Healing Hands

Dry air kills my hands--scratches and cracks, and on top of that our cats love to inflict wounds with tooth and claw.

To combat this I discovered that adding moisturizer while my hands are wet works 10x better than adding it when they're dry, sealing in the moisture.

Radio Songs

Courtesy SomaFM.com:

• Bellingham, Washington's The Pale Pacific's "Identity Theft" from their 2005 album Urgency on the SideCho Records label. Love those guitar licks.
• Orange, California's Aushua's "Sister Saves" from their unpublished music on MySpace. Great vocals. Video.
  
• Toronto, Ontario-based Broken Social Scene's "Almost Crimes" from their 2002 album "You Forgot It People" on the Arts & Crafts/Paper Bag labels. Video.
• London, U.K.-based South's "Silver Sun" from their 2003 album "With the Tides" on the Kinetic label.
• Austin, Texas-based IV Thieves' "You Can't Love What You Don't Understand" from their album "If We Can't Escape My Pretty" on the One Little Indian / New West Records labels. Video.
  

Paul Mitchell Partner School

The Winter 2007 10th Anniversary issue of Cut & Dry, some issue of Power and Motor Yacht, and W magazine (fashion)--I found them all in the waiting area of the Sacramento Paul Mitchell Partner School today.

I read a story about a guy who's trying to care about global warming even though he's candid about the fact that he puts hundreds of gallons of fossil fuels into his yacht each year. Another story featured a guy who forgot to align his gears or something and he had to run down to the lower helm but he had forgot to take off the sunscreens from his windows so he couldn't see out and by the way he's adrift and the motor's not working and he's panicking that he's going to hit some Krogen super-yacht in the bay--but he doesn't, because he regains control and makes his way to the fuel dock. The amount of luxury in the yachts for sale blew me away--even though I imagine one might get the same experience retro-fitting a hard-shell camper with luxury gear and installing a hydraulic rocker to simulate the wave-motion. Some of the multiple deck boats had helicopter landing pads--looked pretty iffy to me, landing on a bit of deck the size of a driveway, to tell the truth. They also featured a new yacht-storage facility proposal called Hercules that seemed pretty cool--park your mega-yacht in a temperature and humidity-controlled dry-storage room. I guess if one has the $27 million to spend on a yacht that big, one has enough dough to demand the best storage too.

Most of the magazines featured ads on every facing page--fine by me given I had hours of time to kill. I think the funniest ad I saw was in the yacht mag, with two people sunbathing on the back of a rushing boat--my thought was, "Who's running the boat?"

The Cut & Dry magazine is the quarterly Paul Mitchell mag shipped to Partner Schools and afiliated salons around the world. John Paul DeJoria bills himself in the back as "model philanthropist and expert in the field of helping others." I liked that.

It also listed Linda Flowers' answer to the question, "What's on your iPod's Most Played List? John Legend, The Stranglers, Talking Heads, Maroon Five, Neil Diamond, Jack Johnson and Seals & Croft, to name a few." I wasn't familiar with a few of them so I thought I'd write them down.

The final bit I noted from Cut & Dry stated, "A wise man once said, 'You don't want to die with your secret.'"

What's your secret?

Anime Runs

Dawn and I have undertaken a run through the anime series Chobits and Noir. The video store which supplied the first episodes in the series lacks the final volumes--so we have to decide whether we want to purchase the final volumes or not.

I like Noir's music--I discovered the series when a Linux installfest installer left a copy of the soundtrack on my PC. The series does suffer a bit from what I call the Airwolf-syndrome (for example, here)--that is, when the music swells, we know our heroes will face a battle and they'll eventually triumph. At least, so far.

Padding out shows happens in any enterprise, it seems--Noir handles it frequently by re-hashing scenes of Mireille's discovery of the murder of her parents. In Chobits, I haven't seen it so much--although the latest episode featured a pop single which padded out the cleaning scene.

Six Tips For Converting Regular Expressions to Minimized Deterministic Finite Automatons

Here are a few tips to make converting a

1. regular expression->
2. non-deterministic finite automaton (NFA) with epsilon transitions->
3. NFA without epsilon transitions->
4. deterministic finite automaton (DFA)->
5. minimized DFA

a bit easier:

1. Back-transfer accepting states all the way back--don't overlook any epsilon transitions
2. Verify the NFA works as intended at each step of the process--if something seems amiss, it probably is.
3. Maintaining neatness and order for lines between states helps minimize confusion.
4. Grid/graph paper helps with drawing straight lines and uniform circles.
5. Remove states inaccessible from the Start state only after eliminating all epsilon transitions to and from them.
6. Use a mechanical pencil and a slab eraser to correct the mistakes
   

I made every mistake in the book this evening working through the transformation of the regular expression (a+ba)*b* to a minimized DFA--but I don't mind, because my studies represent the time I want to make the mistakes--not during my upcoming midterm.

Hope this helps in some small way.

