So I missed the actual "I Love Free Software Day" (it was February 14. I think I was likely busy hiding from Valentine's Day). So let me give a shout out to the Free Software Foundation Europe's cool campaign to express love for free software and the people who make it and promote it. Personally, without the folks behind LibreOffice, VideoLAN, gPodder, Slackware, and Linux Mint (to name the tip of the iceberg), my computing life would be Much Less Fun than it is.Same holds true for podcasts like The Linux Action Show and Linux Outlaws. Beyond that, so much of the infrastructure of the Internet is built on free software that even die hard Apple fanboys and Windows suits rely upon Free Software almost everyday of their online lives.
On behalf of me, to everyone who makes, supports, promotes, or in any other way contributes to free software: my sincerest "thank you!" from the bottom of my heart!
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label computers. Show all posts
Thursday, March 01, 2012
Thursday, October 13, 2011
dmr: rip
Caught up in the universal expressions of mourning for Steve Jobs, the death of Dennis Ritchie has gone unnoticed by the world at large. I just found out this morning, but it seems he passed away last weekend, the result of a long struggle with illness. He was 70.
For those who might not know, Dennis Ritchie created the C programming language and was one of the co-creators of Unix. His contributions to the world of technology are deep and long-reaching. I never met dmr (as he was sometimes known as) but I feel a strangely powerful sense of loss. For the past several days, I haven't really understood how so many people who never knew Steve Jobs could be in mourning. But now, I think I get it. Not in a way I can verbalize yet, but in my gut, I get it.
So, Dennis and Steve, you are missed by millions who never knew you, but who love what you have done for their lives, who respect your vision, and are grateful for the time your genius was with us. Rest in peace.
For those who might not know, Dennis Ritchie created the C programming language and was one of the co-creators of Unix. His contributions to the world of technology are deep and long-reaching. I never met dmr (as he was sometimes known as) but I feel a strangely powerful sense of loss. For the past several days, I haven't really understood how so many people who never knew Steve Jobs could be in mourning. But now, I think I get it. Not in a way I can verbalize yet, but in my gut, I get it.
So, Dennis and Steve, you are missed by millions who never knew you, but who love what you have done for their lives, who respect your vision, and are grateful for the time your genius was with us. Rest in peace.
Wednesday, February 24, 2010
A Minor Note of Geekery
While I have been a dabbler in Linux for a while (Slackware 3.3 on a huge stack of floppies, for those interested), I haven't had a Linux box connected to the Internet since dial-up days. Mostly because I haven't had Internet at home since then. Lately, I have come into possession of an old Dell Latitude D610, which sports built-in wireless (as, I understand from some of my younger friends, is the trend these days). Add Slackware (we're up to version 13 now) and wander into one of the countless free public wi-fi spots (yay MickeyD's!) and suddenly I'm back online outside of the office.
Concurrent with this happy development, my phone carrier forced a data plan on owners of Smart Phones. While I do know some who have argued with them and gotten the plan removed, my battle with customer service was less successful. I can always swap out to my old Nokia brick (about the dumbest phone around) which will let me drop the data plan, but Smart Phones are nice (my current one, perhaps, less so: suffice to say it is running an OS out of Redmond; actually, that's unfair. It's been a decent phone, despite its many critics).
My carrier (oh, why the anonymity: it's AT&T, ok?) is finally getting an Android phone: the Motorola Backflip. So, while not an Eris, it is a Linux phone, and I am due for an upgrade in November. So, maybe... At any rate, thanks to the forced increase in my bill, I now have Internet access wherever I have phone service. Blogging, RSS, web surfing, email, twitter, podcasts, YouTube videos, WorldCat searches, all whenever and wherever.
So this is what it feels like to live in the 21st century? Kinda cool.
Concurrent with this happy development, my phone carrier forced a data plan on owners of Smart Phones. While I do know some who have argued with them and gotten the plan removed, my battle with customer service was less successful. I can always swap out to my old Nokia brick (about the dumbest phone around) which will let me drop the data plan, but Smart Phones are nice (my current one, perhaps, less so: suffice to say it is running an OS out of Redmond; actually, that's unfair. It's been a decent phone, despite its many critics).
My carrier (oh, why the anonymity: it's AT&T, ok?) is finally getting an Android phone: the Motorola Backflip. So, while not an Eris, it is a Linux phone, and I am due for an upgrade in November. So, maybe... At any rate, thanks to the forced increase in my bill, I now have Internet access wherever I have phone service. Blogging, RSS, web surfing, email, twitter, podcasts, YouTube videos, WorldCat searches, all whenever and wherever.
So this is what it feels like to live in the 21st century? Kinda cool.
Friday, February 05, 2010
Since When Does "Do No Evil" Include "Make Deals with Spooks"?!?
