2009 Feb 14, 5:41"Now, you can simply add this link tag to specify your preferred version... and Google will understand that the duplicates all refer to the canonical URL:
http://www.example.com/product.php?item=swedish-fish. Additional URL properties, like PageRank and related signals, are transferred as well."
via:mattb google link html url uri canonical canonicalization web 2009 Jan 14, 2:03Google Maps now has a public transit route finder. Would have been useful in Munich and certainly will be useful here at home since they cover the Seattle area including the east-side. "I'm pleased
to announce the launch of the Transit Layer on Google Maps in more than 50 cities around the world making it easier for citizens and tourists around the globe to access public transportation line
information in their cities."
google map travel bus traffic seattle redmond munich transportation maps public-transportation transit 2008 Dec 30, 1:03"Introducing Make: television, Coming in January 2009: A new national series from MAKE magazine, Twin Cities Public Television, and American Public Television"
pbs tv make diy community hack via:boingboing 2008 Nov 13, 10:21"Ever since I read about the incremental updates feature of the PDF file format, I've been patiently waiting for a malicious PDF document with incremental updates to come my way. Thanks to Bojan,
that day has finally arrived."
pdf security javascript exploit malware adobe 2008 Oct 31, 2:37"The Microsoft Active Accessibility SDK provides several utilities that can be used by both clients and servers as testing tools."
msdn microsoft accessibility tool free download 2008 Oct 30, 12:13On hearing news of Live ID supporting OpenID this is pretty much exactly what I was thinking: "With every big portal acting as a provider but not a consumer of identity credentials, users are still
going to wind up creating accounts for more than one service (says this user of Flickr and Google Calendars). When it comes to third-party sites, they may not need to remember a new username and
password, but they will have to remember to which of the providers they chose to provide the credentials for their account. Anyone who slips up may wind up with three or more identities on a single
website, with different data associated with each."
openid identity microsoft google 2008 Oct 23, 2:07Thoughts on how an army of robot soldiers can be made to act more ethically than humans: "One of the fundamental abilities I want to give [these systems] is to refuse an order and explain
why."..."For those situations we have very clear cut guidance from the Geneva Convention, the Hague and elsewhere about what is ethical."
robot army ai ethics 2008 Sep 30, 12:11"Before he was on The Daily Show, before he was the PC in the Mac commercials, John Hodgman wondered, just like you, about the very special world of famous people. Now he explains why being one of
America's best-known minor celebrities is even better than you imagined"
john-hodgman humor article apple tv fame 2008 Sep 16, 2:44Update via the web, email, or your phone, stats on day to day activities. For example send 'lunch time' to create a new time dataset named lunch and then send 'lunch' when you eat lunch and it will
note all the times you ate lunch. I was tempted to use this to see a graph of when I add delicious posts but it doesn't support importing old data. Don't think I'll use it but it uses OpenID
perfectly.
blog statistics openid social graph visualization tool 2008 Sep 10, 1:32Discussion on IETF DNS mailing list about Mozilla's Public Suffix list and what they should do ultimately. "I'm inclined to suggest: Gather and hard-code your list into Firefox, and also provide a
mechanism by which domain authorities can publish information which overrides your list for their domain."
idn domain firefox publicsuffix ietf mozilla tld 2008 Aug 28, 2:35Read about "Dress Like Raymond Day" (as in Raymond Chen of The Old New Thing) and 'The Microsoft Tie' at IBM.
microsoft humor article book 2008 Aug 25, 11:39"The Seattle Municipal Archives documents the history, development, and activities of the agencies and elected officials of the City of Seattle. Strengths of the records include those documenting
engineering, parks, urban planning, the legislative process and elected officials. Holdings include over 6,000 cubic feet of textual records; 3,000 maps and drawings, 3,000 audiotapes; hundreds of
hours of motion picture film; and over 1.5 million photographic images of City projects and personnel."
