House of the rising Moonglum

Metra Serves Booze?

Moonglum — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 16:55:22 +0000

When I saw an article stating that Metra isn’t renewing their contract for their bar vendor on their trains my first thought was, “Metra has a bar vendor?” But don’t worry apparently you will still be able to drink on the train. Who knew? Now I want to start commuting.

Red-Light Cameras Don’t Work

Moonglum — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 16:41:25 +0000

In fact the first major study done on them concluded that they are a hidden tax on drivers. Study after study shows that red light cameras cause an increase in accidents. So the tax is paid out to: city governments, auto body repair shops, and insurance companies. Interestingly the only body that generated studies that believed that red light cameras did any good were funded by the insurance companies which stand to profit from them. So they do not work.

Or do they….

Tin foil theory: the government in its infinite wisdom is trying to wean us off of automobiles as early as possible in anticipation of peak oil, and red light cameras are just another way of making car ownership more prohibitive. Ok, probably not, but I like it.

Joe Biden

Moonglum — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 21:00:43 +0000

Joe Biden!? Reallly, Joe Biden?

Oh well, what did I want really. After all the bickering and whatnot they needed to appeal to the base. Still if you are supposed to be all about change, perhaps picking the establishment as your running mate isn’t the most genius idea ever.

Tribune Report On Zoning In Chicago

Moonglum — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 18:10:44 +0000

The Trib recently ran an excellent five part article on the zoning situation in Chicago. It is a bit long, containing way too many personal anecdotes for my preferences, but it does go into a good amount of detail on how the zoning process is supposed to work, and how it actually does work. Some of the Rogers Park bloggers show up in the final part. One of the most elucidating quotes from the entire series though, points out what I think the real problem with the zoning situation in Chicago is:

City officials in the Zoning and Planning Departments review proposals and issue recommendations before aldermen vote. That review involves determining if new construction would be an “intrusion” to the neighborhood.

But aldermen pay little heed. City staff objected to about 40 percent of the zoning changes that the council approved over the last three years, city records show.

If the city’s zoning department actually managed to form official objections to 40% of the zoning changes, but only 10 or so didn’t go though, there is a real problem in this city. We pay professionals to determine the proper city planning, but then they are simply ignored. If the aldermen are just going to have the final say, why do we even bother with the city planners in the first place? Save some money and get rid of the whole department.

Voting Machine Problems

Moonglum — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 19:01:00 +0000

XKCD once again comes to the rescue with a clear and concise explanation of the problem. First of all the company felt the need to change their name because the old one had been so tarnished. And they really expect us to trust them with our votes? And yes the analogy really is a good one. Something has gone horribly awry if a virus can get on your voting machine.

Michael Phelps is the new Chuck Norris

Moonglum — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 13:54:12 +0000

My wife and I have been laughing our behinds off at the Phelps “perfect human specimen” spots that NBC has been airing this past week. They talk about his (completely mutant) physique as if his mother decided that that is what he was going to look like. So when my wife ran across a similar account in Gawker this morning, she had to point it out to me. I took a quick look, and while the article itself isn’t particularly interesting, the comments are hilarious. A few of them are simply old Chuck Norris jokes rehashed, but there are a bunch of new ones in a similar vein. Including: “Michael Phelps is the new Chuck Norris… and Chuck Norris is OK with that.”

The Laws of Probability

Moonglum — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 14:41:40 +0000

IANAL, IJLS: “Once again probability proves itself willing to sneak into the back alley and service Drama as would a copper piece harlot.”

I have GOT to remember that for the next time something breaks the odds in real life. Something with a 10% chance of happening is really unlikely something with a one in a million chance is a sure thing. Just awesome.

Musharraf Resigns

Moonglum — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 13:29:14 +0000

When Musharraf first took over in Pakistan I was pretty pleased with that particular change of government. Pakistan seemed to need a stronger hand than the existing government was able to provide. The problem with dictators though is that once they are in place they very seldom give up power. Given the fact that he already broke a number of promises to step down my opinion of him has gradually declined over the years. It appears that following the latest challenge to his power however, he stepped down as president which was his last piece of power in government. Pakistan is such a large diverse country there are no silver bullets to its problems and this certainly won’t fix everything, but hopefully it is a step in the right direction. Also, hopefully after so many years of working with Pakistan we have developed good working relationships with people and institutions besides Musharraf.

In any case, a nice little independence day present for Pakistan.

Computer Questions

Moonglum — Mon, 11 Aug 2008 12:58:18 +0000

People often ask me computer questions. One question that I regularly get is “do I need to upgrade my computer?” I personally like to keep computers around for a while, and due to upgrades and whatnot probably hold on to them longer than others in my field. (Though perhaps about as long as non computer types.) Thus my general advice is that a computer should last for about 5 years. Do I eat my own dog food?

Classic II 1991, upgraded once with (10 MB RAM) and once (80 MB HD). (It still runs and has all the original packaging. Anyone want it?) That lasted for 4 years until I got my Power Mac 7500 in 1995. That was one of the most expandable (Mac) machines ever (ram twice, a graphics card, a processor upgrade, and probably something else that I am forgetting) and got me all the way to my first “real” programming job lasting 5 years. Although I did keep using it as a gaming, desktop, and server(!) machine for another three years. It was eventually replace by the Pismo in 2000. That was another awesome and expandable machine, but by this point my care and feeding of macs skills had improved, so it might not actually be all that expandable. In any case it holds a special place because it transitioned me from OS 9 to OS X, which was a beautiful thing. Also it let me surf in the living room which was a nice ability to have when working from home. In any case, it eventually got a little long in the tooth for doing some of the work I was doing (what do you mean you can’t do interactive SVG rendering development on a laptop??) and I got a Dual G5 tower in 2005. This machine (that I am writing on now) absolutely screams. And it still does. The graphics card is a bit out of date at this point, but less than you would think, and any apps that are vector unit aware will blow the pants off of anything else out there still. The main problem is that somewhere between there and now Apple decided to switch over to the crufty (but regularly upgraded) Intel chipset.

So what does all this introspection have to do with anything? Well two items really. First is makes me realize that I’ve only been using this desktop machine for well on three years, and I really have no right to get one of those laptops that I have been drooling over. The one problem is, I don’t have the ability to upgrade this machine like I should since the chipset changed over. No swapping out processors for me. (Ram and disk I could do though…)

The other item is that I am not as cool as I think I am about using older machines. Holy crap! He is using a 13 year old computer and asking advice on how to hook a network computer up to it! That is making me want to break out with the old 7500 and boot it up as a server again. I wonder if YDL is still around?

Phoenix Lander Measures Water

Moonglum — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 23:37:22 +0000

Nasa’s lander sampled water on Mars results from last week show. I forgot to post this earlier. While not unexpected, it is still exciting to get the confirmation that, yes, water is in the dirt. People are making more of this than they should of course, but it is an exciting first step. Some of the making more of it comes in the form of articles being published and retracted. The latest news appears to be that peroxide may have been found in the ground. If true that would put the kibosh on any possible life. It also appears to get them the 90 day extension that they need to finish running the suite of tests that they sent up there. I mean really, how many millions to get this thing there and they have a couple delays and you are going to skimp out on the extra 90 days they need? At least they got it.

It looks like NASA has at least two more major press conferences coming up though, so who know what the verified results will actually be?