Older blog entries for davidw (starting at number 173)

The new tcllib is out. I'm proud to have a few chunks of code of my own in there:-)

Picked up Rivet again. I did a neat trick for sessions - in the server init script, I launch a tcl daemon that acts as an IPC system, which seems to work quite well.

I'm having a nasty problem though, and I have a feeling that it won't have an easy answer. When Rivet - linked against a threaded Tcl 8.4 - is loaded, I am not able to CTRL-C out of apache -X (i.e. non daemon mode). I'm pretty sure it's got something to do with threads and signals interacting badly, but it's proving difficult to even narrow the problem down. I managed to repeatedly crash gdb yesterday (I sent in a bug report).

It's poppy season in Italy. They usually grown in corn fields, when the corn is just coming up. The visual effect of the bright red flowers amongst the blue-green corn is stunningly beautiful, and is something I love about this season. Google has some good images: http://images.google.com/images?q=papaveri&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search

I am uploading tkcon to Debian today. tclreadline could use some work, but I just don't think I should go chasing after another project. As a consequence, it will probably rot:-(

Went to webb.it Friday and Saturday. It was fun to see old acquaintances. On the other hand, Debian's stand was more of a collection of people with laptops rather than anything organized to present itself to the public at large, which was unfortunate. In any case, I had a good time.

The Giro d'Italia has started! It's so cool to watch it on TV. I hope to start training more seriously myself soon. I have a lot of weight to lose:-/

Finally getting my 'feet on the ground' so to speak. I fixed some serious bugs in tclreadline, although it looks as if the maintainer is MIA, so I have to think about trying to take the project over or forking it, neither of which I want to do.

The dollar is doing very badly against the Euro, which is bad news for me, living in Italy, until I start getting some revenue coming in in Euro.

Just so everyone knows, we did indeed arrive in one piece in Italy, with all our luggage. That was a relief, because after Air France lost all my luggage (it was stolen, I'm sure, in Paris, as that's the last anyone saw of it), it makes me pretty nervous. I still haven't replace a bunch of things I lost.

Anyhow, I'm really happy to be back in Italy, although finding an appartment is proving to be a bit of a trial. We should have something soon in any case.

So... I leave for Italy in a few days. Not sure how much longer I'll have a net connection or time to use it, so I'll take a moment to say "goodbye USA" here. It was nice to be back, enjoy some tasty mexican food, and see some beautiful places in California with Ilenia. I'm sure we'll be back - living in Europe, we'll hopefully have a month long vacation that will give us time to spend here and see more...

I have some free software related consulting work lined up in Italy, but I'm still a bit nervous. I guess I could do consulting for a while yet, but working on my own is not where I want to end up.

War/Politics

This article talks about how Rumsfeld has put US and British troops in danger by insisting on sending a smaller force than what the military experts thought was necessary. I saw some interesting commentary by several former military types on PBS. They were not at all the stupid, bloodthirsty warmongers that some paint them as. In fact, they had very telling things to say about what a mess Bush may have on his hands if things turn ugly in Baghdad.

In any case, I've managed to resume hacking this week. Did some more fun stuff with my eCos toy that I'm developing for a magazine article. I also updated some of my Debian packages.

I hope that Martin, newly elected Debian Project Leader, can do something about making things work better. Bdale is an extremely competent guy who I have a great deal of respect for, but his style seemed to be more 'behind the scenes'. I kind of miss the days when Bruce actually led by doing things. That, and lots of competent hackers over the years, are what made Debian great. Not beaurocrats devising complex ways to sort out people who want to get involved. Ah well... we'll see where this leads.

I really wish I were as able as many people seem to be here to concentrate on their day-to-day lives, despite the war, and other various goings on in the world. Maybe it's also the fact that I'm going to be headed back to Italy, and all the stress that that will entail.

In any case, I got in a good long hack session on Rivet this evening.

ianmacd: I think the US should be part of the international criminal court as well, but from what I have read, it really needs to be, at least initially, for the worst of the worst - rape, torture, genocide, stuff like that. As much as you (or I) might not think this war is a good idea, you can't be taken seriously if you think that that is condoned by US leaders. By declaring that Bush and company should be dragged before the ICC, you play right into their opposition to US involvement in it, because you would use it for what amounts to political purposes, and that's why they say the US shouldn't participate.

As to the illegality of the war, that's a different matter from war crimes. The Economist has an interesting article on the issue, at http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=1649850 although unfortunately it's "premium content". A relevant quote:

It is not yet clear whether the United States is proposing to ditch the whole idea of international law, or merely to revise its rules. Many statements by Mr Bush and other senior American officials seem to indicate the former.

I've been quite stressed out by things. I have some doubts about the war, and don't like how Bush has handled things. The rhetoric on both sounds, for and against, is disconcerting, because I think as people, the only thing that keeps us going forward is thinking about things rationally.

Is Saddam's Iraq like Hitler's Germany? Certainly not, even though Hussein himself is certainly a horrid person. Is Bush like Hitler? Please, be serious. If you really believe that, you should be calling for your government to strike against the US militarily before Bush goes on with his world conquest, and before he starts sending millions of americans off to gas chambers. By making assertions like this, you turn moderate people off to your point of view, and paint yourself as a deluded extremist. Why go to those lengths to color your opposition as 'evil'? On the face of the evidence, there are plenty of logical reasons to avoid going to war this hastily, no need to go to such extremes to vilify those who don't agree with you.

I have had trouble concentrating on work, this whole situation has been extremely distracting, and makes it very hard to get 'in the zone' so conducive to programming.

I tend to be a bit of a worrier, and world events surely have me working overtime. It strikes me as deeply unfortunate that calmer, more rational heads don't prevail more often in the world. Let's all hope that somehow, things turn out for the best for all involved.