David Siegel, a former colleague from a previous venture, has a new book out on what might be called "Web 3.0" or "The Semantic Web". It's called Pull: The Power of the Semantic Web to Transform Your Business , and it hearkens back to David's blog The Power of Pull.
David's an interesting guy and always has something thought-provoking to say. I haven't read the book yet, but I have read a lot of his writings that led up to this book and his blog and found them stimulating.
DISCLAIMER: I don't get anything other than good vibes back from David for mentioning his book. Not even a free book.
So was the enigmatic message from HAL 9000 in Arthur C. Clarke's 2010: Odyssey Two...
And so now we start a fresh new decade. It seems to be an American tradition to come up with resolutions for the New Year to do things (we Jews have been doing this for our New Year celebrations, which tend to be much more sober affairs than secular New Years, for generations.), and so as not to break with this tradition, I offer mine own insights and hopes for the new year, both personal and professional.
Personally, I'm hoping to achieve a number of things, including finishing off the last 20 lbs or so of weight loss I've been working on (I'm about halfway there -- ideally I'd like to be under 200 lbs, which is a place I've not been since I was about 17 years old) and I have incentives this year in that I'm hoping to test for Black Belt in my karate organization (which does not officially require me to lose the weight, but sure, it has held be back and continues to hold me back.) I'm reasonably confident that I'll be able to do it "this year for sure", since coming into 2009 I had no idea that I'd ever be able to run 5 kilometers, and I managed to hit that a few times before I damaged my achilles tendon during the summer...
Professionally, I've got a number of goals, among them:
- Updating my company's website 3 Phase Computing -- that link points to the old site, not the new one
- I, personally, have never really been into marketing, but this has to change now, as 3 Phase has to grow, so I've decided to begin marketing in a truly geek fashion: by writing papers and software to establish a name, rather than make vague promises backed up by smoke and mirrors. So this part is to actually write papers/blog entries (not here) and post them to the corporate website. I'm also counting on the abilities of my talented co-workers as well.
- I have a Ph.D. already, so in some cases having a long string of professional certifications in addition may label me as more of a "test-taker" than a "do-er". Nonetheless, just for my own edification, so I know that I know some material, I'm sitting a few of these exams. If it turns out that presenting these additional certifications helps with marketing, then all the better, but I'm not counting on it.
- Finally, although I don't spend much of my time writing code any more, my resolution in this regard is to write better code so I don't need to purchase offsets for my ... code. Luckily, this is a relatively easy resolution to keep, because I have so many other hands who are looking at my code and complaining to me about it.
- There is a long list of new technologies that I've not sufficiently explored or played with:
- ZFS and Solaris Containers, and upgrading my develoment environment to FreeBSD 8.
- While I've used VMWare quite a bit in the past, trying some of the new, fancy features in the enterprise suite are things that I need to definitely get my hands on more frequently,
- Some other smaller projects, like network shell
- Larger, new programming areas, like Python 3
- And of course, there is the whole new NoSQL/Document database burgeoning movement that has captured so much mindshare and intellectual energy recently.
Continue reading "All these worlds are yours except Europa.".
This is an expansion on the 140 characters I spoke about on Twitter a little while ago. This is as much of the conversation as I can remember.
I just received a call from an "IT recruiter" (I don't remember who, and it doesn't matter who, really), who started off the conversation by breathlessly exclaiming:
"I need to speak to someone about a network problem."
Um, who is this?
"Is this the IT department? I need to speak to the IT manager."
Um, that would be me. Who are you trying to reach? Who are you?
"I'm so-and-so, this is the number that they forwarded me to."
Um, there is no "they", we have an auto-attendant. Who is this again?
"I got your number from J. Random Otherperson."
I don't know them, but OK. Who are you?
"I'm so-and-so, and I'm with an IT recruiting firm, and I wanted to know if blah blah you had any projects blah blah" (Yeah, I figured this out by now, but I wanted to let it play out.)
Hi, well, why did you give me this whole story instead of just coming out and saying it? I don't like being told stories to. To tell you the truth, we're not inclined to want to work with people who lie to us. I certainly don't like being told a whole cock-and-bull story to get my attention. Thank you very much. Good-bye. <click>
I hope it's not the same way in every sales arena.
(This is from an email that I sent out to a group of colleagues, in response to an email sent to me from members of the American Physical Society.)
