erroneous thoughts

It is not only images than can be worth more than a thousand words… so are videos like this:

From Que Treta!

As the trial of the century goes on, some notable bits emerge. First was the King Kong defence, and now here’s another one I found the other day:

Today’s trial was also marked by a bizarre bit of geek speak as prosecutor Hakan Roswall (attempted to) pull out his geek card. TorrentFreak has the translation:

“When did you meet [fellow defendant Gottfrid] for the first time IRL?” asked the Prosecutor.
“We do not use the expression IRL,” said Peter, “we use AFK.”
“IRL?” questioned the judge.
“In Real Life,” the Prosecutor explained to the judge.
“We do not use that expression,” Peter noted. “Everything is in real life. We use AFK—Away From Keyboard.”
“Well,” said Roswall. “It seems I am a little bit out of date.”

I would wonder what’s next, but as the trial is over by now, oh well… (verdict is expected on April 17th)

This is so true, so obviously true, and still, so widely unknown or ignored… and so well written, that I just can’t resist copying it here. I bet nearly everyone who’s under 40 identifies his or herself with, to a greater or lesser extent (if you work with computers, greater it is).

An simple thought popped into my head yesterday as I was attempting to make some serious headway into my inbox of more than 250 unread items. For reasons I don’t particularly understand, it actually came to me in the form of a quote that could easily be a soundbite:

The hardest thing I have to do every day is to decide what to ignore.

I thought about it for a few minutes and realized how true it was. My email inbox is the obvious example. Every time I look, I’m faced with a bunch of crap to filter through. Hundreds of split-second decisions (trash, file, respond, defer, etc) need to be made. My RSS aggregator is the same way. It reminds me of how many things I’ve yet to deal with. There’s reddit and random links sent from friends via IM and email. Flickr. YouTube. Blog comments. Presentations and classes at work. Podcasts. The stack of unread books in my computer room. The list goes on and on.

In our culture of abundance, they’re nearly infinite in number.

I need to invert my thinking. I should be starting most days with a strong idea in mind of what I want to spent the majority of the day focusing on. If there’s time left, I’ll tend to the other distractions.

But some habits are just hard to break.

The frustrating thing about all this is that as our electronic tools evolve to more efficiently find information, I’m a bit more aware every day of how much stuff I am ignoring. Life was easier when I was ignorant of how much interesting stuff the world had to offer.

O novo desperdício de dinheiro (dos contribuintes) a que o governo se propôs, é a instalação (obrigatória) de chips nas matrículas dos automóveis (sistema apelidado de SIEV: Sistema de Identificação Electrónica de Veículos). As razões pelas quais isto é um desperdício são bem explicadas numa petição contra este sistema. Dois dos argumentos mais relevantes a favor deste sistema são, a fiscalização do cumprimento do código da estrada, e a facilitação da cobrança de portagens. Cito as explicações de porque é que nenhum destes argumentos justifica este sistema:

2.1) ‘Fiscalização do cumprimento do Código da Estrada e demais legislação rodoviária’

Os sistemas de fiscalização existentes já cumprem estas funções eficazmente; como, aliás, é reconhecido internacionalmente. Senão, recorramos ao principal critério de eficácia neste campo é o da redução da sinistralidade rodoviária. Entre 2001 e 2007, Portugal reduziu a sua taxa de sinistralidade em 42% sendo, a par de França e Luxemburgo, considerado país-modelo pelo Conselho Europeu de Segurança Rodoviária.
Os sistemas actuais obtêm resultados inegavelmente bons e eficazes. Logo, não é razoável alegar que, para as mesmas funções, seja necessário adoptar toda uma infra-estrutura acessória que, além de dispendiosa, exercerá uma influência intrusiva e controladora sobre os indivíduos.

[ . . .]

