The Runcible Blog

Last night, somebody cut the undersea cable to medford, where this server lives.  I suspect either Mossad or the CIA, but in any case, everything should be back to normal now....
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As of a few minutes ago, you can get yer very own Tabblo blog badge like I've got in the sidebar. What are you waiting for?! DO IT! (if you've got a blog, that is)...
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Since Ned put the smack down on the web framework zealots, and Antonio chimed in about the intangible benefits of working with a "fringe" framework/language, I thought I'd add my 2 rupees to the discussion on this whole web-development thang. Having spent a year working on a Struts application (and evaluating several other Java frameworks) at my last gig, the difference between those platforms and Django (or hey, even Ruby On Rails) means the difference between being able to ship ......
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I came across a post about the quickest way to remove duplicates from a python list. This particular problem seems to crop up often, and I've noticed a huge slow down when doing something like: new_list = [] for i in old_list: if i not in new_list: new_list.append(i) I never took the time to benchmark different techniques like Peter did, though. It's interesting to see that: {}.fromkeys(seq).keys() is the fastest method, but only a hair faster than the conceptually simpler: ......
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PyStone results (best of 4 tries for each): AMD Sempron 1.5Ghz running FreeBSD 6.0: 29090.9 pystones/sec Dual G5 2Ghz desktop running OS 10.4.6: 30120.5 pystones/sec Dual G5 2Ghz Xserve running OS 10.3.9: 11261.3 pystones/sec Macbook Pro 2Ghz running OS 10.4.6: 45871.6 pystones/sec (1.5x faster than G5) Yes, I'm sure this isn't a scientific test. The Xserve failed miserably. Even though it did have a light load, I'm guessing OS 10.3.9 played a part in its poor performance. I'm also not ......
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I've been looking for voice recorders lately because I want to try doing audio/photo interviews or essays.  I wasted some time buying an Olympus VN-240PC only to find out that it doesn't work like a USB drive (as the salesperson assured me), and so it was useless to me.  After looking at professional minidisc recorders and all sorts of digital voice recorders, I think I'm going to get an Olympus WS-100 (for a lot cheaper than retail price).  Minidisc might ......
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This server was offline for a while today because somebody accidentally pressed the "standby" button on the cable modem. Why is there a standby button anyway?! When would that ever be useful? Well, I taped some wood and cardboard over the button, so it shouldn't happen again!...
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I'm at one of the MIT libraries right now, using a very fast "dumb terminal" running Linux. Web browsing is wayy faster than on my Mac Mini, though I guess it helps to have a T3 or whatever. I almost want to get a speedy FreeBSD box just to use FireFox. But, I don't have the space......
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Death to Categories! Long live Tags! I had been thinking of adding something like those new-fangled "tags" that every website seems to have these days because the current category paradigm seems too static. Well, I just implemented tags after some inspiration from Ross Poulton's post about tags with Django. I took it a step further and tried my hand at "multi-tags" like IMDB's keyword search. I don't think I'll spend too much time refining the tag selection, but it has ......
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After running 24/7 for 125 days, the fan on this server's power supply seized up and died. The strange noises (sometimes loud, sometimes silent) it had been making apparently were caused by the fan's intermittent locking. If I had known, I would've replaced the power supply earlier. The cheap-o power supply breathed its last breath early Saturday morning, and I didn't get around to replacing it until today after Nate got a "Mad Dog" brand power supply from CompUSA. Now ......
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Friday night I decided to get poked with an ink-filled needle at Masterpiece Tattoo in Salem. I wasn't sure what to expect of the pain because everybody responds differently. At first, during the outline, it felt like a razor was scoring my arm slightly (I actually know how that feels). It wasn't too bad, but about ten minutes in, my ears started going blank, and my eyes started to fade out into blue. I felt like I was going to ......
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(warning: geek speak ahead...) There's a weird system here that enables me to update this picture every 30 seconds and involves three computers and lots of noise. A Logitech Quickcam Express connects to an old iMac called aquaboogie. The picture then gets sent via NFS to this huge server a few feet away whose fans lull me to sleep at night. The picture is stored on a RAID array of one drive (therefore, it's neither redundant nor an array). Finally, ......
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