Jerry Yoakum's Blog

Agile non-negotibles

2011-09-14T23:17:00.003-05:00

Agile non-negotiables are those software engineering practices that you'd be crazy to go without.

Unit Testing: Knowing your code works
Refactoring: Paying down your Technical Debt
Test-Driven Development: Knowing what your Goal is before Coding
Pair Programming: Tightly binding review and development together
Continuous Integration: Making it Production Ready

I'm a little crazy. I don't always use all of the above practices. I try to but my desire to be a hero and get things done quickly overcomes my sensible side. I think most people do this too. There are always outside influences that can seduce a developer into over promising.

The argument for ignoring those outside influences and always practicing the above agile non-negotibles is that you will have:
- better quality code,
- more consistent deliveries, and
- less bugs.

Stop worrying about taking three days to develop something that might have took two days had you left out unit testing or refactoring. That is only a short term savings. Consider how long it will take to fix a missed bug or add a new feature next year.

Using the above practices is an investment in the future of your software.

Pair Programming

2011-09-11T11:49:00.003-05:00

I'm a big fan of pair programming. I have used it many times and almost everytime the result was better code that was developed faster. Pair programming is like having continuous code review.

Sadly, there is a lot of controversy with this particular agile/XP practice. Seeing two valuable resources sitting down at one computer makes most managers nervous. They think their team's productivity has just been halved. The worst thing about this mentality is that it makes it clear that the manager thinks programming is just typing.

Mere typing, programming is not. A good idea or a bug caught early on in the process can save a team a lot of work and rework later. By pairing you share valuable knowledge and practices throughout the team, catching more bugs early, and increasing code quality.

Merciless Refactoring

2011-08-15T21:54:00.000-05:00

Many people are afraid to make code changes out of fear that they will break the code. To ensure you can safely make code changes you should change it often. I'm not talking about pointless changes but solid improvements. Run FindBugs against your code and fix the issues. If you disagree with FindBugs then use PMD or any static analysis tool. However, if static analysis suggests that your code looks like a bug then consider changing it to look less dangerous.

Anyway, the point of merciless refactoring is to always be improving your code. To make changes and ensure that it was easy to make those changes. If it isn't fast and easy then you need to make changes to make it fast and easy. Write unit tests, delete unused code, optimize loops, automate tests; everything you can do to make it possible to complete your next project in record time.

Merciless refactoring can also be described as following the boy scouts rule of always leaving a place cleaner than when you found it. If you add a method to a class then add some JavaDocs to the other methods while you're there. If you change a single line of code in a method, take a look at the entire class and fix it up if you can.

HIV/AIDS Cure Proof of Concept

2011-06-02T21:25:00.000-05:00

New York magazine had this great article, "The Man Who Had HIV and Now Does Not", last month. It is as the title says about a man who was cured of HIV. It is an amazing read. It is not a cure for everyone; there are some specific genetics required but it is sparking new AIDS research.

Secret Santa

2010-11-23T07:12:00.000-06:00

I wrote a little webapp to create secret Santa lists:
http://secret-santa-list.appspot.com/

It has a nifty feature that allows you to specify who to exclude as a possible choice for certain people when generating the list. In my case, I used it to generate a list for extended family where spouses did not get each other as secret Santas. Using the exclude list you could also set up a list to ensure that men get gifts for men and women get gifts for women.

For those who are concerned about sending the email addresses of their friends and family across the Internet there is a HTTPS link:
https://secret-santa-list.appspot.com/

New Nutrition Goals for dailyburn.com

2009-11-03T00:55:00.008-06:00

If you are not happy with dailyburn's suggested nutritional goals because you find them to be too heavy on protein and unrealistic for carbs then you might want to try calculating your goals based on the formulas below.

I've decided on a target of 1900 calories. Since I am not an the Atkins diet which dailyburn seems to be pimping I've done some of my own calculations to adjust my nutritional goal ranges.

First, I used dailyburn as a baseline writing down the suggested values and calculating the differences of each range. Second, I found recommended targets that I am happy with. Finally, I adjusted the values:

With a target of 1900 I used the same range difference that dailyburn used, a difference of 250; giving me a range of 1775 - 2025.
The carb target can be calculated by multipyling 0.125 times your target calories which gave me 238 g [1]. Using dailyburn's difference of 84 that gives me a range of 196 - 280.
I used dailyburn's earlier suggestion to calculate the following ratio: 0.02613. Multiply that by your target calories to get your fat target. Using dailyburn's difference of 29 I get a range of 35 - 64.
For an absolute minimum protein target you should calculate that off the USFDA's recommend value of 50 g per 2000 Cal [2]. I decided to use 1.5 times my weight in Kg as the upper limit; 152 [3]. Then using dailyburn's difference I got a range of 60 - 152.

