p.s. When is the new season starting anyway?

p.s. I just noticed some links breaking on my site... any ideas what the hell is up?

Capoeira + Soccer @Rio = HOT.

One sight at [Bjorn] Stroustrup's face is enough to understand, that C++ much more successful then other languages.

Not the law is clear? There is a beard - there is a success. There is no beard - you are guilty.

Eifell, Scheme, Cecil, Haskell, Erlang - great languages, but no one except profs are working with them

The "catch" is in moustaches. Perl is the one more language widespread almost as the BASIC and having almost same bad glory. It has written Larri Wall. Look what moustaches he has.

The authors of others script languages have no moustaches. Ruby and the Python is better, than Perl, but meet where less often than Perl. There is, however, a hope for Van Rossum, suddenly will grow a beard. It is not necessary to count on Mr. Matsumoto - at Japanese the beard grows badly.

Could it be that the actual connection is between personal hygiene and nerdiness?

p.s. The follow up article can be found here

Ever had a boss or peer who types with two fingers? Has that ever bothered you a little? Do you have a boss or peer that thinks they're all that because they can type a gazilion words per second? Do you think you're faster than them?

Now you can solve all of your problems with one site. Give your annoying single-finger-typer the gift of speed typing, prove to your peers that you are the fastest typer west of the Nile. Take the challenge, I did.

Looks like type racer is based on open social which means you're going to see this on almost every social network you can imagine (think Facebook, orkut, igoogle, etc.)

I'm loving this game, and it's a healthy workout. The should have a "calories burnt" next to the wpm counter... that would be awesome.

PicLens instantly transforms your browser into a full-screen, 3D experience for viewing images on the web. Photos will come to life via a cinematic presentation that goes well beyond the confines of the traditional browser window. With PicLens, browsing and viewing images on the web will never be the same again.

I was basically told to download the software and search for Jessica Alba on Google... of course I kicked it up a notch and searched for Bar Refaeli... this really deserves a wow....

Google just released this new AJAX API for translating and detecting languages on the fly, something I like to call GLoco-lize. I think this is a great tool and I think Google really did it up. They are currently in version 1 of the API and I'm sure that with the communities help most issues will be resolved, and new innovative features should be present by version 2.

So I thought this was a really cool feature to add to the blog, and decided to implement it. Overall I think it took me about 2 hours to plug everything in, style and tailor it to blog.a.lish standards. It's relatively easy to use but I did run into a couple of bugs and a few expected limitations while implementing this:

• There is a limit on the size of request you can make. I didn't find anything on GLoco-lize so I'm currently limiting the translated string to 1000 characters so you really only get a partial translation.
• The support for Portuguese, which is kind of important to me, does not work! Even though they did say it works and the sample page includes it, it didn't work for me.
• HTML support is not great, URL's are sometimes translated... ughh. So for now, I'm stripping out the HTML tags.

So I now officially support Spanish (es), French (fr), Italian (it), and German (de) but only for Jacobooie. Should I add Japanese support just for the hell of it? It's only a flag away.

It's still down... I have it down for over 10 minutes now... awkward.

Sources:
http://www.tiobe.com/tpci.htm
http://www.dedasys.com/articles/language_popularity.html

I'm sure there are millions of other players in the search-o-sphere, but none that seem as nice as Search Me. The new Visual Search paradigm seems like the way to go now that people have better internet connections. I have to admit I have my doubts about how fast and effective this tool will actually work (they're in private beta right now, still waiting for an email from them...) but I'm excited to see smaller players get up in MSFT, Yahoo!, and Goog's faces and basically force them to innovate this field.

I realize this is a press release, but the voice over is quite annoying... IMHO.

baaah baaah

Imagine what he could get for $0.03... it blows my mind.

[He] would have a hard time imagining hiring a programmer who was still on Windows for 37signals [his company]. If you don't care enough about your tools to get the best, your burden of proof just got a lot heavier.

So if you haven't switched already, stop procrastinating. Get it over with. If you have any desire working for the rising rank of companies building their business on open source technologies, you don't want to carry a liability like that around on you resume. Being labeled a 2005 Switcher is bad enough.

