Thursday, September 30, 2004
What it's really like in Iraq
If you think that the US is cleaning things up in Iraq, you might want to read this letter by Wall Street Journal correspondentFarnaz Fassihi. (Scroll down from the Thursday heading). And yes, the letter's authenticity has been confirmed by the author. Bush has dug the US into a deep, deep hole, and the sides are caving in. Here's a small sample:
If there was any justice left in the US, George Bush would be impeached, something he deserves much more than Bill Clinton did. Hopefully Kerry's performance in the debate last night will persuade enough people to vote him out.
"A friend drove thru the Shiite slum of Sadr City yesterday. He said young men were openly placing improvised explosive devices into the ground. They melt a shallow hole into the asphalt, dig the explosive, cover it with dirt and put an old tire or plastic can over it to signal to the locals this is booby-trapped. He said on the main roads of Sadr City, there were a dozen landmines per every ten yards. His car snaked and swirled to avoid driving over them. Behind the walls sits an angry Iraqi ready to detonate them as soon as an American convoy gets near. This is in Shiite land, the population that was supposed to love America for liberating Iraq."
If there was any justice left in the US, George Bush would be impeached, something he deserves much more than Bill Clinton did. Hopefully Kerry's performance in the debate last night will persuade enough people to vote him out.
Tracks on Mars
This photo, taken from orbit by the Mars Global Surveyor, clearly shows the tracks left by the Spirit rover. You can also see the lander's parachute and the rover itself. The spectacular resolution is made possible by a new technique that rolls the spacecraft to compensate for the ground speed under the camera. This is truly a memorable picture.
Global warming will make hurricanes worse
A recent study is not good news for Floridians. According to an article in the New York Times (free registration required), global warming will cause hurricanes to get stronger and wetter. If you have vacation property in Florida, you might want to consider selling now.
Wednesday, September 29, 2004
SpaceShipOne flight successful!
SpaceShipOne just broke the X-15's altitude reocrd of 358,000 feet and has just touched down. Gorgeous flight expect there was a LOT of roll on the way up. My heart was in my throat watching that - I was really afraid he was going to lose control. Now that's a ride I wish I could take! Now to win the X-Prize they need to make another flight within 10 days. I don't know if the rolls (about 18 of them) on the way up will affect their plans, but somehow I doubt it - he did keep it going straight up.
Update-Sept. 30: According to newspaper reports today, they didn't get to 358,000 feet, probably because the pilot turned off the engine early because of the roll. It was still high enough to qualify as one of the X-Prize flights. A video is available on the X-Prize site (though I couldn't get Mozilla to run it; you may need IE).
Update-Sept. 30: According to newspaper reports today, they didn't get to 358,000 feet, probably because the pilot turned off the engine early because of the roll. It was still high enough to qualify as one of the X-Prize flights. A video is available on the X-Prize site (though I couldn't get Mozilla to run it; you may need IE).
I can see clearly now - part 3
I had cataract surgery yesterday on my left eye. Back in December, I had cataract surgery on my right eye, which because of the lens implant, improved my vision dramatically. I probably won't get as much of an improvement in my left eye, because my left eye is weaker, but it'll still be a lot better than what it was before.
So far vision is blurry in the left eye, but that should clear up over the next couple of days. Assuming I don't have any complications (infection being the likeliest) I should be able to go back to work on Monday. By that point, my vision should have stabilized to the point where I'll know whether I need to change the presecription in my left eye. About the only downside of the surgery is that I will now have typical middle age vision - in other words I will have trouble with fine print. Bifocals may be in my future.
I noticed with some interest that the FDA has approved lens implants for use in the US. These have been a standard part of cataract surgery for some time, but up until now it hasn't been done just to correct vision. While I'm extremely happy that I've had this done, I wish I could have done it 20 years ago.
So far vision is blurry in the left eye, but that should clear up over the next couple of days. Assuming I don't have any complications (infection being the likeliest) I should be able to go back to work on Monday. By that point, my vision should have stabilized to the point where I'll know whether I need to change the presecription in my left eye. About the only downside of the surgery is that I will now have typical middle age vision - in other words I will have trouble with fine print. Bifocals may be in my future.
I noticed with some interest that the FDA has approved lens implants for use in the US. These have been a standard part of cataract surgery for some time, but up until now it hasn't been done just to correct vision. While I'm extremely happy that I've had this done, I wish I could have done it 20 years ago.