[1] I picked this because it seems more realistic for my habits.

    http://nutrition.about.com/od/askyournutritionist/f/howmanycarbs.htm 

[2] http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/scales/dailyvalues.htm

[3] http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/nutrition/a/protein.htm

Duracell donates emergency supplies to Springfield

2009-10-24T12:59:00.002-05:00

I know that Springfield has had some bad storms but I never really felt in danger. I guess it is a bit riskier than I thought because Springfield is one of five cities recongized as vulnerable to power outages as a result of extreme weather. Apparently, Springfield and the surrounding 30 miles have the highest frequency of extreme weather-related damage reports in the nation. As part of Duracell's "Hours of Power" donation campaign, Springfield has received $100,000 of emergency products, including batteries, safety kits, chargers, and flashlights. Some of the above information can be found at http://www.duracell.com/us/hoursofpower/cities.asp Also, it is fairly clear that Duracell is using the donation campaign as marketing; which I am fine with, it is a business. Please take a minute and visit the site above and click on the donate button. It is a small effort to help others.

Googlism

2009-10-04T21:32:00.001-05:00

I just found http://www.googlism.com . It is an interesting waste of time for an individual but possibly a quick summary of a business' website.

Banned CFC-driven Inhalers

2009-04-11T00:01:00.002-05:00

In August 2008, Scientific American did a story about a federal ban on ozone-depleting chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) to conform with the Clean Air Act. The albuterol inhalers without any CFCs cost three times more than generic inhalers that use CFCs. The CFCs from inhalers have an insignificant impact on the Ozone Layer but raising the cost of a $15 inhaler to $45 is a significant burden. I tried searching online but kept finding articles from last year. Does anyone know if this moronic switch has been enforced?

Expedia Flights to Mars

2009-04-01T13:40:00.000-05:00

Data Mining Finds Bad Drugs

2009-02-04T21:57:00.001-06:00

University of Minnesota Duluth professor Ted Pedersen and University Minnesota Twin Cities professor Serguei Pakhomov have been awarded a three-year, $935,000 National Institutes of Health research grant to develop natural-language processing (NLP) techniques that search through medical records to quickly detect widespread adverse drug reactions. Pedersen says the goal of the project is to improve the quality of post-marketing surveillance for adverse drug reactions. He notes that although the Food and Drug Administration approves all drugs before making them available, people often take so many drug combinations that it is not possible to test every interaction. Additionally, pharmaceutical companies may not have conducted enough studies to identify possible adverse reactions, he says. Pedersen will use NLP to develop methods that can identify different statements that have similar underlying meanings in medical records to enable the quick identification of patients who are taking similar combinations of drugs and possibly suffering from adverse reactions.
University of Minnesota Duluth (01/21/09) Latto, Susan Beasy

An Algorithmic Game of Clue©

2009-02-04T21:52:00.002-06:00

Duke University researchers have developed an algorithm capable of determining the best strategy for winning a game of CLUE©, a mathematical model that also could be used to help robotic mine sweepers find hidden explosives. Duke post-doctoral fellow Chenghui Cai says robotic sensors, like players in CLUE©, take information from their surroundings to help the robot maneuver around obstacles and find its target. "The key to success, both for the CLUE© player and the robots, is to not only take in the new information it discovers, but to use this new information to help guide its next move," Cai says. "This learning-adapting process continues until either the player has won the game, or the robot has found the mines." Artificial intelligence researchers call these situations "treasure hunt" problems, and have developed mathematical approaches to improving the chances of discovering the hidden treasure. Cai says the researchers found that players who implement the strategies based on the algorithm consistently outperform human players and other computer programs. Duke professor Silvia Ferrari, director of Duke's Laboratory for Intelligent Systems and Controls, says the algorithm is designed to maximize the ability to reach targets while minimizing the amount of movement.
Duke University News & Communications (01/27/09) Merritt, Richard

Is Technology Producing a Decline in Critical Thinking and Analysis?

