Older blog entries for mojotoad (starting at number 17)

Hot Damn!

Got my kernels kickin'
Got my Zooms zoomin'
Got my masqs rading'
Got my hops in hand
Sittin' by the pool,
Posting on Guacamole
With a laptop lapping.

Of course, the mosquitoes are out and it's past midnight. This was just a range test. Zoom wireless cards rock.

Time to sync up on the CVS tree and start cranking out my next module releases. I've been neglecting them lately, mostly due to external distractions but partly due to getting the laptop kicking. I'm ready to start cranking, now, though.

I suppose I can be one of those people in the coffee houses now, face aglow from the laptop betwixt sips of joe. We'll see. Mostly I'm just glad for any change of scenery from my cluttered bedroom, where I tend to hack from a frankenstein desktop constructed from the hastily disassembled components of my mp3 box. The micro ATX form factor looks like a postage stamp in the case. Anyway, it's nice to be able to wander about with the laptop.

Off to the Redneck Riviera next week for vacation. Laguna Beach, Florida, which is between Destin and Panama City Beach. Beautiful beaches, awesome seafood (oysters...mmmm...).

Can't decide whether to take projects along with me. I should probably go analog for a while.

The car (87 Volvo 240 GL, what a trooper) is in the shop for a tune-up, so I'll be biking around town tomorrow. Unfortunately I don't think my satchel is big enough for the laptop in addition to a change of clothes, shower paraphernalia, etc. To stink or to hack, that is the question. I suppose I will have mercy on my coworkers.

I haven't done squat for coding lately.

I did get my laptop in, however. It's a Sony VAIO PCG-F420, and is quite a nice little toy.

Unfortunately, even though it has a fully capable parallel port, I can't seem to get a PLIP connection working on it...my mothership computer has an internal modem, the laptop has a useless winmodem...so I was hoping to use PLIP for bootstrapping debian off of my main computer. All the interupts, etc., yadda yadda are set correctly, but no dice. Finally I said to hell with it, and ordered a couple of ZoomAir wireless cards. They're more fun, anyway.

Also got my new monitor in, today. XF86Setup is being a bitch, though, because the vga16 driver does not display properly on the new monitor (driven by a voodoo3), and that's the only way it allows you to run...grrr. I need to RTFM on XFree86. I wish debian used xconfigurator. I guess I'll find out whether it does anything that debian dislikes during my reading.

metaguacamole: Regarding the mozilla image thing, I've been tracking it on the various sites (mostly kuro5hin, but it also looks like the shit finally hit the /.fan).

Anyway, it's sort of encouraging to see the course of the conversation here on guacamole. The alarmist rants hardly even registered before a discussion of the ethical issues involved in the world of producer and consumer emerged; in particular, how privacy issues survive in the crucible between the sometimes conflicting goals of the two. (give credit where credit is due, eivind probably first kicked that can with a position he must have known would be contrary to most readers; I suppose it's possible that it was a bit of a troll, but he at least makes some intelligent efforts to back up his assertions with things other than ad hoc button stomping).

It's why I keep coming back, anyway.

As for diaries...various distractions lately...this have been distracting from coding as well. sigh. These distractions have not been without merit, however; drum lessons are proceeding well. I'm pretty sure I detected faithful execution of a rhumba/bolero beat emanating from my flailings today. It could be a monkey/typewriter thing, though.

There is something distinctly nice about a coding frenzy and a flagon of mead, so long as you keep an eye on the metric of clear thought.

I ran into some unexpectedly interesting problems whilst wrangling with the general issues surrounding context-free HTML table extraction. I need to crack open the CS books and figure out what the real name is for something I loosely refer to as "delayed conditional nodal inheritance". Hrmm.

I am a bit bummed that the Espresso PC has a less than stellar built-in sound card, leastwise according to the arstechnica review. I was hoping to use one of these puppies to reimplement the core of my home grown mp3 extravaganza box since I had to cannibalize the prior motherboard for my central computing needs recently. Ah well.

Mmmph. <slurp>. Mmm. Triple latte good. Mmmm. <slurp>.