2.3) ‘Cobrança electrónica de portagens em conformidade com o Serviço Electrónico Europeu de Portagem bem como outras taxas rodoviárias e similares’

Repare-se que em Portugal já existe um sistema de cobrança electrónica de portagens – chama-se Via Verde. Como é natural e legítimo, a subscrição desse serviço foi sempre opcional. As pessoas que o vêm como vantajoso, subscrevem-no; e vice-versa. Não é nem o papel nem o direito do governo, o de procurar impor um sistema similar à Via Verde a todos aqueles que, por opção própria e legítima, optaram por não subscrever esse tipo de serviço.
Mas o ponto de maior interesse nesta alínea, é o modo como admite que o SIEV servirá para taxar o público – através da cobrança de portagens, mas também de ‘outras taxas rodoviárias e similares’. Esta é, naturalmente, uma premissa perigosa. Como é demasiado evidente, dá ao governo – seja ao presente, seja a qualquer governo posterior – o espaço legal para aumentar taxas já existentes, ou mesmo para criar novas taxas; e para, depois, impor o pagamento destas taxas, com o SIEV.

Para aqueles (infelizmente cada vez menos) que dão o devido valor à privacidade, deixo aqui uma última citação, também da mesma petição (ênfase adicionada):

Mesmo assumindo que a primeira legislação aprovada pelo governo possa procurar salvaguardar a privacidade dos indivíduos – o que não é um dado adquirido -, o facto é que é criada toda uma infra-estrutura de controlo efectivo que, como tal, está sujeita a:
- Falhas potencialmente graves (p.ex., partilha ilegal de dados);
- Possíveis reenquadramentos legais no futuro, que o possam converter num sistema de controlo mais intrusivo do que aquele que já é pretendido.

O link da petição é: http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/siev/index.html

Quem também achar que isto é mais uma “megalomanía” deste governo, é desde já encorajado a juntar a sua assinatura a essa petição.

Got this in an email. Kudos for Marcelo for emailing this to me!
In the Beginning
In the beginning, there was the computer.

And God entered:

C:\Let there be light!

Enter user ID:

C:\God

Enter password:

C:\Omniscient

Invalid password

Enter password:

C:\Omnipotent

And God logged on at 12:01:00 AM, Sunday, March 1.

C:\ Let there be light.

Unrecognizable command

C:\Create light

Done

C:\Run heaven and earth

And God created Day and Night

And God saw that there were 0 errors.

And God logged off at 12:02:00 AM, Sunday, March 1.

And God logged on at 12:01:00 AM, Monday, March 2.

C:\Let there be firmament in the midst of water and light

Unrecognizable command. Try again.

C:\Create firmament

Done.

C:\Run firmament

And God divided the waters. And God saw that there were 0 errors.

And God logged off at 12:02:00 AM, Monday, March 2.

And God logged on at 12:01:00 AM, Tuesday, March 3.

C:\Let the waters under heaven be gathered together unto one place and let the dry land appear and…

Too many characters in specification string. Try again.

C:\Create dry_land

Done.

C:\Run firmament

And God saw there were 0 errors.

And God logged off at 12:02:00 AM, Tuesday, March 3.

And God logged on at 12:01:00 AM, Wednesday, March 4.

C:\Create lights in the firmament to divide the day from the night

Unspecified type. Try again.

C:\Create sun_moon_stars

C:\Run sun_moon_stars

And God separated the light from the darkness. The sun ruled over the day and the moon and stars ruled over the night.

And God saw there were 0 errors.

And God logged off at 12:02:00 AM, Wednesday, March 4.

And God logged on at 12:01AM, Thursday, March 5

C:\Create fish

Done

C:\Create fowl

Done

C:\Run fish, fowl

And God created the great sea monsters and every living creature that creepeth where the waters swarmed after its kind and every winged fowl after its kind.

And God saw there were 0 errors.

And God logged off at 12:02:00 AM, Thursday, March 5.

And God logged on at 12:01:00 AM, Friday, March 6.

C:\Create cattle

Done

C:\Create creepy_things

Done

C:\Now let us make man in our image

Unspecified type. Try again.

C:\Create man

Done

C:\Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the fowl of the air and over every living thing that creepeth upon the earth

Too many command operands. Try again.

