2009 Jul 1, 6:21"The QR code, used to store and decode small bits of data via printed symbol, received an artistic rendering by SET as part of its campaign for Marc by Marc Jacobs." I like the idea although in this
case its not very subtle or different from a regular QR code IMHO. Also, I was surprised that my phone could still read the QR code in this form.
qr qrcode marketing art internet mobile technical 2009 Jul 1, 2:24Stats on HTTP servers and HTTP server response headers. "Current statistics are based on a sample of 84604 probed servers, gathered in the last 386 days."
http statistics server internet http-header via:mnot technical 2009 Jun 29, 4:19
I've looked at my web server logs previously to see if anyone had used my Web Frotz Interpreter and until recently didn't realize that awstats (the web server log report generator) was truncating the query from my URL, so I couldn't tell that anyone was actually using
it. But after grepping the logs manually I've pulled out the URLs of visitor's text adventure sessions. If you'll recall, my Web Frotz Interpreter stores the game state in the
URL so its easy to see user's game states in the web server logs.
I've put some of the links up on the Web Frotz Interpreter page. Some of the interesting ones:
server-logs technical zork frotz pants interactive-fiction uri if 2009 Jun 29, 1:20"The Music of Erich Zann is a short film based on the story by H.P. Lovecraft. Though conditions inside the abandoned Savoy Hotel made this a very challenging project (Sub-freezing temperatures;
cramped quarters; enough dust to suffocate Cthulhu himself), I was thrilled with the opportunity to work in such a haunting location, with such a talented and dedicated group of filmmakers."
chris-shelton hp-lovecraft video movie 2009 Jun 25, 1:53"The document provides practical best practices related to specifying the language of content that HTML content authors can use to ensure that their HTML is easily adaptable for an international
audience. These are best practices that are best addressed from the start of content development if unnecessary costs and resource issues are to be avoided later on."
language i18n internationalization html w3c xml reference xhtml technical 2009 Jun 22, 3:09"Web/browser-security maven and coder Adam Barth has been working on implementing a content sniffer in WebKit, based on a content-sniffing algorithm that was originally specified in the HTML5 draft,
but that's now specified as a separate IETF draft that Adam is editing and that's titled, Content-Type Processing Model."
mime mime-sniffing webkit http technical 2009 Jun 20, 9:45"When the scan button is pressed on the product, nothing happens. The scan button does not work correctly." The workarounds are all basically, "don't use that button then." They say their Vista
driver doesn't support sending the appropriate event. Lame.
vista hp scanner driver lame technical 2009 Jun 20, 9:39If you have Office installed you may have an OCR library sitting on your hard drive just waiting to be used via C#...
ocr microsoft office .net automation scanner camera windows technical 2009 Jun 19, 3:27You must wonder if Bruce Schneier is having trouble selling his laptop just because he's Bruce Schneier and he announced his sale on his blog. I thought his description was funny though: "But I still
want to sell the computer, and I am pissed off at what is essentially a denial-of-service attack." A scam or attack to you or me is at worst a DoS to Bruce Schneier.
bruce-schneier ebay fraud security dos 2009 Jun 8, 3:40I didn't hear about this at the time, but a sixth Hitchhikers Guide novel will be written by Eoin Colfer. This article has some quotes from Eoin about it and big-shoe filling is addressed. Also in
the article is a clip of the voice actor of Arthur Dent from the radio series as Arthur Dent complaining about being brought back to life that had been played on BBC Radio.
hhgttg douglas-adams eoin-colfer and-another-thing book news audio 2009 Jun 1, 11:07
When I heard that
Live Search is now Bing one of my initial thoughts was how'd they get that domain
name given
the unavailability of pronouncable four letter .COM domain names. Well, the names been used in the past.
Here now, via the
Wayback Machine is a brief, somewhat speculative, and ultimately anticlimactic
history
of bing.com:
-
2003 July: The first archived version of bing.com features "bing! is a small device (e.g., possibly even a small
Band-Aid(R)-like sticker!) that vibrates when a person's cell phone rings." I can't recall 2003 cell phones, were they big enough to require this device?
-
2004 August: Site for the same device is rewritten and looks much better, IMHO.
-
2006 June: The domain is now parked by easyDNS. I guess the "bing!" device didn't work out?
-
2006 November: Its now "BING*" and they won't say what they're working on ("we're still in stealth mode") but they are
hiring C#/.NET developers.
-
2007 January: And they're gone. Without even exiting stealth mode. Too bad, I liked their logo. Their domain is now for
sale...
-
2007 February: Looks like EasyMail buys the domain and offers a physical mailing service in Australia: "By simply clicking
a button on your computer, mail is beamed electronically to a bing post office. Your mail is automatically printed, folded, enveloped and dispatched into the Australia Post network the very same
day."
-
Present: Now its the new home for Live Search of course.
