Nelson's Linkblog 2004-04

about • archive • mastodon • feed

Pywebsvcs update

Some frustrations, some good things

NK explosion images

Comparative overview of the blast-affected town of Ryongchon (via Metafilter)

2004-04-30 death • disasters • globalization • history • interesting • maps • news • odd • people • photography • world

Steampunk products

Fun photoshop contest (via BoingBoing)

2004-04-30 links

Hey Ya video game

Fun little bit of classic video game image remixing (via Metafilter)

2004-04-29 flash • fridayflash • funny • games • humor • media • movie • woot

Kim Jong Il... I kiss you!

Haven't seen this on his Livejournal yet.

Tim Bray is learning to love the airport that King Willie's friends built

300 Images From 1800 Sites (via Waxy)

2004-04-29 art • design • free • graphics • icon • icons • images • inspiration • reference • web • webdesign

Simple Windows backup software

2004-04-28 backup • computer • howto • network • software • sync • sysadmin • tools • useful • utility • windows

Manneken Pis is dressed up as former President of South-Africa Nelson Mandela

Top 100 big US cities

Just a list (via Anil Dash)

2004-04-28 100 • bigger • cities • city • interesting • jobs • reference • states • travel • usa • zzz-tosort

Bush human kleenex

Bush uses unwitting woman's sweater to clean his glasses (via BoingBoing)

2004-04-28 activism • bush • entitlement • fun • general • humor • imported • politics • sad • video

Really, really smooth

Details on the Gravity B gyroscopes (via APOD)

Jan. 1993 web crawl

An early use of Python to crawl the web. 50 or 60 different sites!

Python MS installer

Python2.4 is moving to MSI. Good idea: InstallShield and Wise are pure crap. (via Python URL)

2004-04-27 c@ts • installer • python • tech • windowsinstaller

Yep, it's ugly. (via Metafilter)

Thief 3 preview

The game is sounding better and better.

RoN expansion pack

The best RTS game ever. Expansion pack should breathe some new life into it.

Filing nerd book

Fun 1960s book about how to file stuff. The world before computers. Great 60s design, too.

2004-04-27 business • humour • social

Tron costume guy LJ

This guy seems genuinely nice. (via BoingBoing)

2004-04-26 memes

Prog. Lang. matrix

Comparison of writing various toy problems in different languages.

2004-04-26 algorithms • code • comparison • development • examples • language • languages • matrix • programming • reference • source

Scalia conflicts

Another hunting trip, another favour for a buddy

Python fixed point

For almost everything I do, I want fixed point - not floating point

2004-04-25 python

No commentary, no provenance, just some great photos

2004-04-25 misc • photos • war

New HP calculator

Looks like a remix of my beloved-old HP-11C. (via Slashdot)

Red / Blue America

Washington Post article on American politics. Maybe the reason it's a 50/50 split is because there's no essential difference between the two parties?

2004-04-25 politics

Olsen twins milk

This photo is just too much. The white crust? The Warhol banana? They're not quite 18 yet. Does that make this photo pedophilic?

Chowing the Body

Kerry ignores Vatican's attempt to influence US politics

Marquee HTML tag

wow, something more obnoxious than blink!

2004-04-25 =code • blogscodigosetc • design • html • imported • marquee • projects/us-website • retro • techniques • tutorial • web

Sarah Henderson's Guide to Kiwi Slang (via Mike Bostock)

2004-04-25 aotearoa • co.nz • dictionary • kiwi • language • languages • new.zealand • newzealand • nz • slang • travel

Spamassassin detail

Google Answers: detailed explanation of each rule (via Waxy)

2004-04-24 email • geekery • mail • messaging/spamassassin • perl • scammers • software • spam • spammers • web

Free all-purpose video editing tool. Quite handy.

2004-04-24 audio • capture • editing • free • freeware • multimedia • opensource • software • tools • video • windows

Tutorial site for working with DVDs, VCDs, mpeg, avi, etc.

2004-04-24 cd • computers • dvd • hardware • howto • media • movies • multimedia • safari_export • software • video

Webern Nazi hoax

Wacky story claiming Webern was encoding nuclear secrets in 12 tone music

XBox Python forum

Place to talk about using Python in XBMC

XBox Python hacks

Someone seems to be taking advantage of XBMC's Python support

Steamboy trailers

New animation from the guy behind Akira. (via BoingBoing)

2004-04-24 anime • safari_export

Cocteau Twins discog

List of all Cocteau Twins albums. I finally got the EP collection all organized so I can listen to it in order.

