Well, I've improved my performance greatly in loading the article into my database in the hopes that I'll be able to use this data to help them update their interface.
So, up from the last number of articles I have loaded in to my database, I now have 7770 articles of over 10,000 articles uploaded.
That's pretty good. Less than 3,000 to go and then I'll need to be able to grab the most recent articles as well.
There are lots of options with the Useless-Knowledge website update. one hopes for the least work for the most increased abilities, looks and performance, but it seems to me that it is likely that they'll need something completely custom.
I just don't know. And considering the efforts necessary for completely custom - it is difficult to discern if it is worth it. Perhaps they should look at the update in phases. Start with looks and an improved posting logic. Then later add article counters and comments sections to the articles.
It might be better, who knows.
Alex
Monday, December 12, 2005
New Greyhound
This is mostly a personal entry. It has been the better part of two years since one of our two greyhounds had to be put to sleep.
I should say that there is a moral obligation when humans take on pets - that you must be able to say to yourself about the animal at least 'I am going to kill you' - when you take on a pet.
Because it is unfair for an animal to live its existence primarily for your pleasure and companionship to suffer a horrible painful prolonged death because you don't have the guts to know when the time is - to put that animal to sleep. To kill it. Or you don't have the courage to do what needs to be done.
And in most cases - unless you are near the end of your own life you will outlive your family pet(s). One of the dogs we almost adopted - the owners - a couple - the husband died. The dog was mostly the husbands dog and the wife I suspect may no longer have been up to handling a dog - at least for a time. Fortunately, the dog is healthy and can be re-adopted to another family. Boy it was a really friendly dog. I have cats in the house, though - and this particular greyhound failed the cat test and wanted to eat the test cat. Since I don't want to have another dog at the expense of losing all my cats - he was out of the running.
It is a stark reality that any pet owner should acknowledge when you begin your custodianship of an animal. It is responsiblity for life and death.
Determination of when that time is - to put down a pet - is much harder. But if you don't recognize the fact that this will probably come to pass on inception of taking care of an animal - it is much harder.
No matter what it is hard to put an animal down - when the balance has shifted significantly on the issue of quantity or quality of life. It is largely a judgement call - but good veterninarians won't let you put an otherwise healthy animal down - if in their judgement you are overreacting.
Ok, so we've been looking for a new dog. It is always a journey to find a good fit. Fortunately, I think we found one in a timid greyhound who is just off the track called Willy.
Unfortunately, our current greyhound is called Philly, and Willy doesn't know his name. So you call one and you get both. So we are going to change Willy's name. Usually we keep the name, with Jet and Philly - we kept their original names. They both also seemed to know their original names - so that makes it a whole lot harder to justify changing the dogs name.
I've been watching a lot of anime lately - and am a fan of the sounds that Japanese language makes. So, my wife and I came up with a first and last name for our new Greyhound formerly known as Willy.
Oku Gengetsu. Oku - meaning Timid. Gengetsu - meaning crescent moon.
Greyhounds in general are somewhere between labrador retrievers and well, I can't come up with a completely sedate breed of dog. Anyway, Greyhounds are usually fairly well-rounded in being jumpy happy dogs and lying on the couch or floor sleeping.
Oku, though - and probably because he doesn't know anything about anything - is very very timid. So, Oku means timid in Japanese - and timid he is.
Crescent moon - is because he has a large two or three inch tall crescent moon scar on his side. We actually didn't notice it when we picked him up (him being very timid and another dog that we couldn't have because of his cat-eating obsession being very pushy and wanting to be with me). It wouldn't have mattered, of course. Philly was abused before she came to us and had many scars, but nothing nearly as large as this.
Timid Crescent Moon. Doesn't sound nice or anything in English. It is transformed - even in simple words - in Japanese to Oku Gengetsu.
So, hopefully, some day - a very long time from now - will come the time of decisions for Oku. And one hopes it will be a long time for Philly as well. But Philly is getting older and a large amount of the reason we got Oku - was because she was getting lonely and stopping eating.
She is of course ecstatic to have a companion again.
Now, if only we could get Random to be disciplined enough not to scare Oku so Oku can get acclamated to our house. :)
He's doing well, though - with all so many new things around him. And he isn't allowed to come up on the couch yet.... Which has got to bug him because Philly is allowed to... But them's the rules passed down from the adoption/rescue people and that's that.
Alex
I should say that there is a moral obligation when humans take on pets - that you must be able to say to yourself about the animal at least 'I am going to kill you' - when you take on a pet.
Because it is unfair for an animal to live its existence primarily for your pleasure and companionship to suffer a horrible painful prolonged death because you don't have the guts to know when the time is - to put that animal to sleep. To kill it. Or you don't have the courage to do what needs to be done.
