Advogato blog for cmacd

21 Oct 2006

Sat, 21 Oct 2006 01:49:13 GMT

Great interest around here, the Provincial privacy commissioner made a statemnet that the INFOCARD feature in the upcoming VISTA OS is just what the Internet needs..

Hopefully any ontario residents will be in a position to "educate" her on this matter..

article here

9 Oct 2006

Mon, 9 Oct 2006 01:33:47 GMT

Some of my friends who are connected with the Gosling Community have been working on a little bit of awareness of FLOSS for the local Political folks. They prepared a package on OpenOffice for windows and such which may be of use for others who want to raise awareness. The package is at Gosling for those who are intersted.

The story did get a bit of a play on CJOH program Tech Now.

10 May 2006

Wed, 10 May 2006 01:03:58 GMT

After a stint at trying burn out at my old job, I have been working at getting back to life. Unfortunatly, the new job I have been put into is a bit disorgainized, and so I am not sure what is happening. At least I have a boss who is working on a few good projects. I am sure I will muddle through.

I have used the time to decide that I will no longer dream of contibuting software, as young folks can write several apps while I am just doing an outline. Instead I will concentrate on getting folks to use the fine software that others have written.

OF course, the nice folks at Stats Canada, are giving me more motivation to work at my new found task. They have decided to Hire An Amrican Defence Multinational or two to write the software for the May 2006 Census, and in the process created a 4 million Dollar web application that will only work on Windows and Mac. The application checks its enviroment before it will run, and depends on a specific version of Java.

True, most the limitations seem to be from This COTS Package which claims to be Multiplatform.

MCR does have some good analysis on his page.

28 Jul 2003

Mon, 28 Jul 2003 18:53:26 GMT

HI all.

I have not been here in a long time due to our old friend stress, but I did get a welcome reprive at this years OLS.

I just posted an article on the front page that sums up what I learned at the BOF that I held..

I was hoping to post this yesterday but somehow some dimbulb managed to get an Ant Trap into my Backyard where the dog Got a chance to chew on it, so that day went by in a blur of visits to the vet, and reporting things to the police.

Take care everyone

17 May 2002

Fri, 17 May 2002 02:05:42 GMT

HI again

Between problems at work, a dead machine at home, and ending up on sick leave for stress...I have not been here for a while..

Since my Advogato cookie was on the machine that croaked, and part of the stress came from lack of web access ... I managed to get back in here by trying about 20 old passwords.

At least I can be proud to say that I am declaring myself Windows free at home.

Must get working on my FAQ updates.

27 Feb 2002

Wed, 27 Feb 2002 13:13:10 GMT

tnt: Good for you, but do you know how much work ajh created for himelf with just that sort of thinking.

dyork: I hear that "Men with Brooms" is coming out March 8.

25 Feb 2002

Mon, 25 Feb 2002 14:19:36 GMT

I want to update my Linux box before I try to copy all the data from my sick hard drive. I decided that I should get a fresh copy of SuSE 7.3 personal edition on my way home from work on Friday. The one place I expected to be able to find it was at NovoClub on Merivale Road. Detoured way out to the south end, and found out the store is now bankrupt! Not only could I not get anything newer than 7.1 there (on the closeout sale) but My favorite source of O'riley books is Kaput.

Anybody know who stocks SuSE in the west end of Otter-wa?

Tyler is mellowing out, we may be able to get him to calm down enough that he can stay.

19 Feb 2002

Tue, 19 Feb 2002 14:25:37 GMT

Why Me

Our new Puppy is getting fixed this morning, we have found out that he is very agressive with other dogs, to the point where we are afraid that he will have to find a single dog home. Getting fixed early will at least remove one potential source of agression.

On the weekend some friends of ours brought over their one year old Black Lab, (80 Pounds) and Tyler (20 Pounds) wanted to start a fight with it. The folks from Border Collie Rescue have been notified, and they have him listed on petfinder. The experience is heart breaking as he is so sweet with us, and is extremly smart otherwise, but if he is wanting to pick a fight with every dog he sees, he will not be able to participate in agility.

In Other News

My Old computer, that I have been using to keep up my web sites, and so has all the unapplied updates, made a funny noise from the Hard Drive over the weekend.I shut it down, but probaly should try to move the drive to my main box, and get the info off it before it all evaporates.

In the mean time, I can't seem to get through to look at my web site this morning, so my working backup is also not accesible.

12 Feb 2002

Tue, 12 Feb 2002 14:30:28 GMT

Wal-Mart is Amazing.

I took couple of rolls of film in for processing, and asked for a CD, they had two choices, I could get their "Good" one at 8 bucks, which is scaned from the prints on a Kodak machine, and comes with a bunch of WIndows software. or for 5 bucks thay could make one on their Noritsu * printer, scaning from the negatives at the same time they made prints. The Noritsu one comes with just a windows viewer aparently, so guess which one they recommeded.

Scientist that I am, I let them make me one of each, and as I suspected, the "Direct to disk" one was far superior. so I will be able to ask for the less expensive one with a clear consience from now on.- (But must budget for a film scanner)

Mind you I am not really comfortable with the fact that the new minilabs scan, and then use a laser to expose the paper, Too much chance for an upper quality limit to get in there when the printer is only rated for 320 DPI.

Anyway, After some serious Gamma Correction of the .JPGs from the CDs (particularly the Kodak CD,) I stuck up a new page showing our new Puppy

Two border collies are good for the soul.

* Noritsu also has a US site, but it wants to crash Netscape and has navigation based on FLASH.

7 Feb 2002

Thu, 7 Feb 2002 16:55:03 GMT

I see where one of the Virtual Reality folks in town is going to get some actual reality "training" at the olympics

I have been sleepy this week, Our Family has increased. We have adopted a 4 month old Border Collie pup from the Lanark Animal Welfare Society. I will try to get a picture up on the web in a day or three. I expect that it won't be long before he will be taking classes at Dreamfields along with our six year old BC - Boots