C:\Run multiplication

Execution terminated. 6 errors.

C:\Run Breath

Done

C:\Run multiplication

Execution terminated. 5 errors.

C:\Move man to Garden of Eden

Filename: Garden of Eden does not exist.

Abort, Retry, Ignore?

C:\Create Garden_of_Eden

Too many parameters

C:\Create Garden Eden.

Done

C:\Move man to Garden of Eden.

Done

C:\Run multiplication

Execution terminated. 4 errors.

C:\Copy woman from man

Done

C:\Run multiplication

Execution terminated. 2 errors.

C:\Create desire

Done

C:\Run multiplication

And God saw man and woman being fruitful and multiplying in Garden Eden.

Warning: No time limit on this run. 1 errors.

C:\Create freewill

Done

C:\Run freewill

And God saw man and woman being fruitful and multiplying in Garden Eden.

Warning: No time limit on this run. 1 errors.

C:\Undo desire

Desire cannot be undone once freewill is created.

C:\Destroy freewill

Freewill is an inaccessible file and cannot be destroyed.

Enter replacement, cancel, or ask for help.

C:\Help

Desire cannot be undone once freewill is created.

Freewill is an inaccessible file and cannot be destroyed.

Enter replacement, cancel, or ask for help.

C:\Create tree_of_knowledge

C:\Create good, evil

Done

C:\Activate evil

And God saw he had created shame.

Warning system error in sector E95.

Man and woman no longer located in Garden.edn. 1 errors.

C:\Scan Garden.edn for man, woman

Search failed. Abort, Retry, Ignore?

C:\Delete shame

Shame cannot be deleted once evil has been activated.

C:\Destroy freewill

Freewill is an inaccessible file and cannot be destroyed.

Enter replacement,cancel, or ask for help.

C:\Stop

Unrecognizable command. Try again

C:\Ctrl_Break

C:\Ctrl_Break

ATTENTION ALL USERS *** ATTENTION ALL USERS:

COMPUTER GOING DOWN FOR REGULAR DAY OF MAINTENANCE AND REST IN FIVE MINUTES

PLEASE LOG OFF.

C:\Create new world

You have exceeded allocated file space. You must destroy old files before new ones can be created.

C:\ Destroy earth

Destroy earth: Please confirm.

C:\Destroy earth

Confirmed

COMPUTER DOWN *** COMPUTER DOWN.

SERVICE WILL RESUME SUNDAY, MARCH 8 AT 12:01 AM.

YOU MUST SIGN OFF NOW.

And God logged off at 11:59:59 PM, Friday, March 6.

On Saturday, March 7, God rested.

On March 8, God created Macintosh

Loosely based on this, with some addons.

So first download the font from: http://launchpadlibrarian.net/21202254/ttf-droid_1.00%7Eb112%2Bdfsg-0ubuntu1_all.deb

Then dpkg -i <name.deb>

Then System->Preferences->Appearance and set the fonts and sizes to your liking.

Finally, copy this into ~/.fonts.conf (create if file doesn’t exist):

< ?xml version="1.0"?>

< !DOCTYPE fontconfig SYSTEM "fonts.dtd">

<fontconfig>

	<match target="font">

		<edit name="autohint" mode="assign">

			<bool>true</bool>

		</edit>

	</match>

</fontconfig>

Restart X, and enjoy

This is mind blowing:

The big irony of course, is that I found this particular lecture from the homepage of a former college teacher. It’s an irony because the talk is about the importance of creativity, as an expression of intelligence, and of how current schooling systems “educate us out of” that same creativity. And in my own experience, the climax of that removal process was no more no less than … college.

In the page where he talks about TED, he writes:

TED makes you want to live your day-to-day in an extraordinary mental realm. Unfortunately, it’s not possible. Even so… Thank you TED!

Yes unfortunately it is not possible. Sadly, unbelievably and even amazingly so. Even so, Thank you TED!

Ridendo castigat mores, oh yeah!

