Tralfaz

Month: August 2013

  • Hmm, it’s about time

    My main domain, tralfaz.org was a compromise. When I first registered it in 1999, the tralfaz.com domain wasn’t available, so I grabbed the .org variant.

    I have often kept an eye on the .com domain to see if it expires, but the scummy domain squatter hasn’t budged. I wouldn’t have minded, but over the last 14 years, the owner has done nothing with that domain. It has moved between registrars (because the “coming soon” message changes every couple of years), but never once has there been any “real” content at that site.

    Then today I get three queries that it is going up to auction. It looks like I am going to be able to pay some scuzzball too much money to get the domain I wanted originally.

    Astro(For those that don’t know, Tralfaz was the original name of Astro, the Jetson’s dog before they got him. At the time I had an English Mastiff named Astro, and I wanted a domain that reflected that, so “Tralfaz” it was.)

  • A lot of Microsoft Hate this afternoon

    I have seen lots of friends and respected news sources bashing Microsoft today with the announcement that the CEO, Steve Ballmer, will be retiring in the next 12 months.

    First and foremost: I am not a microsoft fanatic. I am a Mac user, and am far more productive on the Apple platform, so take this with a grain of salt.

    Many of the messages I have seen are lamenting that Ballmer should have retired/been fired a decade ago. Lots of hate around Vista and Win8.

    But I think those are unfair criticisms.

    As a Mac person, I moved my work laptop to Vista when it launched, and I actually liked it. Of course, it had well supported hardware, and I waited long enough for quality signed drivers for our printers and other items I connected to. I found it to be very stable, and actually quite decent to use. I feel like a heretic, because the mantra in the wild is to bash Vista as a huge mistake. But it was the first Microsoft OS that put security in the forefront. Yes, that meant that you were not allowed to just run as administrator. If the software you wrote expected administrator privileges, you’re gonna have a bad time. And the desktop search was well done, and after it completed its initial indexing really improved the user experience.

    Windows 7 is much more polished. Microsoft used the three years in between the two systems wisely, and put out a great, usable, and very accommodating OS. I have been using it at home and at work since it’s day of launch in 2009 and it is a strong performer. Of course, all the cruft demanded by my employer causes me to curse the ground that Microsoft occupies, but that is hardly their fault.

    A few weeks ago, I had some time to kill, so I sat infront of a new-ish laptop with windows 8 and a touchscreen. I was pleasantly surprised. It was no where near as awful as the pundits make it out to be. I am confident that I could use it day to day. I have yet to try Office 2013, but I liked the transition to the Ribbon in Office 2007, and the significant improvements in 2010, so I am sure that when I am forced to move to Office 2013, it will be no big deal.

    What kills the Windows experience is the proliferation of crappy, under powered, poorly supported and unreliable hardware. The drive to sub $400 laptops comes at the cost of quality, and capability of components. While you can get decent hardware, you have to hunt, and read a lot of spec sheets to ensure that you get what you need. Hardly a task for the novice.

    Microsoft has also greatly improved their reputation in the back office. SQL Server is a solid, capable platform. Server OS’s are quite good today (even if licensing is a bit wonky), and Hyper-V is a decent bare metal hypervisor for virtualization.

    The real problem for Microsoft is their connection to the average consumer. What they sell comes bundled with hardware, and the experience of the user is dominated by fit/finish and appropriateness for the application. Apple does this so much better, they have fewer choices, but just do not offer a poor performing system. Everybody is on an even keel, and that leads to a greater degree of user satisfaction.

    Of course, the XBox also is a huge success for Microsoft in the consumer space. But beyond that, their products are me-too, and lack the attention grabbing that Apple or Android devices get.

    But Microsoft still own the enterprise, and is growing in the data centers. Their cloud computing platform is promising, and their hybrid cloud based document creation/sharing/collaboration solution is in many ways superior to GoogleApps.

    Yes, Microsoft’s stock has been a mediocre performer for the last 13 years, but that is not a terrible thing for a company with a market cap of 1/4 trillion dollars.

  • Boo: flat tire

    I have had late calls all week, which has prevented me from cycling in to the office. I have been jonesing to ride in during the week ( a good stress reliever after a long day, even if it is 105F).

    This morning, I headed out to the garage after walking the dogs, and bam, flat tire. Sigh.

    Since it has probably 2800 miles on it, I shouldn’t be disappointed that it finally got too thin to prevent thorns and other debris to penetrate and hole the tube, but it is time to replace the tires.

    So, I had to drive in, and at lunch I will trek on over to Performance Bicycles, and buy a pair of tires. I guess my ride(s) will have to wait for the weekend.

