Month: April 2006

synchronicity

Relative Openness of Mapping APIs:

I’m interested in drilling down on the question of why Google Maps has become the platform of choice for location mashups, rather than Yahoo! or Microsoft or MapQuest. Was it just being in the right place at the right time, and getting the momentum, or is there something about the API or the terms of service? There are hundreds of Google Maps mashups versus tens of mashups for Yahoo! Maps or Microsoft Virtual Earth, and only one for MapQuest.

I asked Schuyler Erle and Rich Gibson, co-authors of Mapping Hacks and Google Maps Hacks this same question yesterday. Schuyler replied with some thoughts, which he’s since blogged on mappinghacks.com. But I’d love to know more. Why are you guys continuing to choose Google maps? What features, if any, would competitors have to add, to get you to switch?

As heard on NPR: http://www.platial.com/ For a useful example, click here.
So is it reasonable to expect the API to stay open and free?

My answer to Tim’s question is that Google has such a huge amount of mindshare, more than Yahoo (5 years ago, Yahoo might have had it, but now?), and certainly more than MapQuest. A look at their interfaces helps explain why as well.

what he said

This is the heir to DesktopManager, similarly useful but made unstable by Tiger.

links for 2006-04-07:

Virtue
Very promising virtual desktop manager for OS X with an intuitive grasp of the principles of use for OS X. Well worth a try.

(tags: osx OpenSource Mac software desktop utility)

This is a much improved version, especially for those without a lot of screen real estate. One big improvement I noted right off: when you bind an application to a desktop, switching to that app doesn’t open it in the current desktop (if you’re on a different one) but switches you to the appropriate desktop.

Now playing: Pillar To Post by Aztec Camera from the album “High Land, Hard Rain” | Get it

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adventures in small darkrooms/pinhole retrofitting

The load of photo gear I picked up last week included some Paterson developing gear — a tank and three adjustable reels. I have two rolls of 120 to process so I figured I’ve give them a shot.

I looked up how the Paterson reels work, and it seemed quite an advance: they use a ratchet system to load the film from the outside in, as opposed to the old-fashioned way, from the center out. You feed in a couple of inches, and then just crank the reel halves and wind in the film.

Works great in daylight, but not so well in the changing bag.

As I learned from a little research, Paterson reels are a little touchy. The reels have to be dry, the ratcheting components — a pair of ball bearings, one on each side — have to be free to move around, and the plastic can’t be gunked up with old chemistry. I can attest to 2 out of 3, and since they work in daylight, I guess they’re not in too bad of shape. One reel seems quite worn and wants to come apart, so perhaps I’ll put it aside until I understand them better. They come in two parts, and the spindle has two interlocking sections that allow it to expand and contract for different film widths.

But as it happened, I got nothing done with the Paterson stuff. I ended up using my stainless steel reel and tank and it took just a couple of minutes, even doing it twice. As this page points out, an elegant tank and reel design that uses a lot more chemistry might not be all that efficient.

If it takes more than, say, 18-20 ounces to fill up a two-35mm reel plastic tank, start asking yourself if it’s really a good tank or is it bad engineering?

So my money might might be better spent on one more good quality stainless steel reel: I already have a large stainless tank.

More as events progress.
Continue reading “adventures in small darkrooms/pinhole retrofitting”

creation incompatible with christianity?

Now there’s a schism I’d like to see . . . .

Making Light: Darwin fish found:

Won’t change their minds. They’ll say it’s a fake.

So maybe that means they won’t have to deal with it; but they’re just begging to have their kids suffer a catastrophic loss of faith when they discover that it’s demonstrably not a fake. You can only go so far in inculcating denial. Beyond that, the person has to want to deny the evidence.

Or that it was put there by God to test our Faith.

God Almighty is infinite truth and light, but the God we deal with here on earth is lying to us? Doesn’t that make them some unpleasant variety of Gnostic?

Also, could they please explain what other apparently solid data is eligible to be dismissed in that fashion? Yes? And how they can tell the difference? One step past that point in any direction, they’ll fall into “some parts of creation are More Real than others“: a muddy, fetid philosophical swamp that breeds errors by the swarm.

“What do we know, and how do we know that we know it?”: There’s a reason it’s a classic.

Or worse, it was put there by the Foul Deceiver to undermine said Faith.

Ooooookay, so Satan is a creative force, and had a hand in the creation of the world? That can’t be anything but Manichaeanism: a recurrent Christian heresy, explicitly rejected as doctrine by all the major denominations.

There’s your real problem with Creationism: it’s incompatible with Christianity.

Gotta be careful what you say. Someone might be listening, someone who can pick apart your threadbare logic into its slender threads . . .

colors

Today is National Tartan Day. And this is my tartan. There is no Harris tartan (odd that, with Harris tweed being so well-known), but it seems the Harrises are sept of the McLeods.
Macleodhtg
My Harris lineage makes me a member of Clan McLeod, specifically McLeod of Harris.
Curiously, I have been to the ancestral home of the clan, Dunvegan Castle on the Isle of Skye. Never knew it for what it was.

Turns out the Campbells claim the Harrises as well, but reluctantly.

trash to treasure

What a good idea. I wonder what other containers will fill this need?

eBay: Plastic Film Cans for 120/220 roll film (item 7605790972 end time Apr-07-06 09:37:21 PDT):

If you do much field shooting with 120/220 film, you know how handy it would be if medium format film came in waterproof plastic cans like 35mm film does, so you wouldn’t have to worry about the paper tab cominug unglued and unwinding in your bag, or rain falling on your film and warping the backing paper, etc.

As it happens, old-style 13-dram pillbottles from before the Tylenol poisoning scare are a perfect fit. They’re dark amber, watertight, snow-proof, and hold 120/220 format rolls perfectly. They’re a close enough fit that film still in its wrapper won’t rattle around, but exposed, unwrapped film will, so you can tell fresh and exposed film apart without even opening the bottle.

Looks like these are pretty common in the pharma trade, as cheap as 9¢ apiece.

Boot Camp and a kick in the slats

Apple released its software to allow Windows XP to run on its Intel-based hardware.

But not without a few digs . . .

  • Developers can learn all about the sixth major release of Mac OS X this century at Apple’s Worldwide Developer Conference, to be held August 7-11 in San Francisco.
  • Macs use an ultra-modern industry standard technology called EFI to handle booting. Sadly, Windows XP, and even the upcoming Vista, are stuck in the 1980s with old-fashioned BIOS. But with Boot Camp, the Mac can operate smoothly in both centuries.
  • Windows running on a Mac is like Windows running on a PC. That means it’ll be subject to the same attacks that plague the Windows world. So be sure to keep it updated with the latest Microsoft Windows security fixes.

I couldn’t have resisted it either.

And AAPL is up $5+ $6 on the day.

nature vs nurture

Professor Holbo ask the question: is criminality inborn or learned?

Root Causes of Crime:

David Frum: “Over time, they [the Republican class of ’94] succumbed to some of the high-handed and self-serving practices of the old Democratic majority they defeated.”

Redstate: “Where he started by using the enemies’ tools against them, [DeLay] began to take part in the excesses of his Democrat predecessors.”

Could it be this Culture of Corruption thing has all been the fault of the Democrats, because they provided Republicans with a bad environment? It’s sort of an intriguing ‘root causes’ argument. Odd, though. I was led to understand hand-wringing about ‘root causes of crime’ was a liberal sort of thing to do.

Twain of course maintained that America had no native criminal class, except Congress.

The meta-question: does being in Congress corrupt someone or does it attract them?