Jeff Atwood, at one of my favorite blogs, Coding Horror pointed out what a douche Heinemeier was for writing what he thought was a reasonably valid point in a very distasteful way. He also points out words from a 2007 technology prediction piece by "the douche" where he is quoted saying:

Here's what I don't understand about statements like this. They have exactly the opposite effect that the speaker probably intends. There are two possible reactions:

1. Wow, David's right. I made the wrong choice in my career. It's high time I looked into OS X and Rails programming. They sound great!
2. F****************k you.

Guess which reaction is more common? Actually, there's no need to guess, as I can guarantee every Windows programmer reading this is thinking #2 right now. As an evangelist looking to increase adoption of your platform, this is a remarkably poor strategy. When has abusing people into agreeing with you ever worked?

Of course, as David has said many, many times, he doesn't care whether we agree with him or not. Well, not in so many words, but you get the idea:

I actually admire this sentiment, as I've seen too many people get so wrapped up in what other people think of them that they can't bear to have an original opinion about anything. But if you accept the premise that this kind of statement won't change anyone's mind, and is ultimately ineffective-- even counterproductive-- what are we left with? What purpose does the statement "stigma of being a Windows developer" serve? I can only think of one: David gets off on putting other people down.

And that makes him kind of a douchebag.

Which also means when you're using Rails and OS X, you're using the platform of choice for douchebags.

Well I'm obviously a .NET developer, and while I am all for open source software, did it occur to "the douche" that Windowz is still the leading platform out there? Did it occur to him the MOST of his users are probably using his software on a windows box? The point Jeff makes about "there's nothing more satisfying than kicking someone's ass with the worst character in the game." is a little harsh (if my understanding of his comparison of Earthquake in Samurai Showdown II to Windows...) but I kind of understand what he's saying... fuck the tools you have, if you're a great developer you can write C# in any language.

I found this over on Google Operating System they also have a link to Jack Black's new "internet" Be Kind Rewind which I thought was kind of swede too.

Microsoft Introduces Snow Reports Instant Answers

Type in your favorite resort or mountain (ex: "Whistler", "Tremblant", but not "hunter mountain" that's too sophisticated) and you get the following:

Even though Ask.com does provide some sort of help for snowboarders I'm glad to see that Micrsoft seems to be trying to innovate, it's been a while (excluding their attempt at natural language processing in the new sync, don't get me started on that...) since they have given the consumer something really innovative. What happened to the days when they would lead the industry in innovation? When we couldn't wait for the next version of Windowz or Office to come out? Oh right... Google happened.

The blog post acknowledges that content boxes like this above the web results can be a balancing act. (Google recently expanded its local Onebox to 10 listings, to mixed reviews.) They'll show a maximum of four resorts. For example, the query "washington snowboarding" brings up the top four open resorts by recent snowfall.

Google has no corresponding Onebox. The official ski area websites tend to have sitelinks and an expandable map to quickly get you to the information you need (although that requires a click), and a current search for "snoqualmie" has a news result about the pass closing as the fourth result. Yahoo! apparently isn't a big skiier or snowboarder.

p.s. I'm going to MIX 08 in Vegas! I'm excited about it and I can't wait for some down time to get back to daily blogging.. it's been wildly busy lately... but it's all good.

While it seems to be the year of the big Apple, and I don't mean New York City, Apple (AAPL) stock has been plummeting. After peaking at almost $203 Apple hit $127 yesterday during trading. I guess this is a sign that a burst maybe closer than we think.

At the 2008 MacWorld expo, Mr. Jobs announced that Microsoft (M$FT) is now shipping Office Mac 2008, a "companion" to Time Machine called Time Capsule, 4 Million iPhone's sold (I think my friend Shawn got the 4 millionth) and the new SDK and v1.1.3 of the iPhone firmware, and some great new apps for the iPod touch (hoooray!). Finally Jobs opens a brown envelope and pulls out the new MacBook Air "the worlds thinnest notebook". Past 3 expo's considered I think this one was a little bit of a disappointment. I wonder if people were expecting more, perhaps more advances in the iPhone, maybe an iPhone nano, the iPhone 3G... who knows. Apple also announced a very successful quarter, and even though I don't know much about the stock market it seems like that didn't help their stock.

