I think I jinxed Blogger by bragging about google so much in the last post or two. Turns out it's been having a rough week, but I'm optimistic. I'll take the blame for jinxing them this time. Hopefully the effect will be limited.
They're in the process of making all their services communicate with each other, which, to most people, will elicit a loud yawn. It uses zend or something, which is like xxxml. That is, really, really, really, extensible markup language.
I get really excited about these interoperating initiatives because the code I'm paid to work with, sadly, is the total opposite. Think decades of urgent deadlines and no budget for documentation; a handful of developers and virtually no separate end users, and you can tell why I get jealous.
Tuesday, October 31, 2006
Sunday, October 29, 2006
Thriller, even scarier.
(If you don't see a youtube embedded video thingy, click here. I'm not sure the Facebook-imported version is up to the challenge yet.)
It starts off slow, but the chorus is priceless (~10 min. in). I haven't laughed that hard at legos since the Brick Testament.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
Build a Beta Mousetrap...
So apparently google has officially assimilated blogger.com, which means the first order of business is to make it into a beta version. It's interesting to see a label that originally was not involved with marketing become a mark of some distinction. Consumers seem to be more interested and trusting of beta versions than full releases, presumably largely due to the goodwill of the big G.
Rarely do you see these apologetic labels change connotation for the better. Terms such as pre-owned, and virtual, smart, and lite/diet/free have steadily declined in popular appeal (where popularity is defined by my extrapolation to other people's heads as I sit alone except for the company of my senile computers). That's not to say that marketers have given them up altogether. It's just that even the [whatever the opposite of savvy is] of consumers have wised up.
Beta, on the other hand, is a term originally used to describe a system or product that was only barely ready, or to apologize and disclaim any responsibility for its shortcomings. Funny thing is, the new standard for beta software is head and shoulders over similar programs that have been around for years. Google maps was in beta for the Silicon Vally equivalent of a metric eon. Gmail, which caused an immediate and frantic redesign of every other web-based email client, proudly displays its beta status, as if to say, "you ain't seen nothin' yet."
A less obvious but likely more fundamental shift is the realization on an institutional level that software is a service and not a product. Certain technical metaphysicists like your humble narrator have been screaming this at varying volumes for varying lengths of time. One powerful symptom is the shying away (by the smarter companies) of the "n.0" release strategy. AOL went from 4.0 to 11.0 in the span of a year without adding (arguably) any substantial value to their product. The idea was that if you saw your buddies using version 5.0 and you were stuck on 4.1.9, that you were missing out, and should pay to upgrade to the new product.
Unfortunately, that strategy puts incentives on companies to add features rather than improve the overall product quality (or to use an about-to-jump-the-proverbial-shark buzzword, the "user experience"). Naming names would be too easy, but the end result is fragmented versions of the software requiring either separate maintenance and support strategies for each version or the abandonment of users of the older version ("forced obsolescence").
What seems to be happening is that loyalty to software vendors doesn't run deep enough to support the chunky release-fix-EOL-rerelease model. Consumers, aside from the revered but routinely screwed early adopters, expect a product to work the first time they buy it, and don't enjoy paying to have initial defects fixed. Thinking of software as a product degrades one of its best advantages, i.e., its softness: if I can't count on what I buy today working six months from now, then I have better uses for my money.
The software-as-service approach, however, makes just about everybody happier, or at least more accountable. That doesn't mean I favor exclusive, long-term contracts with larger vendors. Businesses who bought into, say, Microsoft's enterprise licenses had to wait along with the rest of us for every delay in Longhorn/Vista. I'm no economist, but it would seem to me that the ROI would tend to drop when the investment doesn't return, for example, anything.
Anyway, back to the Greek letters. With very little marketing, google has risen from (or trickled down, depending on your perspective) from a favorite tool of geeks to the only serious game in town. Whereas ask.com has to put pathetic spots in prime time TV, google seems to be doing find by word of mouth.
The reason for this, I think, is that Google grew from a community of users, who were passionately interested in research and the organization, dissemination, and preservation of information. Several of their current and emerging services started as internal tools, so there was never any desire to cut corners. Improvements are constant, but rarely disruptive. Likewise, google advertisements are ubiquitous, but so non-intrusive (in most cases) that they aren't resented.