The whole climate change stuff has really split the physics community.
Behold the following letter I just received.
(I add my own commentary at the bottom.)
-------- Original Message --------
By the way, the folks signing this, they're not nobodies--they're major players in the world of physics, and widely respected. The whole climate change problem is FAR from over, the major scientific societies are at each others' throats over this whole mess. This whole tempest is over what constitutes legitimate "massaging" of data, and whether or not the climate scientists whose email was released did so. (There are many things one does with the raw data to normalize it in order to make sure you are comparing apples to apples, etc.) I have not spent enough time looking into what exactly these scientists did to their data, but none of them (as has been mentioned) is denying what they did. One of the major tenets of scientific research is to be skeptical about all theories and data, requiring falsifiability for theories and independent repeatability for experiments. Unfortunately, climatology does not readily admit to either one--we can't well set up a controlled environment comparable to Earth, nor can we repeat long-term measurements. (Make no bones about it, too: there is much hemming and hawing about the validity and accuracy of the raw data, which contributes in large part to the statistical massaging that MUST be done in order for the data to be sensibly used in any climate model!) There are clear indications that something is going on--recent data on polar ice sheets are indisputable, but like everything else in science, without a model, one cannot know why the ice sheets are melting. Unlike the other instances of scientific misconduct coming out recently (think the Bell Labs debacle of a few years back), this particular instance *begs* one to ask: cui bono? If there's something wrong going on, why is it going on? Who stands to benefit from all this? Practically speaking, all this doesn't mean we shouldn't personally still reduce consumption and output of hydrocarbons, nor should we renege on our commitment to find alternative energy sources (without energy growth, our economy will come crashing to a halt, and the whole "Peak <X>" problem [for <X> in "natural gas","oil","water"] is a statement of mathematics, as indisputable as any other part of math--and the diminishing ability to produce more energy is certainly an issue) However, whether one should support, for example, "cap&trade" for emissions, or other new public policies that are based on science that is now cast into doubt, and come with extremely wide-ranging consequences, is something that you should very much reconsider. If anthropogenic climate change really is occurring, we do need to take active steps; if not, or if the effects are of equivalent order of magnitude to other naturally occurring events, one can still engage in them, but certainly you should not justify these policies with cries about impending climate doom--especially when sooner than climate doom we are facing major energy growth problems.
-------- Original Message --------
Dear fellow member of the American Physical Society: This is a matter of great importance to the integrity of the Society. It is being sent to a random fraction of the membership, so we hope you will pass it on. By now everyone has heard of what has come to be known as ClimateGate, which was and is an international scientific fraud, the worst any of us have seen in our cumulative 223 years of APS membership. For those who have missed the news we recommend the excellent summary article by Richard Lindzen in the November 30 edition of the Wall Street journal, entitled "The Climate Science isn't Settled," for a balanced account of the situation. It was written by a scientist of unquestioned authority and integrity. A copy can be found among the items at http://tinyurl.com/lg266u, and a visit to http://www.ClimateDepot.com can fill in the details of the scandal, while adding spice. What has this to do with APS? In 2007 the APS Council adopted a Statement on global warming (also reproduced at the tinyurl site mentioned above) that was based largely on the scientific work that is now revealed to have been corrupted. (The principals in this escapade have not denied what they did, but have sought to dismiss it by saying that it is normal practice among scientists. You know and we know that that is simply untrue. Physicists are not expected to cheat.) We have asked the APS management to put the 2007 Statement on ice until the extent to which it is tainted can be determined, but that has not been done. We have also asked that the membership be consulted on this point, but that too has not been done. None of us would use corrupted science in our own work, nor would we sign off on a thesis by a student who did so. This is not only a matter of science, it is a matter of integrity, and the integrity of the APS is now at stake. That is why we are taking the unusual step of communicating directly with at least a fraction of the membership. If you believe that the APS should withdraw a Policy Statement that is based on admittedly corrupted science, and should then undertake to clarify the real state of the art in the best tradition of a learned society, please send a note to the incoming President of the APS ccallan@princeton.edu, with the single word YES in the subject line. That will make it easier for him to count. Bob Austin, Professor of Physics, Princeton