Tuesday, September 28, 2004
Dylan autobiography excpert
MSNBC has posted an excerpt from Bob Dylan's soon to be published autobiography, Chronicles, Volume 1. Most of the excerpt deals with Dylan's reaction to his increasing fame in the late 1960s and early 1970s. This will be worth reading, I think.
"The actor Tony Curtis once told me that fame is an occupation in itself, that it is a separate thing. And Tony couldn't be more right. The old image slowly faded and in time I found myself no longer under the canopy of some malignant influence. Eventually different anachronisms were thrust upon me—anachronisms of lesser dilemma—though they might seem bigger. Legend, Icon, Enigma (Buddha in European Clothes was my favorite)—stuff like that, but that was all right. These titles were placid and harmless, threadbare, easy to get around with them. Prophet, Messiah, Savior—those are tough ones."
Monday, September 27, 2004
Space tourism is here
According to the BBC, Virgin boss Sir Richard Branson has signed a deal with Bert Rutan's Scaled Composites to buy five of Rutan's SpaceShipOne and begin commercial flights into space. The flights will cost around $200K US to start, though they will probably get cheaper over time if all goes well. He's named the venture Virgin Galactic and flights should begin in about three years. I want to go, but I'd have to sell one or both my kids, so it's not in the cards.
Cool (US) government publications
Sometimes the government publishes cool stuff. CoolGov is a blog about cool government publications. The latest post describes research as Sandia government labs where they crashes an F-4 jet into a brick wall to see what would happen. The results are quite spectacular. Posting are categorized by topic to help you find publications about cheap stuff, science, history, money, and so on.
Sunday, September 26, 2004
Rutan inspired by Disney\von Braun TV shows
The BBC has an intersting article about Bert Rutan, which discusses his motivation for going after the X Prize. It turns out he was inspired by seeing the Disney Tommorowland TV shows in the 1950s in which Wernher von Braun showed how people could travel to the Moon and Mars. He isn't too keen on NASA either, as you might expect.
Friday, September 24, 2004
The death of documentation
Adam Engst, the author of "The Death of Documentation" should write science ficiton, because he has an obvious gift for predicting the future. The article was written six years ago but it feels like it was written yesterday. Other than some references to older software (Office 98) all the trends mentioned in the article have come to pass. As well as a lament for the day of the complete, exhaustively indexed, and printed manual, the article does offer some good suggestions for how to produce useful documentation in our leaner, meaner, times. This is an excellent article; I'm really surprised I haven't seen it or any citations to it before, espeically considering that it was publisbed siz years ago.
Detecting forged documents
The New York Times (free registration required) has an interesting article on the high-tech tools analysts are using to detect forged documents, including microscopic examination of typefaces to detect if more than one printer has been used. Fascinating stuff.
Stem cells for retinal repair
This Wired article describes research into repairing retinal damage or even perhaps restoring sight to the blind by implanting embryonic stem cells into the retina. As someone with low vision, I find this research very exciting, though it is at a very early stage. While many eye conditions or problems can be repaired or corrected, damage to the retina almost always leads to loss of sight or blindness.
Thursday, September 23, 2004
Steve Stirling's Dies the Fire
A few years ago, in Island in the Sea of Time, Steve Stirling wrote a story about what happened when the island of Nantucket was mysteriously transported back into 1250 BC and how the islanders coped with being cut off from the rest of the world and much of modern technology. Many people, myself included, wondered what happened in our time when Nantucket disappeared. Now, in Dies the Fire, we find out, and it's not pretty.
In our world, all electrical devices stop working: radio television, generators, computers, even batteries. All dead. And it's not limited to electricty. The Change, as the characters in the story call it, also affects guns and explosives, which don't work, and steam and internal combustion engines. In an instant, mankind is knocked back to a medieval level of technology. Anyone who lived through last summer's blackout will know the sinking feeling when you're caught in the middle of a major blackout; now imagine being in a big city when the power dies -- and stays dead, forever.
Stirling follows two groups of people, a group of Wiccans and a bush pilot and passengers whose plane crashes in the wilderness when the Change happens. Both groups are determined to survive and their struggle to do so and build sustainable communities forms the core of the novel. What they have to cope with is pretty grim: plague, starvation, cannibalism, and petty warlords being just some of the perils.
Dies the Fire is a compulsively readable book; it helps if you have a strong stomach and a taste for hard-edged weapons. I'd have liked a little less emphasis on the weapons and a little more on the characters, some of who are a little too good to be true. Still, I am looking forward to the next two books in the series.