  • Pleasant Memories: Necco Wafers

    The memories flood back in when I see these
    The memories flood back in when I see these

    My grandfather on my mother’s side passed when I was pretty young. I don’r remember when, but I do remember fishing trips, and an annual weekend in Yosemite to play in the snow.

    Driving the big Ford pickup truck, with a camper on it, we would head out. And there was always an adequate supply of Necco wafers in the cab. We would probably go through 2 rolls each way. All us kids would jockey to sit in the front, and partake in the ritual.

    A couple weeks ago, I was at the airport, and I spied a display of Necco wafers. I had to buy a roll for good ol’ times sake.

    Good memories. (ok candy)

  • What a way to waste a Sunday – troubleshooting edition

    On our trip last week, my wife (again) dropped her laptop. After that, it stopped working. Oops.

    First thoughts were that it was a failed hard drive. All my utilities failed to find it. So I replaced it with a known good drive.

    It had a clean install of OS X Lion on it, and was pretty lightly used before I replaced it. I know it was good.  The system wouldn’t boot.  So I thought maybe that the install didn’t support her older laptop. So out came the Snow Leopard (10.6) install DVD. It failed to install. It found the drive ok, but it couldn’t properly access it. No way to write to it, and diskutility was unable to unmount the drive.

    Out it goes, and back into an external case and off to my main mac. No problems, the drive behaves as expected.

    Crap.

    Take the original drive and put it into the external case (a generic OWC FW800 enclosure), and bam, the system boots off it fine.

    So, it is either in the drive cable (unlikely) or the system Logic Board (much more likely).

    Alas, it is beyond my ability to troubleshoot, or repair, so off to Apple for my wife. But I spent about a half a day fiddling with it. Oh well.

     

  • Movie review: Brazil

    I remember seeing Brazil when it first came out in 1986. It was one of those relatively rare times when I actually went to a theatre to see a first run movie. Being a long time Monty Python fan, I was entertained on many levels by Brazil, from intellectual stimulation, to marveling at the cinematography, to the comical story line. There is something for everyone in the movie Brazil, and every time I re-watch it, I get a few new bits from the film.

    I have had a DVD rip for a while, but I wanted to get a good copy. On a lark I splurged on Amazon and got the “Criterion” collection. The print is luscious, and the restoration that they did to remove the film to digital noticeably improves the experience of the film.

    Set in the future, the world has become entrenched in bureaucracy, and novelty computers (tiny CRT’s behind large fresnel lenses). The story is one of love, deception, and bucking authority. Notable are the dream sequences, that add to the mystique of the film.

    Jonathan Pryce, playing the lead character of Sam, does a phenomenal job as the dream weaver. Also notable is an appearance by Robert De Niro as Archibald Tuttle, a freelance heating and cooling engineer who is operating outside the auspices of the dreaded “Central Services”. A clerical error puts Sam on a collision course with the girl of his dreams, Jill Layton (played by Kim Griest).

    Michael Palin in a mask
    Michael Palin in a mask

    2 hours and 24 minutes long, it is a film that will certainly entertain those who “get” Monty Python humor, and who have read Orwell and Huxley.

    The second disc of the Criterion edition has the “Happy Ending” version with the edits that director Terry Gillian refused to make.  94 minutes long, I thought that they couldn’t possible destroy the story line. How wrong I was. I am watching it now, and they completely destroyed the story line, and the whole essence of the film. This version was only shown on syndicated TV, and it is a pale comparison to the original print.

    I bought the discs from Amazon, and as is my custom, I read some of the reviews. I didn’t expect to be swayed one way or the other, but reading the 1 star reviews was entertaining. Clearly, some people don’t get Python humor, and didn’t appreciate the film. But I was astounded by the number (29 total out of hundreds of reviews) who felt the need to do an in depth dissertation of how they didn’t get the film, and how they thought that all the positive reviews were off the mark. They probably aren’t going to like 12 Monkeys either.

    Please, it is a movie that was release more than a quarter century ago, and if you don’t appreciate it, don’t watch it.

    If you haven’t seen it, I highly recommend getting it on your Netflix list.

  • What I am reading: 1984

    With all the buzz lately about the NSA revelations by Edward Snowden, and the surveillance state, I thought I would pick up my copy of 1984 and re-read it.

    Set in the year 1984, it is a masterful piece of fiction that is remarkably prescient in many of its predictions, given that it was published in 1949. The two way telescreen is particularly poignant, with the amount of listening that is apparently being done by BB.