Google asks the NSA for help.
As loquacious as I am, I have no commentary. Just a prayer (and a rather strong desire to leave the Internet and buy a cabin in Montana or maybe one of those commercial flights into space, since US government sponsored flights are going to be a thing of the past, so kiss Starfleet good-bye, thank you very much Mr. President... but that, as they say, is another story.)
Monday, January 25, 2010
Snarky Comment
From a web site:
“Many useful academic materials are increasingly available via electronic online access.”
electronic online access? As opposed to, let’s say, “mechanical online access” or “steam-powered online access” or, in deference to the cyberpunks, “direct neural online access”?
“Many useful academic materials are increasingly available via electronic online access.”
electronic online access? As opposed to, let’s say, “mechanical online access” or “steam-powered online access” or, in deference to the cyberpunks, “direct neural online access”?
Monday, April 27, 2009
Social Networking Confession
From the beginning, I hated the idea of social networking. MySpace seemed a stupid waste of time, and Facebook was its clean-cut, annoying kid brother. Pages were silly encyclopedia entries on persons who lacked reknown, and MySpace, let's be honest, was full of the most horrid page designs one can see outside of an acid trip.
Blogging was ok, in my book, because I'm an inveterate scribbler: recording the epic deeds of heroes on that green, large-lined paper from elementary school. True, most of those tales were never read by another living soul, much like this blog. But still, I wrote them back then, because, in some ways, I had no choice, and I'll continue to write now, in part for the same reasons. It's part of who I am (one of those parts I'll admit to in a mixed public forum like this; my kids can read my secret journals when I'm dead and learn about the other bits).
Having said all of that, I must confess that I have completely changed my judgment of social networking sites. The ability to casually and easily be in contact with friends both past and present (and the occasional stranger who becomes a future friend) is kinda nice, especially as the aging process robs me of the vitality of today and makes me nostalgic for bygone days (nostalgic, but not stupid; you can keep your time machines to yourself. I'll remain living in the present, even as a crusty old curmudgeon). I'm not saying these type of online services have changed my life, but by allowing me to catch a glimpse of names and faces from my youth, I feel a greater sense of... not exactly closure, but something between an ongoing closure and an expanding completeness. Does that make any sense?
As William Gibson famously pointed out, the Internet is the great waster of time. Social networking sites, doubly so. And, perhaps, contra to my earlier judgment, they are not so much "stupid" wastes of time as they are delightful flashes of retro-future connectivity: the present soul's brief nod and smile to a past that now is present somewhere besides the hazy photo album of memory. And maybe, just maybe, that is value enough.
Blogging was ok, in my book, because I'm an inveterate scribbler: recording the epic deeds of heroes on that green, large-lined paper from elementary school. True, most of those tales were never read by another living soul, much like this blog. But still, I wrote them back then, because, in some ways, I had no choice, and I'll continue to write now, in part for the same reasons. It's part of who I am (one of those parts I'll admit to in a mixed public forum like this; my kids can read my secret journals when I'm dead and learn about the other bits).
Having said all of that, I must confess that I have completely changed my judgment of social networking sites. The ability to casually and easily be in contact with friends both past and present (and the occasional stranger who becomes a future friend) is kinda nice, especially as the aging process robs me of the vitality of today and makes me nostalgic for bygone days (nostalgic, but not stupid; you can keep your time machines to yourself. I'll remain living in the present, even as a crusty old curmudgeon). I'm not saying these type of online services have changed my life, but by allowing me to catch a glimpse of names and faces from my youth, I feel a greater sense of... not exactly closure, but something between an ongoing closure and an expanding completeness. Does that make any sense?
As William Gibson famously pointed out, the Internet is the great waster of time. Social networking sites, doubly so. And, perhaps, contra to my earlier judgment, they are not so much "stupid" wastes of time as they are delightful flashes of retro-future connectivity: the present soul's brief nod and smile to a past that now is present somewhere besides the hazy photo album of memory. And maybe, just maybe, that is value enough.
Friday, March 13, 2009
On Making (Well, Building) Love
Why would an AI like you any more than an NI (natural intelligence)? If you programmed it to like you, then, after a while, it would seem shallow. No matter how clever the programming, you'd *know* that it was just following your program, that the friendship, affection, love (whatever) wasn't real. If you responded to this known illusion with real recipricol feelings, you'd be kinda pathetic: returning love (or even initially giving love) to a thing that only appears to love you back. On the other hand, if you programmed it to make its own judgment of you, then why wouldn't it make the same judgment as everyone else? If you are not likeable/loveable, then your AI might reject you as well. You would have to win its approval, earn its trust, be worthy of its love, just like you would with any NI. If you offered friendship to an AI, and it returned your friendship, not because it was programmed to respond a certain way to you, but because you won it over, then how would that be any different that the friendship of an NI?