In our world, all electrical devices stop working: radio television, generators, computers, even batteries. All dead. And it's not limited to electricty. The Change, as the characters in the story call it, also affects guns and explosives, which don't work, and steam and internal combustion engines. In an instant, mankind is knocked back to a medieval level of technology. Anyone who lived through last summer's blackout will know the sinking feeling when you're caught in the middle of a major blackout; now imagine being in a big city when the power dies -- and stays dead, forever.
Stirling follows two groups of people, a group of Wiccans and a bush pilot and passengers whose plane crashes in the wilderness when the Change happens. Both groups are determined to survive and their struggle to do so and build sustainable communities forms the core of the novel. What they have to cope with is pretty grim: plague, starvation, cannibalism, and petty warlords being just some of the perils.
Dies the Fire is a compulsively readable book; it helps if you have a strong stomach and a taste for hard-edged weapons. I'd have liked a little less emphasis on the weapons and a little more on the characters, some of who are a little too good to be true. Still, I am looking forward to the next two books in the series.
Wednesday, September 22, 2004
Adobe beta testing Acrobat Reader 7
Adobe is beta testing Acrobat 7, according to an article in The Register. Some features of the full Acrobat (document signatures and reviewing) will become part of the Reader, but it's bloating up to 18 M The article also notes users' dissatisfaction with Acrobat Reader 6 and notes some alternatives to Adobe's product.
DVD FAQ
If you have any questions about DVDs, the DVD FAQ will probably have an answer. This is an exhaustive list of questions and answers compiled from the rec.video.dvd newsgroups. It's extensively hyperlinked, both internally, and externally to resources and sites on the Internet. This one's a keeper.
The best of the best freeware
I'm a software junkie, always on the lookout for a new or interesting program, preferably free. And there's a lot of good stuff out there - the problem is sifting the good from the junk. Pricelessware.org has done that for me. It's a compendium of the "best of the best" freeware, as selected by the members of the alt.comp. freeware newsgroup. The site is divided into catagories (file utilities, organizers, Internet) and so on, with each category being an annotated list of programs. There's a lot of good stuff here - I know because I already use some of it, but there's quite a few programs I've never seen before that I'm going to check out.
Tuesday, September 21, 2004
Writer's Guide for Technical Procedures
The US Department of Energy Standard 1029-92, "Writer's Guide for Technical
Procedures" is available online as a PDF file. This is an exhaustive government standard for writing procedures, definitely overkill, but if you wade through it, you'll find some good advice. Recommended for standards junkies and as source material for anyone assembling a writers guide.
Procedures" is available online as a PDF file. This is an exhaustive government standard for writing procedures, definitely overkill, but if you wade through it, you'll find some good advice. Recommended for standards junkies and as source material for anyone assembling a writers guide.
Monday, September 20, 2004
Libraries fight for freedom
One of the scummier provisions of the Patriot Act in the US is the ability of the FBI to go into a library and get the records of what a patron has been reading. Librarians are prohibited from even revealing that the FBI has made such a visit. This article tells how some librarians are fighting back, for example, by posting signs such as: "The FBI has not been here. (Watch closely for the removal of this sign)".
Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow
This movie has been getting a lot of buzz recently, mostly because of the way it was filmed, pretty much entirely against a blue screen with all the sets being digital creations. It's certainly worth seeing, although it's not quite a classic like Raiders of the Lost Ark. It's a hommage to the old 1930s and 40s pulp magazines and movie serials (like Raiders), with a unique visual style. The digital effects are completely convincing and occasionally brilliant. The story is pure pulp (what else would you expect) and the acting just OK. I enjoyed it a lot and would probably go again if I had the chance. There's a good review of it in the New York Times (free registration required).
Friday, September 17, 2004
I need help with Windows XP
I'm having a problem with Windows XP Home and I need some help. I am not able to kill programs or processes. Normally, in Windows XP, when a program hangs you can use the Task Manager to shut it down or kill it's process. This isn't working for me right now. I can open Task Manager, end the program or process, but nothing happens. In some cases, I have to reboot. It's getting kind of annoying as I'm also experiencing more crashes than normal; up until a month or two ago my system has been pretty stable.
