The Author – Bart Busschots
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May
22
A Non-Scientific Contrast of PHP & Perl
Filed Under Software Development, Computers & Tech | 11 Comments
It’s no secret that I don’t like PHP. In fact, I dedicated an entire article to explaining just why I don’t like PHP last year. Recently I’ve found another reason to dislike PHP. The GD image manipulation libraries SUCK! They are so insanely and needlessly complex. All I wanted to do was write a simple command-line script to read in a folder and edit each JPEG image in the folder to resize it, insert a Creative Commons logo, and the URL to my website. I’m currently working on uploading some of my photography to my website and doing this manually for all my photos is just not an option, it would take forever! So, I started writing a PHP script because I know PHP can do these things thanks to the DB libs. That turned out to be a bad idea so I ran home to Perl 🙂
[tags]Perl, PHP, GD Libs, Image Magick[/tags]
May
21
Would Somebody Think of the Color Blind People!
Filed Under Computers & Tech, Software Development | 3 Comments
If you design stuff please bear in mind that not all of us are blessed with perfect color vision. When you’re developing your color schemes please make sure they are still readable to the color bind. Don’t worry, it’s trivially easy to test this with a great free tool called Color Oracle. BTW, even if you don’t have an actual need for this tool it’s still fun to play with 🙂
What’s really nice about this tool is that it’s available for Mac, Linux and Windows so everyone can play! I’ve only tested the Mac version and it works like a charm. It adds a simple menu bar icon to select which kind of color blindness to simulate. When you select a scheme your screen colors change so simulate what a color blind person would see. I really like that the change is very temporary, just click the mouse of press a key and everything goes back to normal. You can also set up hot-keys so you can very quickly check your interface works for color blind people with just the press of a single button. There is no excuse now for developing an interface that color blind people can’t use!
[tags]color blindness, software, freeware, OS X, Windows, Linux[/tags]
May
20
Having set myself the challenge of observing all the planets with a pair of 10x50mm binoculars I bought in Lidle for €19 this year I got to tick another one off my list today, Jupiter. I now just need Mars and the two difficult ones, Uranus & Neptune. Although Jupiter is the only one I get to cross off my list today I did get to observe many more planets, in fact, I observed all the planets bar the three I’m missing!
May
18
First Light of my New Nikon D40
Filed Under Photography | 5 Comments
My new Nikon D40 Digital SLR arrived today. My first impressions of the camera are excellent. It is easy to use, ergonomically well designed, and it takes great pictures. What more could you want from a camera!? Because I bought it over the net the only manual that came with it is in German so needless to say I haven’t read it! But, TBH, I saw no need to read it because in just a few minutes I was taking pictures as if I’d owned the camera for years. The UI guys obviously did something very right with this camera.
Needless to say I just had to put the camera through it’s paces so here are the results of my first experiments (not original resolution obviously).
[tags]Photography, Nikon, D40[/tags]
May
17
Microsoft Start to Crack
Filed Under Computers & Tech | 4 Comments
It’s no secret that I’m no Microsoft fan. Their business practices annoy me and the way they treat their customers like criminals makes my blood boil. I mean really, what exactly is the genuine advantage consumers like you and I get from ‘Genuine Advantage’? I’m a big fan of open source. I like the openness and the community and I think that approach leads to better software in general. Having said that I’m no Linux zealot. I do use it both at work and at home and do run it regularly as both a desktop and a server OS. However, I’m also a dedicated Mac user. One thing I do not own is a Windows machine. Linux and OS X all the way for me!
This week Microsoft provided me with yet another reason to hate them. They are now threatening to sue open source users for supposedly using their patents. Leaving aside the fact that I find software idea patents objectionable and a bad idea and that I think the American patent system is a disaster, this all strikes me as a great big load of FUD. MS are not naming the patents. They are just making threats. They are trying to use fear, uncertainty, and doubt (FUD) to scare people back to MS software.