In other Mac Head news a buddy film maker of mine set out, I believe it was November of 2006, to create a documentary about Mac Heads. I remember seeing the teaser around December of 06' and knowing he had something there. Apparently I was right (that sounds a little cocky. Disclaimer: I take no credit for his success but completely endorse it and wish him only the best... go Kobe!!!) the blogosphere has been buzzing about his (Kobe) documentary. You too can watch the teaser on the official site: www.macheadsthemovie.com and read about it here, here, and here. (or just search Goog for it).

The last item for this post is Yael Naim. Most of you are probably asking who she/he is, how is she/he related to Apple, and why do I care?

Well... I while ago (Jan 1st 2008) I introduced the lovely Yael Naim (made in Israel) in a blog post thinking this is one great singer that should be recognized. Today, as I watched the new episodes of Chuck, I saw the new Mac Book Air ad and I heard Yael Naim's voice. Turns out they used the song I so happily tried to promote. Well then... I would like to take credit for that, with your blessings of course.

related: funny error messages.

I love how they have him playing the XBox guitar hero guitar...

What Woot Learned Last Week

I'm not going to quote their article because you can simple click on the link, but I will quote my favorite comment which had me laughing for a couple of seconds...

This week, I learned that those cone things you put on a cat's head to keep him from chewing his bandages are not only a cost-effective source of entertainment, but a complex, time-tested feat of human engineering. I figured I could just cut one from cardboard and tape it together, but let me tell you,... the geometry alone is a challenge, not to mention, it must be ergonomic, non-chewable, and toilet-water-proof. Designing cat cones is truly one of the world's un-sung skill sets. I recommend that anyone who has a cat give it a try.

I caught this article over on TechCrunch and I had to navigate to the original rant by Zed Shaw. Wow, this guy picked one hell of a rant to kick off the new year. I actually read the entire thing, it's quite amusing. I love that he points out how ridiculous Google's offers to him were but most of all I love that he pointed out that a lot of today's web developers don't know the first thing about computer science. Some candidates I've interviewed didn't know what a fucking Hashtable was or how to traverse a Tree.

Rails is a ghetto

If anyone had known Rails was that unstable they would have laughed in his face. Think about it further, this means that the creator of Rails in his flagship products could not keep them running for longer than 4 minutes on average.

Repeat that to yourself. “He couldn’t keep his own servers running for longer than 4 minutes on average.”

This is exactly what makes Rails a ghetto. A bunch of half-trained former PHP morons who never bother to sit down and really learn the computer science they were too good to study in college...

...They were all pricks, morons, assholes, and arrogant fucks who didn’t care about the art or the craft.

They were all a bunch of little ghetto fabulous princesses trying to make it in this tiny little Rails world and not enough brains between them all to make it happen...

They then build the team and dole out the positions: Software Architect to the shithead who can’t code; Project Manager to the MBA asshole who talks like a car salesman; Lead Engineer to the guy using my shit to run his company. What do they give me? Nothing. I’m just Zed. Nobody needs my skills.

Then there’s the social network idiots. They all have a social network plus something fucking stupid to sell, but of course no MBA can actually code so they come running to me. However, there’s a slight problem. You see, I have a business degree you cock suckers. If you tell me that your social network will take on facebook because it includes baby pictures then I’m going to laugh in your face. They are an established player with CIA backing. You won’t wipe them out.

Google was a total riot. They offered me a job twice. I went with it, and they never responded. Probably because the job they were offering me—someone who’s been coding for 21 years, 15 professionally—was as a junior system administrator. What the hell does a junior sysadmin do at google? That’s probably like mopping the floor at a glory hole in Queens. I told them to review my resume and offer me a real position.

Zed on Consultants

Consultancies used to provide a service by managing the entire project so you didn’t have to do much. Now with Agile and Pair Programming the consulting firms can dupe clients into helping them make the sausage, provide little to no services, yet still charge insane rates. What’s impressive is these consulting firms somehow charge rates that are 5 or 6 times what they pay their employees.