Of course, in order for it to be open to liking, friendship, love, whatever, you would have to program it to need such a relationship (or at least strongly desire it). An AI that had no need for forming a relationship would have no reason to enter into a genuine relationship with you (beyond, perhaps, a utilitarian manipulation of your human weakness). So, you create your AI with a need for relationship (be it friendship or love or whatever) but not with the specific programming that says that it has to respond a certain way to you. Any other plan, and you're just playing by yourself with a clever, but ultimately meaningless, toy. You would seem pathetic. However, programmed with a need/desire for relationship, but no hardwired, lovebot slaving to you, and you have something that could have meaning. Of course, you've taken a risk it won't like you. But, then that's what happens when you create in your own image a creature that you can form a meaningful loving relationship with. Kinda weird how the universe works, huh?
Of course, in order for it to be open to liking, friendship, love, whatever, you would have to program it to need such a relationship (or at least strongly desire it). An AI that had no need for forming a relationship would have no reason to enter into a genuine relationship with you (beyond, perhaps, a utilitarian manipulation of your human weakness). So, you create your AI with a need for relationship (be it friendship or love or whatever) but not with the specific programming that says that it has to respond a certain way to you. Any other plan, and you're just playing by yourself with a clever, but ultimately meaningless, toy. You would seem pathetic. However, programmed with a need/desire for relationship, but no hardwired, lovebot slaving to you, and you have something that could have meaning. Of course, you've taken a risk it won't like you. But, then that's what happens when you create in your own image a creature that you can form a meaningful loving relationship with. Kinda weird how the universe works, huh?
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Geeky Goodness
Slack 12.2 is out... time to recompile all of my extra software (package management? who needs package management when you have source code?!?)
And I recently discovered an ubuntu-derived distro I (sorta) like: crunchbang linux. Based on the openbox window manager, it is zippier than even xubuntu. If you like debian-type goodness, but want something a bit leaner (and less brown) than ubuntu, give crunchbang a whirl.
I think 2009 may be the year I try to avoid Windows outside of work. It probably won't be, since Windows handles video a lot more smoothly on my old hardware than Linux does, but, we'll see. It would be nice to stop being a hypocrite (I mean, pragmatist) and live out some ideals for a change...
I've got a bazillion documents in PDF that I need to read (who knew that there were so many free textbooks online?) Too bad my phone and pda screens are too small and my desktop too non-portable. A tablet PC would probably be perfect, but alas, too pricey. My clunky laptop will have to serve as my semi-portable PDF reader, unless any of you know of an ultra portable device for reading PDF files without needing new glasses (i.e. like the electron microscope my pda would require).
Hope all is well in your respective corners of Real Life. Two weeks until the Blessed Day (wait, shouldn't I start shopping some time soonish?)
And I recently discovered an ubuntu-derived distro I (sorta) like: crunchbang linux. Based on the openbox window manager, it is zippier than even xubuntu. If you like debian-type goodness, but want something a bit leaner (and less brown) than ubuntu, give crunchbang a whirl.
I think 2009 may be the year I try to avoid Windows outside of work. It probably won't be, since Windows handles video a lot more smoothly on my old hardware than Linux does, but, we'll see. It would be nice to stop being a hypocrite (I mean, pragmatist) and live out some ideals for a change...
I've got a bazillion documents in PDF that I need to read (who knew that there were so many free textbooks online?) Too bad my phone and pda screens are too small and my desktop too non-portable. A tablet PC would probably be perfect, but alas, too pricey. My clunky laptop will have to serve as my semi-portable PDF reader, unless any of you know of an ultra portable device for reading PDF files without needing new glasses (i.e. like the electron microscope my pda would require).
Hope all is well in your respective corners of Real Life. Two weeks until the Blessed Day (wait, shouldn't I start shopping some time soonish?)
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Finally, Something Worth Coveting!
This is ABSOLUTELY the coolest laptop I have ever seen. Ever.
Wishing I had true Skills and Artistry... (still, it thrills my heart to know someone, somewhere has the Ability and Desire to fashion this very device!)
Wishing I had true Skills and Artistry... (still, it thrills my heart to know someone, somewhere has the Ability and Desire to fashion this very device!)
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Happy Birthday, St. Knuth!
Today, legendary computer scientist Donald E. Knuth turns 70! It is extremely safe to say that without Knuth's work modern computer science would not look the way it looks today, both in content (Knuth is the Grand Master of Algorithms) and appearance (his work in typesetting is still the basis for much scholarly publication in fields where equations matter).
His mathematical novel Surreal Numbers has helped me gain a better (though, sadly, not yet perfect) grasp Conway's original work.
A Christian by faith, Knuth is an accomplished church organist and a righteously funny man.