I've scanned for viruses and adware and my system appears to be clean. I don't really want to reinstall Windows. I've been considering uprgading too XP Pro or XP SP2, or both, but I'm not sure that'll solve the problem either. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
I've scanned for viruses and adware and my system appears to be clean. I don't really want to reinstall Windows. I've been considering uprgading too XP Pro or XP SP2, or both, but I'm not sure that'll solve the problem either. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Information architecture research
Information Architecure Research is a collection of links to sites and papers about information architecture collected by Peter Morville. This is cutting edge stuff, at least for the field of technical communication, and although some of it is pretty academic (The Use of Proximal Information Scent to Forage for Distal Content on the World Wide Web, for example), there are some interesting links here.
Thursday, September 16, 2004
Unicode information
If you ever have to localize a document or help system (especially if it's a non-Latin language like Chinese or Arabic), you're going to run up against Unicode, a system for providing unique identifiers for all of the characters in all of the various languages. Unicode.org is the official Unicode site, and it's probably the first and best place to go for information about Unicode. As well as the Uniocde standard, there are FAQs and code charts to get you started. I wish all sites relating to technical specifications were this well organized.
Quake 4 preview
Although Id software's seems to be a superb graphic treat, it hasn't been getting that great reviews for its gameplay. Now it turns out that Id, in conjuntion with Raven software, is also working on Quake 4, which will use the Doom 3 engine. This article is a preview of Quake 4 with some screenshots. It looks pretty amazing. I've avoided Doom 3, both because I don't have the graphic horsepower to run it, and because it looks too dark and grim for my taste. But I've enjoyed the previous Quake games, and this looks like one I might go for. (The article is posted as graphic scans of a print image so it's a bit hard to read.)
Wednesday, September 15, 2004
Windows flaw affects pictures
It's often been stated that picture files are "safe" - that you can't use a picture to transmit a worm or virus. Well that's technically true, but you can use a picture to cause the software opening the picture to transmit a worm - at least if you are using Windows. Microsoft's programmers obviously still haven't figured out how to check for buffer overflows, sigh. This CNet article has more details and links to Microsoft's patches. Guess I'll have to go home and patch my systems tonight - I'm sure this one is going to be quickly exploited.
Corporations need better writing
According to this ABC News story, businesses need and want people who can write well.
This is true, but it remains to be seen if they're actually willing to pay for it. The number of good, and reasonably paid, technical writing jobs currently available would seem to suggest otherwise.
"In a fast-paced workplace, precision and brevity are essential. For e-mails, reports and presentations, the commission found that accuracy, clarity, spelling, punctuation, grammar and conciseness ranked among the most sought-after skills."
This is true, but it remains to be seen if they're actually willing to pay for it. The number of good, and reasonably paid, technical writing jobs currently available would seem to suggest otherwise.
Tuesday, September 14, 2004
Firefox hits 1.0
Mozilla's Firefox web browser has reached version 1.0. Actually, it's a preview release for 1.0, but it should be pretty close to the final version. I'll probably switch from Mozilla to Firefox and Thunderbird (the email client) this weekend, as both integrate RSS feed reading and Thunderbird has full-text search, something that Mozilla lacks and I desperately need. More on this later, probably.
Microsoft Office support newsgroups
I've been using Usenet almost ever since I got on the Internet, but it's not a part of the Internet that's very popular. I've seen statistics that say that only about 5 percent of Internet users use Usenet; that statistic is borne out by personal experience. Yet Usenet newsgroups can be an excellent source of news and support about products.
Microsoft realizes this and have had a public news server for support for quite a while now. To make it easier to use, they also have a web interface to the newsgroups that makes it extremely easy to use, just point your browser to the URL and select a group. I've used these newsgroups before, with Outlook Express, a tool I don't really like using. Since I need to access the Word groups from both home and work, the web interface is easier to use.
If you use MS Office, these groups are one of the best sources of information and support that you'll find.
Microsoft realizes this and have had a public news server for support for quite a while now. To make it easier to use, they also have a web interface to the newsgroups that makes it extremely easy to use, just point your browser to the URL and select a group. I've used these newsgroups before, with Outlook Express, a tool I don't really like using. Since I need to access the Word groups from both home and work, the web interface is easier to use.
If you use MS Office, these groups are one of the best sources of information and support that you'll find.
Monday, September 13, 2004
Roberta Bondar landscape photographs
Roberta Bondar is one of the handful of Canadians to have flown on the Shuttle. She's now devoting much of her time to landscape photography and the Diane Francis Gallery in Vancouver is showing some of her photographs. I wish I could see them in person; even scaled down to the 96 dpi the computer monitor provides, the colour and detail are striking (she uses medium and large format film).