Think about that. How is it possible that your consulting firm has so much inefficiency they must charge 600% overhead? Are the services you get really that far above the base pay of that employee? Why the hell not just hire someone and have a long term learner who’ll be ready to work on anything?

My favorite quote of this article must be:

What the effff? You shrunk my effin' car you bitch!

Blue-ray vs. HD DVD seems to be a battle Sony might actually win. I guess the third time's a charm, after loosing the whole beta max battle and who can forget the mini disc (well I guess not a lot of people), any and all blog's, shopping sites, comment sections, are talking about which format is better and what you the consumer should buy. What I find interesting is that a lot of these people claim to have both and therefore can compare quality, durability, and other weird comparable attributes. The "hotest" debates I've seen were on Amazon.com, simply search for a blue-ray or HD DVD player and read the reviews. To sum things up those who have one of the devices say they're the best (obviously), those who have both seem to be leaning toward Blue-ray.

I ran into this interesting-ish article about how heated the hi def war got over the holiday season. Apparently the official Blue-ray site got hacked and visitors were redirected to the official HD DVD site... that's just crazy (crazy awesome that is) I'm sure the developers, system admins, and security people at Blue-ray got their asses handed to them... that's really got to suck.

Hacks and smack-talking make hi-def format war even uglier

The Blu-ray site modifications occured last Friday, when visitors to the Blu-ray site were redirected to "The Look and Sound of Perfect," the website for the HD DVD format operated by the North American HD DVD Promotional Group (including Universal Studios, HP, and Intel).

The redirection seems to have been fixed quickly, but it was no doubt a bit disconcerting to the Blu-ray camp while it lasted. There's no word yet on who was responsible for the mischief, although speculators have proposed various scenarios, including the HD DVD Group paying off a hacker to do the job. That last one seems particularly improbable, but we've heard stranger stories before. Either way, this hack wasn't a particularly malicious or damaging one, but it is representative of just how heated the format wars have become.

Another blog that captured the hack is www.boygeniusreport.com. They have a nice picture of the hacked site. Check it out.

Which camp am I on? Well I was a very early mini-disc adopter and my dad is a huge Sony person but what did it for me was the PS3 (as you probably already know if you follow this blog). To be completely honest I am only supporting Blue-ray because I have a player and I want all movies to come out in Blue-ray format. Another reason is that I'm also one of the few people that are not Netflix users but a Blockbuster.com user... and guess what... they have Blue-ray DVD's you can rent. Lastly, from the arguments I've read online I must say the Blue-ray pluses seem to over weigh in the following (very important) categories:

• Price - 24$ for Blue-ray vs. 28$ for HD DVD for the same movie on Amazon.com
• Durability - Scratch proof coating on Blue-ray vs. no proof coating on HD DVD
• Capacity - Blue-ray goes up to 50GB vs. HD DVD that goes up to 30GB

UPDATE People have pointed out that HD DVD will win for the same reason VHS won the battle, that reason being the porn industry. While that was true for the VHS vs. Beta Max battle it is quite untrue for the current war. One of the porn industries biggest studios, Vivid has already released Blue-ray movies and has paved the road for other porn studios to do the same. I am not making this up people... read all about it on cnn.com and on the inquirer.

Nuff said?

Federal Trade Commission Clears Google's Acquisition of DoubleClick

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) today welcomed the U.S. Federal Trade Commission's clearance of its planned acquisition of DoubleClick Inc., a premier provider of display ad serving technology and services. Google announced in April 2007 a definitive agreement to acquire the company for $3.1 billion in cash from San Francisco-based Private Equity firm Hellman & Friedman along with JMI Equity and management.

"The FTC's strong support sends a clear message: this acquisition poses no risk to competition and will benefit consumers," said Eric Schmidt, Chairman and CEO, Google. "We hope that the European Commission will soon reach the same conclusion, and we are confident that this deal will deliver more relevant ads for consumers, more choices for advertisers, and more opportunities for website publishers."

