I somehow got sucked into a rather exhausting debate on evolution with creationist Andrew Ross in the comment section of one of his photographs on Flickr.
This is a Java-embeddable language that can perform queries on generalized graphs using a clear and concise XPath-based query language. In addition it adds typical scripting constructs that make it a complete language. However these additions seem weak, and I think a pure query language (like SQL) would have been better.
One thing I thought was a bit inelegant was the number of special reserved identifiers in the query language, such as "outE", "inE", "outV", and "inV". I understand this was necessary to stay compatible with XPath, but I think it would have been better to move away from XPath and put such special identifiers in the syntax of the language.
I did like was how easy it is to define computed edges in the graph, sort of like views in SQL. This can be considered a kind of reasoning. I particularly was struck by the clear insight in the presentation that "Graph-based reasoning is the process of making explicit what is implicit in lop co-developer the graph"
I never tried this before, but here is my first attempt at creating music. The words are from a poem by W.B. Yeats; the music and the performance are by me.
A nice framework for implementing REST services in Java. It's use of annotations make the code a lot cleaner than when using the Restlet library. However unlike Restlet it has a lot of dependencies and is more difficult to get setup.
Rendering web pages to images using a Python wrapper around the Gecko/Mozilla browser engine. This renders Flash correctly unlike the similar solutions that use Webkit.
Display the photo title, which is also a hyperlink to the Flick photo page.
Improve algorithm for selecting photographs to include closeness as well as interestingness, and to automatically adjust the radius of search depending on the density of nearby photos.
Display a status message when communicating with Flickr so when you have a slow network connection you can tell what is happening.
Display some dummy photos in case you have no network connection or if there are no photos within 32 km.
Use photos to which I have copyright (my own) as the example photos and dummy photos.
Fixed some bugs encountered when flicking through photos.
Displays photographs that people on the Flickr have taken close to your current location. Flick left and right to browse through the photographs. Automatically updates as you move. (All photographs are copyright of their owners.)
The meme of Christianity was in decline on the Western fringe of Europe as the Germanic tribes of the Angles and Saxons and Franks swept aside the lingering Celtic-Roman society left behind by the Roman Empire. But, some carriers of the meme, personified in legend as St Patrick, made it to Ireland where it proved stronger than the pre-existing polytheistic Druidism, and from its Atlantic fastness it ultimately spread back East and Christianized the invading Germanics. I celebrate this today not so much because of the Christianity but because of the technology of Writing that accompanied it, setting Ireland on a literary course that ultimately lead to Yeats and Joyce and Becket and Heaney. Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
The Git source code control system has a lot of advantages compared to the more established Subversion. Many online tutorials emphasize the similarities to Subversion, giving examples of sequences commands that can adapted and used in a rote way. However these tutorials also tend to gloss over the sometimes fundamental conceptual differences between Git and Subversion which can lead you into confusion and trouble. This tutorial by contrast does a good job of explaining the conceptual fundamentals, but in a practical way without getting into too much detail.
I like the Pimsleur courses a lot. They allow you to get to a very basic speaking level in a language very quickly.
The courses are audio-only — in fact, they expressly discourage you from reading the language while you are listening to the course.
Nevertheless, now that I am finished the first eight lessons I feel
the need to actually see what the written Chinese (both pinyin and
characters) looks like. So here is the vocabulary from Pimseur Quick
and Simple Chinese Mandarin, Lesson 1. I show both the standard
pinyin and in my own phonetic impression of how the words sound.
The iText library is a great resource for generating and manipulating PDF files. However its API is very complex and there is a notable lack of good online tutorial material. So you often must resort to plowing through the Javadoc-generated API documentation trying to figure out how to use the library.
Doing that, you might be annoyed at the fact that the API available online does not just include the public and protected members, but also includes package-private and private members. While this would be useful to people working on the internals of iText, it is just a lot of useless clutter to most people who are just going to use the API.
So I regenerated the Javadoc from the 5.0.1 source, using the default settings which hides the private stuff. You can access this at:
I have seen several reverences to Airnergy device by RCA that claims to recharge a battery by harvesting WiFi signals from the air.
That sounded a bit fishy to me. Let’s look at some numbers. First, how much power does a WiFi hotspot put out? According to moonblinkwifi.com a typical output is 200 mW.
