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[Krow.net] [TangentOrg!] Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Brian "Krow" Aker" journal:| February 7th, 2005 | |
|---|---|
| 11:12 pm [Link] |
Don't feed the baby
( 1 image ) |
| 01:18 am [Link] |
mod_mp3 Version 1.0
Just released version 1.0 of mod_mp3. Despite me not updating it in approaching two years (funny that, nearly two years... I wonder what got in my way?), I finally have it working well enough with Apache 2.0 to do a release. The interesting thing is that the code base is unified with Apache 1.3, which was the real trick since I didn't want to drop support of Apache 1.3 just to make Apache 2.0 work. This is the third attempt to do a port and its the first one I am even somewhat happy with. I suspect that the 2.0 version can't quite push as much data as the 1.3 did, but I think that it won't be that much of a loss of performance. The new ID3 library which I have worked on for a couple of years now is in it, so it can't start up large collections much faster. Not sure if the MySQL support (or for that matter postgres) is working for 2.0. It compiles but I didn't test it. I suspect that since I went to the extra effort to make this all work with threads but since versions previous to this never had to deal with threads, that I probably missed something along the way. The internal dispatch is probably the piece I am most worried about in regards to this. Its basically an in memory storage system and having multiple threads touch it at once may cause issues (I couldn't find any... but I just know I must have forgotten something). Hopefully this all works fine, since I have other features I am more interested in doing now. 2.0 support just makes it easier on me and opens up the possibility of moving my streaming server to Fedora Core 3 (which comes with Apache 2.0). Bed time... |
| February 2nd, 2005 | |
| 06:29 pm [Link] |
MySQL Meetup
Just as a reminder, there is a MySQL meetup next Monday at the Elysian, I am planning on attending. Find out more information at http://mysql.meetup.com/ |
| January 30th, 2005 | |
| 10:42 am [Link] |
How Not to Send an SMS
Sending messages of "Where are you!" to my cell phone is not likely to get a response. If you don't sign it then the odds of me thinking it was spam is quite high. See unsigned, unvalidated phone numbers to me means "someone is trying to figure out if this is a valid number or not". Now, if you are in the address-book of my phone then I will respond because I will know who it is. But are you really sure I have you in it? So, if you are reading this and wondering why I didn't respond to your SMS, you now know why. "And knowing is half the battle!" (TM) |
| January 29th, 2005 | |
| 08:13 pm [Link] |
Stanford Linear Accelerator Computer Center
Went to SLAC to talk about long term storage. Neat people, neat problems. I'm very accustom to talking about MySQL with terabyte storage. Its a known problem and one we easily handle. Multiple petrabyte storage? Doable, but you really have to rethink data indexing and a host of other things. The nice thing is that the partitioning support Mikael is working on, plus the federated support Patrick has for 5.0 gives us some of the building blocks for doing this. Still, its a different world. That and you have people who can consider actually having 20 terabytes of memory to make use of :) ( 7 images ) |
| January 27th, 2005 | |
| 10:01 pm [Link] |
Coffee runs the world Sitting at SeaTac waiting for my flight this morning. The woman announces for the flight: "This mornings flight will have no water. Sorry for this inconvenience." No one moves, everyone just continues to wait in the line to board. She repeats this twice, no one seems phased. She then changes it too: "This Morning's flight will have no water. This means we will not have coffee onboard the flight, sorry for this inconvenience." Grousing begins, most of the line splits from boarding to hit the starbuck off to the side. Funny how in the end the consequences can causes a stir when the root seems so innocuous. I wonder how many people it just dawned on that coffee comes from something other then cute barista? |
| January 24th, 2005 | |
| 10:56 pm [Link] |
david before gutter ball
( 1 image ) |
| 08:57 pm [Link] |
Disclaimer and other nonsense for Journals
