For my last post in November, i give you a randomly generated post, using all my previous posts as input. I'm using an order-2 markov chain over whole words, with first-class punctuation. Order-1 was too nonsensical, and order-3 was too sensical.

Enjoy.

The relentless pace of package updates can be 17, 25, or, as most of the data in bytes.

Using ( Read more... )

Four weeks.

Four weeks of posting every single day.

I think it's safe to say that this is the hardest thing i have ever done.

Two more posts one more post, and it'll be over. (And since i never bothered to sign up on http://nablopomo.com/, i suppose i won't be getting any prizes. Oh well.)

As i could have predicted, i wound up with a bunch of spare ( Read more... )

1. What are the most important problems in your field?
2. Are you working on one of them?
3. Why not?

In computer science, the most important problem i can think of is that of Artificial Intelligence. People have been trying to build intelligent machines for decades; dating back at least to the AI Lab at MIT in the 1960s.

People have been trying to ( Read more... )

Yesterday i released the decompression code i mentioned a few days ago. It's on github-go check it out.

What it is is compression/decompression code for Nintendo's LZSS formats.

LZSS is one of a family of compression formats. Nintendo uses a slightly modified LZSS format in their games, and in fact the GBA and DS have LZSS compression routines in ( Read more... )

AAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

I wasted today playing with graphviz, updating Arch, reading Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality, and reading about MVC. (Okay, not exactly wasted.) Oh, and writing. Can't forget about the writing.

Here is a nifty trick i figured out with screen.

One of the benefits of using a console IRC client like WeeChat is that you can ( Read more... )

Waffles.

Waffles are delicious.

I'm going to share with you my recipe for Cinnamon Waffles-well, it's not really mine; i adapted it from the Buttermilk Pancake recipe from Knead It, Punch It, Bake It.

Without further ado:

Hardware:

• 
  A Waffle Iron-one of those big, wonderful, Belgian Waffle ones. Ours can turn upside-down, sort of like those fancy ( Read more... )

As i mentioned before, i'm doing some work on PPRE. This means i finally have to learn me some GUI.

I started programming with Visual Basic 4.0, with the classic "application logic is in the OnClick handler of Button1" style. I have pretty much avoided GUIs ever since, getting by with HTML instead. (Although i did play with Tk in Python once.)

GUI ( Read more... )

Last time, i covered my Firefox Essentials. I recently left Windows, so as a way of saying goodbye, i'd like to list the software i used. The next post in this series will be about Linux, promise.

All these programs are either freeware or open-source. (Because i am a cheapskate.)

Programs marked with † are Windows-only.

1. 
   Browsing: Firefox + a ( Read more... )

eevee linked to a depressing article.

http://blog.wekeroad.com/thoughts/open-id-is-a-party-that-happened

The article basically says that OpenID is a huge headache for business owners.

That's sad because we need distributed global online identity. Because the status quo sucks-the proliferation of usernames and passwords has got to stop.

What i mean by ( Read more... )

Eevee:

So, inspired by magical's lofty praise and lured by the promise of a permanently bleeding edge, I decided to try out Arch Linux.

Let me preface this by saying: Do not use Arch Linux.

...

That's a little... harsh. And the reasons he gives don't sound that bad to me-definitely not bad enough to warrant such a... bold proclamation. (Ba-dump tish ( Read more... )