The difference, I guess, comes down to reputation. Plenty of the big vendors have made numerous promises that were filled too late or not at all. Google, on the other hand, consistently delivers, and continues to improve smoothly. Of course, it helps to have a network-centric software engine, where there's only one instance to worry about and no legacy constraints.
I'm going to stop writing now, and leave you with a new batch of Bushisms.
Rarely do you see these apologetic labels change connotation for the better. Terms such as pre-owned, and virtual, smart, and lite/diet/free have steadily declined in popular appeal (where popularity is defined by my extrapolation to other people's heads as I sit alone except for the company of my senile computers). That's not to say that marketers have given them up altogether. It's just that even the [whatever the opposite of savvy is] of consumers have wised up.
Beta, on the other hand, is a term originally used to describe a system or product that was only barely ready, or to apologize and disclaim any responsibility for its shortcomings. Funny thing is, the new standard for beta software is head and shoulders over similar programs that have been around for years. Google maps was in beta for the Silicon Vally equivalent of a metric eon. Gmail, which caused an immediate and frantic redesign of every other web-based email client, proudly displays its beta status, as if to say, "you ain't seen nothin' yet."
A less obvious but likely more fundamental shift is the realization on an institutional level that software is a service and not a product. Certain technical metaphysicists like your humble narrator have been screaming this at varying volumes for varying lengths of time. One powerful symptom is the shying away (by the smarter companies) of the "n.0" release strategy. AOL went from 4.0 to 11.0 in the span of a year without adding (arguably) any substantial value to their product. The idea was that if you saw your buddies using version 5.0 and you were stuck on 4.1.9, that you were missing out, and should pay to upgrade to the new product.
Unfortunately, that strategy puts incentives on companies to add features rather than improve the overall product quality (or to use an about-to-jump-the-proverbial-shark buzzword, the "user experience"). Naming names would be too easy, but the end result is fragmented versions of the software requiring either separate maintenance and support strategies for each version or the abandonment of users of the older version ("forced obsolescence").
What seems to be happening is that loyalty to software vendors doesn't run deep enough to support the chunky release-fix-EOL-rerelease model. Consumers, aside from the revered but routinely screwed early adopters, expect a product to work the first time they buy it, and don't enjoy paying to have initial defects fixed. Thinking of software as a product degrades one of its best advantages, i.e., its softness: if I can't count on what I buy today working six months from now, then I have better uses for my money.
The software-as-service approach, however, makes just about everybody happier, or at least more accountable. That doesn't mean I favor exclusive, long-term contracts with larger vendors. Businesses who bought into, say, Microsoft's enterprise licenses had to wait along with the rest of us for every delay in Longhorn/Vista. I'm no economist, but it would seem to me that the ROI would tend to drop when the investment doesn't return, for example, anything.
Anyway, back to the Greek letters. With very little marketing, google has risen from (or trickled down, depending on your perspective) from a favorite tool of geeks to the only serious game in town. Whereas ask.com has to put pathetic spots in prime time TV, google seems to be doing find by word of mouth.
The reason for this, I think, is that Google grew from a community of users, who were passionately interested in research and the organization, dissemination, and preservation of information. Several of their current and emerging services started as internal tools, so there was never any desire to cut corners. Improvements are constant, but rarely disruptive. Likewise, google advertisements are ubiquitous, but so non-intrusive (in most cases) that they aren't resented.
The difference, I guess, comes down to reputation. Plenty of the big vendors have made numerous promises that were filled too late or not at all. Google, on the other hand, consistently delivers, and continues to improve smoothly. Of course, it helps to have a network-centric software engine, where there's only one instance to worry about and no legacy constraints.
I'm going to stop writing now, and leave you with a new batch of Bushisms.
Sunday, April 02, 2006
For Rich or for Poor, in Sickness and in Health, in Paper or in Plastic
"You can reactivate your account at any time prior to your account expiring on 1/1/1900." Thanks, guys, now I feel even safer about my information security. Good thing it's only a dating site, so none of it's true in the first place.
