Date: 2009-12-10 14:40 Subject: Vacuum air filtering Security: Public Mood: cold

Rowing can get boring, but there isn't a lot of brainpower to be diverted when rowing hard. So, yesterdays effort was spent pondering HEPA filters, vacuums, allergen removal etc. I decided to mentally calculate what percentage of the air in my house gets filtered when I do vacuuming. After some mental arithmetic I figured out that about 50% of the air in the house gets filtered through the machine. It's not clear how much is filtered twice, with exhaust going around and back in. But, the exhaust blow straight up in back, so there is a lot of mixing and redirection. The percentage double filtered is probably low. It's not clear what this really means in terms of dust, etc. Since I'm not sensitive to dust it doesn't really matter. This analysis was just something to pass the time.

Date: 2009-12-09 11:19 Subject: Google Chrome for Linux Security: Public Mood: cold

I gave the Google Chrome for Linux beta a quick try. Initial reactions:
- Wow, it's a lot faster than Firefox. This isn't a careful benchmark, it's just a user reaction.
- I get real uncomfortable without NoScript, Adblock, and other tools that I'm accustomed to.
- I don't like their default tab, bookmark, etc. It's different than Firefox mostly, but one surprise is putting bookmarks on the right rather than the left. That's rather jarring. I did a quick look through their config option GUI and found nothing to adjust this. Maybe it's beta related.

My intention is to have a chroot'ed area where I can spawn a really restricted user and use that for some of these javascript heavy aps that are emerging. I could do the same with Firefox, but that would be closer to work and less entertainment. Maybe I can create a special restricted ApArmor profile for it also.

Date: 2009-12-05 15:02 Subject: Stock market porn Security: Public Mood: amused

It's like a gGodwin's law for crises. The latest news out of a collapsing financial firm is a harassment settlement that reads like amateur porn. It will be difficult for the hard right adherents to deal with this one.

Date: 2009-11-16 19:35 Subject: Bangladesh arsenic update Security: Public

MIT research has tracked down one causal factor for the arsenic in the Bangladesh wells. The deep sands contain arsenic, but other chemicals are needed to release them. It appears that the excavation of dirt to raise the land level of villages higher above the flood plain is a cause. The excavation left behind ponds where sediment released carbon that was tracked to the well water. That carbon will release arsenic.

The "simple" solution is to dig the wells deeper. The waters below 150m are mostly arsenic free. The problem with the "simple" solution is that hand pumps don't work that deep. An ordinary hand pump is limited to 15m. A deep-water hand pump is limited to 50-75m by the force needed to lift the water. Deep water pumps need to be lift pumps, so the hand lever and rod needs to lift the entire column of water. To go deeper means either unusual strength or multi-person pumping. At about 100m you start running into effectiveness limits due to the long pump rod stretching under the load.

So for now, life still sucks. Arsenic removal treatment still seems most effective, although as the causes are better understood, some locations may find wells that are arsenic free at usable depths.

Date: 2009-11-09 10:06 Subject: More government tidbits Security: Public Mood: busy

The budget committee had a look at long term needs this week.  For capital we had a spreadsheet of capital and bonding for the next ten years.  I was surprised by the audience reaction.  I expected a reaction along the lines of "what if we .... " or "how does it calculate ... ".  Instead, there was an audience pull back and withdrawal.  This group doesn't want to play with a spreadsheet to understand it or see what happens when you change assumptions.  The four scenarios that we showed as illustrations were not explored.  Nobody proposed tinkering with anything.

There were also the ongoing "don't get it" folks.  Apparently yet another twit was complaining that the town doesn't have a free swimming facility, and that certainly the new high school ought to include that.  At least the budget committee considers suggestions like that to be a joke.  But, we had one lady whose response to a discussion about how citizens were running out of money and couldn't absorb lots of new fees with the comment "Well then we just raise taxes to pay for it."   It's like the folks who proposed adding 80+ new mandatory health insurance coverages to MA regulations.  I think they really don't get it.  They must think that insurance companies get money by magic.  They don't understand that their nice new coverages are really a form of having to poor subsidize the rich.  Insurance is mandatory, so all the low-wage folks who are struggling to meet insurance bills will pay  for these coverage frills.

The other scary figures are the long term tax needs to cover the two huge future liabilities.  These are health insurance projected costs and pension projected costs.  The pensions are really scary.  MA is a bit ahead of the rest of the country in having a mandatory statewide ramp up to 100% funding of pensions costs for all governments and agencies.  Right now we are at about 75% coverage, with coverage being increased 1-2% annually, putting us in the top third for coverage.  The postponed bill for pensions is absolutely staggering.  We could see tax rates double just to cover pension commitments.  

