Never been to the Pacific Northwest before; that situation shall be remedied.
Itinerary
Date Flight Routing Details
Thu Jul 03 99 Depart DENVER INTL (DEN) at 7:40 PM
Arrive in SEATTLE TACOMA WA (SEA) at 9:35 PM
Sun Jul 20 3338 Depart SEATTLE TACOMA WA (SEA) at 6:25 AM
Arrive in DENVER INTL (DEN) at 10:10 AM
I’ll be working remote during that time. Used vacation days: 0
w00t!
For the non-nerd readers of this blog out there, here is a glimpse of what it’s like to be a nerd — we are going nuts over seemingly inconsequential issues that normal people don’t even realize exist!
In our first episode, Val Henson complained about having to pay $15 for focus-follows-mouse (which I blogged about here).
Today, Stevey rants about f-f-m too.
Two smart people complaining about an obscure feature that most people have never heard of. What the heck is it?
Thanks to Stevey, we have an explanation which he thoughtfully typed so I don’t have to:
Focus-follows-mouse means that when you move the mouse cursor, the window under the cursor gets the keyboard focus. But saying that confuses Mac people who all assume that “focused” is synonymous with “foreground”, because that’s the way it works on the Mac.
[...]
Flavor #1: autofocus — in this flavor, reminiscent perhaps of a sweet juicy mandarin orange, the window under the mouse gets the keyboard focus but does not come to the front. This allows you to interact with a partially-obscured window. [without having to click in that window! --ed]
[...]
Flavor #2: autoraise — in this pungent flavor, somewhat evocative of a slightly overripe Durian fruit left in the tropical sun for about nine hours, moving the mouse into a new window automatically brings that window to the front. In the especially horrible default configuration, it comes to the front instantly
[...]
Many programmers feel that autofocus is delicate butterfly and autoraise is a big, stinky buffalo. That’s just how they feel about it.
Go read the rest of his blog if you want to read someone who is much funnier and smarter than I am.
By the way, the piece of software that Val found earlier, called MondoMouse, for which she paid $15, implements the big, stinky buffalo version of ffm (according to their website), not the delicious mandarin orange version. Blech.
Let me plug one of my new favorite web comics: Basic Instructions. Scott Meyer strikes the perfect balance of insight, wry dry humor, and wackiness that really appeals to me.
Maybe I need to use this image of his as my logo:
A quick followup to my previous post on India’s brain gain, here is the New Zealand points indicator that indicates whether they want you or not.
Your total score is 130
The points threshold you must meet to submit an Expression of Interest is 100.
Hey, why not…
‘Brain gain’ for India as elite return seems exciting at first. One might think “Oh good! People returning to their homeland is a good thing, right?”
I find the phenomenon sad and disturbing.
Sad because it means the United States is losing out in the global competition for brains, and smart immigrants are precisely the ones we, as a country, want to keep. In fact, it’s fundamentally what our country is built on, and is one huge factor that explains why our country is successful, whereas places with more restrictive immigration laws, like the European economic zone, are lagging. Even now, countries like New Zealand, etc. are realizing that a liberal immigration policy is essential for success.
Disturbing because of descriptions such as:
Now the decision to choose India is much easier. Jobs are plentiful and, armed with good salaries, the newly returned can cocoon themselves in gated Western-style ghettoes, which shut out any trace of the ever-present slums, squalor and poverty.
Far be it from me to dictate to others how they lead their lives, but I hope that the newly repatriated Indians are giving back to their communities and raising them up, rather than isolating themselves in their lush gated compounds.
Kinder, gentler Alex has been trying really hard not to be overtly mean-spirited lately, but this personals ad on craigslist really made my eyebrows go up:
I’m a 24 year old single mother of one two year old that I adore. I am not utterly unattractive, I have common sense, average body and weight, good job, good home life, and pretty well put together. I dont sound too crazy right?
Good so far.
I am 5′5, 180lbs., blue eyes, blonde hair, wear glasses, and smoke. If you can not handle these things thanks for stopping by and travel safe on your journey.