The acquisition was approved earlier this year by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission and was recommended for approval by one of three Brazilian regulatory agencies. Google cannot close the acquisition until the European Commission, which is still examining the transaction, grants clearance of the deal.

In its clearance opinion released today, the FTC explicitly rejected any current or potential competition concerns. Google and DoubleClick are complementary businesses and do not compete with each other.
[...]

The only thing that sucks is that I heard it on the elevator on my way into the office... I need to get better sources.

The IQ Game

What's your high score?

Soon you will be able to do absolutely everything from google's home page. If you weren't aware of some of the existing shortcuts here is a short list for you enjoyment: (randomly sorted)

• define: - to get the definition of a word
• tracking number (ups/fedex/usps etc.) track your package
• movie name + zip code - get movie times
• mathematical expressions work too
• weather + zipcode (or city, country) - get weather information
• stock symbol (ex: GOOG) - get stock quote

Anyway, I'm sure there are more... feel free to add them in the comments. The reason I started this post was because the Goog has just added a new shortcut and it might be a new favorite. I might not use it daily like the ones mentioned above but this is just awesome.

Google Knows How Late Your Flight Is Running

Google has announced a flight tracking service that provides up-to-date information for those flying over the Christmas/ New Year break.

The service delivers details as to whether a flight is on time or delayed as well providing the estimated departure and arrival times. Using the service is as simple as typing in the flight number into Google, and the flight details will be delivered as the first search result (airline and flight number, or use an abbreviated version with a space between the airline code and flight number.) The service competes in part with Orbitz’s Traveler Update service, although Orbitz does offer associated airport information as well.

Data for the service is pulled from Flightstats.com.

"What would you do if you had 1,000 times more data?" turns out to be the question that spawned cloud computing at Google, and when CEO Eric Schmidt says: "I didn't realize he was going to try to change the way computer scientists thought about computing. That's a much more ambitious goal." (referring to Christophe Bisciglia, Sr. Engineer at Google) I figured this 5 page article was worth a read... and it was.

Google and the Wisdom of Clouds

To launch Google 101, Bisciglia had to replicate the dynamics and a bit of the magic of Google's cloud—but without tapping into the cloud itself or revealing its deepest secrets. These secrets fuel endless speculation among computer scientists. But Google keeps much under cover. This immense computer, after all, runs the company. It automatically handles search, places ads, churns through e-mails. The computer does the work, and thousands of Google engineers, including Bisciglia, merely service the machine. They teach the system new tricks or find new markets for it to invade. And they add on new clusters—four new data centers this year alone, at an average cost of $600 million apiece.

In building this machine, Google, so famous for search, is poised to take on a new role in the computer industry. Not so many years ago scientists and researchers looked to national laboratories for the cutting-edge research on computing. Now, says Daniel Frye, vice-president of open systems development at IBM, "Google is doing the work that 10 years ago would have gone on in a national lab."

How was Bisciglia going to give students access to this machine? The easiest option would have been to plug his class directly into the Google computer. But the company wasn't about to let students loose in a machine loaded with proprietary software, brimming with personal data, and running a $10.6 billion business. So Bisciglia shopped for an affordable cluster of 40 computers. He placed the order, then set about figuring out how to pay for the servers. While the vendor was wiring the computers together, Bisciglia alerted a couple of Google managers that a bill was coming. Then he "kind of sent the expense report up the chain, and no one said no." He adds one of his favorite sayings: "It's far easier to beg for forgiveness than to ask for permission." ("If you're interested in someone who strictly follows the rules, Christophe's not your guy," says Lazowska, who refers to the cluster as "a gift from heaven.")

[...]

Yeah, I'd love to take that course... I wonder if CUNY is offering something similar ;)

Autonomous Foosball Table

The computer runs a Java Media Framework app that tracks the ball as well as the human opponent via webcam. The PC then issues commands to a PIC microcontroller across a serial line, based on the information it's receiving. From there, the microcontroller tells the servos to either move or kick the ball. In addition, the table can predict the trajectory of the ball, lifting its midfielders in time to set up a clear shot.