Date: 2009-11-03 21:00 Subject: A memorial Security: Public Mood: sad

Just back from the memorial for the tragic loss of a child by a lesbian couple in church.  I hope that there are enough people in Maine who have sense to preserve the ability of couples like this to have the bonds of a marriage recognized by their community to help them through times like this.

Date: 2009-11-03 13:10 Subject: Press pressure and manipulation Security: Public Mood: annoyed

The CSM report on auto sales is an interesting example of how politicians pressure the press.  The reporter is very careful to avoid expressing any opinion on the veracity or credibility of his sources.  But he is also careful to include links to the two contending reports.  On the one hand you have Edmunds, with a long reputation for independent statistical analysis of automotive data.  Their report clearly sources their original sales predictions and the actual sales numbers so far this year, month by month.  The politicians' report quotes a major financial source with a single monthly sales figure that is rumored to have been from an insider at an automobile company.  A car dealer (with huge outstanding liabilities if there are payment delays for his clunker rebates) calls the Edmunds report "sloppy" and gets lots emphasis from the white house.  The politicians report then builds a very pretty mountain of speculation on top of that single number.

If there were no pressure, the reporter would likely point out all these differences.  But that would probably lead to denial of access to the white house sources in retaliation.  So he hopes for intelligent readers to follow the link, read the details of the report, and notice these differences on their own. 

I'll stick with the Edmunds analysis.  The cash-for-clunkers cost $24K for each incremental car sold.  It's your basic pure subsidy, much like many of the other stimulus efforts.

Date: 2009-11-02 10:09 Subject: Weekend Security: Public Mood: busy

A whole weekend without work VPN means a tidal wave of morning email on Monday.  Feh.

But it was a decent fall weekend.  On Saturday there were frequent wind gusts that would fill my window view with flocks of flying yellow leaves.  My maples went from brightly colored trees to bare branches in a few days.

Amtrak is also recovering from the reduced travel.  They haven't cut their train schedules like the airlines have cut flights.  The trains are just short of full.  On the trip down I was able to upgrade to first. The train up was similar. They've managed to set their prices at the right balance point to fall just short of filling the train.  This means closed to optimal revenue. 

I listened to various lectures and podcasts on the way up.  Two good lectures and one poor one I skipped after about ten minutes, plus a few radio shows.  There was also a good video capture of the Straczynski lecture at MIT this September.  I don't always use the available electricity and table to do paying work.  Sometimes I join the other 50% of riders that are listening to or watching entertainment during their trip.

Date: 2009-10-29 22:58 Subject: Ian McKellen Security: Public Mood: pleased

A good 90 minutes.  It was a series of short scenes and speeches with some connective banter.  Most was shakespearean, but a variety of other sources were also involved.  McKellen is a superb actor.  One scene was a dramatic reading of the lyrics from the Beatles "Help".  It can tell another story.  Most were speeches and scenes intended as such.  It's a one time only event for the occasion of fund raising.

The theater is new (or newly renovated), very nice, and conveniently located.  It was a complete sellout.

Date: 2009-10-26 20:51 Subject: Sushi Security: Public Mood: tired

OK.  It's a standards meeting.  We've had three big platters of sushi across 14 people, with plenty of beer.  But now, instead of dealing with important new standards activity like beard recognition systems for automatic login, I must go back and worry about SAML crud.  Feh.

Date: 2009-10-25 10:04 Subject: An engineer complains about this week's local disruption Security: Public Mood: amused

This engineer's complaint rather amused me.  Especially the part about Obama's speech on renewable energy:

Date: 2009-10-21 21:31 Subject: Lavender and apricot chicken Security: Public Mood: tired

While not bad, it's not worth the fuss of getting dried lavender flowers.  I may try other spice mixes together with the apricot.  The other part: artichoke hearts and blue cheese crumble over polenta was very good.  I made a batch of polenta from a cup of cornmeal, ate about a third direct and put two thirds in the refrigerator.  This used another third reheated.  The combination of melted blue cheese, hot artichoke heart, and polenta is excellent.  That will be made many times again this winter.

Date: 2009-10-20 20:40 Subject: Pop quiz Security: Public Mood: amused

Is the following a joke or serious?  will it pass congress?

Date: 2009-10-20 20:31 Subject: Edible lavendar flowers Security: Public Mood: cold

I found edible lavender flowers at the natural foods store.  They were a mere $55/lb.  But they are also fluff.  Enough to try the chicken with apricot and lavender flower sauce was only 50 cents.  So, I'll try that for tomorrow's dinner, together with some leftover polenta and artichoke hearts.

