Januar 2006 - Posts

• Enter the house tigers

  Some photos of our newest room mates. Posted Jan 30 2006, 10:20 by Dirk with no comments

• When the Danube freezes over ...

  To all those people who ever said "I will make up to person X when the Danube freezes over": now is the time to make good on your promise.  For the first time in at least fifty years, the Danube is frozen in Vienna.  I am not kidding. I took some pictures as proof. Posted Jan 30 2006, 09:49 by Dirk with no comments

• Pulse DVD

  I can't help but shake my head after reading the latest information about the Pulse DVD in what is starting to sound like a neverending story. It's now set for a release in October 2006. In time for the 2006 X-Mas shopping ... Posted Jan 29 2006, 05:54 by Dirk with no comments

• Da Bird

  Playing with cats is not an easy business. It takes patience and perseverence to figure out what and how cats like for entertainment. We tried a number of toys, and at the end of december we ordered Da Bird from an Austrian web shop. Da Bird is one of those rare products that fullfil every expectation set by publicity, and then some. Never mind the three weeks waiting time, never mind the lack of communication from the Austrian web shop, Da Bird really flies. Frodo and Sammy go crazy at the sight of Da Bird, and chase it with vehemence and abandon.  They roll out speed and endurance reserves I didn't believe they have in them, and run the length of the couch up and down trying to catch Da Bird. Or they jump, sometimes almost 1.5m meter up. Especially Sammy is quite adept at catching Da Bird. I am finally beginning to understand who it is possible for cats to catch a bird. I used to think that must be quite difficult, since all a bird really has to do to escape is fly away.  A few sessions with Da Bird cured me of this misconception. If a bird (or the person wielding Da Bird) fails to pay attention for a fraction of a second, the cats make a lightning-fast jump and they have the bird in their claws. The packaging of Da Bird warned us to lock away the toy when it's not being used, because otherwise "your cats will love them to pieces". No idle warning indeed. Frodo took to guarding the cupboard where we stored Da Bird, and in the course of yesterday evening our lovely cats managed to open the cupboard and get out Da Bird. Da poor Bird now looks rather worse for use, and we locked it away in another cupboard, one that I do not expect the cats to be able to open. Posted Jan 23 2006, 08:31 by Dirk with no comments

• Ripping of the Ribbon

  There is not yet a widely available beta version of Office 12, but there is already at least one commerical .net component "out there" that features an Office 12 Ribbon: http://www.devcomponents.com/dotnetbar/. This sort of worries me. Let me explain. I am sure that the Office team team has spent a lot of time and effort designing the Ribbon, and coming up with scenarios for which Ribbon part to use where. What I fear is that when other people start copying the look of the Ribbon, they will basically do nothing more than take the existing toolbar paradigm and slap a new look on it.  That was afaik exactly _not_ the intent of the ribbon. And if there are applications out there that look like Office 12 but don't behave like it, I'm sure that would tarnish Office 12. This problem would imo be lessened if there were a clear guideline about the Ribbon, sort of like the Windows Vista UX guideline. Office would benefit from such guidelines in two ways: first the "other" apps are less likely to tarnish Office's image, second 3th party plugins for office will use the ribbon correctly. Posted Jan 19 2006, 02:21 by Dirk with no comments

• WinFS: United We Stand?

  I read The WinFS Files: Divide et Impera by Sean Grimaldi yesterday: an interesting treatise on the philosphy and rationale behind Windows Future Storage (which I still predict will be renamed to Windows Storage Foundation, by the way). I honestly can't say that I'm entirely convinced by the article, however. Here's why. Does WinFS unify data? Mr. Grimaldi claims that WinFS will unify data: gone will be the days of several different implementation of the same concept. He takes Person as an example, and more or less promises we will never have to write code to convert one Person class to another Person class from another department or company. This is true, but only as far as it goes: what if my company and that other company have special, somewhat related extensions to person?  My company might store the social security number as SSN, the other company as SocialSecNumber. To really unify all data, Microsoft must provide implementations of all concepts - a daunting task. Take for example the game Hero Quest. Hero Quest is a fantasy board game with role playing elements, and it uses several cards for equipment, treasures, spells and so on.  The game is long since out of print, but it still has many avid followers, and quite a few of them are programmers. The natural consequence is that there are a number of Hero Quest programs out there. Most of them model the concept of a card somehow, but there's no unified implementation.  Will Microsoft provide an implementation of a Hero Quest treasure card?  Probably not, so we are left with the divided data.  Unless someone else will provide this implementation, but who? Privacy Backlash? Mr. Grimaldi also describes the benefits of unification: tailored advertisment can read my unified calender, and propose events that fit my schedule, or indicate where they do not.  I don't want advertisments, and I certainly don't want advertisments to read my calender, thank you very much.  Will there be an easy and obvious way to restrict who will be able to access my data? I'm not concerned about WinFS per se, but rather about the way it may be used. WinFS has great power, and with great power comes great responsibility. Posted Jan 18 2006, 12:26 by Dirk with no comments