Now say this device is 3 metres (10 feet) away from the hotspot. This 200 mW of power will be spread on the surface of a 3 metre-radius sphere with a surface area of about 110 square metres.
Now, this device looks to be about 10cm X 5cm which is about 1/22000 of the area of the sphere across which the 200 mW is spread. Which means the amount of power hitting the device is about 9.1 μW
Now according to the Wikipedia battery article a small AAA rechargeable battery stores about 6700 J of energy. How long would it take to recharge a AAA battery with our 9.1 μW of power, assuming you could miraculously capture 100% of the power?
The answer: 24 years.
OK, there are some approximations here. The WiFi antenna does not actually broadcast equally in all directions, and you might have the device closer to the antenna, and there might be multiple WiFi signals you could receive. On the other hand, you probably want to recharge a battery that has more capacity than a little AAA battery.
So I call bullshit. A battery charger that takes on the order of a decade to recharge a battery, is a useless device.
The sad thing is how many tech journalist sites reported uncritically on the Airnergy.
I created this list of Chinese characters for my own benefit in trying to learn them. I took Jun Da’s list of most frequently used characters and added a Google image search to provide some mnemonics. I added tone-color and exaggerated tone marks to the pinyin to help remind me of the the tones.
See this on a separate page with links to shorter and longer lists of characters.
(Note, this may look ugly if you are using Internet Explorer. It should look better on Firefox, Chrome, or Safari. I need to do a bit more CSS-hacking to make it work on IE.)
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的 dedi´di`
(possessive particle)/of, really and truly, aim/clear
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一 yi¯
one/1/single/a(n)
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是 shi`
is/are/am/yes/to be
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不 bu`bu´
(negative prefix)/not/no
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了 leliao˘liao`
(modal particle intensifying preceding clause)/(completed action marker), to know/to understand/to know, clear, look afar from a high place
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在 zai`
(located) at/in/exist
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人 ren´
man/person/people
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有 you˘
to have/there is/there are/to exist/to be
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我 wo˘
I/me/myself
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他 ta¯
he/him
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这 zhe`zhei`
this/these, this/these/(sometimes used before a measure word, especially in Beijing)
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个 ge`
(a measure word)/individual
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们 men
(plural marker for pronouns and a few animate nouns)
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中 zhong¯zhong`
within/among/in/middle/center/while (doing sth)/during/China/Chinese, hit (the mark)
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来 lai´
to come
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上 shang`
on/on top/upon/first (of two parts)/previous or last (week, etc.)/upper/higher/above/previous/to climb/to go into/above/to go up
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大 da`dai`
big/huge/large/major/great/wide/deep/oldest/eldest, doctor
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为 wei´wei`
act as/take…to be/to be/to do/to serve as/to become, because of/for/to
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和 he´he`huo´huo`
and/together with/with/peace/harmony/union, cap (a poem)/respond in singing, soft/warm, mix together/to blend
how/which, that/those, that/those/(sometimes used before a measure word, especially in Beijing)
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得 de´dedei˘
obtain/get/gain/proper/suitable/proud/contented/allow/permit/ready/finished, a sentence particle used after a verb to show effect/degree or possibility, to have to/must/ought to/to need to
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于 yu´
(surname), in/at/to/from/by/than/out of
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着 zhao¯zhao´zhezhu`zhuo´
catch/receive/suffer, part. indicates the successful result of a verb/to touch/to come in contact with/to feel/to be affected by/to catch fire/to fall asleep/to burn, -ing part. (indicates an action in progress)/part. coverb-forming after some verbs, to make known/to show/to prove/to write/book/outstanding, to wear (clothes)/to contact/to use/to apply
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下 xia`
under/second (of two parts)/next (week, etc.)/lower/below/underneath/down(wards)/to decline/to go down/latter
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自 zi`
from/self/oneself/since
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之 zhi¯
(literary equivalent of 的)/(subor. part.)/him/her/it
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年 nian´
year
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过 guo`
(experienced action marker)/to cross/to go over/to pass (time)/to celebrate (a holiday)/to live/to get along/(surname)/excessively/too-
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发 fa¯fa`
to send out/to show (one’s feeling)/to issue/to develop, hair