• Font issues

    Posted on by Wells 1 Comment

    So, I am in the Civil Air Patrol (hence the category in this case of CAP), which is the Auxiliary to the United States Air Force, at least when we are performing missions for the Air Force. As such, we hold true to a very large portion of the rigmarole that occurs in the Air Force, including the creation of Memos. Lots and lots of memos get created and pushed around in the Air Force, and also in CAP.

    My issue in this case is a recent memo that came from our Wing Commander, concerning term limits for group and squadron commanders. No big deal with the content… heck, it had to be stated somewhere, and now we have it written down from on high that it will be a specific amount of time, and then you have to give it up to someone else. Fine, no problem, makes sense. My issue is with the bloody font he used in the memo… not sure of the exact font name, but it is a Gothic style font, and neigh unreadable. Well, yes, you can read it, but it is bloody annoying.

    I never thought I would be one to whine and complain about a font that someone is using… until now. There is a reason why most word processors default to one of two different fonts, either Times New Roman or a Courier… because they are easy to read and do not have weird spacing!


    📂This entry was posted in Flying/CAP

  • “Fiery Sunsets”

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    So, just reading a post from someone else on Google+, and they posted pictures of a sunset here in Florida, entitled “Fiery Sunset”.

    Now, I have a wee bit of a problem with this caption… I mean, it is a sunset… by definition, it is fiery… I mean, it is a giant (and in the case of the example poster, I have a feeling he does not quite understand just how massive it truly is) burning ball a very long distance away (approximately 1 AU, give or take planetary orbit eccentricity)


    📂This entry was posted in Me

  • How to get poor customer reviews

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    So, at work we have a cluster that recently went out of warranty with a company. This was a three year warranty… no problem, and we knew that the warranty was going to expire. We get that… we know that warranties expire and that after they expire we would have to pay for parts.

    So a couple of months after the warranty expires, we lose a couple of power supplies on some of the nodes. No big deal.. this happens as well. Call up the company and request three new ones, with the expectation that we would have to pay for them. The response?

    “Sorry, we contacted the supplier and those power supplies are no longer available. You are SOL.”

    This is only a couple of months after the warranty expired. What if we were still under warranty? Would they honor it then? How could they, since the supplier no longer makes them?

    So… with that in mind, I think we just dropped Penguin Computing as being any sort of supplier for our equipment. (oh, there are more reasons that this to have dropped them… this I think is just going to be the icing on the cake.)

     


    📂This entry was posted in Linux

  • I got bored

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    This is all Dante Shepherd’s fault…

    Spatula cat, spatula cat
    Does whatever a spatula can
    Flips a burger, any size,
    Scrapes up eggs just like the Fonz
    Look out!
    Here comes the Spatula Cat!


    📂This entry was posted in Me

  • America Idol — An example of pure democracy

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    So… recently I was reading in the news about how Pia Toscano was voted off of the show (America Idol) in a “shocking” elimination vote. This doesn’t surprise me in the slightest. Apparently this is a growing trend on the show, and the last female artist to win was apparently Jordin Sparks, four years ago.

    One only has to look at the demographic of those that watch (and vote on) the show… pre-teen and teenage girls who have major infatuations with the male artists. Call it Bieber-itis, if you will.

    This is what happens when you have what amounts to a pure democracy… you get majority rule, or as some would call it, mob rule. The majority of the associated people make a decision, despite that decision not necessarily being the right one, simply because emotions have taken effect.

    In the case of Pia Toscano, the mob voted, and despite being a (presumably) better singer was voted off of the show.

    I guess my point is that this country was designed as a representative republic for a reason, and this illustrates one of those reasons… majority rule may seem fair, but it is not necessarily the smartest thing. By electing representatives, we put into position people who make it their business to know more about the actual issues than we as the voters may know or care to research. I know for a fact that I do not have the full picture on things like zoning laws in the town I live in, nor do I have the time to do the research… which is why I place my vote for a representative who will do that sort of research and make a better educated decision on what exactly to do.

    The same goes for American Idol… the judges sitting there on the panel are there because they are knowledgeable about the subject at hand (singing and performing) and can make a better decision about which contestants will make good stars… and that does not necessarily mean that they can simply sing well… I am sure that there are a number of other factors that I am simply not aware of that they know a whole lot more about that factor in on making an actual star.