Date: 2009-10-20 12:51 Subject: Financial and eco-analysis of bread machine Security: Public Mood: cold

I realized that it's been a little over six months with the new bread machine.  It cooked another loaf overnight.  Based on the bread that I used to buy, it's got a financial ROI of something between 30-50%.  Now my brother-in-law get's super cheap bargain price bread.  His cost of a loaf is about the same as mine.  So, cheapskates of the world.  You can get the same cost and much superior quality if you are willing to dump ingredients into a bin and push a few buttons.

The eco-analysis is harder.  All the big stuff involving wheat and ingredients are the same.  Energy use is probably a bit worse with the bread machine.  Factory bakery bread has extra shipping costs, because bread is bulky and has added water weight.  The factory baking process is probably more efficient than the bread machine.  Really about break even, with neither having a big advantage.

So taste and convenience win.

Date: 2009-10-19 22:53 Subject: Weekend winterizing Security: Public Mood: busy

I did another of those to-do list weekends.  This early cold weather has accelerated all sorts of little fixes to weather stripping, etc.  It seems that I'm not alone in this.  Home Depot was much busier than usual with people buying the same sort of stuff that I was.  They were even sold out of one item that I need.  It was impressive how some tasks that I thought would take a long time, just took 15 minutes, while others that should take no time ended up taking almost 2 hrs.  I'm just no good at estimating the time to fix, clean, repair, or whatever.  But the list of lots of little things got shorter, like it's supposed to.

This afternoon was diverted from work to do all but two of the "need sunlight, need dry weather" items that I couldn't do over the weekend.  Those last two depend on finding a hardware store with the sold out weatherstripping.  I should be able to get to the store, buy it, and then install it some  time this week.  Then everything else is inside stuff that I can do pretty much any time.

And of course work interferes.

Date: 2009-10-17 10:28 Subject: Today's useless error message Security: Public Mood: annoyed

The error message "Invalid text in prolog" really means "That wasn't XML dummy!".  So much time wasted before realizing I'd picked  the wrong file as input.

Date: 2009-10-12 17:05 Subject: Old standards get no respect Security: Public Mood: busy

I recently stumbled across the London School of Economics Public Lectures.  These are vaguely podcasts I suppose.  They record various of their public lectures.   What I noticed when downloading a few was how large they are.  A quick check of other podcasts shows the same thing.  The problem is that they still use MP3 for voice.

Voice channels have some old standards: PCM and ADPCM that both deliver what is called "toll quality" voice.  It's the level where Bell Labs test subjects stopped being able to hear degradation of voice for a variety of human speakers.  PCM requires 7KB/s, and ADPCM is 4 KB/s.  By comparison, cell phones are about 1/3 this data rate and have quite noticable degradation.  PCM and ADPCM also require negligible computing power to implement encode or decode.  This was a significant issue back in the 1960's when they started this work.

The 70 min lecture I downloaded consumed a little over 40MB of storage for the MP3.  That would have been 30 MB for PCM or 17 MB for ADPCM.  So these lectures, and most of the voice based podcasts, are consuming twice the necessary storage and network charges.

Why?  Because some major handheld player manufacturers (Apple, Microsoft) have chosen to not support the old voice data formats.  These old voice formats are not suitable for music.  You definitely hear the degradation.  But the computational needs for PCM and ADPCM are infinitesimal.  They were designed so that you could handle 16 channels encode and decode with a 1 MIPS 8-bit processor.  The music player could almost do it without exiting sleep mode.  The code requirements are equally tiny.  I recall fitting ADPCM into 256 bytes of 8051 code.  That's bytes, not kilobytes.  It's tiny.

What a waste.  Maybe we should sic the green police on them for the environmental impact of their decision. :-)

The lecture subjects look pretty interesting, and they get well known speakers.  It will take months for me to work through the backlog of interesting looking lectures.

Date: 2009-10-06 13:10 Subject: New password advice Security: Public Mood: busy

An interesting tidbit of new password advice based on threat analysis.  One of the major causes of password loss these days is keylogging.  So the suggestion is in addition to having a separate password for each account, to have the password look like a short tweet.  These obscured garbled text strings stand out in the key log.  But the little tweet text is easy to overlook.  It takes much more contextual parsing to realize that it's a password.

Date: 2009-10-05 12:01 Subject: Nice explanation of mortgage complexities Security: Public Mood: busy

From time to time Calculated Risk does a good job of explaining the complexity of the real world.  This article is a good explanation of why it is wrong to pretend that the details of the mortgage laws can be automated away.   They've tried to pretend that automation can hide all these details and make a mortgage market exchange work.  It doesn't work.