2009-02-04T21:49:00.000-06:00

University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) professor Patricia Greenfield says that critical thinking and analysis skills decline the more people use technology, while visual skills improve. Greenfield, the director of UCLA's Children's Digital Media Center, analyzed more than 50 studies on learning and technology. She found that reading for pleasure improves thinking skills and engages the imagination in ways that visual media cannot. She says the increased use of technology in education will make evaluation methods that include visual media a better test for what students actually know, and will create students that are better at processing information. However, she cautions that most visual media does not allocate time for reflection, analysis, or imagination. "Studies show that reading develops imagination, induction, reflection, and critical thinking, as well as vocabulary," Greenfield says. "Students today have more visual literacy and less print literacy." Greenfield also analyzed a study that found that college students who watched "CNN Headline News" without the news crawl on the bottom of the screen remembered more facts from the broadcast that those who watched with the crawl. She says this study and others like it demonstrate that multi-tasking prevents people from obtaining a deeper understanding of information.
UCLA News (01/27/09) Wolpert, Stuart

Data Mining Promises to Dig Up New Drugs

2009-02-02T23:06:00.001-06:00

European researchers have developed a robot called Eve that uses artificial intelligence, data mining, and knowledge discovery technology to analyze the results of the pharmacological experiments that it conducts. The robot can make informed decisions on how effective different chemical compounds will be at fighting diseases, potentially providing more effective treatments and a faster development process for medicines. Eve relates the chemical structure of different compounds to their pharmacological activity to learn which chemical compounds should be tested next. "Over time, Eve will learn to pick out the chemical compounds that are likely to be most effective against a certain target by analyzing data from past experiments and comparing chemical structures to their pharmacological properties," says Jozef Stefan Institute researcher Saso Dzeroski. Dzeroski says Eve should help scientists and pharmaceutical companies identify more effective compounds to treat diseases, and help them find drugs in a fraction of the time and cost of current methods. Dzeroski says Eve is the first robot-based computer system capable of originating its own experiments, physically performing them, interpreting the results, and repeating the cycle. He says that instead of choosing compounds for testing at random, Eve can pick compounds that are more likely to be effective.
ICT Results (02/02/09)

Report Calls for Boost in IT Research, Policies

2009-01-28T22:12:00.002-06:00

U.S. President Barack Obama's transition team has received a copy of a National Academy of Sciences report that recommends several strategies the United States could follow as information technology research and development becomes increasingly globalized. Randy Katz, a computer scientist at the University of California, Berkeley, who co-chaired the panel that wrote the report, says the top spot that the United States holds in information technology research and development is being challenged. The report suggests the United States would be a better place for innovation if small startups that want to go public did not have to contend with the costly financial reporting requirements for disclosure.[They're talking about Sarbanes-Oxley (SOX)] The patent system should be reformed to discourage litigation, the report adds. Also, more funding is needed for research into the biggest challenges. Katz says the High-Performance Computing and Communications initiative of the 1980s and 1990s is the type of "programmatic research [that can] build communities of researchers that collaborate and also compete while pursuing a particular goal."
Science (01/23/09) Charles, Dan

Related article: Law Profs Decry SOX as 'Debacle,' Express Hope for 'Re-Examination'

Barry's Moon Landing

2009-01-28T21:44:00.003-06:00

This is how my friend, Barry, tells me the moon landing really happened.

HP Grants Aim to Redesign College Engineering & Computer Science

2009-01-27T21:13:00.001-06:00

Hewlett-Packard has made more than $2.4 million in cash and equipment available for its "HP Innovations in Education" effort, which aims to reinvent undergraduate computer science and engineering programs through the use of technology. HP is asking for proposals from two- and four-year colleges and universities that offer degrees in engineering, computer science, or information technology. Grant projects must explore the potential for innovation through the intersection of teaching, learning, and technology, with the ultimate goal of "re-imagining undergraduate engineering education." HP plans to award about 10 grants to public or private colleges or universities in the United States. Each grant will include more than $240,000 in HP technology, cash, and professional development. Proposals should describe how the technology will enable innovation in four areas: Leadership Capacity, or creating a global network of administrators and faculty to implement innovative approaches; Digital Learning Environments, or using technology to fundamentally redesign the learning experience in ways that increase student engagement in academic success; the Undergraduate Design and Research Experience, to make engineering real and relevant by involving engineering undergraduate students in design and research challenges that address the needs of society; and Pre-College Outreach, to encourage administrators, faculty, and undergraduate students to work with secondary-school teachers and students to increase student awareness and interest in high-tech programs.
eSchool News (01/20/09)

Operation Comfort Warriors

2009-01-25T17:44:00.002-06:00

The American Legion accepts donations for Operation Comfort Warriors, which raises funds to Provide comfort items for wounded U.S. troops recovering in military hospitals.
www.legion.org/ocw
No donations are used for administrative costs.

