October 2003 Archives

Finally there is an emblem for me! Full-time hacker Eric S. Raymond created a Hacker Emblem based on the famous game of life:

For all people misguided by the popular media: a hacker is not somebody who is breaking into your computer ---that is a cracker---, but rather somebody who enjoys exploring the details of programmable systems and how to stretch their capabilities (The Jargon File: Hacker).

La Pelota Vasca is a documentary movie about the situation in the Basque Country. In this movie, a lot of people involved with ---both sides of--- the situation like politicians, musicians, professors and victims are interviewed to give a view of how hopeless the situation is. Two important groups are absent: the party currently governing Spain (PP) and the ETA; exactly the two groups who could make a difference in the situation. I saw this movie last Saturday and was very impressed and decided to write about it on my site. But of course I did not have time for it, so I forgot it until I saw the news yesterday.

The PP has the opinion that the movie gives a one-sided view of the problem (mainly because they refused to participate in the first place), and is doing everything they can to prevent people from watching this movie. So when this week a British film festival decided to show the movie, Spain withdrawed their yearly support for this festival to bring the festival into financial problems. I was amazed to hear that a modern country which considers freedom of speech one of the basic human rights is trying to prevent British festival visitors from seeing another opinion than the government's.

In the same news block I heard the news that the government refuses to talk with the governor of the Basque Country about his plans for a better relation between the central government and the autonomous regions. So they do not only refuse his plans, but refuse to talk with him at all!!!! Once again, I cannot believe some of the things this government is doing, and getting away with.

If you ever get the chance to watch 'La pelota vasca', do it quickly. Though a little bit depressed, it certainly is worth your time. And you're teasing the Spanish government at the same time!!!

Ik wil geen loopbaan, ik wil een glijbaan

(Remy van Green Lizard)

I like computers... as long as they work.
But lately I've had too much problems with them. I still didn't have time to fix them all, so the cover of my PC lies next to my computer, and my desk is full with computer parts and little screws. People knowing me a little bit can imagine my feelings about this, since I always prefer to work in a clean and organized environment.

The problems started when the hosting provider for fimcap had been taken over by another company, and the server migrated to a new platform. As a result, our scripts were broken, and SSI worked on another way, so we had to change the extension of all files. All in all a lot of work, which I still haven't completely finished. Besides that, I can only download the access logs from a password protected site, almost impossible to automate. I have contacted the support desk many times, but answers are typically slow. Anyway, for the moment things are almost running as before again, but we will surely move to another provider after the current paid term expires.

While I was working hard to fix all the problems described above, the hard disk of my own computer started having problems. Each time after working for about half an hour, the disk started making an awful noise and the computer halted. After waiting an hour, I could start up the computer again for another thirty minutes of work. In the cooling down period, I used my laptop computer, which also has some problems since I dropped it on the floor. I cannot use it while the batteries are recharging, and the batteries only last for ---again--- thirty minutes. You have to know that both computers are very old, my desktop is seven years old and my laptop probably 8. You could say that they are way too old, but I disagree. My desktop with its Cyrix P133+ processor is more than fast enough for me, since all I do is read my e-mail, visit some web pages ---no problem as long is you don't have Flash installed---, and create HTML and CSS files.

Anyway, since I just bought a new computer for my in-laws, I took their old machine, took out the hard disk and started installing. At this moment I have installed just the basics to start working again: Windows 98SE, Microsoft Office, HTML-kit, TopStyle Pro, WS_FTP Pro, Mozilla Firebird and Mozilla Thunderbird.

It is not ready yet, I still have to install Trillian, Acrobat Reader and Xenu Link Sleuth, and there is some more configuration to be done. But at least I am working again. And after all, that's why I have a computer, isn't it?

A List Apart is the resource for the latest trends in web design. Today the third version of their site became available, with no more than three new articles.

How disappointed was I when I noticed that they use a fixed width for their pages, a really small font by default, a font colour that lacks contrast and that some parts of the text are rendered unreadable with the blue background instead of white. I don't know whether the last problem is a bug in Firebird or a coding problem, since it disappears when I reload the page.

Fortunately the content is much better than their new design!

Imagine that I would have a lot of spare time. And imagine that I still remember how to program applications, and know all the ins and outs of Perl, PHP or Python. Imagine all that...

If all that would be true, I would create a Content Management System. A CMS is an application in which you can enter your texts in a very easy manner, and after that the application does all sorts of things with permissions, rules and templates to create for example a web site and/or a PDF document. One example of a CMS is Movable Type, which I use to create this site. I only have to enter the text of my article, and MT creates a page with this text and a comment form, adds a summary to the main page, updates the monthly archive overview, etc.

Last week I made some changes to this site to prevent spammers from harvesting e-mail addresses from this site and from posting spammy comments. Unfortunately I made some mistakes, which made that visitors posting comments last week were automatically blocked from my site. Last Thursday I fixed that problem, but also accidently introduced a new problem, so that comment posters received a 404 error. As far as I know now, all issues have been solved, so go ahead and type your comments!

I am receiving quite some spam, which fortunately gets filtered out at my mail server. And there it sits quietly in my spam folder, waiting for the moment that I will delete it forever.

Sometimes I've had the feeling that I have to do something with it, but I never knew what. Alright, once in a while I report my spam to SpamCop, but that makes that I have to spend even more time on my spam. I want to do something with my spam, without having to spend a lot of time on it. Something like this Spamblog. Brilliant! That's it! I want that too!! I am going to create another weblog, and forward all my spam to an e-mail to Movable Type gateway. Let's share my spam with the world!

I am not the only having the opinion that there is nothing but buying a real CD. Favourite quote from the comments:

Download is voor pubers met een budgetair probleem en een te snelle Internet-verbinding...

I also think that CD's are way too expensive, but there are so many good CD's missing in my collection, that I usually end up buying three old ones for the same price as a new CD.

[Update 2004.01.21]: Removed broken link

Today we turned on the heater for the first time, since the temperature dropped below 20°C. Summer's over...

There are some sites, whose content only consists of answers to Which XXXXX are you? contests. To me it looks as a very cheap way to generate content, and tell something about yourself without telling anything concrete. I never added this kind of stuff to my site, untill I found What Pixies song are you?. Of course, if they mention my favourite band, I'll have to do it:

In Heaven, everything is fine
In Heaven, everything is fine
In Heaven, everything is fine
You got your good thing, and I've got mine

In Heaven, everything is fine
In Heaven, everything is fine
In Heaven, everything is fine
You got your good thing, and you've got mine

In Heaven
You're mysterious, picky, and a bit aloof. Some people say you have a very cheery personality, but it's hard to say because you mask your emotions behind dark pretenses. You enjoy watching obscure movies and going to plays, but by the end of the day you're usually too wound-up by the ironies of your life to relax.

Mmmm.... that doesn't sound like me. Guess this will be the last post of this kind of contest results.

[Update 2004.01.21] Removed broken link

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

In het Nederlands:

Vlgones een oznrdeeok op een Eglnese uvinretsiet mkaat het neit uit in wlkee vloogdre de ltteers in een wrood saatn, het einge wat blegnaijrk is is dat de eretse en de ltaatse ltteer op de jiutse patals saatn. De rset van de ltteers mgoen wllikueirg gpletaast wdoren en je knut vrelvogens gwoeon lzeen wat er saatt. Dit kmot odmat we neit ekle ltteer op zcih lzeen maar het wrood als gheeel.

I guess everybody has received the message above, but it is not true.