And in most cases - unless you are near the end of your own life you will outlive your family pet(s). One of the dogs we almost adopted - the owners - a couple - the husband died. The dog was mostly the husbands dog and the wife I suspect may no longer have been up to handling a dog - at least for a time. Fortunately, the dog is healthy and can be re-adopted to another family. Boy it was a really friendly dog. I have cats in the house, though - and this particular greyhound failed the cat test and wanted to eat the test cat. Since I don't want to have another dog at the expense of losing all my cats - he was out of the running.
It is a stark reality that any pet owner should acknowledge when you begin your custodianship of an animal. It is responsiblity for life and death.
Determination of when that time is - to put down a pet - is much harder. But if you don't recognize the fact that this will probably come to pass on inception of taking care of an animal - it is much harder.
No matter what it is hard to put an animal down - when the balance has shifted significantly on the issue of quantity or quality of life. It is largely a judgement call - but good veterninarians won't let you put an otherwise healthy animal down - if in their judgement you are overreacting.
Ok, so we've been looking for a new dog. It is always a journey to find a good fit. Fortunately, I think we found one in a timid greyhound who is just off the track called Willy.
Unfortunately, our current greyhound is called Philly, and Willy doesn't know his name. So you call one and you get both. So we are going to change Willy's name. Usually we keep the name, with Jet and Philly - we kept their original names. They both also seemed to know their original names - so that makes it a whole lot harder to justify changing the dogs name.
I've been watching a lot of anime lately - and am a fan of the sounds that Japanese language makes. So, my wife and I came up with a first and last name for our new Greyhound formerly known as Willy.
Oku Gengetsu. Oku - meaning Timid. Gengetsu - meaning crescent moon.
Greyhounds in general are somewhere between labrador retrievers and well, I can't come up with a completely sedate breed of dog. Anyway, Greyhounds are usually fairly well-rounded in being jumpy happy dogs and lying on the couch or floor sleeping.
Oku, though - and probably because he doesn't know anything about anything - is very very timid. So, Oku means timid in Japanese - and timid he is.
Crescent moon - is because he has a large two or three inch tall crescent moon scar on his side. We actually didn't notice it when we picked him up (him being very timid and another dog that we couldn't have because of his cat-eating obsession being very pushy and wanting to be with me). It wouldn't have mattered, of course. Philly was abused before she came to us and had many scars, but nothing nearly as large as this.
Timid Crescent Moon. Doesn't sound nice or anything in English. It is transformed - even in simple words - in Japanese to Oku Gengetsu.
So, hopefully, some day - a very long time from now - will come the time of decisions for Oku. And one hopes it will be a long time for Philly as well. But Philly is getting older and a large amount of the reason we got Oku - was because she was getting lonely and stopping eating.
She is of course ecstatic to have a companion again.
Now, if only we could get Random to be disciplined enough not to scare Oku so Oku can get acclamated to our house. :)
He's doing well, though - with all so many new things around him. And he isn't allowed to come up on the couch yet.... Which has got to bug him because Philly is allowed to... But them's the rules passed down from the adoption/rescue people and that's that.
Alex
Thursday, December 08, 2005
Useless-Knowledge
I am currently involved in a project to update the useless-knowledge website. Who knows what will really happen to the site, but one thing is crystal clear - in a major update many people might say leave the old articles behind.
This is very disturbing to me - these articles represent a lot of work on the part of a lot of people. Over 10,000 articles and who knows how many people.
So, I have begun first by getting a list of all the articles in to my database - and now the slow process of grabbing that content and putting it in a database. This way, if and when a conversion happens, the data will be in a database and can be applied to the newer format.
I am currently on the 143rd article - going in to my database. This is going to take some time, because I have ascertained no completely automated way to place the articles in the database. I could grab the entire page, but this isn't particularly useful.
I am just grabbing the article content and whatever HTML is associated with the article.
We'll see how long I stick with this and how much time is involved.
Alex
This is very disturbing to me - these articles represent a lot of work on the part of a lot of people. Over 10,000 articles and who knows how many people.
So, I have begun first by getting a list of all the articles in to my database - and now the slow process of grabbing that content and putting it in a database. This way, if and when a conversion happens, the data will be in a database and can be applied to the newer format.
I am currently on the 143rd article - going in to my database. This is going to take some time, because I have ascertained no completely automated way to place the articles in the database. I could grab the entire page, but this isn't particularly useful.
I am just grabbing the article content and whatever HTML is associated with the article.
We'll see how long I stick with this and how much time is involved.
Alex
Colored Bubbles
In a previous posting I showed a link to a Popular Science of Popular Mechanics article - which talked about the difficulties of creating bubbles that have color instead of clear bubbles.
Well, one of the uses this process could be applied to is medical coloring. Since the color disappears - when one applies an ointment to your face (for example) it could be colored temporarily - showing the user exactly what parts of the face have been covered.
I suffer from acne - even at age 34 - or however old I am now.
I use a couple of topical medications as well as a medical soap - but nothing works 100% or even 95%.