What's a Serving?

2009-01-25T17:17:00.002-06:00

I've been trying to cut back on how much I eat. But in a day and age where it is more common to eat out, I'm not very good at judging a serving. I'm finding it handy to compare food to other objects to judge the serving size. For example, the recommended amount of meat for a healthy meal is 3 o 4 ounces - about the size of a deck of playing cards. Some more examples:

1 oz. meat: size of a matchbox
1 oz. cheese: size of four die
2 tablespoons of peanut butter: size of a ping-pong ball
1/2 cup of pasta: size of a tennis ball
1 medium apple/orange: size of a tennis ball
1 cup of vegetables/fruit: size of a baseball
1 medium potato: size of a computer mouse
1 cup of lettuce: four leaves

You can get a wallet-sized portion guide from the American Cancer Society at:
http://www.cancer.org/docroot/subsite/greatamericans/content/Portion_Control_Guide.asp

Auto Gear-Change Bicycle: Computer Controlled Bicycle Gear Changes Optimize Power, Comfort

2009-01-24T16:13:00.002-06:00

Researchers in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at National Defense University in Tashi, Taiwan, are developing a computer system for bicyclists that tells them when to change gears to optimize power while maintaining comfort. The researchers cite ergonomic studies that show cyclists can be in an optimum state while cycling with a fixed output power and peddling speed. The researchers developed an algorithm that provides cyclists with a gear shift strategy to maintain the optimal gear without sacrificing comfort. The algorithm, which has been tested in a simulation of a 12-speed bicycle, provides a gear-shifting sequence with minimal power losses and gear shifts. The algorithm will enable riders to operate the derailleur gearing system more easily, making riders more comfortable because they will be in the correct gear and shifting gears will be smoother. The researchers say the technology could eventually be extended to an entirely automatic mechanical gear-shifting system.
ScienceDaily (01/14/09)

Captivated by R's Power

2009-01-21T08:56:00.002-06:00

The R programming language is being used by a growing number of data analysts as data mining is increasingly being used by organizations to set ad prices, find new drugs faster, or fine-tune financial models. The open source language also has become popular among statisticians, engineers, and scientists without a background in programming because of the language's ease of use. "R is really important to the point that it's hard to overvalue it," says Google research scientist Daryl Pregibon. "It allows statisticians to do very intricate and complicated analyses without knowing the blood and guts of computing systems." Statisticians find R particularly useful because it contains several built-in mechanisms for organizing data, running calculations on the information, and creating graphical representations of data sets. Some familiar with R describe it as a stronger version of Microsoft's Excel spreadsheet that can help present data trends more clearly than is possible using information in rows and columns. R also is popular because users can alter the software's code to write variations for specific tasks. "The great beauty of R is that you can modify it to do all sorts of things," says Google's Hal Varian. "And you have a lot of prepackaged stuff that's already available, so you're standing on the shoulders of giants."
New York Times (01/07/09) Vance, Ashlee

NSF Looking for Wicked Cool Visual and Data Analysis Algorithms

2009-01-20T23:43:00.001-06:00

The National Science Foundation (NSF) wants to develop highly interpretive mathematical and computational algorithms and techniques to help the U.S. government and private researchers evaluate the data generated by health care, computational biology, security, and other areas. NSF wants to make it easier for law enforcement and the intelligence community to present its data in a visual format, which will require the development of new algorithms capable of representing and transforming digital data into mathematical formulations and computational models that allow for efficient and effective visualization. NSF's research effort is part of a five-year, $3 million project known as the Foundation on Data Analysis and Visual Analytics (FODAVA), which is led by the Georgia Institute of Technology, the NSF, and the Department of Homeland Security. One FODAVA program is a Georgia Tech system known as Jigsaw, which provides multiple coordinated views of large document collections to show connections between entities found within the collection. Meanwhile, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency says it wants to develop software capable of capturing knowledge from naturally occurring text and transforming it into the formal representations used by artificial-intelligence reasoning systems.
Network World (01/07/09)