2004-04-24 antónio • imported

Playlist format survey

Study of different ways to make an MP3 playlist. By the inimitable Lucas Gonze!

2004-04-24 audio • formats • itunes • m3u • metadata • mp3 • music • playlist • rdf • reference • standards

Catalog of common file extensions with more information about them

2004-04-24 computer • computers • extension • extensions • file • internet • reference • search • software • tools • windows

Do you have stairs in your house?

The terrible secret of space

Habitat Chronicles

These guys wrote the best paper ever about virtual worlds. Now they blog. (via Terra Nova)

2004-04-24 blog • blogs • community • design • games • habitat • mmo • mmorpg • programming • virtualworlds • weblog

Handy way to learn the basics

2004-04-23 development • howto • programming • reference • tutorial • w3c • web • xml • xpath • xsl • xslt

Global warming data

Satellites Show Earth Has a Fever. Cool photo. (via Slashdot).

2004-04-23 eco • environment • science

Corn syrup / diabetes

Study Blames Corn Syrup for Rise of Diabetes in US

2004-04-23 diabetes • food • health • medicine • scary

Pentagon minitrue

No soldier has died in Iraq. No soldier has ever died in Iraq.

Paranoia game blog

Ah, the good old days

2004-04-23 blog • blogs • design • fun • game • games • gaming • paranoia • roleplaying • rpg • tabletop

e-lection fraud

Slashdot | California Grills Diebold Over E-Voting Foul-Ups

Xbox media player is getting a total rewrite / upgrade

2004-04-22 .imported • center • home-multi-media-pc • media • pvr • research • xbmc • xbox • xbox-media-center

Rubik's cube solver bot

Built out of Lego. Oldie but goodie. (via Mark Baker)

2004-04-22 cool • fun • games • geek • lego • programming • robot • robotics • robots • rubik • toys

Making bamboo shoots

Joi talks about traditional preparation

Auto Gordian knot

DVD to Xvid encoding software

Iraq casket photos

The Memory Hole files a FOIA request and gets around the military policy of erasing the dead. (via Metafilter)

2004-04-22 (battlefield • at • fatalities) • military • of • photo • photography • photos • politics • the • war

I'm going to remember the names of everyone involved in this fiasco

Half Life gossip

Former Planet Half Life staffer rips Valve a new one for lying about the game's status. Software schedules meet game fanboys and bad things happen.

Deriving music scales

More music theory

2004-04-21 468 • acoustics • music • music_science • musictheory • piano • reading-matter • reference • scales • science • theory

Basic music theory

Google answers goes into the basics.

Scientology - Marissa Ribisi a Scientologist - find out what I have gained from Scientology... (via Metafilter)

Andy Oram reflecting on why MySQL is popular (via Slashdot)

2004-04-21 blogmarks • business • databases • gnu • livros • mysql • none • oss

Pentagon Minitrue

Rumsfeld quote malreported rectify

If terrorists were brands (via Waxy)

2004-04-21 art • brand • consumerism • cool • govern • humor • illustration • images • logo • politics • terror

Moire pattern in Flash

Yes, you do get the same effect with antialiasing

2004-04-20 alternative • band • bands • electronica • flash • indie • music • musica • pop • sound • stereolab

Slashdot on TCP flaw

Unusually useful discussion

Vulnerability DB

Open Source Vulnerability Database: I guess this is Bugtraq now that Bugtraq is too commercial

2004-04-20 database • exploits • hacking • infosec • news • opensource • reference • security • software • vulnerabilities • vulnerability

TCP flaw advisory

More on the TCP flaw. Looks like you can guess sequence numbers for long lived connections and forge resets. BGP sessions are particularly vulnerable.

2004-04-20 blogmarks • networking • tcp • vulnerability

TCP security flaw

Still looking for a good analysis

Friendster and Plaxo

Gossip about VCs stepping in and changing the leadership. Sounds ugly.

cute flash app that lets you make cartoon insects (via Waxy)

2004-04-20 animals.insects • art • flash • web • web-games

Interleaved chronocolouring

Full colour graphics on the Atari 2600

Python daemonization

This is really too hard, but here it is.

2004-04-20 code • daemon • development • example • howto • linux • programming • python • recipe • software • unix

DOS gaming woes

It's very difficult to play ten year old games. Try configuring your EMS! (via Slashdot)

Inappropriate ads

This Is Broken shows a mortgage ad superimposed on a photo of a hotel burning in Baghdad. Popover ads are offensive in general, but this takes the cake.