The new name reminds me of the show Friends. Also, I hope they get a new favicon - I don't enjoy the stretched 'b' nor its color scheme.
microsoft technical domain history search archive dns bing 2009 May 29, 9:13"Developed in the late 1960s by Dutch physicist J. R. J. van Asperen De Boer, infrared reflectography (IRR) is a technique used to look through the paint layers. ... Many paints will appear partially
or completely transparent while others, such as black, will absorb the infrared radiation and appear dark."
art history science ir ir-reflectography 2009 May 26, 11:28"But Data.gov is different. It is primarily for machines, not people, at least as a first step. It is a catalog of various sets of data from government agencies. And the idea is to offer the data in
one of several standardized formats, ranging from a simple text file that can be read by a spreadsheet program to the XML format widely used these days for the exchange of information between Web
services. Other data is presented in formats that are meant to feed into mapping programs."
data nytimes xml government 2009 May 25, 3:02
Checking out at a grocery store to which I rarely go, the cashier asks me if I want an
Albertson's card. I respond sure and she hands me the form on which I give up my personal information. I ask if I need to fill this out now, and she says yeah and it will only take two minutes,
which surprised me because at QFC they just hand me a new card and send me on my way. I fill in my phone number as the first ten digits of pi so I don't have to worry about getting phone calls but
its something I can remember next time I'm there and don't bring the card.
I turn to leave and the cashier asks me is that a '759' or '159' in my phone number. I stop for a second because I only know the digits as a sequence from the start and pause long enough reciting
it in my head that its clear its not my phone number. And she calls me out on it: "Is that your real phone number?" I sigh, "No, does it have to be? Are you going to call me?" "Yeah," she says,
"I'll call you." (ha ha) "Well I'll try entering this number," she says doubting the computer will accept the fake phone number. "On the number's already registered," she says, "So you already had
a card." "No," says the manager who had walked up during for this exchange, "It means someone else used that same number." So the moral of the story is, try your fake phone number before trying to
use it to get a new card.
personal2 pi albertsons 2009 May 8, 8:23
I watched the new Star Trek movie Thursday morning, along with many others who work on Windows. Microsoft rented out a theater and played the movie on all screens. I greatly enjoyed the movie!
Spoilers follow... I'm obviously not the biggest Star Trek nerd (or at least TOS nerd) since I didn't even pick up on the fact that Kirk's dad being dead was a discrepancy from the TV series. I
only figured out the alternate time-line stuff when they killed most of the Vulcans. I was just surprised they didn't set right what once went wrong by the end of the movie with some more time
travel magic to bring back Vulcan. On that note, I'm pretty sure the Spock-Spock conversation at the end, is Nimoy Spock sending Sylar Spock off to school so that Nimoy Spock can get freaky
repopulating the Vulcan race. Although at first after his 'two places at once' comment I thought he was saying... something else. Also, was the main evil guy a random miner turned psycho? And his
crazy looking spaceship that destroys the Federation fleet was just a mining vessel from the future? Once they invent time travel anybody can get drunk, go back in time, and conquer Earth.
personal2 nerd movie star-trek spoliers time-travel 2009 May 3, 10:03"Architectural Styles and the Design of Network-based Software Architectures - DISSERTATION submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY in Information
and Computer Science by Roy Thomas Fielding 2000"
http rest paper web architecture development api webservices roy-fielding 2009 May 3, 10:36
Looking at the HTTP traffic of Netflix under Fiddler I could see the HTTP request that added a movie to my queue and didn't see anything obvious that would
prevent a CSRF. Sure enough its pretty easy to create a page that, if the user has set Netflix to auto-login, will add movies to the user's queue without their knowledge. I thought this was pretty
neat, because I could finally get people to watch Primer. However, when I searched for Netflix CSRF I found that this issue has been known and reported to Netflix since 2006. Again my thoughts stolen from me and the
theif doesn't even have the common decency to let me have the thought first!
With this issue known for nearly three years its hard to continue calling it an issue. Really they should just document it in their API docs and be
done with it. Who knows what Netflix based web sites and services they'll break if they try to change this behavior? For instance, follow this link to add my Netflix recommended movies to your queue.
technical stolen-thoughts csrf netflix security 2009 May 2, 8:54Humorous Firefox bug description: "This privacy flaw has caused my fiance and I to break-up after having dated for 5 years."
firefox bug humor privacy browser web 2009 Apr 23, 4:46Some lovely data visualizations. Is their Crimespotting visualization supposed to look like the map interface from GTA3SA? "Since 2001, Stamen has developed a reputation for beautiful and
technologically sophisticated projects in a diverse range of commercial and cultural settings."
blog web art visualization information interactive interface portfolio mashup
Sarah and I have a new place in Redmond and we'll be moving
there in a few weeks. Exciting! Incidentally, when researching the place on the Internet I found that the nearby park used to be a radar site for the Project Nike missile system in the fifties.
Fun!
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