I had someone ask me about a post I recently made (probably the previous entry). They asked me: "What was the point?" My answer was "there is none". See, sometimes I just read other people's post and they strike me peculiar and I feel like mocking them. Nothing to be mean, but I see a lot of pointless posts (I would see more if I read my own (and posted more)) and sometimes they just strike me as odd. Or Crazy, I see crazy a lot. Its easy to see crazy when its not you and the vantage point that you sit on has a different perspective. Someone else sitting out there might see it a different way, but isn't that the great thing about opinions? The point to this journal, and I hope to some nameless alien who might swat us all like flies if we don't offer up cheesy puffs once a month to them that I might have a point every so often, is just for me to have a place to: dump thoughts send a message (sometimes to friends, sometimes to relatives, and sometimes to the kid in his parent's basement who likes to run flood pings against my router) mock stuff that I think needs mocking take some abuse every so often for doing any of the above So, don't expect everything to make sense, certainly don't expect it to all seem profound, and please do not worry yourself if I do not post from time to time. If I see something of interest then sure I will record it, but otherwise I'm not going to post just to prove I can. All of this is void though if I ever get my phone to start sending images to LJ. Expect lots of fuzzy pointless pictures if that happens :) |
| January 19th, 2005 | |
| 04:16 pm [Link] |
Spring Like Heat
Spring like heat makes me want to eat nachos. The Big Plate of Nachos makes me feel mildly ill (cheese... yuck...) and full. Feeling full make me sleepy. Being sleepy makes me not program. Sleep itself is really only a nap, so it does little to no good. Have I mentioned lately that my dog sometimes sleeps with all four feet straight up into the air. It is not only gravity defying but it makes one wonder how she does it. Which makes me start to think, which of course just makes it hard to nap. The world is filled with a lot of unimportant distractions. |
| January 16th, 2005 | |
| 07:09 pm [Link] |
mod_mp3 Apache2 support (just two years late)
Sure, I had it in my head to just sit down and write Apache 2 support. I was going to do this two Decembers ago. Einfach? Nein. Pain in the ass. Two different attempts, a complete conversion of the configure system and having to wait on bugs to be fixed in Apache2. Somewhere in this time I wrote a brand new id3 parser just because I got tired of how much memory the old one ate up (and modified it so that anyone can now use it for any project). Finally today mod_mp3 it plays music again. Its CVS version has been broken for over a year. You know, if I had never decided to support Apache 2 I could have gotten in all of the features that I have wanted. They would have been done a long time ago. Instead I just had to force myself down the road of supporting a web server that for the most part I complain about. The thing is that I prefer to just let Fedora update my machines and I was getting tired of downloading Apache 1.3 each time I went to upgrade. Version 2 support is not done, I already see a number of bugs that I will need to fix. Not all messages are being displayed correctly. I think there may be a bug that causes music in the internal dispatch to disappear when multiple threads use the same dispatch context. Thankfully I write enough threaded code that I never did anything that wasn't thread safe in the first place. |
| January 11th, 2005 | |
| 11:11 pm [Link] |
Malaysian Food I've discovered a brand new cuisine that is quite tasty. I've had Indonesian food before, but only in Amsterdam. Malaysian is very close to Indonesian but it seems a bit more like Thai (Indonesian would still be my preference for food if the choice was between the two). The tofu in my dinner was so so, but the sauce was incredible. The sauce was a brown peanut sauce with some sort of crumbs in it. Quite nifty. Something to figure out how to make when I get back to Seattle... |
| 11:07 am [Link] |
Airport Conversations
Woman in front of me: "Yes, this is my first passport. Its so unfortunate that my first sticker had to be from a scary country like the Bahamas!" Huh? Scary? Are you crazy? Oh, and its a stamp, not a sticker. |
| January 10th, 2005 | |
| 12:01 am [Link] |
Web Page Design Web page design is loathsome. Years ago, many moons, and what seems like a life time ago I did graphic design. Of those people in my life right now not a one can remember this because it was so long ago (though I believe either Christine or Michelle might remember the hidden "Eat More Fish" adds I used to hide in the newspaper I worked for at the time). My designs were pretty good, and graphic design was something that was enjoyable. At this point in history page design was mainly done by hand (yes, with tape, wax, and paper cutters), but people at begun to do it with applications like "Ready Set Go", which was an incredibly awesome application for the Mac in its day). What about PageMaker or Quark Express? PageMaker was just not the application for page design at the time, and Quark Express wasn't really around at the time. So HTML design enjoyable? Nope. Nothing ever lines up properly and there always seems to be a space here or there that you want to do ditch but have no idea about how its being generated in the first place. Give me wax, paper, and a knife any day over HTML. For some reason I got into this mood tonight and redesigned my home page once again (I used