I've been kinda sick this weekend, but I'm sure I know why. On Friday I signed up for a new life insurance policy, which of course won't take effect until I make the first payment. Naturally my State Farmer has been employing a voodoo doll to remind me of my own mortality. I've been effectively dead for the last 48 hours or so.
I would've fared better in the negotiations had I not been woefully outnumbered; my agent had his boss "sit in on" the process. I didn't realize that shopping for retirement plans would feel that much like buying a car, but I guess so. The guy made several arithmetical errors in describing things, not the least of which comparing a 30-year performance of his plan with a 3-month interval of mine.
The end result is that my hypothetical beneficiaries consider me better off dead, and the scary part is they could be anywhere.
Nothing much else is new, aside from seeing a woman in a wedding gown and her presumed groom (in full dress uniform, Air Force I think) killing time in Target yesterday. The official story was that they were there for the photos, which beats my original theory of having a reception in the Starbucks. I tried to get a crew together to pelt them with rice, and one of the stock boys was all for it, but had to ask his boss. "I like this job too much," was his excuse. Granted, he wasn't exactly CEO of the place, but, after considering the blonde co-worker he was paired with, I had to admit he had a point. The next level manager denied his request, and as I, being half dead, didn't feel up to assaulting a GI solo, let the opportunity pass. I guess I can make up for it at my brother's hitching, though. How much rice fits in a slingshot?
I've been kinda sick this weekend, but I'm sure I know why. On Friday I signed up for a new life insurance policy, which of course won't take effect until I make the first payment. Naturally my State Farmer has been employing a voodoo doll to remind me of my own mortality. I've been effectively dead for the last 48 hours or so.
I would've fared better in the negotiations had I not been woefully outnumbered; my agent had his boss "sit in on" the process. I didn't realize that shopping for retirement plans would feel that much like buying a car, but I guess so. The guy made several arithmetical errors in describing things, not the least of which comparing a 30-year performance of his plan with a 3-month interval of mine.
The end result is that my hypothetical beneficiaries consider me better off dead, and the scary part is they could be anywhere.
Nothing much else is new, aside from seeing a woman in a wedding gown and her presumed groom (in full dress uniform, Air Force I think) killing time in Target yesterday. The official story was that they were there for the photos, which beats my original theory of having a reception in the Starbucks. I tried to get a crew together to pelt them with rice, and one of the stock boys was all for it, but had to ask his boss. "I like this job too much," was his excuse. Granted, he wasn't exactly CEO of the place, but, after considering the blonde co-worker he was paired with, I had to admit he had a point. The next level manager denied his request, and as I, being half dead, didn't feel up to assaulting a GI solo, let the opportunity pass. I guess I can make up for it at my brother's hitching, though. How much rice fits in a slingshot?
Thursday, February 02, 2006
Why I Need a Shotgun
So I'm installing the new version of Visual Studio. For those of you fortunate enough not to be familiar with this fine piece of software, suffice it to say that it is what puts together the lion's share of every other program on Windows, and is simply a joy to use.
So if you're gonna install the new version, you have to uninstall the old one first, right? That should be simple enough, using the uninstaller and junk. I went through the motions, removing .NET versions 1.1, 2.0, 2.0beta, J# somethingorother, and half a dozen other add-ons that might get in the way of the new one. Now it comes time to remove Visual Studio itself.
So I click in the clicking place, and all is well. This leads me to the setup wizard, shown below. I, being a dilligent user, again click where I'm told (remember i'm uninstalling now).
With me? Here's the fun part. Instead of launching the uninstaller, it sends me to the Copy Utility screen. Note how (a) I'm not copying anything now, (b) the Copy Utility is not part of Visual Studio, even in the most inclusive sense, (c) no trace of an uninstaller can be seen anywhere, and (d) there's really nothing I can do here.
Now, ordinarily I'm a forgiving enough user. You really have to be if you want to use any software from these people. What I don't get is how they expect me to purchase their new products if the uninstaller for the old version links me to a dialog box from another completely unrelated application, which never worked to begin with. Visual Studio is solely responsible, remember, for building/assembling/linking/compiling/otherwise tacking together probably 90% of the software being developed comercially for Windows. How is a poor developer supposed to work with a product that not only can't find its own uninstaller, but, instead of displaying an error to that effect, picks a component it has no business even seeing and launches it?
