Dwayne Phillips ' Day Book
This is my day book for this week. I have modeled this after science
fiction and computer writer Jerry Pournelle's view, or as he calls it,
his Day Book.
I encourage you to see Jerry
Pournelle's site
and subscribe
to his services.
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This
week: September 15-21, 2008
Summary of this week:
Monday - Tuesday
- Wednesday - Thursday - Friday
- Saturday - Sunday
Monday September 15, 2008
This is one example of several posts on this subject. People seem surprised to learn that employers are looking at FaceBook and other Web 2.0 sources to learn more about applicants.
Of course employers are looking, why not? I don't understand why some
people are surprised to learn that an employer is learner all they can
about an applicant.
Here is a case study in self-publishing a book. The sample size is only one, but it has some lessons.
Intel has released a six-core CPU.
This story is all over the Internet, so...Apple is supposedly shipping new MacBook portable computers from factories in China. They will go on sale in stores on September 23rd...or so the rumor goes.
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Tuesday September 16,
2008
Computerworld compares four really small portable computers.
More really small portable computer bits: Here is some information on the Acer Aspire One. And some information on Samsung's entry into this market.
This piled onto the bad economic news from yesterday. HP will cut 25,000 jobs over three years. This is part of the purchase or merger of HP and EDS. More efficiency.
Another story on writer's block. I rarely experience such. As written before, I use Jerry Weinberg's methods and have more material to write than energy and time to do so.
A few people have figured out that Drudge actually knows what he is doing on the Internet.
This I find interesting, "If you had a clean sheet" to create a digital office...
Recommendations for what you would buy and why. I find it odd that they
recommend an Apple computer but pair it with an non-Apple phone.
Integration efforts?
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Wednesday September 17,
2008
Chris Anderson has a good post about passionate amateurs and bored professionals.
I have seen both in action many times. I worked for the U.S. Federal
government for 28 years - plenty of bored... I once saw a grad student
(passionate amateur) sit at a computer terminal for 28 hours straight
to complete a program he wanted to write. I agree with Anderson in that I will take the amateurs any day.
Maybe Best Buy knows what it is doing. They are buying Napster for over $120 Million. ?????
Windows 7 from Microsoft is not just a rumor. Someone has seen a build version.
Once again, video games are not bad for kids.
But plastics may be bad for our hearts. I understand cooking food in a plastic container in a microwave oven does all sorts of unknown things. Try to avoid that.
Microsoft and Cray are cooperating to sell a $25K compact supercomputer.
I would like one, but too much for the home. I had the good fortune of
working with Cray and several other supercomputers in the early 1990s.
We were really crunching numbers.
This summarizes all the productivity ideas on the Internet - only ten items. I would add "Treat all people as loving and caring individuals"
It has been settled once and for all...girls do like guys with fancy cars ;-)
And guys are switching from porn to social networking sites. Seriously no ";-)".
Good advice for writers here on re-writing.
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Thursday September 18,
2008
I like George Will's editorial this morning on the virtues of divided government in Washington.
Fact: in eras of a single party controlling the White House and
Congress, the rate of growth of government spending triples. Hmmm,
deadlock and partisonship - what I was told in school were "checks and
balances" - don't sound too bad.
Good news for Apple. Apple had about 10 percent of the portable computer market last quarter. That is a rise of 60 percent.
Here is a simple definition of a writer - a person who writes. Sean Platt discusses this at length in this nice post.
I encourage most people I meet to write - I mean sit down everyday and
write something. I have met many people who "want to be a writer."
Please, sit down and write everyday. You are thus a writer.
And to go along with that thought, here are ten reasons you should write something everyday.
Stowe Boyd writes about the use of cell phones on airplanes, trains, and other "public" transportation.
He sees it as inevitable and quite beneficial when an "urgent" matter
of family or business arises. Of course "urgent" is subjective and
deciding what color paint will be good in the bathroom is urgent to
some people but not others.
I think this is kind of silly, but the story is everywhere. Microsoft is firing Seinfeld and starting a new ad campaign. Well, maybe they aren't firing Seinfeld but merely going into phase 2 of their new ad campaign. Only the insiders will know.
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Friday September 19, 2008
Microsoft has there new "I'm a PC" ads out. I didn't see them on TV last night, so here is a link to one of them.
Another large e-ink reader will hit the market next week. I hope some of these work.
Stanford is putting some of their engineering course materials on line. Learn for free - I like it.
One fifth of American homes will not have a telephone by the end of 2008. They will be using cell phones 100% of the time. I suppose this is progress in some manner.
"College students in America are not as "digital" as we might wish to pretend."
So writes SIVA VAIDHYANATHAN in this post. I agree with him. There are
always those who have the latest gadget in their hands, but how many
really know computers or how to "program" them to do something else?
Few.
Intel has run a server center with little air conditioning.
They went without it 90% of the time. The test was in New Mexico. 25
years ago we ran a similar situation without air conditioning in the
winter. The dust made a mess of our tape recorders, but then who uses
tape recorders these days. Yes, it it possible to avoid the air
conditioners. I look at my office complex. In the winter we heat the
offices and cool the computer rooms. How stupid is that? Let's all
think a little more about these things and follow Intel's experience.
This seems to be everywhere on the Internet - software that spots "spin" in speeches.
Of course we could use the old adage, "How do you know when a
politician is lying? When his/her lips are moving." Perhaps that is a
bit cynical, but only a bit.
Some people are tying to talk sense in this week of financial crisis. O'Reilly seems to be one of them. Jerry Pournelle is another.
You may disagree with either of them and they may disagree with one
another in the details. The point I am reading is that we need to build
products, not trade lines on a financial spreadsheet and call that an
industry. I think I heard a line like that back in the 1980s in the
move "Wall Street." Hmmm.
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Saturday September 20,
2008
It seems like someone would have checked this. Microsoft's new TV ads were made on an Apple computer using Adobe software. Hmmm, is there a message there?
Here is some new work on blocking muscle fatigue.
There are real applications to this other than sports. Cancer patients,
for one, report chronic fatigue and this new drug may be a great
benefit to them. This caught my eye as walking 15 miles a day for the
past five days has brought lots of muscle fatigue.
Here is a $100 portable computer - not a OLPC model. Yes, it is possible.
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Sunday September 21, 2008
Here is one person's story about considering switching to an Apple computer instead of a PC. Your mileage may vary.
Damon Darlin in the New York Times argues that technology - like Google - doesn't make us stupid.
I think laziness makes us stupid. It is like Congress. I believe it is
possible for Congressmen to take campaign contributions from lobbyist
and still make the right decisions. Money doesn't make people corrupt.
I a person is corrupt he is corrupt regardless of the presence of
money. If a person wants to be lazy and stupid he will be so regardless
of the presence of a technology.
Here are some good tips on health and sitting in a chair all day.
I dread the election in November. The more I read the more I read about pending failures in the machinery used in voting.
Some people at MIT have developed a wheel chair that recognizes voice commands and remembers locations in buildings. The user can say "take me to the kitchen" and the wheelchair can do that. Excellent combination of several technologies.
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