U.S. Plans Major Upgrade to Internet Router Security

2009-01-20T01:13:00.003-06:00

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plans to invest in research dedicated to securing the Border Gateway Protocol (BGP) by adding digital signatures to router communications. DHS says the research initiative, dubbed BGPSEC, will prevent routing hijackings and accidental misconfigurations of routing data. DHS expects BGPSEC to take at least four years before deployment. "The reason BGP problems are so serious is that they attack the Internet infrastructure, rather than particular hosts," says Columbia University professor of computer science Steve Bellovin. "This is why it is a DHS-type of problem." Arbor Networks' Danny McPherson says BGP is one of the largest threats on the Internet. "There doesn't exist a formally verifiable source for who owns what address space on the Internet, and absent that you can't really validate the routing system," McPherson says. The extra funding should enable the DHS to develop ways of authenticating Internet Protocol (IP) address allocations and router announcements on how to reach blocks of IP addresses.
Network World (01/15/09) Marsan, Carolyn Duffy

Reply to SciAm Perspective: After the Crash

2008-12-03T23:13:00.009-06:00

In the December 2008 issue of Scientific American, the editors wrote a SciAm Perspectives piece entitled “After the Crash,” that focused on making sure that some of the blame for the Wall Street crash is placed on the developers of the software models. The last sentence of the opinion piece really drives home how little the SciAm editors understand about the software models, “Like an airplane, financial models can never be allowed to fly solo.”

What?! The problem wasn’t that the financial models were allowed to “fly solo”. The problem was that the models kept getting changed to appease the developers’ bosses. The SciAm editors also try to make it sound like the developers should have just not made the changes to the models each time “overoptimistic assumptions and faulty data” was given. What should have they done? Just said, “I’m sorry, Dave. I’m afraid I can’t do that.” They would have been fired and then replaced. In some cases maybe they could make a stand and say that making the change is risky and shouldn’t be done without being fired. However, it would amount to the same efforts that Roger Boisjoly made on January 27, 1986, when he convinced his manager, McDonald, to warn the NASA managers not to launch the space shuttle, Challenger, until warmer weather. The push back from the bosses was such that another person was found to sign off on the launch.

I am getting a little off topic. Let us return to this financial airplane that we don’t want to allow to fly solo. Many disasters have been caused by people doing their best to “fix” the problem instead of allowing the established protocols (usually designed using mathematical models) to deal with the problem. I’ll give two examples: Three Mile Island and the incident aboard the drill rig Ocean Ranger in February 1982.

In short, it is wrong to blame the people who work on the product because they are not the people with the power to decide what work is done on the product regardless if the product is a car or a financial model.

Bucket List

2008-08-23T21:09:00.001-05:00

Go on an Insight cruise: http://www.insightcruises.com/

Donald Knuth

2008-02-23T23:09:00.002-06:00

Dr. Dobb's Journal published an Interview with Donald Knuth in April of 1996. It was a very good read.

Knuth discusses what distinguishes a "computer scientist" from a "computer programmer" but neatly side steps actually separating the two terms. Choosing to instead explain how computer science is about thinking about problems in a different way. (You'll have to ready the article to see what I mean.)

There is some discussion about Knuth's The Art of Computer Programming. Which Charles Moss tells me is a wonderful read. I'm not sure I believe that but the MSU library has volumes 1-3 in case I want to check them out.

I must quote this because one of my coworkers is just fanitical about C++. To him, everything that is not C++ is crap with the exception of javascript and ruby.

DDJ: You've mentioned Edsgar Dijkstra. What do you think of his work? DK: His great strength is that he is uncompromising. It would make him physically ill to think of programming in C++.

Kunth followed that quote up with some very reassuring comments about trying to find the middle ground between very specific control of code and allowing a library to be used without knowing how it was implemented.

[W]hen you write a program, think of it primarily as a work of literature. You're trying to write something that human beings are going to read. Don't think of it primarily as something a computer is going to follow. The more effective you are at making your program readable, the more effective it's going to be: You'll understand it today, you'll understand it next week, and your successors who are going to maintain and modify it will understand it.

DVD-RW driver problem in Windows Vista

2008-01-26T12:11:00.001-06:00

Something I installed in the past month made Vista no longer recongize my DVD-RW. I tried removing it and reinstalling it but that didn't work. After a few online searches I found "Top Tip: DVD-RW driver problem in Windows Vista?".

I don't know why it works or what application made my DVD-RW stop working, but Andy2639's solution works.