Despite how awesome it looks to the layman, the project wasn't perfect according to the team. For one, they'd like to improve the moving and kicking speeds, a task which would simply require larger (and more expensive) gears. Also, they would ideally have a webcam capturing video at 60fps instead of the current 30fps. These improvements, combined with a better AI engine, could pump the table up to beating a serious player, or at least most drunk and/or stoned college kids.

The Netherlands goes open-source in 2008

April 2008. That's the date when the notoriously progressive Dutch government goes open source. The plan was approved unanimously yesterday in a meeting of two parliamentary commissions. The policy dictates that government organizations at the national level must be ready to save documents in the Open Document Format (ODF) by April, and the state and local level by 2009. Use of proprietary software and file formats from the likes of Microsoft will have to be justified under the new policy. The government expects to save $8.8 million a year on city housing registers alone by making the switch. Tough week, eh Microsoft? You'll have to get your OpenDocument plug-ins for MS Office ISO approved on the quick if you want to avoid further trouble.

My Mac/Linux buddies are going to give a lot of shit for this....

Antitrust regulators with the Federal Trade Commission have received an extension to review the controversial $3.1 billion Google-DoubleClick megamerger, according to sources.

The FTC faced a Thursday deadline to either challenge the deal or allow it to go through. But the commission is now expected to stay quiet for at least several more days as it continues to study the impact of the proposed merger on competition and consumers. A decision Thursday is unlikely.

Google complied with the FTC's second request for information on the merger on November 14. Once a company complies with a "second request," federal antitrust regulators have 30 days to issue a decision on a pending merger, unless the prospective buyer is willing to waive that deadline.

A Google spokesman declined to comment, other than to note the process is ongoing. And a representative from the FTC also declined to comment.

Antitrust attorneys have previously noted that they expected the FTC to ultimately sign off on the deal, given it's been roughly three decades since the FTC has challenged a merger involving companies in adjacent industries, otherwise known as a vertical, or non-horizontal merger.

In part, that is because the commission views such mergers as creating "efficiencies" that could ultimately benefit consumers, versus a merger of two companies in identical lines of business that may largely result in removing a competitor from the market.

Google and DoubleClick both run an ad service business. Google operates AdSense to dish up ads to Web sites in its publisher network, whereas DoubleClick offers an ad serving and ad management tool called Dart, geared toward publishers, advertisers, and corporate customers.

But the companies differ in that Google's pay-per-click text ads are generated from keyword searches, while DoubleClick puts banner ads on sites. DoubleClick also recently introduced an advertising exchange, which serves as a marketplace to match sellers of ad inventory, such as Web site operators, with advertisers. DoubleClick runs a search engine marketing business called Performix.

While the timing of a decision remains a bit unclear, a number of competitors have voiced their opposition to the merger.

Really?? More time? What will they discover in these "several more days" that they don't already know? I guess the closer we get to election season the more stake is involved.

Another Week, Still No DoubleClick Approval

Despite rumors at the beginning of the week that the Federal Trade Commission was going to approve Google’s $3.1 billion acquisition of DoubleClick by the end of the week, nothing has happened. Looks like this thing will keep dragging on, and Google is making plans to cover itself one way or another. Google is downplaying DoubleClick’s importance and saying that it is looking at multiple ad partners and to work with other companies.

“DoubleClick is one piece of it,” said Tim Armstrong, Google’s president of advertising and commerce in North America. “We think the deal should close. We think our competitors have been able to close their deals.”

Google’s playing both sides of the story. If the deal fails, they’re running pre-emptive damage control to protect the stock price, as well as lining up deals to make up for some of what it loses without DoubleClick. If everything goes well, then they’re helping DoubleClick line up more clients, which might be necessary since this protracted approval process has probably distracted DoubleClick from concentrating on its core business.

Google promised to add features at a higher pace in the new version of Gmail. The latest addition is label colors: you can now set a different color for each label so you can identify messages easier. Not all Gmail accounts have the new feature, but it will probably be enabled for everyone soon.
The feature was previously available as a Greasemonkey script . I wonder if all scripts written by Mihai Parparita will become Gmail features.