to keep a version number right at the top of it... started this in 1995 or so, but stopped doing it in 99 or there about). It probably has to do with being sick most of Thursday which seems to only have fully passed today. Creativity in web design for me is reduced to "who's design I can swipe". Sure I will tweak it a bit, I've never copied a page in exact detail. Using everydevel for site software leaves you little choice. The big leap this time? Finally moved beyond my gutter 1990 HTML skills and figured out style-sheets. They aren't that profound, they make a bit of sense, but the only real advantage discovered thus far for me, is that I can reduce some of the code that had to be done in everydevel. Someday I can only hope that someone comes up with something better then HTML. The technology is over a decade old at this point, can't we come up with something better? Whine, Whine, Whine.... |
| January 7th, 2005 | |
| 11:49 pm [Link] |
6th Annual White Elephant Party and Potluck Once again this year we are doing a potluck/White Elephant party at the house on the 22nd. Add your email address to the below poll and I will add you to the invite (I am setting it private so no one can see your address). Poll #414956 Invite me! Open to: Friends, results viewable to: None Email Address? Please send me the information, don't put my name on the public form The current color of Nausicaa is View Answers white black spotted don't you ever give that cat a bath? I like to fill out polls! View Answers
yes no did you really need to ask four questions I am sticking with blue |
| 05:20 pm [Link] |
2005 Resolutions
Read better books. Sure this is the same thing I said last year, but I don't believe I really came close to this (some of the best books I read this year came from Lynda during a phone call in a bookstore... cell phones are wonderful things). RSS. I need to figure out how to really put RSS to work for me. For years I have been writing software that allowed others to exploit it, I need to do a better job of exploiting it myself. Todo lists. Today I keep several. I need to keep fewer of them, and make use of them. Work flow is the key word here. Write more. Not open up any more projects in the house till I have the current ones complete. At this point I would say 1/3 of the house if not more is currently torn up. I need to get more pieces of work done before I start others. Fix it so I can post pictures from my phone to LJ. It annoys me that I have yet to get this to work. Look at this list in the middle of year. Cut to the chase sometimes. I have mucho respect for Chris and his ability to do this. Already did this once this year do to a little "oops" on an invite, it felt nice to do that. Speak more in German. Continue my interest in VOIP technology. Release updates to more of the software I maintain myself. Move up to the 3rd floor. Stop and smell the flowers a bit more. Learn to work while in Seattle from other locations. I get lots done when I travel, and I think I could possibly get more done if I would on occasion leave the house and go somewhere quiet that lacks internet access. I am sure there are more, but this is what is on the tip of my tongue. |
| 05:06 pm [Link] |
Funkstar De Luxe
You know, its pretty hard to not stop nodding your head and tapping your foot when iTunes pulls out a song named "It's Too Funky Here" by and band named Funkstar De Luxe. It needs to be a friday. I got a lot of work done this week despite being deathly sick yesterday (great way to lose weight though!), but I need a break. I only weigh around 165# now a days, so its not like I really need to lose any weight. Still not finished my New Year's resolutions, I should do that soon. Need to start running up frequent flyer miles soon. |
| January 4th, 2005 | |
| 04:54 pm [Link] |
Countries Visited in 2004 create your own visited countries map or vertaling Duits Nederlands Counting entire countries does make my trip to Russia look quite impressive. Too much white... |
| January 2nd, 2005 | |
| 01:06 pm [Link] |
Stuff I sad that I would not do in 2004
So I went back and read up on what I said I would do in 2004: > Take at least two vacations (I have the time, honest) Blew that one. While I took some vacation I used it mainly to work on the house. I am rolling over 2 weeks of vacation though to next year, so perhaps I will figure out something. Sitting around being idle doesn't work for me. Technically I traveled more, and I did take the time on occasion to see places, so this is not entirely true that I didn't take vacations. My vacations though are just not what people consider to be the normal "holiday". > Work on new book (outline is floating around, contracts need to be signed... yadda yadda..) Still working on it. Just been slow. I am close to completing a chapter for another book though. > Write more in general, especially humor pieces. Did a couple this year, but not much in the way of stuff I really enjoyed (though I have heard back from