In case that URL is broken in the future here is the solution:

Open the Registry Editor, navigate to:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Class
select key {4D36E965-E325-11CE-BFC1-08002BE10318} (now's a good time to backup)
delete the LowerFilters string value
delete the UpperFilters string value
Restart Windows.

She blinded me with Science!

2006-12-14T10:38:00.004-06:00

The following tidbits were discussed last weekend with a small group of friends. It's mostly science stuff that I'm following up with links to confirm or expand on the things I talked about.

We were watching MythBusters and they had a Lifter on the show and I said that it is an example of ionic propulsion. Which then lead to a discussion of ion engines. Yes, NASA has launched a space craft with a ion engine. It was called Deep Space I; it launched in October 1998 and was retired in December 2001. I would to love to know why it was retired, what it's max speed was, and how far from Earth did it make it.
Anyway, back to Lifters; while most people might avoid Wikipedia I like it because it reads well and at the end of most entries are a list of sources with links. Anyone who has a problem with Wikipedia can skip right down to the links.

Next came the uses of magnets in MythBusters (we are all big fans of the show). JP said that Dr. M (physics prof. that we all took for Physics II) said that there are one pole magnets. This conversation was really short lived. I said that Dr. M is an idiot and Kirk explained that without two poles there would be no magnetic field and without a magnetic field the "magnet" would not be magnetic. Okay, it is possible that Dr. M was talking about a Halbach Array, this is a magnet setup so that one pole is on top and the other pole is on the sides. This leaves the bottom with no or very little magnetic effect. However, I'm sticking with my Dr. M is an idiot hypothesis because there is a big difference between a Halbach Array and a magnet with only one pole, and as a teaching professor he should be able to explain that.

There were undoubtedly more science related things talked about but I can't think was anything else that might deserve comment here.

x64 QuickTime

2006-09-03T21:23:00.000-05:00

I don't know when it happened but QuickTime is now working on my Windows XP x64 system. Even though the last attempt to install iTunes gave a warning message saying the install was unsuccessful I guess that the QuickTime install was good. So, rejoice every who enjoys using QuickTime on a 64-bit system. Of course, VLC does a better job with fullscreen, but it is nice to have more software working correctly on my system.

The Expert Mind

2006-08-16T01:36:00.000-05:00

"Teachers in sports, music, and other fields tend to believe that talent matters and that they know it when they see it. In fact, they appear to be confusing ability with precocity. There is usually no way to tell, from a recital alone, whether a young violinist's extraordinary performance stems from innate ability or from years of Suzuki-style training. The preponderance of psychological evidence indicates that experts are made, not born. In fact, it takes approximately a decade of heavy labor to master any field. Even child prodigies, such as Gauss in mathematics, Mozart in music, and Bobby Fischer in chess, must have made an equivalent effort, perhaps by starting earlier and working harder than others. It is no coincidence that the incidence of chess prodigies multiplied after László Polgár published a book on chess education. The number of musical prodigies underwent a similar increase after Mozart's father did the equivalent two centuries earlier." The Expert Mind @ Scientific American

XML - No Silver Bullet

2006-07-26T08:58:00.000-05:00

Several years ago, when XML was just a buzzword and I was an undergrad in Computer Science, I went to a technial presentation / recruiting talk given by Cerner at my university. One of the "big" reasons to go work at Cerner was that they were cutting-edge; they were using XML. I gave the presenter some flak on that point. XML is no silver bullet. No one would consider listening to me, an undergrad with very little experience, not even the professors who should have known better. Maybe someone with more experience can be more convincing.... Software Development Amidst the Whiz of Silver Bullets... ACM Queue vol. 4, no. 5 - June 2006 by Alex E. Bell, The Boeing Company http://www.acmqueue.com/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=401

Review of Nerdcore Hip-Hop Music

2006-07-12T15:48:00.001-05:00

My first taste of Nerdcore was through the stylings of MC Frontalot. It is light and funny. Check out the review and links provided at:
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/12/1354242

Career Quiz

2006-07-10T17:51:00.001-05:00

Below are my results from the PrincetonReview Career Quiz. Considering that I am currently have a research assistantship, I guess the quiz is fairly accurate.
		People with yellow Interests like job responsibilities that include organizing and systematizing, and professions that are detail-oriented, predictable, and objective. People with yellow Interests enjoy activities that include: ordering, numbering, scheduling, systematizing, preserving, maintaining, measuring, specifying details, and archiving, which often lead to work in research, banking, accounting, systems analysis, tax law, finance, government work, and engineering.


