each. But it’s really brilliant. Dear Jad, make more!
I’m afraid if I were to try to describe it, I’d have a hard time distinguishing it from This American Life (“each week we have a theme…”). TAL is usually pretty good too, but Radio Lab is something altogether different. The image of a goat perched on top of a cow on the side of a California highway is still with me. [Detective Stories, aired 14 April 2006]
Another honorable mention is BBC’s Digital Planet, which is just technology news (and not particularly technical) but Gareth Mitchell is fun and easy on the ears.
Filed under
fun
Friday 4 August 2006 @14:42
Two new toys for my commute! About a month ago I bought a Panasonic car stereo from Crutchfield. It supports MP3 CD-RWs, an auxiliary audio input, and an iPod connector. Installing it was fairly simple; they give you a wiring harness and bracket that fits your particular car model. I had to take the entire dashboard off though, which was a challenge. My other half had no faith that we’d ever again have a stereo in the car; it’s probably good he didn’t see it completely disassembled.
Unfortunately, the CD-RW support is limited to MP3 (and WMA, but who cares?) and my primary formats for my music library are MP4/AAC and FLAC. I wasn’t sure when I bought it whether I would create CD-RWs with extended playlists, or whether I would get an iPod. Art already has an iPod mini, so that’s good for our trips together. But I needed something for my commute too.
So this week I obtained the video iPod. It connects to the stereo through the data port at the bottom, so the car actually recharges the iPod while you’re driving, and you control the entire thing through the stereo panel, so the iPod itself can stay hidden.
Music is great and all, but I think primarily during my commute I like to listen to talk radio or radio documentaries… in short, NPR. But I can’t always count on shows and segments I want to listen to during the hours I commute (which vary greatly every day). So now I’m subscribed to lots of public-radio podcasts from NPR, BBC, and other such affiliates. There are a few independent podcasters thrown in, we’ll see how they fare in comparison.
Essentially, this is like having a Tivo for public radio in the car. I can time-shift my favorite programs, pause them when I need to pay attention to traffic, etc. Pretty great. Here’s the subscription list, for now:
- WNYC: Brian Lehrer
- I pretty much stay glued to this if I happen to be driving in between 10 and 12.
- WNYC: Radio Lab
- Hardly ever heard this before, but might be interesting.
- WNYC: On the Media
- Often managed to catch this on the weekends; usually very good.
- PRI: Studio 360
- Also catch this occasionally on weekends
- NPR: Engines of our Ingenuity
- BBC: Digital Planet
- Listened to this on the way in today; seems good for current tech news.
- This week in science
- An independent podcast, seems worthwhile.
- CBC Radio 3 Podcast
- Yes, there’s music here too: this one looks at new Canadian bands.
- NPR: All Songs Considered
- APM: Speaking of Faith
- Yes, I’m an atheist, but this is an incredibly thoughtful and enlightening show, that normally airs on WNYC at 7 in the morning on Saturday. I suspect it plays only on NPR affiliates, and not on traditional Christian/Family radio. Sigh.
So that’s the line-up for now. I may try to add more independent podcasts — something on teaching and learning may be nice — but unfortunately I think the lower the ‘production value’ the more likely it is that my attention will drift away.
Thursday 15 June 2006 @19:19
Nothing that new or amazing, but fun all the same: the church sign generator. Found via god hates shrimp.
link