[tags]Micorsoft, Litigation, Patents, Linux[/tags]
May
15
And Award for the Worst Door-to-Door Canvasing Goes to …
Filed Under Polemics & Politics | 11 Comments
Well, what with the election being just around the corner the door-step brigade are out in force. I just had Fine Gael at the door and can’t believe their ineptitude. These people sure didn’t leave me with the impression that they had the where-with-all to run the country. Here’s how the exchange went:
Me: So why should I vote for Fine Geal?
Fine Gael: Ah … sure why not?
Me: *stare in amazement*
Had they been able to follow that up with any sort of real answer I wouldn’t mind. But instead they just gave me some literature. When I started asking questions they looked at their copy of the register, realised that only one male was registered to vote in the house, and that he was a Fine Gael member. They then got suspicious and stopped answering us! Instead they then asked to speak to people by name. I pointed out that none of them lived here anymore. They told us we obviously couldn’t vote because we weren’t on the register. I pointed out that all it meant was that we would not be voting in this constituency but they didn’t seem to care. They couldn’t get away quick enough.
All in all a poor show. What makes parties think that sending out plebs with no ability to discuss policies with potential voters around to smile and make small-talk will win votes?
[tags]Ireland, Politics, General Election, Fine Gael[/tags]
May
13
A Look at the NoScript FireFox Add-on
Filed Under Security, Computers & Tech | 2 Comments
I have been warning of the dangers of JavaScript on the web for quite some time now (see related articles at the bottom of this article). I have also always said it is unrealistic to expect people to turn JS off completely. Hence, my advice has been the same, use FireFox, and use the NoScript add-on. However, I’ve never actually done a proper review of NoScript, until now.
May
11
More DRM Insanity
Filed Under Security, Computers & Tech | 1 Comment
The company Media Rights Technology (MRT) are suing Apple, Microsoft, Real and Adobe under the DMCA (Digital Millennium Copyright Act) because they won’t use their technology. The DMCA makes software designed to circumvent copy protection illegal. It all hinges around MRT’s X1 SeCure Recording Control software which, according to them at least, is effective against the ripping of streaming media. MRT’s court case is based on the fact that these companies have been “actively avoiding the use of MRT’s technologies”. MRT are now claiming that because of this refusal to use their software these companies software is designed to facilitate piracy and therefore illegal. This is obviously totally laughable and if the American courts have even an ounce of sense left it will get thrown out of court. However, it is a dangerous case because if it wins it will mean that the DMCA makes DRM compulsory. This is also an interesting attempt to build a monopoly for MRT through legal action. Their business must really be suffering if they have to resort to abusing the DMCA to force companies to use their software. One has to ask what legal standing they have to even bring this case. This has the potential to set some very dangerous precedents. Lets hope common sense wins out in the America legal system for once.
[tags]DRM[/tags]
May
10
Could I Be a Switcher?
Filed Under Computers & Tech | Leave a Comment
There are many more operating systems than just Windows but for the vast majority of people Windows is their first and often only OS. Hence, the majority of people who use Mac OS X, Linux or Unix are people who’ve switched from Windows to those other OSes, i.e. the are ‘switchers’. Contrary to what some people may like to have you believe switching is not always straight-forward and it’s not for everyone, however, for some people it really works and the change really improves their daily lives. So, if you think you might be interested in saying goodbye to Windows this post may be of some help to you.
[tags]Windows, Linux, Unix, OS X[/tags]
May
6
The Great Solitaire Experiment
Filed Under Science & Astronomy | 7 Comments
To settle a little argument in the family I’ve been keeping a record of the results of all the games of Solitaire I’ve played since Easter. Since Nature weren’t interested in my results I present them here on my humble blog 🙂 To cut a long story short, Dad’s hypothesis was that one only wins about one in every twenty games of Solitaire, I disagreed giving a non-scientific estimate that I win about one in five games. He asked me to prove it, so I started keeping records! Today my dataset hit 150 games which I think is enough to average over and get meaningful results. To further support my work my brother also contributed data on a further 100 games owing to extreme boredom while forced to take time off work because of a football injury.
[tags]Solitaire[/tags]