		People with blue styles prefer to perform their job responsibilities in a manner that is supportive and helpful to others with a minimum of confrontation. They prefer to work where they have time to think things through before acting. People with blue style tend to be insightful, reflective, selectively sociable, creative, thoughtful, emotional, imaginative, and sensitive. Usually they thrive in a cutting edge, informally paced, future-oriented environment. You will want to choose a work environment or career path in which your style is welcomed and produces results.

Diagrams on the Web

2006-06-29T02:05:00.000-05:00

Draw and share diagrams on the web!! I'm there.

Free Science and Video Lectures Online

2006-06-28T15:18:00.000-05:00

http://freescienceonline.blogspot.com/

"sexual orientation"

2006-06-27T20:00:00.000-05:00

At Missouri State University there is a continuous hubbub about adding the words "sexual orientation" to the nondiscrimination policy. The local newspaper recently posted their opinion [1] that the university should go ahead and add the words citing other universities that have done so. The everybody else is doing it argument. I think the university should go the other direction. There is no need to even have a nondiscrimation policy. Nondiscrimation is federal law; so, having a policy that reiterates the law is pointless. There would be less printing costs and more space on documents to print useful information. The state and federal government require this crap. So, MSU has to either stick to their guns and only print what is required or jump on the bandwagon. I hope that the current administration does not give in to the demands for a policy change. The people who want such a change should have started with the law-makers then all the universities would have changed their policies in the same way and at the same time. Truly, I fault the administrators of those other universities for giving in so easily and coddling their students. They are not teaching their students to go to the source of a perceived problem. [1] http://www.news-leader.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060627/OPINIONS01/606270328/1091

Wish list

2006-06-20T23:02:00.000-05:00

Grad School, the T-shirt <link>

I want to display my school spirit with a little irony. "Grad School: It seemed better than getting a real job" on the front, PhD logo on the back.

Color: maroon
Size: XL

Castlevaina - Nintendo Game

2006-05-29T13:41:00.000-05:00

Free Flash Games

Summer School

2006-05-22T16:10:00.000-05:00

I enrolled for a summer class today. CSC 698: Research In Computer Science. Luckily, I have a research assistantship that the course is being modeled after; meaning that I get academic credit for what I do at work. I'm looking forward to it but I'm not quite ready to start. Finals were last week and a week off would be nice but I need to meet with my advisors sometime this week and discuss goals and possible approaches that I should take to achieve those goals. So, in order to look good, it would be great if I can come in to the meeting with some work and results done. We'll see. I'll take today off and do some work tomorrow (keep in mind that the job doesn't start until June 5 and the class until June 12).

Ubuntu's Add Applications Program

2006-03-10T22:21:00.000-06:00

This is the screenshot from when I installed Rhythmbox and Eric Python IDE. As you can see just point - click - done. However, Rhythmbox sucks (or at least did for me); so, also using Ubuntu's Add Applications Program I unselected Rhythmbox and select XMMS instead. I've been listening to mp3s and streaming music for the past hour.

Virtualization

2006-03-10T22:07:00.000-06:00

The ACM Virtualization presentation (08 Mar 06) really impressed me. I went to vmware.com to download the server software and immediately got distracted by the Virtual Application challenge. $200,000 is one hell of a distraction. Anyway, I ended up downloading the VMware-player and the sample Browser Application. The sample Browser Application is only a 250 MB zip file that contains an Ubuntu disto with Firefox setup ready to go. Installation, execution, installing XMMS and Eric Python IDE, and downloading some MP3s took less than 45 minutes. This is with me playing around while doing this. This FUCKING Rocks! Thanks for answering all the questions I asked you since I came in to Kirk’s presentation late. To everyone reading this download & install VMware-player (28 MB) and the sample Browser Application (250 MB). Very cool shit. Browsed and Created in Browser-Appliance-1.0.0, VMware-player

If I were rich...

2006-03-01T23:55:00.000-06:00

I think I'll start a "If I were rich..." theme. Anytime something really cool (but expensive) catches my attention I'll make a "If I were rich..." post. The SkyScout which you can read about at www.celestron.com is so cool. Just read this, "Aim it at any heavenly body, and the GPS receiver and three-axis position sensor identifies stars, planets, and constellations by voice or text." Sah-weeet! However, at four hundred dollars I'll just print out a star chart and wing it.