Java applets that show various moire effects (via Slashdot)

2004-04-19 art • cool • design • images • moire

Xbox clone wars

Makers of a mod chip and OS become hostile to ripoffs. The joys of an unregulated market.

Atari 2600 awards

Cool news about hacks, new games, etc. (via Slashdot)

Caltrain/BART fixes

Mike's suggestions on how to improve the CalTrain/BART/SFO transfer process

There's this whole alternate blog universe on LiveJournal

The Baghdad boil

Leishmaniasis, a parasite that is transmitted by Iraqi sand flies. How's that for biological weapons?

Gay Repub quandry

Duh: "Gay Republicans Say It's Hard to Back Bush"

NES/SNES manuals

scanned as PDFs, available via bittorrent

2004-04-18 games • manuals

He looks awfully happy to have that gun

Bilestoad interview

Interview with the author of one of the most creative Apple ][ games ever

2004-04-16 6502 • apple][ • assembly • bilestoad • game • goodman • inspiring • marc • people • software

Tim O'Reilly on Gmail

Very detailed commentary on what Gmail could mean for Tim

2004-04-16 article • business • email • gmail • google • internet • oreilly • privacy • security • web • web2.0

Interactive fiction book

Review of Nick Montfort's book on text adventures, etc.

2004-04-16 infocom

Baby Jessica blog

What a weird way to be famous; fall down a well at 18 months. Now she blogs.

$47000/yr MMORPG

Terra Nova: Journalist Earns Significant Salary Trading Virtual Goods

2004-04-16 mmorpg

Unicode rejects

No Klingon, Phaistos disk, or Yoruba precomposed.

2004-04-16 character • klingon • language • rejected • text • unicode

Protocol design papers

Nice roundup of how to build network protocols right. The "Note on Distributed Computing" is essential reading.

2004-04-16 blog • design • http • network • papers • programming • protocol • protocols • reference • software • web

Porn star quarantine

Yahoo! News - Actor's HIV Infection Strikes Calif. Porn Industry

Joel on Schedules

Oldie but goodie: Painless Software Schedules

2004-04-16 article • business • development • gtd • management • productivity • programming • project • projectmanagement • scheduling • software

So much for clear mountain air

Fighting a lawyer

Brad Ideas: American Express threatens me over joke on web site

2004-04-15 funny • legal • political

2d barcode-like thing, high data density

2004-04-15 2d • barcode • code • geo • mobile • qr • qrcode • tutorial

Larry Ellison home run

OK, so it's not that Larry Ellison, but the same guy snagged two home run balls out of the McCovey Cove.

Criticism of architecture of Apple's new SF store. Mostly I like the word "iSore".

John Kerry flash ad

Clever advertisement Ken saw running on bigcharts.com, one of a series of web ads for Kerry. (Flash)

Bandwidthaholic

mathowie discovers the joy of a box that can serve 60Mbps

2004-04-15 bandwidth • dedicatedserver • haugheym • networking • web

28 hours to do taxes

Little AP article filed 12 hours before tax deadline

Zanzibar gay panic

BBC NEWS | Africa | Zanzibar outlaws homosexual acts

Marine times on photo

More on this insensitive prank

Ugly marine photo

This photo is now resulting in an investigation

Presidential infallibility

Yahoo! News - Bush Is Stumped on Question of Mistakes

Bellagio still dark

Nice photo of the strip with a big black hole in the middle

retroCRUSH (via Shellen)

2004-04-14 collections • culture • entertain-me • fashion • fun • nostalgia • retro • shopping • underoos

Boondocks cartoonist

Aaron McGruder discussion in The New Yorker (via Anil Dash)

2004-04-14 aaron • boondocks • comics • interview • mcgruder • newyorker • politics

PC Xbox Media Center

Someone ported the popular Xbox media application to the PC! Wacky, but sensible.

Life Balance software

To-do list with a humane goal. I find the idea that software will improve my life very appealing, but I'm skeptical. But Stewart Brand's endorsement is compelling.

2004-04-14 cooltools • geekery • gifts • lifebalance • organizing • pda • pm • productivity • read • software • thinking

Gmail ad example

Detailed screenshot of ads in Gmail.

House market busts

Real estate horror stories - Dec. 2, 2002

2004-04-14 bubble • realestate

Web services blog

Anne Thomas Manes: web service status. She's doing a lot of good industry research on the state of web services.

Despite the hostile copy protection this is a pretty damn good game.