Come again?
I don’t buy into the societal anorexia so prevalent these days, but 5′5″ and 180 really doesn’t seem “average” to me. Maybe this person thinks she’s a an above-average driver too.
Pet theory of the day: nerdism begets more nerdism. Which is to say, people who dive deep into one subject matter, deeper than their peer group norm, tend to dive deep into all subjects. The simple and obvious explanation for this phenomenon is that deep divers are simply intellectually curious about, well, everything. This observation isn’t all that profound, but it is a nice lead-in to my favorite new blog http://ilovetypography.com/.
Yes, a blog about fonts. And I’m mclovin’ it.
That there are people out there who get as frustrated about typography mistakes as I do about computer mistakes makes me happy, and I demand that you read this link:
Ten typographic mistakes everyone makes:
typographic faux pas are not as potentially dangerous as grammatical fuckups – there’s little chance that using a period instead of an interpunct will obscure or confuse your meaning – but they are nevertheless wrong, at least for the time being. The large-type heading for each section contains an example of a typographic mistake; if you can see what’s wrong in each one before reading the explanation below, give yourself a pat on the back. Then examine your life priorities.
And you thought I was a nerd!
Scenes from an open source lab… at 10:30pm:
22:37:10 sutula: taggart: apt-get source cron ? :) 22:38:27 dannf: taggart: $() 22:38:40 andrew: my guess is that you need to escape them at least once. 22:38:48 taggart: dannf: I thought about using that, but didn't know how 22:38:51 achiang: doesn't anyone in this lab sleep? 22:39:18 taggart: dannf: I just do $(date +%Y%m%d) ? 22:39:28 taggart: achiang: the second shift is starting :P 22:39:32 dannf: taggart: yes, and you can put it in double quotes if you want 22:39:38 achiang: taggart: ooh, that's union talk! 22:40:00 andrew: still, if it is something really complicated -- as sutula says, a script is better 22:41:12 aw: achiang: we get to work on the fun stuff now 22:41:58 achiang: aw: ha, not me. i'm still dorking with kdump. :( 22:42:04 aw: euw 22:42:49 taggart: dannf: ok trying it, we'll see if it blows up the next time the cronjob runs 22:43:42 achiang: med_wfh: it's on my list of things TODO in my Copious Spare Time 22:44:07 med_wfh: heh. 22:44:24 * med_wfh is considerign sleeping in his copious spare time. been a longish day
For those keeping score at home, that’s 7 people up and doing work, at a company with a $116B market cap.
Ouch.
Charges Incurred While Roaming in New Zealand, ZZ Date: 02/17/2008 Time: 8:52 AM Type: INCOMING CL Minutes: 19 Airtime Charge: 43.51
Completely randomly, I saw a sweet band earlier this week called the Ian McFeron Band for $5 at a local venue. Actually, it was only $2.50, considering the $5 cover was for both bands that played that night. Well, really, it was $1.67 since there were 3 bands playing that night, but anyhow, we only stayed for two, so $2.50 seems accurate enough for me…
Anyhow, I spaced it while at the show and didn’t buy a CD ($10), but then realized I wanted their music. Out of force of habit, I checked the iTunes music store first, and then realized I would be purchasing a DRM encumbered piece of crap. Ugh, no thanks.
The next logical stop was Amazon. Whee, no DRM, and the price of the album was only $6.99 — $3 cheaper than iTunes. Success!
Oh waitaminute, am I screwing over a band I like? Well, arguably yes, since I didn’t just buy their CD at the show, but how about my attempt to remedy my earlier mistake? Should I just suck it up and buy from iTunes anyway?
Well, it turns out that both Amazon and iTunes pay out at the same rate. Nice. Everyone wins (except Apple, and they’ll soon figure it out, so yay for capitalism).
Here are some more links for your education:
And of course, check out the Ian McFeron Band — they’re great, and at $6.99 for an entire album, you’re not gonna lose.