via:swannman photo flickr seattle history public-domain 2008 Aug 18, 3:46Legal corner case bugs exploited for free rent in SF. "Getzow is getting pretty well known along the Polk Street corridor. Unlike other serial evictees, who move among different neighborhoods, all of
his eight evictions in San Francisco have occurred in a 20-block area known as Lower Nob Hill."
article legal rent house eviction san-francisco 2008 Jul 30, 10:45"Reporters Without Borders therefore offers the following practical advice to foreign journalists to help them cover the human rights situation in China." Install Tor, use PGP and other interesting
things.
censorship china internet privacy olympics journalism 2008 Jul 22, 6:15Determine one's personality based on their home. Feels like pop science, fortune cookie results still fun though: "Sam Gosling, psychologist ... analysed photos from a handful of New Scientist
readers to see what he could deduce about their personalities
science psychology article personality 2008 Jul 12, 12:33Rice on a speaker makes interesting patterns based on the tone played. Like the cornstarch subwoofer video earlier.
rice video youtube sound science via:swannman 2008 Jun 25, 12:26
The weekend before last was Sarah's birthday and as part of
that, last weekend we took a trip to Victoria, BC. I've got a map of our trip locations and photos. Not all the
photos are on the map but they're all in the trip photo set on Flickr. It turns out there's a lot of tourist intended
activities right around our hotel which was in the inner harbor and downtown Victoria area. As such we didn't get a rental car and did a lot of walking.
On the first day we checked out the Royal British Columbia Museum which had
some interesting exhibits in it and the Undersea Garden which was interesting in that its like a floating aquarium but was a bit grimy. There was a group of Japanese tourists next to us during the
undersea show in which a diver behind the glass in the ocean would pick up and parade various animal life. The group all repeated the word starfish in unison after the show's narrator and one of
the tourists was very excited to see the diver bring over the octopus. The diver made the octopus wave to us while it desperately tried to get away.
We flew in and out of the Victoria International Airport
which is a smaller sized airport. Although we needed our passports we didn't need to take off our shoes -- what convenience! The US dollar was just a bit worse than the Canadian dollar which was
also convenient. The weather was lovely while we were there and I only got slightly sun burned.
victoria canada vacation nontechnical 2008 May 18, 12:15'...he was recording Raleigh's HDTV channel WNCN-DT1 on his Vista machine when a popup stating that "restrictions set by the broadcaster...prohibit recording of this program" appeared.'
tv vista mce microsoft television video windows nbc via:boingboing 2008 May 11, 7:28
![[sprague's photo of Corteo in Maryland]](http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2322/2465010137_9e6f945bb0_t_d.jpg)
Sarah and I went to Cirque du
Soleil's Corteo this past Wednesday. Its in Marymoor Park quite near the main Microsoft campus. They setup
large circus tents in the park including a gift shop, overpriced concession stands, and long lined porta-potties. Despite all this the show was very entertaining and quite enjoyable. The show is
like a circus directed by Terry Gilliam or Tim Schafer and otherwise I'm not sure how to describe it, but I do recommend it.
cirque du soleil nontechnical
The weekend before last Sarah and I went down to Gas Works Park in Seattle. Gas Works Park is a former Seattle Gas Light Company gasification plant now turned into a
park with the machinery kept intact and found right on the shore of Lake Union. There's a large hill right next to the plant with an embedded art installation from which you get an excellent view
of the park and the lake. Anyway a very cool place. Afer, we ate at Julia's of Wallingford where I stereotypically had the Santa Cruz
omelet. Good food, nice place, nice neighborhood.
This past weekend was Halloween weekend. On Halloween at Microsoft parents bring their kids around the office buildings and collect candy from those who
have candy in their office. See Matt's photo of one such hallway at Microsoft. The next day Sarah and I went to two birthday parties the second of which required costume. I went as House (from the
television show House) by putting on a suit jacket and carrying a cane. Sarah wore scrubs to lend cred. to my lazy costume. Oh yeah and on Sunday Sarah bought a new car.
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