Web dev bookmarklets

Edit the CSS live in a page, display the DOM tree, show all the CSS classes in a document, etc

2004-04-13 bookmarklets • css • cucbc_id • firefox • html • javascript • programming • tool • tools • webdev • webstuff

Photo of the Vegas hotel with no power

More 5.1 headphones

These look a little squirrely, but still interesting. (Engadget)

More horrible design

Cloudchaser's Furry Convention Photos. I feel so patriotic.

Worst site design

Mona Lisa's Hideaway, a paean to awful web design (via Metafilter)

Story of Jython

Nice people-oriented story of how this quite impressive technology was created

2004-04-12 compsci • history • it-history • java • jython • people • pl • programming • python • toprint

A fast Python implementation for .NET and Mono

2004-04-12 .net • dotnet • ironpython • language • languages • mono • opensource • programming • python • script • software

Mailing list ARChives

excellent volunteer run archive of useful mailing lists. Most of the Apache lists are archived here!

2004-04-12 archive • archives • linux • list • mailinglist • opensource • programming • reference • resources • search • security

neo Fleur de Lys

Chowhound review of one of SF's best known French restaurants. Sounds like the service is still awful; there's no excuse.

Gay game characters

"trying to force this gay crap down our throats" may not have been the best choice of words (via anildash)

Tech doc weirdness

Fun gallery of strange technical documentation illustrations. (via amitp)

2004-04-12 design • documentation • fun • funny • geek • humor • humour • images • tech • technology • weird

He bet it all and won!

Yahoo! News - Briton Bets All on Vegas Roulette Spin -- and Wins

PubSub aggregator

Another blog aggregator; this one works by doing keyword searches on zillions of blogs and providing new feeds.

2004-04-11 aggregator • blog • blogging • blogs • internet • news • rss • search • tools • web • web2.0

Google search. OK, so it's juvenile, but that doesn't make it any less funny.

Catprin cat costumes

Make your own and make your cat miserable

2004-04-11 animals • cat • cats • clothing • fun • funny • humor • japan • shopping • toys • weird

Blue LED overload

Well written rant about a technogimmick. (via Slashdot)

2004-04-11 colour • leds • tech

President cowboy

Boy I'm sure glad he's relaxed.

Rawdog aggregator

Python script that uses Mark's feed parser.

2004-04-11 aggregator • atom • html • opensource • programming • python • rss • software • syndication • tools • web

Zalman Theatre 6 Headphones - they have several speakers for each ear

Bush video remix

Harsh spoof on Bush's disastrous "nope no weapons here" attempt at humour. Link to .mov file. (via Gillmor)

2004-04-11 bush • fun • humor • humour • jokes • politics • video

Aug 6 PDB photo

Is it just me, or are the redaction marks not very good? You can tell the length and in some case the shape of the words underneath.

Aug 6 presidential brief

The rumoured memo is released.

2004-04-11 news • politics

President fisherman

Bush is off and fishing while Iraq goes to hell. It's like he's rubbing our noses in his detachment.

IRA contribution rules

Publication 590, the IRS reference. (PDF)

2004-04-10 annuities • finance • internal_revenue_service • investing • ira • irs • lifetime • money • table • tax • taxes

internalmemos.com. Clever worm email that says "click this attachment to receive your bonsu"

Chicks dyed in shell

BBC NEWS | Americas | Multi-coloured chicks for Easter

2004-04-10 animals • articles • easter • holidays • odd

Longhorn scaled back

BusinessWeek has some leaked email. Big news is WinFS may not be in fully. Then again, it's all rumour. (via Slashdot)

2004-04-09 microsoft • ms • software • windows

SpaceShipOne photo

Freaky looking plane

tcpflow packet sniff

Handy little utility that stores different TCP streams to disk.

2004-04-08 analysis • linux • network • networking • opensource • security • software • tcp • tool • tools • unix

Bribing the maitre d'

I don't have the stones to try this (via MetaFilter)

2004-04-08 article • comedy • commerce • culture • food • humor • meme • money • nyc • restaurants • tipping

Python generators

Fun tricks with Python generators. Some of this stuff is too recursive for your health.

2004-04-08 algorithms • article • code • generator • generators • howto • programming • python • tip • tips • toread

my former startup's home page is now completely blank

2004-04-08 distributedcomputing • feeforcputime • grid • ideas

Blue doggy bath

I like photos without captions

Good intro article

2004-04-08 apache • blog • htaccess • internet • reference • referer • seo • spam • spyware • webdev • wordpress

Apparently they've gotten to the point where it can play Turok

2004-04-08 emulation • emulator • games • gaming • hacking • hw • imported • mybookmarks • software • xbox • xbox2

Eyeball jewelry

I'm sorry, this seems like a really bad idea

Paris Metro 1937

Beautiful map of the world's most functional urban transport. 14 lines in 1937! (via Kottke)

2004-04-07 diagrams • map • maps • metro • paris

Texas leg trannie

Candidate for Texas legislature revealed to cross-dress. He's not worried about that, just doesn't want anyone to think he's gay.

