Lucky Duck Jasper Curve

Noah Acres, the man behind Bigha, who manufactures the unlikely combo of bikes and lasers, has told us he has spun the lasers out into a new company, called Lucky Duck. They've got a new $160 laser, called the 'Curve,' which has not only an ergonomic shape in five colors, but features a built-in chip that keeps the laser tuned as close to the 5mw legal limit as possible, meaning you'll get as bright of a laser as possible for as long as possible.

Just don't shine the Jaspers or Curves into airline pilots' eyes, or you'll be up for 20 years in a Patriot Act violation. For real.

Product Page [LuckyDuck]

Elliptic Curve Cryptography in Java

Power Line: Staying Behind the Curve

powerlineblog.com/archives/007909.php
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Innovation to drive chip performance
curve.

BEA: huge adoption curve climbing very
fast for Linux.

From Computer World's interview with BEA's CEO Alfred Chuang:

What Linux trends are you seeing with BEA software?

Huge adoption curve climbing very fast for BEA over the last six to nine months. A lot of focus in the financial services marketplace, where there's a lot of experimentation and initial deployment going on with Linux on Intel. And I think the motivation in that arena is simplification and cost reduction, so they are looking to buy significantly less expensive hardware.

What's the breakdown of platforms on which BEA software is running?

About 50% is on Sun, and about 23%, 24% is on Hewlett-Packard. Hewlett-Packard has both Intel and non-Intel platforms in there. And then it drops off pretty quick. IBM hardware, I think, is 5% or 7%. In some countries, we sell a lot of IBM's hardware.

What about the Linux operating system?

Linux is around the 15% to 20% range, which has climbed pretty quickly.

Shark Tank: Mainly we expect you to quit
raising the curve

Odd Bytes: Next-Gen April Gags In Steep
Growth Curve

New HDV Training DVD for Sony FX1 and
Z1U Camcorders Eases the High Def
Learning Curve

Certicom Licenses Intellectual Property
to Research In Motion (RIM) RIM expands
use of Elliptic Curve Cryptogr

EL-1000 Series Thermal Converters
Substantially Reduce AC/DC Transfer
Errors and Produce a Flat Frequency
Response Curve up to 100MHZ

"AIO G3 revisited"

Ratings Revisited

Entry 1,000 Revisited

Entry Number 1,000: One year ago today we hit 1,000 entries. How quaint.

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Strings, revisited

Eldred Revisited

FIleVault Revisited: Yea Or Nea?

OPML Revisited

OPML is a simple, widely used, yet often misunderstood, XML format created by Dave Winer.  IMHO, misunderstandings stem from overexposure to traditional ways of using XML.  I must admit, I also laughed at OPML when I first looked at it years ago.  But when I cocked my head (a technique anyone can learn from their dogs), it began to make a lot of sense.

This is what I saw:

Infoset:

• An OPML document is a collection of objects.
• An object may have properties and contents.
• An object's properties are unordered map of name/value pairs.
• An object's contents are ordered list of objects.

Syntax:

• Objects are encoded as XML elements named 'outline'.
• Properties are encoded as XML attributes.
• Content objects are encoded as child XML elements.

Once you get this picture in your mind, you start to appreciate OPML more.  Throw in display and interaction semantics builted into the format along with distributed object linking and embedding Dave often raves about and you got quite a beast of a language.

As to the question of who defines the properties, the answer is everybody does.  OPML is a kind of Emergent Markup Language in that common properties are expected to emerge through industry practices rather than standardization through committees.

There are some shortcomings with OPML though which I would like to see addressed.

OPML Wiki

OPML needs a wiki for OPML developers to interact with each other and to document how each of them are using OPML so that standard or type-specific properties may emerge.

Structured Properties

One weakness of XML is that, while elements may be structured, attributes may not.  Since properties are encoded as XML attributes in OPML, (semi) structured properties (i.e. HTML fragments) have to be encoded at the cost of readability.

I think the need for a wiki is far more serious than the need for structured property support.

Python Revisited

Recently, we've been looking at developing some server software in Python. This is my first serious look at Python since 1999, and I'm impressed with the improvements. It's a couple of years older than PHP, and certainly more mature. Python has a reputation for being more rationally designed than PHP or Perl, and in general that's true; but you can still see Python's age in the fact that there are many APIs that do the same thing (eg. the string functions).

PHP is still a better language for web development because it is a simpler language, easy to teach to Java or Javascript programmers, has more flexible string processing, and designed to work well with templates.

But as a general programming language, Python has its advantages. You can build sophisticated networking software with Python that supports threads and asynchronous connections with reasonable efficiency (though Python doesn't really take advantage of multiple CPU's due to an internal global lock). The Twisted and Dibbler frameworks are testament to that. Python's C API is well documented and Python can be easily embedded into 3rd party apps.

Python is also a good source of design ideas. I have noticed that othe rs have realized that many good Java ideas do not translate well to PHP. There is an impedence mismatch; many things that are hard in Java are easy in PHP. It makes sense to create an elaborate framework in Java to do something that's hard in Java, but to apply the same to PHP suggests more energy than sense. In contrast, I suspect that Python and PHP are more complementary than we all suspect...

PS: We also had a look at developing the same server software using .NET. However .NET doesn't have builtin support for open protocols such as POP3 and IMAP. I continue to be amused at the (intentional?) omissions in the .NET framework.

The CELL revisited

OpenBSD revisited

MySQL and OS X Revisited

Newsletters Revisited

fireworks, revisited

Using PDF Services, revisited

""Hacking" Revisited"

Flash, revisited

Government Grants, Revisited

OCZ VX Revisited: DDR Updates on DFI
nForce4

The Comair Mess Revisited

Airlines' computer systems questioned: In the wake of the big Comair systems meltdown over the holdays, CNN has an article about why airline's systems are so rickety. It's notable for a quote from uber-security expert Bruce Schneier that tells the naked truth of it.

Bruce Schneier, a computer security expert in Mountain View, California, said the issue boils down to cost versus benefit.

Airlines could upgrade existing computers to handle more transactions, install sophisticated backup systems that come on when the primary system fails or buy high-performance software that is used by NASA, nuclear plants and medical facilities to keep critical systems running at all times, Schneier said.

"It's certainly feasible, but it's my guess it's not economic," Schneier said. "My guess is it is cheaper for the airline to absorb this loss, which doesn't happen often, than to fix the problem.

Isn't that the truth? Absorb the damage, move on, and wait for it to happen again. Nice. Who gets to miss Christmas next year?

Windows vs. Linux Revisited

Videophones Revisited, by Way of the
Modem

The Bell Curve revisited