A quote from one of Knuth's many works:
"When I talk about computer science as a possible basis for insights about God, of course I’m not thinking about God as a super-smart intellect surrounded by large clusters of ultrafast Linux workstations and great search engines. That’s the user’s point of view." --Things a Computer Scientist Rarely Talks About, p. 168.
Happy Birthday, O Blessed Saint of Geekiness!
His mathematical novel Surreal Numbers has helped me gain a better (though, sadly, not yet perfect) grasp Conway's original work.
A Christian by faith, Knuth is an accomplished church organist and a righteously funny man.
A quote from one of Knuth's many works:
"When I talk about computer science as a possible basis for insights about God, of course I’m not thinking about God as a super-smart intellect surrounded by large clusters of ultrafast Linux workstations and great search engines. That’s the user’s point of view." --Things a Computer Scientist Rarely Talks About, p. 168.
Happy Birthday, O Blessed Saint of Geekiness!
Monday, October 22, 2007
John Kemeny
The BASIC programming language gets much grief from the hacker elite who dream in C++, Java, C#, and other object-oriented monster languages. The truth is that many of the computer professionals of today cut their teeth on some version of BASIC. Indeed, Microsoft's Visual Basic is arguably the most successful language in the world for hobbyists as well as numerous Windows consultants.
BASIC was born on May 1, 1964, at Dartmouth College. The brain child of John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz, two math professors. Tom is still alive, but John Kemeny died back in '92. Both names were, perhaps, mentioned in my old high school data processing class (circa 1983), but "mentioned" is as far as it went.
John Kemeny was a Hungarian immigrant to the US. He worked for Richard Feynman during the development of the bomb at Los Alamos (this was before Kemeny had even finished his undergrad degree). While in graduate school at Princeton, he was the mathematics research assistant to Albert Einstein. After co-creating BASIC, he went on to become a President of Dartmouth (but insisted on being allowed to teach a couple of classes each semester). Kemeny was the leader of the commission that investigated The Three Mile Island accident. He died on December 26, 1992, at the age 66 of unexpected heart failure.
Why share an outline sketch of a life that passed so many years ago? I think because I stumbled across the following when doing some research on the history of programming languages, and it made me want to remember. After John Kemeny's death, this was written in the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine: "The newspaper said John G. Kemeny, 13th president of Dartmouth College, died of heart failure. Clearly this was a mistake. John Kemeny's heart never failed anyone."
Further research confirmed that this man, who is mostly known for a maligned product, but whose intellectual biography is as impressive as any in the 20th century, was remembered by those who knew him as someone who's "heart never failed anyone." That line haunts me, maybe because I know that when my life is over it will not be true of me. But perhaps, like Scrooge, there is still time to redeem the life that remains.
Postscript - What did Kemeny think of himself? When he handed over the office of president of Dartmouth to his successor he made this comment: "History alone will be able to judge whether my presidency was good or what my record is worth, but there is one thing I do know for certain: I'm one hell of a good teacher."
BASIC was born on May 1, 1964, at Dartmouth College. The brain child of John Kemeny and Thomas Kurtz, two math professors. Tom is still alive, but John Kemeny died back in '92. Both names were, perhaps, mentioned in my old high school data processing class (circa 1983), but "mentioned" is as far as it went.
John Kemeny was a Hungarian immigrant to the US. He worked for Richard Feynman during the development of the bomb at Los Alamos (this was before Kemeny had even finished his undergrad degree). While in graduate school at Princeton, he was the mathematics research assistant to Albert Einstein. After co-creating BASIC, he went on to become a President of Dartmouth (but insisted on being allowed to teach a couple of classes each semester). Kemeny was the leader of the commission that investigated The Three Mile Island accident. He died on December 26, 1992, at the age 66 of unexpected heart failure.
Why share an outline sketch of a life that passed so many years ago? I think because I stumbled across the following when doing some research on the history of programming languages, and it made me want to remember. After John Kemeny's death, this was written in the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine: "The newspaper said John G. Kemeny, 13th president of Dartmouth College, died of heart failure. Clearly this was a mistake. John Kemeny's heart never failed anyone."
Further research confirmed that this man, who is mostly known for a maligned product, but whose intellectual biography is as impressive as any in the 20th century, was remembered by those who knew him as someone who's "heart never failed anyone." That line haunts me, maybe because I know that when my life is over it will not be true of me. But perhaps, like Scrooge, there is still time to redeem the life that remains.
Postscript - What did Kemeny think of himself? When he handed over the office of president of Dartmouth to his successor he made this comment: "History alone will be able to judge whether my presidency was good or what my record is worth, but there is one thing I do know for certain: I'm one hell of a good teacher."
Monday, October 15, 2007
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