Radio Songs

Heard this afternoon driving north on a windy, light-dappled off of towering clouds sort of day:

Franklin, Tennessee-based Paramore's "Born for This" from their 2007 album Riot! on the Fueled by Ramen and Atlantic Records label.

Huntington Beach-based The Aquabats!' "Lobster Bucket" from their 1997 album "The Fury of the Aquabats!" on the Goldenvoice Recordings.

Inter-Public Transit Google Maps

Google maps can't seem to string together public transit systems, regrettably. I keyed in a trip from downtown to IKEA to see what comes up and Google dumps me north of the Sacramento River and expects me to walk 53 minutes the rest of the way (across the river):

http://maps.google.com/maps?f=d&hl=en&geocode=&saddr=5th+%26+J+St,+Sacramento,+CA+95814&daddr=IKEA+west+sacramneto&date=3%2F6%2F08&time=9:59pm&ttype=dep&sll=38.603457,-121.520634&sspn=0.063051,0.10231&dirflg=r&ie=UTF8&ll=38.593529,-121.52441&spn=0.063059,0.10231&t=h&z=13&start=0

The thing is, both Sacramento Regional Transit and YOLOBUS post their transit data online:

http://iportal.sacrt.com/gtfs/

Without Google Transit I'd have never gotten onboard so readily with taking light rail and buses to and from school. I'm wondering who else out there (and how many) will also come to that realization. My car largely sits idle now.

The SacRT web site has a handy calculator that calculates rough costs savings. For Dawn and I, it's about $3,500 before parking fees. Including the $15/day parking, it comes out to about $7,000 in savings annually, including the cost of monthly RT passes.

Radio Songs

Tonight courtesy SomaFM's Indie Pop Rocks:

The Rakes' Strasbourg.

VIM Color Schemes

As mentioned previously I set my Putty settings to a dark green background with light green foreground.

It's a personal preference sort of thing, but my favorite default VIM color scheme at present is Koehler. Unfortunately, stock Koehler uses darkblue, making text invisible against a dark green background.

To change this, edit file (as root or equivalent):

• Backup the file: cp /usr/share/vim/vim63/colors/koehler.vim /usr/share/vim/vim63/colors/koehler.vim.bak
• vim /usr/share/vim/vim63/colors/koehler.vim
• Run vim command ":%sdarkblue/lightblue/g"

All's good.

GRE

I'll be taking the GRE this summer to qualify for grad school next spring. As it so happens, Sac State doesn't set a minimum score requirement--they use it as a comparison to the average GRE score of all applicants to determine whether or not to accept the applicant.

subversion propset automation via auto-props

Found it:

Link: http://svnbook.red-bean.com/en/1.1/ch07.html#svn-ch-7-sect-1.3.2

config on my host currently reads:

...
enable-auto-props = yes

### Section for configuring automatic properties.
### The format of the entries is:
### file-name-pattern = propname[=value][;propname[=value]...]
### The file-name-pattern can contain wildcards (such as '*' and
### '?'). All entries which match will be applied to the file.
### Note that auto-props functionality must be enabled, which
### is typically done by setting the 'enable-auto-props' option.
[auto-props]
*.c = svn:eol-style=native;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.cpp = svn:eol-style=native;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.h = svn:eol-style=native;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.dsp = svn:eol-style=CRLF;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.dsw = svn:eol-style=CRLF;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.sh = svn:eol-style=native;svn:executable;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.txt = svn:eol-style=native;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
*.png = svn:mime-type=image/png
*.jpg = svn:mime-type=image/jpeg
Makefile = svn:eol-style=native;svn:keywords=Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision

Notes:

• Quotes in file "config" prevented subversion from updating property Id in my test file. For example, this does not work:
• *.cpp = svn:eol-style=native;svn:keywords="Id ..."
• Whitespace confuses subversion propset application. For example:
• This works:
• $Id$
• $Id:$
• This does not work (note the whitespace):
• $Id : $
  
• Steps I applied to test:
• Add this example header to a dummy file (new.cpp):
  /*******************************************************************************
  * #
  * # Author: author
  * #
  * # $Id: $
  * #
  * # *****************************************************************************/
• svn add new.cpp
• A new.cpp
  
• svn proplist --verbose new.cpp
• Properties on 'new.cpp':
  svn:keywords : Id Date LastChangedDate HeadURL URL Author LastChangedBy Rev Revision
  svn:eol-style : native
  
• svn commit new.cpp -m "Initial revision"
• Replacing new.cpp
  Transmitting file data .
  Committed revision 11.
  
• cat new.cpp
• /*******************************************************************************
  * #
  * # Author: author
  * #
  * # $Id: new.cpp 11 2008-02-24 19:26:30Z user $
  * #
  * # *****************************************************************************/
• Italicized items above represent environment-specific text

Level 77

It gets exponentially longer with each level. The top PQ'ers are up to level 92.

This is the only computer game I "play" these days.

Link: http://progressquest.com

Friday Cat Blogging

Kernels once rolled here;
Unpopped, mesmerizing sounds;
Put them back in, please?

Hired

I started a new full-time job on Monday, Feb 4.