It's storming outside. Sounds very nice; I have the windows cracked open so I will no doubt sleep quite soundly.

I've been retooling HTML::TableExtract in a major way. I've fixed header extractions to account for the nastiness you get from colspan and rowspan effects, so that the columns you extract are the columns you would expect when looking at the table visually. (such is the fair of those who deal with sparse trees representing grids). In more exciting realms, I've been implementing search chains which allow you to yank tables relative to other tables using lists of checkpoints, in terms headers, depths, counts, or some arbitrary chain thereof. Time permitting, the new release should be set loose within a couple of days after I've tested it to my satisfaction.

Viva data mining, HTML context free. Other than being in a table somewhere on a page, of course.

Ugh. Can't sleep. I think I need some meditation techniques to turn off code mode at will. As it stands I just lie there with my eyes closed, brain on overdrive.

The crawfish boil went well. As promised, there were whole heads of garlic tossed into the pot; I felt sorry for anyone who walked up late and had to walk that gauntlet of breath.

Saw Frequency over the weekend. As long as you resolve not to dwell on time paradox, it's a highly enjoyable movie. (they subscribe to the "malleable present" type of theory, where you can alter your present by diddling with your past...and as the cause of the alteration, you retain "dual memories" of your past -- the original, and the new version, which at least avoids the doppleganger problem that movies like Back to the Future suffer from, where some poor bastard with the memories of the new past gets displaced into lah-lah land). Anyway. I could go on at great length about the three major Hollywould time paradox approaches. In the case of this movie, just assume that there will be paradox and enjoy the roller coaster.

I guess I'm just going to stay up all night. I'll perk back up when my normal waking hours roll around, then crash and burn sometime after lunch.

I've been skulking around at The Perl Monks site lately, after having seen several references spring up around here. Lo and behold, I bumped into chromatic when discussing a question I posed.

(if you are curious, the question has to do with scalar evaluation of a perl hash when it is tied...it always returns 0, so "if %hash" does not mean the same thing for a tied hash as opposed to a native hash, assuming it has entries. You can get around it by saying "if keys %hash", but I'm a fan of consistency)

Mudbugs tomorrow! I can't wait. I hear tell Botz is planning on adding mushrooms and whole heads of garlic into the batches, along with the regular new potatoes and corn. The gills on mushrooms really soak up those spices. Mmmm! I am glad I no longer wear contacts; it's tempting to wipe away the tears.

Read Souls In the Great Machine recently. Pretty fantastic science fiction romp, if you ask me.

Pushed out new versions of HTML-ElementExtended and HTML-CalendarMonth.

Taking drum lessons; I've been having a ball playing my dumbek.

Can't wait for Saturday...AIIIII YEEE! Crawfish boil! We're cooking up about 300 pounds of bugs.

Waiting on my notebook to arrive so I can spring Linux on it.

Princess Mononoke is not out on video yet. I don't know what to get my niece for her birthday.

Jumped into an interesting discussion regarding stock splits and proper portfolio accounting on the gnucash mailing list. Hopefully I am not being an irritant with naive accounting questions.

Has anyone tried to browse the project listing lately? Shouldn't this at least be alphanumerically sorted?

dria: Huzzah on the cat declaw decision! Some advice: if the cat does not go outdoors very often, then clip its claws with a nail clipper on a regular basis. If he happens to scratch, the claws do no damage. Make sure not to cut to the quick, though -- this should be clearly visible since cat claws are translucent. If you brace the underside of the toe with one finger and press gently on the top of the toe, the claw will extend. (actually the vet sells special nail clippers that behave more like a cigar cutter than nail clippers -- these cut better). Also, I don't know what you got on the scratching post. If it's carpet, and they don't like it, try hemp rope. And my cats, at least, really like the coiled cardboard that sits in the middle of the trackball toys.

As for coffee: perhaps you will find the secret to a perfect cup of joe as informative as I did. It's the nuts and bolts of coffee theory. And, of course, if injesting your coffee just ain't a quick enough buzz for your tastes, then there are alternative techniques.

Phil Katz: God speed, man; hope things go better the next time around.