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Timbre of Tempests

21st November, 2009. 9:20 pm.

http://www.lamemage.com/blog/index.php/87/what-is-microscope/

...

Whoa.

That just broke my head.

Fractal Gaming?

Fuck. Yes.

Also, having Google Wave active in my browser is nuking my CPU at 50%. =(

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21st November, 2009. 7:17 pm.

Software is remarkable stuff. Sometimes, perhaps because we work with it all the time, we forget just how remarkable it is.

Very little else in human experience is as malleable, allowing us free rein to exercise our ingenuity and inventiveness almost without limits. Also, with a very few exceptions that we’ll cover later, software is deterministic—the next state is completely determined by the current state, and (crucially) we have complete access to all of that state whenever we want it.

Compared to traditional engineering, we are spoiled. What do you think a Formula One engineer would give to be able to instantaneously stop an engine when it’s rotating at 19,000 revolutions per minute and examine every aspect of it in minute detail? To see the precise state of each component while under pressure and stress, for example, or to dynamically record the shape and position of the flame front within the combustion chambers during ignition?

It is exactly this kind of trick that we are able to perform with our software, which is why the empirical approach is particularly powerful when debugging.
=)

From "Debug It!", Paul Butcher.

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21st November, 2009. 6:20 pm.

From: Larch Miller
Subject: grasp the nettle
Def: 1. To irritate. 2. To sting.

When I was young, I was told that grasping a nettle firmly actually makes it hurt less than if you merely brush it. It still hurts, to be sure, but less. Thus I've always understood the expression "grasping the nettle" to mean that an unpleasant task will be less onerous, although still unpleasant, if you stop dithering and go about your business decisively.
I like that, I do.

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21st November, 2009. 12:30 am.

"No one has figured out how to test well in any language." -- Jay Fields.

Hm.

Hi Drew.

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21st November, 2009. 12:12 am.

I think BART swings are the only reason I'm interested in visiting California right now.

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20th November, 2009. 8:57 am.

A man's library is a sort of harem. -Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)

...

=X

Now see here...

I just finished putting my library into a bunch of boxes and sealed them with tape.

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19th November, 2009. 1:22 pm.

(1:06:35 PM) Coworker: http://www.dangerousminds.net/index.php/site/comments/hit_the_bitch_the_danish_domestic_volence_awareness_campaign/
(1:19:06 PM) Michael Chui: Yeah...
(1:19:26 PM) Michael Chui: G4C people need to get a brain.
(1:20:30 PM) Michael Chui: This philosophy of "If you let people experience it, then they'll go oh noes its teh badness make it go away" is really, really, really dumb.

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19th November, 2009. 12:19 am.

http://railstips.org/2009/6/3/what-if-a-key-value-store-mated-with-a-relational-database-system

Wow.

That would have been useful when I was trying to figure out what kind of data store to drive my MMO with. Hadn't heard of this. Would be really, really, really interested in people giving me "is awesome because I can do X with this" or "fails in X way" commentary on it.

http://railstips.org/2009/11/8/you-re-an-idiot-for-not-using-heroku

Am vaguely wondering whether or not to try flipping a Heroku+MongoHQ pairing. Assuming I can get a beta invite to MongoHQ.

I'm kinda interested. I'm not going to drop my DH account for this, but after EVE switches over to Dominion and the Moondoggie In-Game Browser appears with its apparently lightning fast awesome, it might be worth it to slap together a logbook app with Rails and get it hosted for free. In da cloudz. Then I could take notes while mining. Would be cool.

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17th November, 2009. 12:14 am.

QOTD: "Do you know what solipsism is? Please explain so I can be sure you're actually insulting me, rather than merely being ignorant."

In hopefully other news,

WTF Sanderson? Saerin is supposed to be a rather competent logician, and against Egwene you have her put forward three completely untenable arguments? That are barely bound together!?

Starting off with "You can barely channel" is an obvious loss leader. The "demotion to novice" was decent. The "if this, then you'd be dead" is a complete retreat from any logic at all--generally speaking, if someone brings death into a conversational argument that isn't actually about death, they're doing it wrong; it's a Godwin standard: right next to reductio ad Hilterum.

Then, after throwing up useless attack after useless attack, she delivers one. One decent argument. A true, syllogistic argument, with a P, a Q, an implication, an assertion of basis, and a conclusion. Sanderson's usage of logical battle was a lot better in Elantris, when he didn't actually get into it at all: he pulled the conversation into one, and then dropped it while mentioning that there was a hefty amount of background. Nothing wrong with that technique.

And yes, of course that last argument had a false assertion for Egwene to take apart in a page-long fact-finding show of her newfound battle-hardened character.

Sigh.

I am starting to hate this book. It's not actually bad, minus this and that. It's outside of Sanderson's style: you can see where he grafts his understanding of Jordan into it, and you can see where his own voice as a writer is overriding it. But it's grating. That's why it's grating.

It's nowhere near as bad as Timeweb. Timeweb was a piece of crap. I'm actually kinda tempted to burn it. The Gathering Storm is entirely readable, and I attribute my dislike more to my raised standards than to any ineptness on Sanderson's part. I liked his other books, to the point where you could call me a fan of his writing. They aren't staggering works of genius by far, but they're actually rather good. Storm isn't, but it falls far short of actually being bad. I will give him that.

I don't remember reading Knife of Dreams, so I have nothing but a faintly pleasant recollection of actually sitting down to a Wheel of Time novel. I believe I read the entire thing at Barnes and Noble in one (very long) sitting. Cross-referencing the publication date with my journal would probably find a mention. I don't think Jordan was better; Sanderson's voice is far, far more concise: perhaps too far, but I'm long-winded so I'm biased: and he covers more ground with less.

I find more to criticize than I do to praise. Ah well. Enough of this. I can probably close another chapter before I sleep.

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15th November, 2009. 4:51 pm.

I love bento boxes.

They make me feel Japanese.

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