Daniel R. http://life.neophi.com/danielr/ en Copyright 2010 Sat, 13 Mar 2010 23:09:08 -0500 http://www.sixapart.com/movabletype/?v=3.3svn-20070408163858 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Programming Language Trends One idea that "The Passionate Programmer" recommends that I've always been intrigued by is the idea of mapping hot technologies along an early, middle and late adoption trend and seeing where the technologies you work with fall. It is a subjective exercise but does help you think about what is out there. Turns out for programming languages (not frameworks or toolkits) TIOBE Software has for some time now been producing a Programming Community Index that ranks programming languages. They have a methodology that I'm inclined to call good enough for most cases.

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/03/programming_language_trends.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/03/programming_language_trends.html Helpful Sat, 13 Mar 2010 23:09:08 -0500 NoSQL Live Boston Yesterday I attended NoSQL Live Boston and participated on the NoSQL in the Cloud panel. During the day I captured some notes for myself which are after a brief recap of some of the points I tried to make during the panel discussion.

Q: What benefits and pitfalls have you found with your use of NoSQL in the cloud?

Based on having used Amazon's SimpleDB service over the past 18 months.

Benefits: pay as go is great for starting off, zero maintenance, zero setup, scaling by spreading data across multiple domains, SimpleSB manages data replication and high availability

Pitfalls: new mindset required to use eventually consistent model, increase impact of network latency, keeping SimpleDB's limitations in mind (size of domains, attribute count, etc.)

Q: How viable are these solutions and what is hampering there adoption?

Viability: SimpleDB has a 2 year track record and recently added consistent reads and conditional puts/deletes opening up new classes of application possibilities.
Adoption: Need body of knowledge, best practice patterns and use cases are still emerging

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/03/nosql_live_boston.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/03/nosql_live_boston.html Helpful Fri, 12 Mar 2010 07:26:26 -0500 The Company of Myself If you are a fan of Braid, The Company of Myself is an awesome little Flash game that uses the replay your actions concept very well.

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/03/the_company_of_myself.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/03/the_company_of_myself.html Visual Tue, 09 Mar 2010 23:23:31 -0500 PKIX path building failed Recently this error message started showing up in one of our log files and needless to say was causing a few issues:

[org.apache.commons.httpclient.HttpMethodDirector] -

Turns out the process had been running long enough that while trying to perform an HTTPS based operation the certificate in the JVM for the certificate authority the target site was using had expired. A quick update of the cacerts file and everything was happy again. Yet another software rot angle to keep in mind.

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/pkix_path_building_failed.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/pkix_path_building_failed.html Programming Sat, 20 Feb 2010 20:47:18 -0500 US: Americans Talk About Love Us: Americans Talk About Love Us: Americans Talk About Love by John Bowe


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
This book isn't about fairytale love. This book is about love being complex, crazy, heart-rending, and at the same time comforting, profound, and heartwarming. The stories reflect the melting pot that is America touching on generational, cultural, and ethical differences of what people consider and call love.

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]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/us_americans_talk_about_love.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/us_americans_talk_about_love.html Books Mon, 15 Feb 2010 09:47:41 -0500 A Fire Upon the Deep A Fire Upon The Deep (Zones of Thought) A Fire Upon The Deep by Vernor Vinge


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A masterful journey through space to save the universe from a growing new power. The story mixes alien races, hive minds, technology, and politics in a captivating story presenting it all in believable scenarios. The ending pushed the boundaries a little but resolved everything cleanly, a pleasant change from other science fiction I've read recently.

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]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/a_fire_upon_the_deep.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/a_fire_upon_the_deep.html Books Sat, 13 Feb 2010 14:57:29 -0500 One Thing At A Time Anonymous asked: How do you maintain focus (on work, dreams, goals, life)?

You do one thing at a time.

-- Frank Chimero

I've been casting my net wide these past fews months and so far haven't found that one thing yet, but I know when I do it will ring true like is has in the past.

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/one_thing_at_a_time.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/one_thing_at_a_time.html Quotes Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:21:43 -0500 Braid Yesterday I bought a computer game. For those that know me well this may came as a big surprise since this isn't something I normally do. Lately I've found myself searching for something to sink my teeth into. I've not quite found it yet so I've been doing my best to not just sit in front of the television and watch movies. To that end a discussion at work recently brought up the game Braid. I have to say so far it is an awesome puzzle game, my favorite genre. The playing with time dynamic the game has isn't something I've seen in the few games I've played or heard about and it's done very well. Definitely worth the few bucks it cost me.

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/braid.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/braid.html Visual Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:53:29 -0500 Don't Make Me Think Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability (2nd Edition) Don't Make Me Think: A Common Sense Approach to Web Usability by Steve Krug


My rating: 4 of 5 stars
A no nonsense approach on how to design web sites to be as effective as possible. The second edition adds information on treating users well and designing for accessibility while trimming the focus on how to conduct usability testing. It has been a number of years since I first skimmed this book and I found the changes welcome. My biggest complaint with the book continues to be a lack of a summary or checklist on the high level points with references to where the topic is covered in more detail. While the book is concise enough to easily skim through I frequently found myself wishing for some more than just the index to find material when I wanted to review a topic. If even half the advice given in the book was followed the web would be twice as easy to use.