Today, I learned there's a form I need to fill out if I want to bring an electric fan into work. A fan! My high hopes for bringing in a new development rig and a compact fridge have met with similar violent ends.

I'm glad I didn't ask before swapping out the stock Cool White fluorescent tubes for Full Spectrum tubes.

On the up side, I'm helping low-income kids, and that feels good.

Shadows

Walking across campus from my compiler class on Thursday, I was struck by the number of shadows I cast as I walked--seven by my count, and perhaps more. I've never noticed before, but it's so obvious. As I walked, they changed direction and opaqueness, as the angle and distance from the light sources changed. It was quiet, save the occasional vehicle, and I felt peaceful.

Sealable Plastic Badge Holder

The past two jobs I've worked at require badges (save the jokes, please) for identification.

Stock plastic badge holders provided with the badge open at the top to allow the RFID card to slide in. The unsealable opening at the top eventually lets in dust, dirt, and liquids. The badge ends up looking beat up after a year or two. Replacing the plastic holder helps, but it's a hassle.

It turns out there's a simple solution--purchase a pack of sealable badge holders from an office-supply store. For example, Office Depot, or intuitively enough, badgeholder.com.

Canon MP160 + Wireless Multifunction Print Server

Wireless multifunction print servers have a few pitfalls--here's what I've been through.

I own a Canon Pixma MP160 multifunction USB 2.0 printer. Originally, I connected it to my laptop's docking station using a GigaWare four-port USB 2.0 hub and shared it on the network from my laptop. The downsides of this configuration:

• Undocking the laptop removes the printer from the network.
• Once undocked, other laptops can still print, but they have to have a separate printer driver installed for local rather than remote printing, and they obviously have to hoof it over to the printer.
• Desktops that rely on the shared printer are out-of-luck.
  

Obviously a non-optimal solution. A wireless print server, theoretically, would mean all wireless-enabled desktops and laptops can print from wherever they are in the house.

The seed of this idea has been in my head for several months. An opportunity to remedy the situation presented itself while I was shopping at a local tech store two weeks ago. On impulse (in hindsight, a regrettable decision) I purchased a Linksys Wireless G print server. Getting home, I discovered in my ignorance that print server manufacturers typically break down print servers into two sets--those that support multifunction printers and those that don't. The Linksys Wireless G print server doesn't support multifunction printers. Above and beyond that limitation, the installation and configuration process of the Linksys Wireless G proved frustrating:

• The print server web server crashes if you begin navigating from the home page. To avoid this bug, one has to start navigating the print server's web server from http://*ip*/ps_stat.htm. That's scary quality control.
• Without knowing this trick, even though you set the local wireless SSID security key, it doesn't take--so it's even worse from the user's point of view, since they think they did everything right.

After researching this on the internet, I decided that I wasn't happy with the bugs and the loss of multifunction printing support for the price, and returned it.

Before I did that, I decided to research wireless multifunction print servers further. My local tech store sells print servers from Hawking, D-Link, Linksys, AirLink, and TrendWare. I ignored the multifunction version from Linksys and decided after reading reviews online that the D-Link Rangebooster G Multifunction print server represented the best bet. I knew from reading their web site that the Canon MP160 wasn't listed as supported under the FAQ, but I decided to take a risk since they only had reviewed HP and Epson. This represented my second learning opportunity.

Last night I hooked it up, and after a quick call to tech support (it needed a static IP to work), got it working. D-Link tech support confirmed that it doesn't work with the MP160 multifunction printer, however. Other than it's failure to work with DHCP, the D-Link seemed like a quality product.

I finally got the idea to just call Canon and ask them point-blank what works with their printers. It turns out that they sell a model called the Silex C-6700WG that works with the Canon printers. Unfortunately, it's $100. *sigh* I guess this is what is meant by vendor lock-in. I haven't decided whether or not to buy it, since in the future I'm hoping to upgrade to a color laser printer

So why does it seem so hard to get printing right for multifunction printers? The answer seems to be (from TrendNet's now defunct page):

Printers that host multiple functions, such as faxing and scanning, use different communication standards to complete respective tasks. Traditional print servers are unable to interface with multi-function printers due to the use of different communication standards within one device. The result is that many multi-function printers are not currently linked to a home or office network.

So there you have it--multifunction print servers need to be fluent in fax, scanner, copier and printer standards--and apparently the communication pipeline of printer-driver<->print-server<->printer is pretty fragile.

1,415

My spam folder currently contains 1,415 spam e-mails, all received in the last 30 days.

On average:

• 354 per week
  
• 47 per day
• 2 per hour
  

To get silly:

• 0.033 per minute
• 0.00055 per second

I'm curious how typical this is....

24C3

Aw man, I missed the 24C3:

http://events.ccc.de/congress/2007/Main_Page

One of the highlights of the tech year.

Radio Songs

Heard on the radio:

Vacaville, CA-based Papa Roach's "...To Be Loved" from their 2006 album The Paramour Sessions on the Geffen Records label. Video.