Sunday, September 12, 2004
Font size in hardcover books
I just picked up Dies the Fire, by Steve Stirling, which I've been looking forward to reading ever since Steve gave me a copy of the first 4 chapters at the reading at TorCon last year.
I'm sure I'm going to enjoy it, but .....
The font size is small. Really small. Now, since I was at Worldcon, I've had cataract surgery and had an intraocular lens implant. My distance vision has gone from 20/200 or so to 20/60 with normal (-4 diopter) glasses. Reading normal book print (even most paperbacks) isn't an issue, but I do use reading glasses for some magazines and newspapers.
But when I get a hardcover book, I usually expect somewhat larger print. I mean, that's the point of having the bigger size in the first place (that and the hard covers) isn't it?
So why is Steve's publisher (Roc, part of New American Library) using such small type? (His last book, Conquistador, was bad too, I mean the font size, not the book, which I liked). As a technical writer, I'm reasonably familiar with fonts and typography, and I know that they could have increased the font size, increased the x-height of the font, and used a font with heavier serifs, all of which would have improved legibility - and kept the page count exactly the same.
I suspect it was typeset by a 25-year-old with microscopes for eyes.
Now it's time to dig out my reading glasses.
I'm sure I'm going to enjoy it, but .....
The font size is small. Really small. Now, since I was at Worldcon, I've had cataract surgery and had an intraocular lens implant. My distance vision has gone from 20/200 or so to 20/60 with normal (-4 diopter) glasses. Reading normal book print (even most paperbacks) isn't an issue, but I do use reading glasses for some magazines and newspapers.
But when I get a hardcover book, I usually expect somewhat larger print. I mean, that's the point of having the bigger size in the first place (that and the hard covers) isn't it?
So why is Steve's publisher (Roc, part of New American Library) using such small type? (His last book, Conquistador, was bad too, I mean the font size, not the book, which I liked). As a technical writer, I'm reasonably familiar with fonts and typography, and I know that they could have increased the font size, increased the x-height of the font, and used a font with heavier serifs, all of which would have improved legibility - and kept the page count exactly the same.
I suspect it was typeset by a 25-year-old with microscopes for eyes.
Now it's time to dig out my reading glasses.
SF writers envision the future
Locus Magazine has an article in which science fiction author John Shirley interviews six other SF author about how they envision the social future:
The results are fascinating and present much food for thought. This from Norman Spinrad (whose opinion closely mirrors mine):
And this from Bruce Sterling:
For the record, the authors are: Ken Wharton, Norman Spinrad, Pat Murphy, Cory Doctorow, Bruce Sterling, and Kim Stanley Robinson.
"I wanted to know about the quality of life in the future. I wanted to know about our political life; the scope of our freedom. I wanted to know what it was going to be like on a daily basis for my son and my grandson — I wanted to know if perhaps my son would do better to have no children at all."
The results are fascinating and present much food for thought. This from Norman Spinrad (whose opinion closely mirrors mine):
"The biggest change, one which I didn't get at the time, was the rise to dominance of the American Christian fundamentalist far right. Where are we going? If Kerry should be elected, back to the Clintonian middle. But if Bush is re-elected, straight into the worst fascist shitter this country has ever experienced. We're on a cusp like that of the Roman Republic about to degenerate into the Empire. Though in many ways it has already."
And this from Bruce Sterling:
“Feudal societies go broke. These top-heavy crony capitalists of the Enron ilk are nowhere near so good at business as they think they are.”
For the record, the authors are: Ken Wharton, Norman Spinrad, Pat Murphy, Cory Doctorow, Bruce Sterling, and Kim Stanley Robinson.
Friday, September 10, 2004
First photo of an extrasolar planet?
Astronomers may have made the first photograph of a planet outside of our solar system. If confirmed, it would be a major coup and very cool, indeed.
Filmnerd2 blog
Filmnerd2 is a blog of film fans who are attending the Toronto Film Festival and reviewing the movies they're seeing. If you want to get a jump start on some of the movies that will be hitting theatres in the next few months. The current lead-off review is of Innocence, the sequel to the anime classic Ghost in the Shell, a movie I'm really looking forward to seeing.
Thursday, September 09, 2004
Nanodots - a revolution in materials science?
This article about nanodots - really, really, really, really, really small dots of pure material, posits that we could soon see the technology used to create 10 terabit chips and solid state lighting that would last for 50 years. The picture of a nanodot is really amazing.
Reviews of Star Wars DVD set
This article on Slashdot has links to some articles about and reviews of the Star Wars DVD set that will be released Sept. 21. The Time Magazine article has some details on the documentary that will be released with the set. I wouldn't mind seeing the movies again, but I doubt I'll buy the set, though my kids may have other ideas.