OK, quick way to create that which is stated in the title. Loosely based on this, with some simplifications. Extremely useful to build/test software with lots of possibly experimental or otherwise dangerous dependencies or features, without polluting the mainhost package management system. Can be a real life (and time) saver.

Here we’ll install a lenny (current Debian stable) chroot, modify the accordingly the commands below if you choose to use some other version.

The name of the chroot in our example will be mychroot

/var/chroot/ is the place where you want the chroot to be created (a folder named (in this case) mychroot will be automagically created inside /var/chroot/ )

1. Install debootstrap: $ aptitude install debootstrap;
(install the one that comes from the repositories, no need to download any deb’s manually)

2. Install dchroot (replace editor with vim or whatever suits you):

$ sudo apt-get install dchroot
$ sudo mkdir /var/chroot # Remember, we assume our chroot is here
$ sudo editor /etc/dchroot.conf

Append this:

mychroot /var/chroot

3. Build the chroot proper. Add -⁣-arch i386 to build a 32 bits chroot on top of an amd64 system. The example mirror is Portuguese; another can be choosen from here.

$ sudo debootstrap -⁣-variant=buildd lenny /var/chroot/ http://ftp.pt.debian.org/debian/

4. Run the following commands (*):

$ sudo cp /etc/resolv.conf /var/chroot/etc/resolv.conf
$ sudo chroot /var/chroot/
$ mount /proc
$ apt-get install aptitude # I prefer aptitude, so install it first
$ aptitude update
$ aptitude install wget debconf
$ aptitude install locales dialog
$ locale-gen en_GB.UTF-8  # this needs improving
$ exit

5. Configure dchroot (including users and passwords)

$ sudo cp /etc/passwd /var/chroot/etc/
$ sudo sed 's/\([^:]*\):[^:]*:/\1:*:/' /etc/shadow | sudo tee /var/chroot/etc/shadow
$ sudo cp /etc/group /var/chroot/etc/
$ sudo cp /etc/hosts /var/chroot/etc/ # avoid sudo warnings when resolving chroot's hostname

6. Enable sudo:

$ sudo cp /etc/sudoers /var/chroot/etc/
$ sudo chroot /var/chroot/
$ dpkg-reconfigure passwd
$ passwd <your first user in the admin group>
$ aptitude install sudo
$ pwconv # SEE BELOW
$ exit

At this point, an additional step was needed to make sudo work, viz.: $ pwconv This was totally empirical, and I have got no clue (as of yet) as to why it works… sorry.

7. Add lines to /etc/fstab (mainhost) that allow access to your home folder from inside the chroot (VERY useful). Note that these commands must be ran from the mainhost, not the chroot.

$ sudo editor /etc/fstab

[add the below lines ]

/home           /var/chroot/home        none    bind            0       0
 /tmp            /var/chroot/tmp         none    bind            0       0
 /media/cdrom    /var/chroot/media/cdrom none    bind            0       0
 /dev            /var/chroot/dev         none    bind            0       0
 proc-chroot     /var/chroot/proc        proc    defaults        0       0
 devpts-chroot   /var/chroot/dev/pts     devpts  defaults        0       0

8. And mount them:

$ sudo mount -a

9. Modify the prompt to tell you that you’re in a chrooted environment. VERY useful if you work with multiple shells (who doesn’t thes days?), both from the chroot and the mainhost. You can call it whatever you want.

$ sudo chroot /var/chroot/
$ echo mychroot > etc/debian_chroot
$ exit

10. Now from the mainhost, (no need to be root) do the command below and you’re in a working chroot environment:

$ dchroot -c mychroot -d

The end.
(*) The locale stuff needs some fine tunning, maybe in a future update.

What can I say, except that I’m not the only one:

Linus Torvalds says he has ditched KDE for good and is now sleeping with its arch rival GNOME. Oh well, rhetoric apart, he says the move over to GNOME happened because in KDE 4, he found it quite bothersome that he couldn’t get his Right mouse button to access the right menu he wanted. In short, he ran into usability issues while using KDE 4.0.

And now all hell breaks loose. Have a nice day.