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]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/dont_make_me_think.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/dont_make_me_think.html Books Tue, 02 Feb 2010 20:19:06 -0500 NoSQL Rundown I've been occasionally following NoSQL over the past year since starting to use SimpleDB for unstructured data storage. A lot of options have opened up and recently Tim Anglade put this list together that I thought was worth sharing. Hopefully I got all the links correct as they were not part of the original message.

  • ESRI ArcGIS (non-free)
  • Oracle's Spatial Layer (non-free)
  • SAND (academic Geographical/Spatial database)
]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/nosql_rundown.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/02/nosql_rundown.html Links Mon, 01 Feb 2010 10:08:05 -0500 The Music of Chance I had read this book awhile ago as part of a book group but due to a gag order around discussing books prior to meeting in person, I'm only now getting around to posting it. Minor spoiler alert.

The Music of Chance The Music of Chance by Paul Auster


My rating: 2 of 5 stars
The book started off great. I had visions of Rounders and Good Will Hunting in my head as the story started to unfold. Unfortunately once they lost the big poker game and voluntarily entered indentured servitude my suspension of disbelief was broken and I could no longer relate to the characters. As a result I found it a drudgery to complete the book.

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]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/the_music_of_chance.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/the_music_of_chance.html Books Sun, 31 Jan 2010 19:01:03 -0500 AIR 2.0 and Presentation Nightmares Tonight I spoke at the Boston Flex User Group about AIR 2.0 with a focus on the new Native Process API and Networking APIs. Alas the talk didn't go as planned since I forgot my bag of video output adapters at home and didn't notice until I was setting up. The meeting was only a few blocks away from the Allurent offices so I ran (more like a sprint) back to find suitable replacements. Alas in my rush to borrow an adapter (only being able to find a mini display port to HDMI) I ran afoul of the old Mac VGA/HDMI mechanical virus issue. However, it wasn't until after sprinting back to the meeting and futzing with projectors for 15 minutes that I realized this issue. Thankfully a fellow attendee loaned me his computer and using the USB drive I did have on me, I managed to gave a modified version of the talk sans running demo code. I'd like to thank those in attendance for their patience, apologize for my forgetfulness, and hope that at least a little information was conveyed. A copy of the presentation is available in PDF format. The most import code snippets are below:

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/air_20_and_presentation_nightm.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/air_20_and_presentation_nightm.html Flex Tue, 12 Jan 2010 23:20:13 -0500 My Top 10 Spam Subjects from 2009 Doing some quick command line hacks I extracted the top 10 spam subjects (ignoring case) that I received in 2009 according to Postini. Each subject accounts for 0.25% of the spam messages I received with no subject accounting for 0.88%. All told just under half of the spam I got used a unique subject.

CountSubject
396[no subject]
127free cialis
124age is no longer a barrier for me in bed
123pay shipping and get your trials
119le_vrai_jeu_se_joue_seulement_lm-`_om-y_il_a_commencm-i:_m-`_las_vegas!_
115we know you want the free cialis
115pay shipping for your erotic nights
115don't pay anything for your pills for 15 days
114feel 10 years younger in bed today
114do not underestimate the value of free pills
]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/my_top_10_spam_subjects_from_2.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/my_top_10_spam_subjects_from_2.html Sat, 02 Jan 2010 11:00:21 -0500 2009 Spam Since I switched to Google for handling my email I don't have as fine grained tracking of spam as I did in years past. My first line of spam defense is Postini which caught 43,683 spam messages for 2009. I get very few false positives from Postini so that number is about spot on. My GMail spam folder currently holds 406 spams messages received in the last 30 days. If I do a rough calculation, I'd say GMail caught another 3,263 spam messages. Postini drops certain spam messages into the bit bucket before I see any trace of it which contributed to only 45% of my email for 2009 being spam. The number of spam messages a day though is marching upwards. Minus a few drops when a spam botnet is shutdown the trend for the year isn't pretty as the graph below shows.

]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/2009_spam.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2010/01/2009_spam.html Kitchen Sink Fri, 01 Jan 2010 17:45:02 -0500 The Mind at Night The Mind at Night: The New Science of How and Why We Dream The Mind at Night: The New Science of How and Why We Dream by Andrea Rock


My rating: 5 of 5 stars
This book provides an excellent history and discussion of current research around dreaming. It is by the far the most approachable book on the topic I've read. Each chapter explores a different aspect of the mind at mind and calls out specific researchers leading the exploration of that area. The books builds upon itself such that the later topics, while dealing with more current and technical material, are digestible as previous chapters laid the groundwork for understanding them.

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]]> http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2009/12/the_mind_at_night.html http://life.neophi.com/danielr/2009/12/the_mind_at_night.html Books Sat, 26 Dec 2009 16:52:20 -0500