Tuesday, 30 August, 2005. 11:58:32 PMI converted my flashcard program from wxWindows to Qt tonight. Even a
single dialog with two buttons showed off the bugginess of the wxWindows
library. The program is supposed to display a question, receive a
button click to indicate that you know the answer or don't know the answer,
display the correct answer in either case, and close after 3 seconds. The
annoying bug I was seeing with the wxWindows version is that if I clicked
the button without moving the mouse, the window would never close. After
that time if I wiggled the mouse just a little bit, the button click
event would be processed, and the window would close. That's an indication
of some serious problems in the event handling code. The Qt conversion
took just a couple hours, and it works perfectly.
Monday, 29 August, 2005. 04:27:50 PMI added two scripts to the root bin directory, est and cst, which update
the /etc/localtime link to point to the correct time zone information.
Monday, 29 August, 2005. 08:24:14 AMI'm sitting in the airport, waiting for a Northwest flight, because my
Delta flight was cancelled because of a maintenance problem with the
aircraft. The interesting part about this is that the Northwest rep
had to override a "No Boarding" flag on my name, because my
name apparently matches against some kind of list that Northwest keeps. The
Delta rep was standing there to help get me transferred over, and she said
that I wasn't on any of the Delta lists.
Friday, 26 August, 2005. 10:36:21 AMI've started collecting parts to build a computer with a real front panel.
I already had three 1802 processors that I bought from another member of
the Yahoo ComsacElf mailing list. The 1802 is an interesting and strange
processor which has some features that make it suitable to this kind
of simple computer. It was one of the first microprocessors, predating many
other processors. It's fully static, which means that it can run at any
clock speed from the max rated down to zero hertz. I can trigger the
clock with a pushbutton switch and observe what happens very closely. There's
also a mode where data in is copied to the memory without executing anything,
which makes implementation of a front panel very easy. So far I am just
collecting parts that I might need. I have a breadboard, wire, CPU, and
a small 5 volt switching power supply. In Austin we have a store called
MC Howard, which is a warehouse type place with any part you could
want in bins. I picked up 12 really nice looking switches and a grab
bag of 100 TTL chips. There's a pretty good assortment of gates, counters,
buffers, and flip-flops, so I should be able to find things to use in
there.
Thursday, 25 August, 2005. 09:34:41 AMThe updates on Debian Testing made gcc version 4 the new default compiler.
Tuesday, 23 August, 2005. 11:39:40 PMGoogle is launching a new chat service, and I've already created my
account there. It's not going to be officially announced until tomorrow.
My screen name on the Google chat service is pdraper@gmail.com. I've
also got a Yahoo chat screen name of pdrap, and an AOL Instant Messenger
name of arfarf1235.
Saturday, 20 August, 2005. 12:50:01 AMI'm going to be on a project in Southfield, MI for the next two months.
It'll be nice to be able to visit my parents and friends who live up there,
but it would be better to have a project that keeps me at home in Austin.
Wednesday, 17 August, 2005. 10:43:22 PMI've been following the story of Cindy Sheehan and her anti-war activism which
started when her son was killed in Iraq. The Republicans have been really
nasty, trying to smear her, though the only thing she has done wrong is
to grieve in public for her son, and ask the President for answers, rather
than shut her face and be quiet like a good little woman.
Rush Limbaugh has this to say about mothers who gave their sons in
service of their country:
Frankly, I'm also fed up -- not fed up. I retract that. I'm weary, ladies and gentlemen, of even having to express sympathy. "Oh, she lost her son!" Yes, yes, yes,
but (sigh) we all lose things.
Apparently Rush believes that losing your son in a war justified with lies
is exactly like
losing your car keys. Is that a surprising position
for a fatass thrice-divorced drug abuser to take?
Tuesday, 16 August, 2005. 04:14:22 PMWe're having a new roof put on our house today. The crew is doing the entire
thing in one day.
Tuesday, 16 August, 2005. 12:42:43 AMI cut some trees and branches tonight. Two trees were starting to fall over,
and one had branches touching my shed.
Wednesday, 10 August, 2005. 12:44:59 AMI wish I was flying into Detroit Metro Airport tonight, because there's
a huge fire at a chemical factory in Romulus, near
Wayne and Van Born roads. That would be a spectacular sight.
Tuesday, 02 August, 2005. 05:46:49 PMCTV is reporting that a flight attendant on the flight says that everybody
got out of the Airbus after it ran off the end of the runway, and the
fire started only several minutes after the accident.
Tuesday, 02 August, 2005. 05:42:51 PMHere's the Air
France A340 that crashed in Toronto today. This photograph was taken
of the aircraft as it landed on January 30th this year at St. Maarten,
Netherlands Antilles. This beach is famous for the low flying aircraft
landing at the airport.
Tuesday, 02 August, 2005. 03:18:30 PMThese are lyrics to a song that Adam Curry's been playing on his podcast.
---
On A Podcast (Explicit)
Words & Music by: Greg St.Clare & Chris Hicks
Verse 1
Do you remember, way back last summer
When mainstream radio was such a fuckin bummer
No indie music nothin too funny
Clear Channel motherfuckers did it for the money
Bridge
But somebody heard the call
Now, you can have it all
Chorus
I heard it on a podcast rockin fuckin radio
You want it, you got it just download it and pod it
On a podcast no ones gonna stop ya
Tell the FCC to stick it kick it
The revolutions on
Verse 2
Do you remember your first computer
That piece of shit was like a freakin Roto-Rooter
Now we've got wi-fi, downloadin files fast
Listenin to everyone who's ever done a podcast
Verse 3
Its history, now you see, each and every nation
Radio has got to go, its our emancipation
Play that song, sing along, mash it up and mix it
Radio was fuckin blow til Adam Curry fixed it
Bridge
Yeah, somebody heard the call
Now, you can have it all
Instrumental
Turnaround
Mp3 killed the radio star
Chorus
I heard it on a podcast rockin fuckin radio
You want it, you got it just download it and pod it
On a podcast no ones gonna stop ya
Tell the FCC to stick it kick it
The revolutions on a
Chorus
Podcastrockin fuckin radio
You want it, you got it just download it and pod it
On a podcast no ones gonna stop ya
Tell the FCC to stick it kick it
The revolutions on
Chorus Tag
The revolutions on
The revolutions on
The revolutions on
The revolution's on a podcast
The revolution's on a podcast
The revolutions on
©2005 G. St. Clare, C. Hicks
Publisher: Audiopium Music
Monday, 01 August, 2005. 12:26:47 PMMy IBM laptop died on Thurday night last week, and it's going to be
another week before I can get it replaced. In the meantime, I've copied
both virtual machines that I regularly work with to my machine at home.