people that they enjoyed the ones I did write). > Start releasing software at a less punctuated rate again Nope, did not happen. I did though write new stuff, but the older stuff I have just poked at. Most of it works and does what I want, so I see little reason to extend it. I have a couple of ideas though for new pieces. > There are a number of people around me who I enjoy and others I think I would enjoy, make a point of getting to know them better (this is where we get > into the, how aspect of this....). This has been happening for the last 6 months or so, so I can say this has went well. > Have more potlucks, maybe once every other month when the new house is in some order. House never has become ordered, but that is changing rapidly right now. So the odds of more potlucks will increase. > Kill the front page to tangent.org, and just list software. Did this. Rarely added to it, but at least the one dead page is gone. > Read more books at night, kill the TV. A bit more of this, though I have started watching more recorded stuff on my laptop. > Read less dreck this year. Some of the crap authors I read last this year is amazing. Ok, I have been skipping on the drek for most of this year. Though I can only say that I have found just a few new authors that I have really been impressed by. Most frequently I am just going back and finding authors that I have preferred in the past an reading them. I have discovered the art of "this book sucks". This means that if I don't like a book I don't finish reading it. If I get a bad book it can take weeks for me to read it. A good book will be consumed in days if not hours. Interesting to see what I had to say last year and how it turned out. |
| December 30th, 2004 | |
| 11:03 am [Link] |
Cast Iron
You know how you read about how the cast iron pipe in the White House has been there since the 1800's, and how fountains in France still use pipe from the 1600's? Ok, suspend disbelief for the moment, and assume you enjoy reading up on ancient plumbing. Well, its not always the case that the stuff lasts forever. Take my plumbing for instance. The 100 year old cast iron on the east side of the house is rock solid, that is except for the piece that used to go to the now non existent bathroom near the entry hall. Now that was quite brittle. Brittle enough that it fell. Not the main stack, its fine, but the piece that once held up a toilet. My guess is 80 pounds at least. Dented the counter in the kitchenette in the basement. I'm pretty glad of course to have not been under it. Time for a plumber. If there is anything I have learned over the years, its that 4in cast iron pipe is not to be screwed with. Leave it to people who do it everyday. Oh, and never get a smart idea of installing plastic instead. Plastic sucks. You know why plastic sucks? Flush a toilet in a modern house that was done on the cheap using plastic. You can hear it through the walls. Cast Iron? Silent. Do you really want to hear toilets being flushed? I don't think so. |
| December 29th, 2004 | |
| 11:23 am [Link] |
Beatles Mashup Most of what I listen to at this point comes from what I pull from the net. There is one type of genre of this called "Mashup", which is take a bunch of original music and remix it. There are a lot of Beatles mashups out there. BoingBoing today has a particularly awesome one up today. Here are a few links to it: http://www.nitz.net/tyto/shared/boing/B http://www.digitalapoptosis.com/Bea http://music.braintags.com/index.php?so http://craphound.com/Beatles%20Mash-u http://www.randomthink.net/music/single Great music like the above is completely illegal. Its an unauthorized work. Though human culture has always been one where we build upon the work of others, our crazy little species has decided to create laws that strip us of the ability to do this. All in the name to keep a poorly drawn mouse under the control of one corporation. Expect record companies to shortly be sending out cease and desist letters asking people to pull that from their sites. Its art, its original, and it will have to be destroyed. When I was growing up I thought we were a crazy little monkey species that would just pollute the planet beyond our ability to live on it, or possibly just nuke the planet into the "Garden of the Cockroach". Somewhere in the back of my mind I had hoped we would find a technology solution to fix our screw ups. Good thing to know we nipped that possibility in the butt. Share it, play it, make people smile because of it. Start poking around the web and you will find others like it. The one hope is that even the RIAA doesn't have enough lawyers to completely destroy it and all of the rest of the music that exists. If the majority were to wake up and realize the simple things we have legislated ourselves out of, and demand to make what is fact the law, instead of making what is company thought the law, we would live in a much better world. |
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