    I didn’t read this, or its other kin when I was in High School like most people. I picked this up in my 30’s, along with Animal Farm, and Aldus Huxley’s: Brave New World. So I didn’t have a literature teacher guiding us through the analysis, so I was free to take my own views.

    First, the world is different from the time when George Orwell wrote this. At that time, it appeared that “socialism” would sweep the world, and that there would be three major centers of socialism, Ingsoc (or english socialism), eastasia, and eurasia, that would be perpetually at war with each other. Like the Russian and Chinese form of socialism, society has been structured into two halves, the proles (proletariat) making up about 85% of the population, and the “party”; the apparatus that keeps the proles in check. Within the party, there is the inner circle, who don’t have much privation or limits on what they can do, and the rest of the party, who lives in a state of fear/hate.

    The protagonist, Winston Smith works in the records department of the Ministry of Truth (minitrue), “adjusting” prior published facts to ensure that the official party line from today matches what was said yesterday.

    There is a whole group who works on newspeak, a language that is used to communicate to the party. New-speak phrases like “FREEDOM IS SLAVERY” are the mantra of the party, and talks about the double speak.

    While I don’t think that we have devolved to a society where common household goods are rationed, and there is a black market for things like coffee and razor blades, it is hard to not see the parallels with the modern state. A significant amount of history revision is common in the political class (both parties are equally guilty), and the policy makers /  “aristocrat” class seem to become ever more isolated from the plight of the common man.

    I am also reading a detailed history of Europe from the middle ages to the present, and much of the societal structure outlined in 1984 is aligned with typical European societies in the past. Of course, the mechanization of production, and the shifting of power to labor, and now back to capital, is part of the shifts in society.

    Along the way, Winston starts doubting the world order when he comes across incontrovertible evidence of fraud in the ruling class. From that point on, he begins with small rebellious behaviors, and escalates.

    The story is a great tale of fighting the system.  If you haven’t read it since your secondary school, I would highly recommend picking it up and reading it again.

  • Unfortunate Name Choices

    I got an email in my inbox today that seemed to imply that I ‘missed’ a big announcement last week.

    Well, I certainly didn’t remember any big announcement, but if I had I probably would have ignored it.

    You have to wonder if their marketing team has a pulse
    You have to wonder if their marketing team has a pulse

    This startup has called themselves “Alpha Software”. Really?  ‘Alpha’? Now I love playing with new and edgy things on my ‘puter, and have installed a lot of buggy, pre-release candidate, alpha quality software, but to name your company ‘Alpha Software’, that really takes the cake.

    For those who didn’t grow up steeped in computers and software, the software development process has a few milestones. The “Proof of Concept” that demonstrates the capability. The “Alpha” phase which is early, not ready for prime time, and certainly likely to crash in spectacular ways. The “Beta” phase is when you are comfortable releasing it into the wild to get some early feedback. And finally “Released” which means that you are comfortable standing behind the product, selling it, and providing at least a modicum of support.

    Only the brave or the foolish will install “Alpha” level code. Funny name for a company though. I think I will pass.

  • Too much to write about – High School Reunion

    Yesterday was my 30th High School Reunion. I hadn’t been to any of them prior, so this was my first. I was unsure what to expect, but I did look forward to it.

    I am so glad I went, because it was a blast. 30 years is a long time, and it turns out that we all had a lot more in common that we did in school (or apparently).

    Great to see some old friends, to meet many more people, and to have a great time.

    I will post more about this later.  We are headed out to the coast for a drive and sight seeing.

  • Shit, blew through a milestone

    You know you are an old time computer geek when you notice special numbers.

    2^8 is something we geeks all know, it is the number of different bytes there are. 2^8 is 256, and the maximum value of a single byte of computer memory is 255.

    2^10 is 1024. I am guessing that most kids today see that number and scratch their head wondering why the old fogeys didn’t just call 1000 bytes a kilobyte.  But us true geeks embrace these.

    The next number is 2^16 which is 65,536, and is the maximum number representable as two bytes (256 * 256 for those counting). I am amazed at how often I stumble across this number int he real world.

    Then there is the first CPU I learned to program, the Mostek 6502. Designed to be a cheaper version of the motorola 8800, it really drove the home computer revolution in the late 70’s and early 80’s.

    Two posts ago, I hit post 256. Makes me smile to mark off these milestones. I suspect I will make it to 1024, but probably not 65,536

    (For the curious as to why 8 bits to a byte, and 2 bytes to a word, I encourage a google search into early computer architectures, some details on the early systems, and then try to relate it to your current laptop or tablet, and your eyes will be well and truly opened. Also read “Turing’s Cathedral” for a good narrative on the first electronic digital computer).