• Harry Potter and the Weasley Connection

  Warning: contains spoilers for all Harry Potter books up to and including The Halfblood Prince. I don't usually read a book before I see the movie version of it, but after reading The Goblet of Fire, I just couldn't stop. I had to know how the story of Harry, Hermione and Ron continues. So I read The Order of the Phoenix. A well written, perfectly paced and gripping book. IMO the best of the six books so far.  What I don't understand is why Harry didn't want to talk to Dumbledore about Umbridge and his nightmares, but then again I don't pretend to understand children/youths when they hit puberty.  Sirius's death was sort of unspectacular, I am sure it will be much longer in the movie. Then I continued with The Halfblood Prince. I think that Harry's feelings towards Ginny are very well described, even if they are a bit disturbing: the monster in his chest and all that. It reminded me of the way Voldemort intruded upon Harry and made Harry want to attack Dumbledore (even if only for a moment). So maybe Harry did make the right decision to break up with Ginny after all. Maybe they'll get back together after Voldemort is killed in book 7. That is, of course, assuming that Voldemort is indeed killed and Harry survives. Scuttlebut has it that both of them will die.  From the movies, I always felt that they were sort of grooming Harry and Hermione to get together. But THP makes it seem like it's Ron and Hermione who will get together. That would leave room for Harry and Ginny at the end.  These two are the two people with the most direct experience with Voldemort, so they have something in common. Is it enough? I don't know. I frown a bit upon Harry's decision to leave Hogwarths as well. I would think he has still some things to learn, to be better prepared for Voldemort.  But Harry is admittedly a danger to the people around him: Voldemort will try to get him and you can bet he doesn't care about collateral damage.  Given that, it is logical that Ron and Hermione join him. But why not Ginny? Or Neville? Or Luna? They are, after all, the core DA members? Snape finally got his wish in THP and becomes Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher. His behaviour is a bit of a mystery. He clearly is a double agent, both sides are aware of that. Both sides also think he is working for them and spying upon the other.  The unbreakable vow is a remarkable thing to take if you are on the good side and not on the bad side. So is killing Dumbledore. But why was Snape so offended when Harry called him a coward? The normal "evil" behaviour would be to sneer and say something to the effect of "you will find it is you who are mistaken about a great many things".  Could it be that Snape really is on the good side and was under strict orders from Dumbledore not to blow his cover, no matter what? Even if it meant killing Dumbledore?  Was Dumbledore pleading Snape to put him out of his misery?  Dumbledore hinted a few times in THP that he considers himself less valuable than Harry, and he says he has a very solid reason to trust Snape. I think this is evidence enough to allow the possibility that Snape really is on the good side after all. Or maybe he is on his own side, and wants to become the new Dark Lord. Posted Jan 09 2006, 11:32 by Dirk with no comments

• Robert Fripp to compose soundtrack for Windows Vista

  Some Microsoft bloggers hinted at it in the past few days, but I guess it is now (at least semi-) official. Slashdot announced that Robert Fripp will compose the soundtrack for Windows Vista. Let's start up the Frippery ;-) If you don't know who Robert Fripp is: go back whence thou camest and refresh your rock music history, with a big emphasis on the seventies. Posted Jan 06 2006, 08:13 by Dirk with no comments

• The pitfalls of programming as non-Admin

  I've been programming as non-Admin for several months now, like any good .net developer should do.  When working on XP, you need to run the asp.net working process under your own account, otherwise you won't be able to debug. The catch here is: if you change your password, you need to change the processmodel entry in the machine.config as well.  If you don't, "Service unavailable" failures will bang you over the head, and the application event logs will be full of errors saying the asp.net working process couldn't start. Posted Jan 02 2006, 10:04 by Dirk with no comments

• Mission Statement

  Dirk’s Mission Statement General I will take good care of my body, mind and soul. I will challenge them, and at the same time respect their boundaries. I will listen to them, and seek appropriate help promptly if needed. I will control the Dark Side in me. I will take all responsibility that is mine to take, and only responsibility that is mine to take. I will love and respect the people who are important to me, most of all Tatjana. I will strive to keep love for others and love for myself balanced. At Home I will contribute my fair share of work towards keeping the apartment in order. I will take on only project for which I have the resources, be they timely, financial, mental or physical resources. At work I will strive to leave work at work. I will strive to work exactly 8 hours every working day. I will strive to be helpful, respectful and patient, regardless of other peoples’ attitude. I will deliver defect-free software, and will strive to inspire others to do likewise. Sport I will ride my bicycle to work whenever possible. Additionally, I will do sport at least three times a week (for example soccer, or gym) except when ill or recovering from illness. I will strive to avoid unintentional fouls when playing team sports, especially soccer. I will avoid intentional fouls when playing team sports, especially soccer. Financially I will spend only the money that I really have. I will avoid taking loans, apart from the existing loan for the Genossenschaftsanteil. I will pay back 250 EUR for the Genossenschaftsanteil each and every month. I will strive to save some money every month. I will keep my Money file up to date, allowing at most 1 week’s worth of unprocessed bills to accumulate. I will respect my budget, and I will strive to respect the categories in the budget. Posted Jan 01 2006, 06:25 by Dirk with no comments