Building a Better Battery

2006-03-01T23:37:00.000-06:00

I have a box of used alkaline batteries at home. I can't convince myself to throw them away since they are still holding 2/3 of a full charge. This is all the fault of my digital camera which takes four batteries at a time and only uses 1/3 of the batteries' charge before deciding that it needs more power. Luckily, I bought a wireless mouse several months ago and it will happily accept a 2/3 charged battery and drain it down to 1/3 of a charge before needing a replacement (and this takes a long time). In the March 2006, issue of Wired there is an article about the M1 battery. It is made by DeWalt (Black & Decker) and it is suppose to have double the power density, five times the peak energy, and a shorter recharging time than a Li-ion battery of the same size. Li-ion batteries are suppose to kick the crap out of alkaline batteries. So, that being said, where is my double-A M1 battery?

A Comment on my Blog

2006-02-17T17:43:00.000-06:00

Today I received an email informing me that someone had posted a comment on my blog. Really I only created a blog to see how Google's recommended blogging site worked. So, this peeked my curiosity and I Googled my name. Holy crap! My Blog profile is the third (second unique) site listed. Well, this is no good. I'm a teaching assistant, how long will it be until one of my student's Googles my name and starts reading the things I write here? Maybe a worse possibility, my advisor sees the site. Hmmm... Can't complain about the thesis project, my students, or my job. I should have took the advise that I read about blogging - Don't Use Your Name!

Finding My Thesis and Stanley, the robotic SUV

2006-01-04T04:58:00.000-06:00

Over the winter break my advisor gave me a list of several things to work on, and top on that list was find a thesis topic. I haven't really been actively doing that. Instead I have been insulating the pipes in my house but in my attempts to procrastate I have been reading Wired magazine. The January issue has an article about "Stanford's souped-up Volkswagen blasted through the Mojave Desert, blew away the competition, and won Darpa's $2 million Grand Challenge." You can find it online at: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.01/stanley.html Good article and definately a must read for anyone working with robotics and|or considering working with robotics. Makes me want to do research in the field. But I'm attending a university that has very little money for this type of thing and the best the AI classes have are some Logo Mindstorm bricks that are at least five years old. Would trying to work with robotics in this environment really mean that I won't get any meaningful experience and my thesis starves to death from lack of realistic data?! Probably.

First Night 2006

2006-01-01T04:51:00.000-06:00

Christy and I went to the fireworks display at Springfield's First Night 2006 celebration. It was a nice way to bring in the new year.

Google's Picasa

2005-12-31T03:57:00.001-06:00

I downloaded Picasa just a few hours ago and have been messing around with it while surfing and posting. It is awesome! Very easy to use and very fast. Sure, it can't even compare to what a good graphic designer* can do with Photoshop (or Gimp) to improve an image. But I'm no graphic designer. I strongly recommend this software. Joyce and Diana, this recommendation is for you two; so, before you next get your digital photos printed, download Picasa and give this a try.

* I served with Kussman in the Army. He can do some very cool things. For example, after my last deployment I went to Scotland, and took a lot of pictures with my digital camera. Well, one picture I took with very low battery power had the bottom third damaged. Kussman was able to make it look perfect; I still wonder how he did it.

"Judge Grants Hinckley Overnight Visits"

2005-12-31T03:26:00.000-06:00

Imagine getting to shoot three people, only spend approximately twenty-five years in a psychiatric facility, and being allowed out. There is something wrong with our system. Hinckley should have disappeared the day he tried to kill President Reagan. If there was a chance that he was innocent then, of course, have a trial and all due process. But he wasn't innocent. There is an article at http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051231/ap_on_go_ot/hinckley which I found at http://bewarethedarkside.blogspot.com/2005/12/free-pass-from-boobie-hatch.html.

CompSciGuy...

2005-12-31T02:52:00.000-06:00

Why have a blog? I'm doing this for a multitude of reasons some profound but most are not. An example of profound reasons for my having a blog can be seen by checking out http://CompSciGuy.blogspot.com. I was thinking in the same vein as this guy and when I tried to register I found the site I was going to create. Which is really cool. Those of you who know me will see the similarities and differences between he and I. So, I had to put some more thought into this whole blog thing. Instead of blogging as some computer science persona, I will blog as myself. I'll write what's going on in my life, jot down my ideas as they come to me, and maybe I'll even post some computer sciency stuff. Mostly I'll just jot down my ideas. This will be my electronic post-a-note board.