Hal Lewis, emeritus Professor of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara
Will Happer, Professor of Physics, Princeton
Larry Gould, Professor of Physics, Hartford
Roger Cohen, former Manager, Strategic Planning, ExxonMobil
By the way, the folks signing this, they're not nobodies--they're major players in the world of physics, and widely respected. The whole climate change problem is FAR from over, the major scientific societies are at each others' throats over this whole mess. This whole tempest is over what constitutes legitimate "massaging" of data, and whether or not the climate scientists whose email was released did so. (There are many things one does with the raw data to normalize it in order to make sure you are comparing apples to apples, etc.) I have not spent enough time looking into what exactly these scientists did to their data, but none of them (as has been mentioned) is denying what they did. One of the major tenets of scientific research is to be skeptical about all theories and data, requiring falsifiability for theories and independent repeatability for experiments. Unfortunately, climatology does not readily admit to either one--we can't well set up a controlled environment comparable to Earth, nor can we repeat long-term measurements. (Make no bones about it, too: there is much hemming and hawing about the validity and accuracy of the raw data, which contributes in large part to the statistical massaging that MUST be done in order for the data to be sensibly used in any climate model!) There are clear indications that something is going on--recent data on polar ice sheets are indisputable, but like everything else in science, without a model, one cannot know why the ice sheets are melting. Unlike the other instances of scientific misconduct coming out recently (think the Bell Labs debacle of a few years back), this particular instance *begs* one to ask: cui bono? If there's something wrong going on, why is it going on? Who stands to benefit from all this? Practically speaking, all this doesn't mean we shouldn't personally still reduce consumption and output of hydrocarbons, nor should we renege on our commitment to find alternative energy sources (without energy growth, our economy will come crashing to a halt, and the whole "Peak <X>" problem [for <X> in "natural gas","oil","water"] is a statement of mathematics, as indisputable as any other part of math--and the diminishing ability to produce more energy is certainly an issue) However, whether one should support, for example, "cap&trade" for emissions, or other new public policies that are based on science that is now cast into doubt, and come with extremely wide-ranging consequences, is something that you should very much reconsider. If anthropogenic climate change really is occurring, we do need to take active steps; if not, or if the effects are of equivalent order of magnitude to other naturally occurring events, one can still engage in them, but certainly you should not justify these policies with cries about impending climate doom--especially when sooner than climate doom we are facing major energy growth problems.
Heads up 1&1 users:
If you use IMAP to access your email at 1and1.com, you'll need to subscribe to a new folder called "Sent Items" to replace your "Sent" folder, and a new "Spam" folder in addition to a "Junk" folder (if you had it).
If you use Thunderbird, you should get the FolderFlags extension and use it to set the flag on your "Sent Messages" folder to "sent"
Continue reading Changes to 1&1 IMAP folders, etc..
So...why haven't I been blogging recently?
Well, I do, somewhat; I mean, there's the continuous status updates on Facebook and the "microblogging" I do on Twitter--not that in either case I have a great following (Although my 100+ "friends" on FB are an order of magnitude greater than the number of non-spam-followers on Twitter, which in turn is probably an order of magnitude greater than the number of readers of my blog...)
I suppose part of the issue stems from the relative ease of publishing to either FB or Twitter (both have SMS update ability, so I can do it from out and about with my phone, and both have a bevy of browser plug-ins that make it possible to simply click on the status bar of my browser and say something, anything!), part of it stems definitely stems from the notion that a formal blog should Say Something Of Import™, which is somewhat at odds with the whole "world in 140 characters" of SMS--the stock in trade of Twitter.
(Of course, there is a facebook/Moveable Type connector that I just found now while writing this...and the one that MT puts at the bottom of my page, so we'll see how that works out. Certainly the ability to blog from FB into MT is nice, but even Facebook has a limitation of how many characters a status update can have makes that particular blogging channel suboptimal if the goal is to Say Something Of Import™) UPDATE 20 August 2009 Of course, there's nothing new under the sun: Jeff Atwood said it a while ago.
So, while older sons are away, son #3 and I went back to the same urban beach we visited just over two years ago. While we saw the standard hermit crabs on the beach, people catching fish, windsurfing, and the ubiquitous litter (come on, fellow city-dwellers! you can do better than this!), we also got to see something unusual: what looked to be a shark's head separated from the rest of its body:
Somewhat more closeup, this is what my Palm Treo could make out:
Certainly not your usual fare!
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