    Unfortunately for them, the rules only give them one real override, and they used it this season.

    My best wishes go out to Pia, because if she really is as good as the judges felt her to be, then perhaps she will get a contract anyway.


    📂This entry was posted in Drama

  • Ebay Auctions…

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    So, a recently published auction came across my attention… (wow, I am not sure how that is going to come across… but screw it… )

    Apple IIgs Woz Edition

    There are so many things wrong with this particular auction…

    • A seller rating of zero? Really?
    • No in-depth pictures. Who knows what the condition of the system board is, or if it even exists.
    • A woz edition IIgs is not really all that special. I used to have one… I would prefer to have a ROM 03 version of a IIgs, frankly.
    • The cost… well, it is laughable. I know that these things can go for a tenth of the cost, and have seen them go for even less.
    • The shipping cost is also laughable.

    So in the end, this is a ridiculous auction, and the only people that are going to make any money off of it is Ebay.


    📂This entry was posted in Me

  • Germany, WW 1

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    So… a bit of reading today brought about a point of interest… Apparently around the time of World War I, Germany did some pretty cool things in preparation prior to the war. When I say pretty cool, I mean that they were being smart.

    What they did was to go around to different parts of the countryside of the places that they were planning to invade, and bought things like farms and stuff in strategic places. They then would lay down a foundation at those farms, and erect a lightweight structure such as a barn or whatever.

    Once they had enough of these set up, the invasion began. It then became very easy for them to simply tear down the structure and all of a sudden they had a strong foundation on which to place their heavy artillery. They became easily defendable firebases for their offensive.


    📂This entry was posted in Books

  • Facebook Status stuff

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    I just got hit with the following two statuses on Facebook… the thing that is interesting to me is that they have opinions at complete opposite ends of the spectrum, and this is coming from two people who are from completely different parts of my life:

    [#]  NAME         TYPE         MESSAGE

    [1]  <Person 1>   attach post  Super bummed on having my PT canceled tonite.
    *sulk pout* I’d say something more, but then I’d
    be getting catty.

    [#]  NAME               TYPE         MESSAGE

    [1]  <Person 2>         attach post  Physical Therapy is such a joy to go
    to….

    I am using fbcmd to monitor statuses of friends that get posted throughout the day… this allows me to keep it in a single terminal window in a corner of the screen instead of having Facebook open in a browser window all the time and me going to check it throughout the day. Nice and clean, basically.


    📂This entry was posted in Me

  • Amphitheatre

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    On the University of Florida campus, just outside of the student union building, there is a small amphitheatre on the edge of a pond. What is unfortunate about this amphitheatre is that there is no stage for a performance to occur, so what you have is an amphitheatre with lots of seating that simply overlooks a pond… a depressing pond, I might add, since it has a fountain smack-dab in the middle of it that doesn’t appear to work, or at least is turned off a good portion of the time.

    This would be a perfect place to erect a small stage (perhaps on the opposite side of the pond) where small one-acts could be performed (the performing arts college is right next door) and perhaps the occasional quiet concert (I am thinking classical quartets or acoustic indie music here, not an amplified garage band…)

    Truth be told, it wouldn’t surprise me if this was the original intent for it, and some environmental weenie got wind of it and protested it because it would disturb the wildlife in the sinkhole nearby, and the ducks that use the pond.


    📂This entry was posted in Drama

  • distributed.net testing

    Posted on by Wells Comment

    So, I am doing some runs with the latest distributed.net client, version 517, dated 2010-06-28. It still doesn’t have processor detection available that works with Magny-Cours systems, and instead detects them as having a processor with tag equal to “40010001”. Magny-Cours has been around for over six months now, so I would have expected these guys to have gotten the processor detection for them by now.

    Anyway, I am running the client on a quad-socket Magny-Cours system we have that has quad AMD 6174’s, running at 2.2ghz. Looks like I am getting in the range of 350M keys/sec, which is pretty damned good. I ran this same test on a similar machine about six months ago, and was only able to get about 305M keys/sec. Not sure if this is because it is a different machine with significantly more RAM (128GB) or if the updated client is a bit better in performance.


    📂This entry was posted in Linux