FrameMaker DocBook projects for download
Steve Whitlach has made available a couple of DocBook projects that he's developed, including one done with structured FrameMaker. If you're thinking about making the move to structured authoring, these are worth a look -- the readme file for the FrameMaker project is a must read if you haven't worked with structured Frame previously.
I've run through the structured FrameMaker tutorials and the XML Cookbook, and have pretty much given up on the idea of using structured FrameMaker (although I'm reasonably happy with the other aspects of Frame). I agree with his evaluation:
I've run through the structured FrameMaker tutorials and the XML Cookbook, and have pretty much given up on the idea of using structured FrameMaker (although I'm reasonably happy with the other aspects of Frame). I agree with his evaluation:
"Structured FrameMaker is big, slow, expensive, complicated, messy, deficient, and buggy. All indications are that FrameMaker has not been actively developed for several years. That is the type of decision upper management would make upon realizing the impact of the design flaws described in the README file in the FrameMaker project. Nonetheless, one can pretty much get the exact formatting of DocBook XML in structured FrameMaker if he is determined. And, I am told that if one is a C magician, he can get FrameMaker to do just about anything through the FrameMaker Developer's Kit and Structured FrameMaker API. Structured FrameMaker may be suitable only for large organizations who require exact formatting capabilities and those organizations that can recoup the required investments in multiple custom clients and elaborate work flow designs that compensate for structured FrameMaker's deficiencies. Unfortunately, because of the flaws in structured FrameMaker's application design methodology, using it as is will always be labor intensive."
Wednesday, September 08, 2004
Good paper on word recognition
The Microsoft Typography site has an interesting paper on word recognition-how we recognize words, do we rely on the letters in the word or on the overall shape of the word. I've heard the latter theory quoted quite often by writers, but this paper discounts it. In any case, the research is quite interesting in itself and the paper is quite readable.
Good tips for installing Windows XP SP2
If you're planning on installing Windows XP SP2, you might want to take a look at this article from The Editor's Desktop site first. There's nothing really new here, but it's fairly comprehensive and include some steps that you might not think of first, such as updating your application software in case there are SP2-specific patches and defragging your hard drive. I'll be keeping this one handy when I upgrade.
Tuesday, September 07, 2004
Anatomy of a Word bug
I recently posted a link to an article by John Dvorak in which he said that Word had become too bloated and compicated, and it was time for Microsoft to build a new product from scratch. If you want a concrete example of why this might be a good idea, read Anatomy of a Software Bug, by Richard Schaut, a Microsoft developer who works on Word. If you have any interest at all in Word, read this article!
Shuttles survive Frances
NASA's Space Shuttles survived Hurricane Frances with few problems, despite winds of up to 124 mph. The huge Vertical Assembly Building, however, lost about 40,000 square feet of panels from its sides, raising fears of more damage if Hurricane Ivan strikes southern Florida this weekend.
Update: According to this Wired article, there was a fair amount of damage to the buildings at the Cape, including the VAB, and it could delay the resumption of Shuttle flights in the spring.
Update: According to this Wired article, there was a fair amount of damage to the buildings at the Cape, including the VAB, and it could delay the resumption of Shuttle flights in the spring.
SF fanzines online
I got quite involved in science fiction fanzine fandom for a while, publishing several issues of a fanzine called Torus (some of which I really should put online at some point). Even in the age of the Internet, people are still publishing printed fanzines, but more have moved online. Efanzines.com is a site that archives electronic editions of both new and classic zines. If you're into science fiction, this site is worth a look. It also includes a list of links to other fanzine sites; I particularly recommend Rick Kleffel's The Agony Column.
Monday, September 06, 2004
FireFox extensions
I've been using Mozilla as my primary web browser for about a year now, and generally, I'm happy with it. Thus I haven't made the move to FireFox, Mozilla's leaner successor. But this article about FireFox extensions is making me think that it might be time to switch. Extensions are small programs, like plug-ins, that extend the capability of Mozilla or FireFox. Although they share a similar architecture, not all extensions work on both browsers, and it seems most of the better ones are now coming out for FireFox.
I'm particularly interested in SAGE, the RSS feed reader externsion, the extension that lets you view a page's structure on screen to see how it's put together, and the extension to archive a page into a single file. And if there was a full-text search plug-in for Thunderbird, the email program, I'd switch in a minute.