Rockbox video file RVF

How to make a movie for your Archos Jukebox. 112x64 monochrome, what's the point?

Rockbox 2.2 relnotes

Various improvements to the open source Archos MP3 firmware - bookmarks in particular. Also "video player", what the hell is that?

Binary XML group

W3C Creates XML Binary Characterization Working Group (call me a crank, but isn't it time we moved past XML entirely?)

Cool little bookmarklet to visualize page layout (via diveintomark)

2004-04-06 bookmarklet • bookmarklets • css • design • html • javascript • programming • tools • web • webdesign • webdev

Asteroids sad record

The man's greatest achievment in life was the world record for playing Asteroids. Only he didn't know it, and died before anyone told him. Trying to save his cat.

Gay marriage fight

Sad story: son is gay and got married in SF, father is author of California's anti-gay-marriage law

Vodka flavor ice cream

But vodka is the white paint of hard alcohol, most of it doesn't taste like anything!

Alaskan knives with walrus bone handles

Skulls unlimited

For all your bone buying needs

2004-04-05 anatomy • animals • bones • cool • education • fun • reference • science • shop • shopping • skulls

Portland, Oregon vintage arcade

2004-04-04 arcade • cool • game • games • ground • oregon • pdx • portland • retro • video • videogames

Foodie message board

2004-04-04 bayarea • daily • food • forum • local • restaurant • restaurants • review • reviews • sanfrancisco • sf

Rise of Nations video

Trailer for the expansion pack. Great art direction for a video game trailer..

NVidia / Macrovision

Stop it with the evil DRM already! (Slashdot)

John Wayne stamps

"John Wayne was a fag." "The hell he was!"

Crazy 80s gameshow of young geeks playing videogames. Being rebroadcast now, boy it's amazing.

2004-04-04 1980s • 80s • arcade • entertainment • gameshows • saturdaymorningcartoons • tvshows • videogames

User-mode linux user experience

warmbrain tries it out, is happy

2004-04-04 debian • hosting • linux • perspective • tech • user-mode-linux • vps • webhost • website

Autopornography

Teen who posted own photo charged with child porn

2004-04-03 *later • legal • misc • news • porn

Fallujah photo cropping

Depending on how the photo is cropped, the images are more or less disturbing (via MetaFilter)

Japanese word meaning material for news and stories. (via Anil Dash)

2004-04-03 blogging • media • news • words

Tron fan costume

Tron fan makes costumes for the movie he loved. And don't we all love that movie? (via BoingBoing)

2004-04-03 tron • costumes • entertainment • geekery • halloween • huh • import • work

Quick description of how worm networks use IRC to control their zombies

What's that sound?

In space, the sound of flapping metal is really loud and scary

XML.com: The State of the Python-XML Art, 2003 [Sep. 10, 2003]

2004-04-02 article • articles • code • development • python • reference • software • standard • tech • webmaster • xml

US knew before 9/11

Sibel Edmonds' story finally breaks into the mainstream

Somali wild ass

Interesting looking animal

Sun and MS make nice

Sun's market cap is 5.8% of Microsoft's

Quake 2 converted to display as random dot stereograms. I never could resolve these images.

2004-04-02 3d • games • gaming • weird

Windows ssh-agent

Ovidiu Predescu's Weblog: Setting up ssh-agent on Windows XP

2004-04-02 cygwin • hack • privacy • reference • ssh • windows

WS-* standard bloat

Tim Bray's list of all the web services standards. Who uses this stuff?

2004-04-02 geek • humor • mess • web_services • webservice • ws • ws-*

The Residents in Tokyo

Yahoo! News - Entertainment Photos - Reuters

Chalabi manouevres

United Press International: Commentary: Chalabi's road to victory

goto for Python

entrian.com - goto for Python - goto for Python

2004-04-01 elvstone • humor • python

Condi's 9/11 speech

Top Focus Before 9/11 Wasn't on Terrorism

Repeater tourbillon

Jason Sutter discovers the wonders of beautiful mechanical watches

Nick Denton's explanation. Congrats on the launch, guys!

Corny math joke

Little visual humour on Joi Ito's blog

2004-04-01 april_fool • fun • funny • humor • humour • joke • mathematics • maths

part ...that has links

You have no presence in the part of the web that has links