I do wonder if such medical coloring - could help - and show what parts of the face I miss with medicine (if that is what is the current problem).
The applications of this material are immense - even without considering the cosmetic fun that could be had if the coloration lasted hours instead of seconds.
Alex
Well, one of the uses this process could be applied to is medical coloring. Since the color disappears - when one applies an ointment to your face (for example) it could be colored temporarily - showing the user exactly what parts of the face have been covered.
I suffer from acne - even at age 34 - or however old I am now.
I use a couple of topical medications as well as a medical soap - but nothing works 100% or even 95%.
I do wonder if such medical coloring - could help - and show what parts of the face I miss with medicine (if that is what is the current problem).
The applications of this material are immense - even without considering the cosmetic fun that could be had if the coloration lasted hours instead of seconds.
Alex
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Writing Music
I was involved with music ages ago. Or at least it seems like ages ago. Right now I have some music instruments around and I play them sometimes for my son so that hopefully he will have some interest in music.
So, it has always been of interest to me to write music - but writing music on paper and performing it with a trumpet was never really my interest. I always wanted to do it in some automated manner.
There is software out there - mentioned by Him Louderback - that allows you to write music (using music notes and Midi synthesizer sounds) on the computer and have the computer perform the music.
Two pieces of software he mentions specifically - Cakewalk Sonar 5 and Notion. He had some complaints about Notion, but he also had some good points with it in that it had excellent sounds to go with the music notes. Rather unfortunately, the software is relatively expensive and at the moment I am pursuing other non-work goals.
Can't do everything at once. Right now I am concentrating on writing my Manga Style comic book - starting with an outline of the story and a cell by cell description of what needs to be drawn.
And at the same time, I am gradually getting the opportunity to learn how to draw in the Manga style.
I suspect that this will be a long-term project, but I definitely feel that the medium of Manga comic book will be an excellent form for the stories I have to tell.
Alex
So, it has always been of interest to me to write music - but writing music on paper and performing it with a trumpet was never really my interest. I always wanted to do it in some automated manner.
There is software out there - mentioned by Him Louderback - that allows you to write music (using music notes and Midi synthesizer sounds) on the computer and have the computer perform the music.
Two pieces of software he mentions specifically - Cakewalk Sonar 5 and Notion. He had some complaints about Notion, but he also had some good points with it in that it had excellent sounds to go with the music notes. Rather unfortunately, the software is relatively expensive and at the moment I am pursuing other non-work goals.
Can't do everything at once. Right now I am concentrating on writing my Manga Style comic book - starting with an outline of the story and a cell by cell description of what needs to be drawn.
And at the same time, I am gradually getting the opportunity to learn how to draw in the Manga style.
I suspect that this will be a long-term project, but I definitely feel that the medium of Manga comic book will be an excellent form for the stories I have to tell.
Alex
Monday, December 05, 2005
The Bright Colors of Future
In a post I made some time ago - I indicated that one of the things I would want would be to change the color of my skin, eyes and hair at any time and be able to change them again - as often as I would want to.
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/0a03b5108e097010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
There is now technology that might make some of that possible. I can almost see me with blue hair and green skin with bright red eyes. A few hours later - I'd be back to my natural color.
Who knows if these guys will be able to realize it?
I can see it now, if my son has children and I'm old he'll be yelling at them about using natural colors instead of flourescent yellow for hair color...
Alex
http://www.popsci.com/popsci/science/0a03b5108e097010vgnvcm1000004eecbccdrcrd.html
There is now technology that might make some of that possible. I can almost see me with blue hair and green skin with bright red eyes. A few hours later - I'd be back to my natural color.
Who knows if these guys will be able to realize it?
I can see it now, if my son has children and I'm old he'll be yelling at them about using natural colors instead of flourescent yellow for hair color...
Alex
Sunday, December 04, 2005
Vacation
Well, I have returned from vacation - lots of things that I want to write reviews of from the course of my vacation. Our Plan with Tan vacation plan, the rental car (Lincoln Town Car), Parks that we went to and overall how things turned out. Some of these will be articles and I suspect that some of them are more blog entries for here and of more personal interest.
Oh, if you go with your child to play with sting rays at Sea World, please don't scream out when it sucks on your fingers when you feed it while your toddler is next to you. My wife scared the crap out of my son doing that.
Anyway, it turned out ok. :) Hopefully my son won't be deathly afraid of sting rays for life.
But if he's going to be afraid of something - deathly afraid of something - sting rays are a pretty good object.
And I didn't feed the sting rays after that :)
Alex
Oh, if you go with your child to play with sting rays at Sea World, please don't scream out when it sucks on your fingers when you feed it while your toddler is next to you. My wife scared the crap out of my son doing that.
Anyway, it turned out ok. :) Hopefully my son won't be deathly afraid of sting rays for life.
But if he's going to be afraid of something - deathly afraid of something - sting rays are a pretty good object.
And I didn't feed the sting rays after that :)
Alex
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