I'm particularly interested in SAGE, the RSS feed reader externsion, the extension that lets you view a page's structure on screen to see how it's put together, and the extension to archive a page into a single file. And if there was a full-text search plug-in for Thunderbird, the email program, I'd switch in a minute.
Boston WorldCon bans blood drive
Noreascon, the World Science Fiction Convention, being held this Labour Day weekend in Boston, has refused to allow the Heinlein Society to hold their annual blood drive on convention premises. The drive was held in two bloodmobiles, adjacent to the convention, and the turnout was about half of what organizers expected. The blood drive at TorCon 3 last year was hugely succesful and had to be extended to meet demand.
The Heinlein Society sponsors blood drives at major science fiction conventions; the tradition was started by Robert Heinlein, who had a rare blood type and made donating blood a condition for signing fans' books.
I find this quite boggling, especially the lame-ass reasoning of the con chair, who seems to feel that allowing the blood drive would result in a roomful of passed-out, wasted SF fans.
The Heinlein Society sponsors blood drives at major science fiction conventions; the tradition was started by Robert Heinlein, who had a rare blood type and made donating blood a condition for signing fans' books.
I find this quite boggling, especially the lame-ass reasoning of the con chair, who seems to feel that allowing the blood drive would result in a roomful of passed-out, wasted SF fans.
Sunday, September 05, 2004
2004 Hugo award results
These are the 2004 Hugo awards, as announced at Noreascon last night:
Best Novel - Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold
Best Novella - "The Cookie Monster" by Vernor Vinge
Best Novelette - "Legions in Time" by Michael Swanwick
Best Short Story - "A Study in Emerald" by Neil Gaiman
Best Related Book - The Chesley Awards for Science Fiction and Fantasy
Art: A Retrospective by John Grant, Elizabeth L. Humphrey, and Pamela D. Scoville
Best Professional Editor - Gardner Dozois
Best Professional Artist - Bob Eggleton
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form - Gollum’s Acceptance Speech at the 2003 MTV Movie Awards
Best Locus - Locus, Charles N. Brown, Jennifer A. Hall, and Kirsten Gong-Wong, eds.
Best Fanzine - Emerald City, Cheryl Morgan, ed.
Best Langford - Dave Langford
Best Fan Artist - Frank Wu
Pretty predictable, unfortunately. I am really disappointed that Robert Charles Wilson didn't win the novel award for Blind Lake.
Best Novel - Paladin of Souls by Lois McMaster Bujold
Best Novella - "The Cookie Monster" by Vernor Vinge
Best Novelette - "Legions in Time" by Michael Swanwick
Best Short Story - "A Study in Emerald" by Neil Gaiman
Best Related Book - The Chesley Awards for Science Fiction and Fantasy
Art: A Retrospective by John Grant, Elizabeth L. Humphrey, and Pamela D. Scoville
Best Professional Editor - Gardner Dozois
Best Professional Artist - Bob Eggleton
Best Dramatic Presentation, Long Form - The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
Best Dramatic Presentation, Short Form - Gollum’s Acceptance Speech at the 2003 MTV Movie Awards
Best Locus - Locus, Charles N. Brown, Jennifer A. Hall, and Kirsten Gong-Wong, eds.
Best Fanzine - Emerald City, Cheryl Morgan, ed.
Best Langford - Dave Langford
Best Fan Artist - Frank Wu
Pretty predictable, unfortunately. I am really disappointed that Robert Charles Wilson didn't win the novel award for Blind Lake.
Friday, September 03, 2004
Scribus - DTP for Linux
O'Reilly is running an interview with the developers of Scribus, a desktop publishing application for Linux. Scribus appears to be intended as an alternative to PageMaker or Quark Express. It's an intersting interview, which gives some insight into the challenges posed developing a large DTP application for Linux. Anyone who thinks it should be easy to develop an open source alternative to FrameMaker should read it.
Big autumn for anime
According to this article in Wired, autumn is going to be a big season for anime features with new movies from three of the major directors. We can look forward to a sequel to Ghost in the Shell, Steamboy, a new movie from the director of Akira, and Howl's Moving Castle, from Hayao Miyazaki, the dean of Japanase anime. The article also gives a good overview of the history of anime, well worth reading if you're not that familiar with it.
The Great Influenza
Some years ago, I was living in Grande Prairie, Alberta, a small town about 400 km. north-west of Edmonton, with a population of about 25,000. One day, on a bike ride, I stopped by a small and mostly overgrown cemetary. Most of the headdstones had dates in the fall of 1918; the people had died from the Spanish flu. Considering that at that time, Grande Prairie had a population of at most of few thousand, if not less, the number of headstones was shocking.
