Author: AMH

Avoiding a pun about “crashing”….

By AMH

I’ve been saving up news articles about security vulnerabilities for my cyberattacks class, but I’m not quite sure where to fit in a discussion of potential vulnerabilities in Boeing’s New 787. On the crazy-cool side, the plane is going to have internet connectivity in the cabin for passengers. On the crazy-stupid side, the passenger’s network is connected to the cockpit network. Solutions are being discussed, but they do not seem to include just keeping the two networks physically separate. But software solutions can, and probably will, have holes, and Boeing is treating this as a software-debugging problem. I can’t imagine … Continue reading Avoiding a pun about “crashing”….

Or you could just let Pennsylvania go first….

By AMH

I was having a discussion over dinner about the problems with current presidential primary process, particularly the scheduling of them – yeah, I know, it’s a controversial stance! Pretty much everybody you talk to has an idea for what could make the current scheduling better, and we were arguing the merits of various hypothetical plans when somebody observed that perhaps people with more expertise and who had actually analyzed the relevant data had looked at this question. So it was home to Wikipedia and their US Presidential Primary page, and the also good FairVote page on Presidential Primaries. The major … Continue reading Or you could just let Pennsylvania go first….

Moving on to 2008….

By AMH

I would not want to buck the weblogging tradition of posting some type of year-end wrap-up, and I was quite lax on the photography and book-reading this year so I thought I would tie up 2007 with a recap of some of the new technologies that I have started using in the past year. RSS Feeds: My general websurfing habits had been to open folders of bookmarks into my Firefox tabs and click my way through them, but I finally broke down and tried out reading feeds and it’s an experiment I’m sticking with. I started out using Sage, a … Continue reading Moving on to 2008….

the ultimate junk shop

By AMH

I finally got around to watching this short documentary (split into five pieces) about a nuclear laboratory surplus shop in Los Alamos while baking cookies today, and it is pretty cool. Both the stuff that this guy has, but also the fact that this guy is living in Los Alamos, used to be a machinist at the lab, is currently repurposing what the lab discards, and is now quite outspoken against nuclear experimentation. It’s interesting to see the town reaction to him also. If you haven’t seen that site, which I had not before this, it’s got some other interesting … Continue reading the ultimate junk shop

It probably even supports ArrayList….

By AMH

I was chatting with a friend tonight about the fact that both of us are interested in learning Python, for slightly different reasons. He has noticed some job listings that indicate Python as being a particularly desirable skill, and theorizes that it would be pretty straightforward to pick up if you have a good understanding of Java. That theory is supported by the large number of books and articles written specifically to help the Java programmer learn Python. (See: Python for Java Programmers or Python for Java Programmers) In fact, if you have a background in Java, this Python & … Continue reading It probably even supports ArrayList….

I guess the snow is pretty at least

By AMH

The week before finals is the long dark teatime of the academic soul. When it corresponds with the first frigid, blowsy weather of the winter, the mind turns to piles of poofy blankets. Barring that, I end up wondering if we have enough laptops to relocate my small advanced programming class to be held around the campus center fireplace with mugs of hot chocolate…. I start thinking that a brain shawl would be cozy and timely. Or at least decide that I need to get serious about shopping for a new winter coat. It is not too late to catch … Continue reading I guess the snow is pretty at least

Appropriately, this will automatically post to Facebook as well……

By AMH

Are you interested in Web 2.0? Maybe you are taking a course on the topic soon. Hell, maybe you are teaching a course on the topic soon ;) Whatever it is, last month the new-to-me but old-to-the-internet Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication had a special issue on social network sites. Besides just trying to tackle the problem of defining a “social networking site” – which at least is a more manageable task than defining the mostly meaningless in my mind phrase “Web 2.0” – there is a a somewhat interesting study of who, demographically, does and does not use social networking … Continue reading Appropriately, this will automatically post to Facebook as well……

How about drive-through legal advice – do they have that too?

By AMH

It is slightly frightening that we have moved past saying that just having a high school degree is not enough, to just having a college degree not being enough to just having a law degree not being enough. Okay, that is an exaggeration, and these people definitely seem well employed, but this is an interesting look at the mind-numbing grunt work some lawyers are getting hired to do. It feels like the legal analog to programmer outsourcing – the good jobs are the creative jobs, and the competition for them is strong. Certainly this type of skilled temp/contract work is … Continue reading How about drive-through legal advice – do they have that too?

I am nothing without a robot car…..

By AMH

Over the weekend, the DARPA Urban Challenge took place, in which about a dozen autonomous vehicles navigated their way through desert and city landscapes in a timed obstacle race. I was bummed out that I wasn’t able to watch the livecast of the event, but a nice highlight video of the qualified round has been posted at the Urban Challenge page (you can see about two minutes in that at least one car took out a stop sign….) and they’ll be posting a highlight video of the finals soon. In the meantime, there are videos starting to show up on … Continue reading I am nothing without a robot car…..

Dancing Cat

By AMH

An informal survey of two people suggests that this is more funny to women, but I am just dying with laughter over this dissection of a tampon ad, looking at the copy, typeface, and the fascinating background images. Make sure you read through the comments as well. For extra fun, try visiting the URL from the ad (www.upgrade-u.com) for even more surreal tampon fun.