I guess I'll just put in the new CD and see what happens; maybe it'll miraculously remove the old one, or maybe it'll make things worse. A sane user would just reinstall windows on this poor old machine (if not put it out to pasture), but I'm past that point. It's survived three versions of Windows (not including service packs), and 4 of Linux, so I'm hoping I can do something constructive with it. It's too heavy to be a fly swatter, but it has potential as a paperweight, or even a nut cracker.
So if you're gonna install the new version, you have to uninstall the old one first, right? That should be simple enough, using the uninstaller and junk. I went through the motions, removing .NET versions 1.1, 2.0, 2.0beta, J# somethingorother, and half a dozen other add-ons that might get in the way of the new one. Now it comes time to remove Visual Studio itself.
So I click in the clicking place, and all is well. This leads me to the setup wizard, shown below. I, being a dilligent user, again click where I'm told (remember i'm uninstalling now).
With me? Here's the fun part. Instead of launching the uninstaller, it sends me to the Copy Utility screen. Note how (a) I'm not copying anything now, (b) the Copy Utility is not part of Visual Studio, even in the most inclusive sense, (c) no trace of an uninstaller can be seen anywhere, and (d) there's really nothing I can do here.
I guess I'll just put in the new CD and see what happens; maybe it'll miraculously remove the old one, or maybe it'll make things worse. A sane user would just reinstall windows on this poor old machine (if not put it out to pasture), but I'm past that point. It's survived three versions of Windows (not including service packs), and 4 of Linux, so I'm hoping I can do something constructive with it. It's too heavy to be a fly swatter, but it has potential as a paperweight, or even a nut cracker.
Friday, January 20, 2006
I can die now.
Granted, the $1.20 I won won't cover much in the way of a funeral, but now I can retire from poker with the best of 'em.
Update: I did it again, on 23 March 2006, and never got around to uploading it.
Wednesday, January 04, 2006
Karina, Karina
Ever have one of those new years days where you meet two girls named Karina within 8 hours of each other, one from Russia by way of Israel, and the other from Romania by way of Cleveland? Maybe it's just me.
Anyway, I rang in the new year the cheap way, in the casino, so instead of paying to drink I got paid. It was a tour de force the whole way, and after starting at noon, I wasn't back up to even again until about ten, and finally ended the day up $100 one hour into 2006. I took Sunday off, but found my way back there on Monday and won an additional $177.50 in five hours.
I played another 380+ hands at Full Tilt yesterday, and ended up down $10. This isn't as bad as it sounds, since I had rotten cards most of the time, and stood a great chance of losing significantly more. I'll be happy to break even on days with bad luck, as long as I can get paid on the good days (like Monday).
The single worst play I've witnessed in my hold 'em career showed up last night. The flop was KKA, then another king showed up on the turn. I didn't follow the action to this point, but the bottom line is two people made it to the river, which was another K. So the board is four of a kind, kings, with an ace kicker. Just as a joke, the first player bet a dollar, and her opponent folded. I guess he was afraid of a fifth king, or maybe he thought she had three pocket aces.
Anyway, I rang in the new year the cheap way, in the casino, so instead of paying to drink I got paid. It was a tour de force the whole way, and after starting at noon, I wasn't back up to even again until about ten, and finally ended the day up $100 one hour into 2006. I took Sunday off, but found my way back there on Monday and won an additional $177.50 in five hours.
I played another 380+ hands at Full Tilt yesterday, and ended up down $10. This isn't as bad as it sounds, since I had rotten cards most of the time, and stood a great chance of losing significantly more. I'll be happy to break even on days with bad luck, as long as I can get paid on the good days (like Monday).
The single worst play I've witnessed in my hold 'em career showed up last night. The flop was KKA, then another king showed up on the turn. I didn't follow the action to this point, but the bottom line is two people made it to the river, which was another K. So the board is four of a kind, kings, with an ace kicker. Just as a joke, the first player bet a dollar, and her opponent folded. I guess he was afraid of a fifth king, or maybe he thought she had three pocket aces.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