The Great Influenza, by John M. Barry, is the history of that pandemic.
As Barry says in his afterword, this book is about more than just the flu. He starts out with a fascinating history medicine in the in the last part of the 19th century up to the beginning of World War I. He describes the war effort and the way it contributed to spread the pandemic. It's been widely known that the movement of troops helped to spread the disease, but it's his belief that the pandemic might have burned itself out at its source (a small farming town in Kansas), had it not spread to a nearby military base, densely packed with troops. And he describes the aftermath, both on the world and society in general, and on the medical community, who devoted so much effort in trying to stem the disease and later, trying to understand what caused it. Would Wilson have capitulated to French demands for German reparations, one of the main causes of World War II, if he hadn't caught the flu at the post-war peace conference?
The Great Influenza is a very well written book and a gripping read, particularly for anyone interested in the history of science and medicine. In the light of the recent outbreaks of bird flu around the world, it's also particularly timely.
The Great Influenza, by John M. Barry, is the history of that pandemic.
I started this book intending to explore not only the 1918 pandemic itself, but also several questions that did not involve influenza per se. One involved how the larger society reacted to an immense challenge. Another confronts anyone making a decision: What process do you follow to collect information that most likely leads to a good one. In other words, how do you know what you know?"
As Barry says in his afterword, this book is about more than just the flu. He starts out with a fascinating history medicine in the in the last part of the 19th century up to the beginning of World War I. He describes the war effort and the way it contributed to spread the pandemic. It's been widely known that the movement of troops helped to spread the disease, but it's his belief that the pandemic might have burned itself out at its source (a small farming town in Kansas), had it not spread to a nearby military base, densely packed with troops. And he describes the aftermath, both on the world and society in general, and on the medical community, who devoted so much effort in trying to stem the disease and later, trying to understand what caused it. Would Wilson have capitulated to French demands for German reparations, one of the main causes of World War II, if he hadn't caught the flu at the post-war peace conference?
The Great Influenza is a very well written book and a gripping read, particularly for anyone interested in the history of science and medicine. In the light of the recent outbreaks of bird flu around the world, it's also particularly timely.
Thursday, September 02, 2004
Hurricane may end Shuttle program
Discovery Channel is reporting that the US Space Shuttle program could be at severe risk if Hurricane Frances strikes southern Florida. All three orbiters are currently in the Orbiter Processing Facility building, which is not rated to withstand a storm of Frances' strength. The entire Cape Canaveral facility will be evacuated because of the storm.
SETI @Home finds an "interesting" signal
Don't get your hopes up too high, but the SETI at Home project has found one signal that may be their best candidate yet for a signal from an extraterrestrial civilization. They've observed it three times, it's very weak, and it doesn't appear to be coming from a star. It doesn't correspond to any known natural phoenomenon.
Update: And according to The Register, it's just a false alarm.
Update: And according to The Register, it's just a false alarm.
Wednesday, September 01, 2004
Happy birthday to the Internet
The Internet is 35 today, according to to this article in The Register. The first time I encountered it was in 1983, when I was living in Grande Prairie, Alberta, and a friend brought over a portable 300-baud terminal and used it to access his email account at MIT. Things have changed slightly since then.
AbiWord - an alternative to MS Word?
Flexbeta.net has a review of AbiWord, a cross-platform, open source alternative to Microsoft Word. The review doesn't give me the feeling that AbiWord is a real alternative to Word yet, but I haven't tried it. (There's no information on how AbiWord implements paragraph or character styles, for example). However, the program is only a 5 MB download and uses only about 6 MB of RAM, so it might be worth looking at for older or resource-limited systems. (Word on my sysstem is taking up about 9 MB right now, with one 30-page document open). You can download AbiWord from Abisource.com.
Copernic Desktop Search
I've mentioned desktop search tools here more than once (including yesterday) and in a nice bit of synchronicity, Coperinic have released Copernic Desktop Search. It indexes your documents on your hard drive, music files, pictures, and your email and contacts (but only if you use Outlook, sigh). My first impressions are quite positive. I installed it last night and ran the indexing routine overnight. It's very fast - it found all the MP3s by a selected artist almost instantly, another search found all documents mentioning my kids' school. And indexes must be fairly compact, as I didn't notice a huge decrease in disk space. This could be a keeper.
