Dead Programmer's Cafe

Month: December 2002

  • Lunch notes

    I’ve got mail!

    Today’s arrivals: Ted Nelson’s(of Project Xanadu fame) “Literary Machines” and T. Edward Damer’s “Attacking Faulty Reasoning”.

    I wanted to get “Literary Machines” for a long time. Ironically for a book about the future of books, it’s rather rare. I paid $35, which is a pretty good deal (I snapped the book up as soon as it came up in my abebooks.com notifications). It’s the second edition though. I’ll write more about Nelson when I have the time.

    I am so happy that I can afford about 70% of all the books that I want :)

    For lunch I had some shawarma from “Bread from Beirut“, a very nice middle eastern restaurant. I wonder if it’s possible to buy one of those shawarma slabs and keep it in a fridge. Shawarma is a great low carb food.

    Lunch is over. Back to codin’.

  • Fugawi

    While researching the GPS stuff today I came across Fugawi, a company that sells GPS software. They must have had some balls to call their company that :)

    From what I understand, the name comes from an old joke about Fugawi Indians, named so because they often get lost and often say “Wherethefugawi?”. I’ve heard that on “The Sopranos”, but the joke probably goes back to WWII or even earlier.

  • Don’t Drop the Soap

    Ilya, congrats on your new job. Just don’t drop the soap :)
    The Register writes: Sodomites overrun Amazon.com
    Oh, and could you find out about OBIDOS for me?

  • I am in MLP mood today.

    For Russia’s new rich, $4,500 fake tree is Christmas must-have

  • Who knew?

    I am researching GPS units. Interesting fact — Leica makes them. Does Hasselblad? Nope.

  • “I, Robot” to be Raped, Deadprogrammer Upset

    Oh, goody. They are going to rape another sci-fi classic.
    Of course they could have taken Harlan Ellison’s screenplay. But noooooooooooooooo.
    They are going to take some crappy unrelated screenplay and add some some “I, robot” elements to it.

  • A (pa)JAMA Story

    An article from JAMA:
    Police Detainment of a Patient Following Treatment With Radioactive Iodine
    “We recently treated a 34-year-old man for Graves disease with 20 mCi of iodine 131. Twenty-four hours after treatment, his radioactive iodine uptake was 63%. Three weeks after treatment, he returned to our clinic complaining that he had been strip-searched twice at Manhattan subway stations. Police had identified him as emitting radiation and had detained him for further questioning ….”

    When I used to be a pre-med, I worked as a doorman/porter in a Manhattan building. I asked all the doctors who lived there to give me their old medical mags. Unfortunately most of them either threw them out or had them delivered to their office. But one very nice retired doctor supplied me with her old medical journals. I loved reading them. Too bad that JAMA is very expensive ($165 per year), and even now I can’t really justify getting it. I especially enjoyed the cartoons. :)

    Also, one doctor who lived there died, and his relatives threw out all of his old medical books. I dragged all of them home, and now they reside on my bookshelves.

  • Workin’ from home today.

    The view from my home office. You can see the ugly ass Kruschev-style building. I live in one just like it. In the evening you’d be able to see the ugly naked guy, but I’ll spare you the horror.

    Little closer

    What’s outside?

  • Gadgetory Matters or Wannna Wanna Wanna

    Ok, what do I wanna?

    A nice GPS unit. I want to do some geocaching and I want to record coordinates of places where I catch the biggest fish. Which reminds me, I also need some nice nautical maps. Any advice?

    A pen scanner like the c-pen (not sure which one to get)

    A custom surf rod and a custom fluking rod.

    A La Marzocco coffe machine.

    A tablet PC.

    Yeah, I still remember about that pen computing post I promised. I still have not started it, but I will write it.

    I have finally seen the Acer tablet, and I’ve got to tell you that it rocked. The feen of the pen is great, so is the sensitivity. The software enhances your writing so that text looks like something written with a quill pen (I think it automatically flares the letters). Handwriting recognitions seemed to be very decent. I only had a few minutes mano a machino, but I have a good feeling about Tablet PC.