Dekoor, a student choir which includes our friend Jense, from Utrecht participates in a television show Korenslag, a pop-idol like contest for choirs. As we've been devoted fans of Jense from the "Miracle Man" up to now, we attended the semi finals of this program. Being in the audience of this show that is broadcast live on national television is an experience in itself. An "applause master" instructed us when to be silent, when to applaud, and when to go absolutely crazy. To which we faithfully complied. During the show Dekoor did very well in our unbiased ears, although the others did okay too. Although we SMS'ed a fortune to vote for Dekoor, the choir "Re-Flax" got the popular vote. Quite to my suprise because they were the least original and dynamic of the four, in my opinion. Luckily the professional jury was again impressed and decided that Dekoor must go to the finals together with "Re-Flax". Unfortunately the finals are decided by popular vote (eur 0,60 per vote) which might work against them. So remember, next Thursday, 20.30 Nederland 1: the finals. Vote Dekoor! P.S. I made some pictures aswell.

Kevin Mark commented:

"I see--Redarded Terrorist--ok. So this Gareth fellow is making a comparison with smarter, more intelligent terrorist that was the IRA. Which kind of says that everyone should be far less afraid of the current crop of folks and yet the media, as it does so well, inflates their dangerousness for the sake of ... well, beats me. Oh, maybe it help Tony get a job ;-) If the IRA came to the US, what color (or is that colour) code would their activities get on our terror scale as opposed to these Tardorrists?"

How about Emerald Green? More seriously, I think it's entirely fair to suggest we should fear this lot less than the often-USian-funded Provisional IRA, or local groups like animal liberationists. Those didn't just attack the big cities - it was everywhere, an attempt at terrorism. I lived about three miles outside Milton Keynes, then a fairly small midlands city, which was firebombed by both those groups. Ultimately, it didn't work. Most people weren't terrified. We carried on regardless. The government may be over-hyping this threat to ride in a new load of "expensive and ineffective" Security Theatre measures, like ID cards. Some media is sceptical, but the Murdoch-run media is mostly complicit, which is hardly surprising given the historic relationship. We should not let these "tardorrists" change our way of life, yet that is exactly what our spineless politicians seem to be doing. Let's continue as before: beware, but be happy. Update: niq comments:

"Recommended reading: Terry Pratchett "Interesting Times". Written before "9/11" and set in the wrong part of the world, but nevertheless beautifully relevant."

After Camino and Seamonkey, Epiphany is joining the let’s have a dumb UA club. Instead of actually fixing the problem at its root by forcing stupid people not to try to match Firefox, by totally removing Firefox in Firefox’s UA, which would definitely have had a good result, they go the opposite direction. If I see that crap coming in Debian in either epiphany, galeon or kazehakase, or any other browser based on libxul, I promise I’ll hack the thing that puts the user-agent together so that it suppresses all occurrences of Firefox from it. If only people at mozilla were as thoughtful as Robert Kaiser…

Yesterday the first concert of 24 Leeways at Cees' Place. Nice work guys.

I spent a good part of this morning trying to find out with several people why oh why the networking of a Dell Poweredge 2950 with Broadcom NetXtreme II NIC wouldn't work using Debian Etch. Tried several drivers, compiled non free drivers but no luck. Only to find out that the bnx2 driver that comes with the stock Etch kernel maps Gb1 to eth1 and Gb2 to eth0 (inverted). Simply plugging the network cable over made the network run! It's even documented at the Dell website.

Alex Hudson commented:

"Similar comments about another W3C WG: http://ln.hixie.ch/?start=1181118077&order=-1&count=1 W3C should be about authoring material for the web. It seems at the moment, they're more concerned with the stuff that happens after authoring - e.g., how stuff relates in "the semantic web". IMHO we still don't have any powerful tools for authoring either, so the idea that authoring tools will automate many of the "bolt on accessibility" tasks is pretty naive."

After implementing pingback, I have some respect for hixie. It's disappointing but not surprising to read those comments. Not sure what is meant by powerful authoring tools there. My tools are powerful, but I know they're not easy for new users. As I'm getting old and cynical, I'm not sure whether power tools can ever be correct and truly easy - just look at the pigswill spewing out of some Web 2.0 sites. niq sent me a link to the WCAG Samurai Errata and commented:

"The problem with WCAG 2, as with WCAG 1, is precisely that it's a Work of Committee, and seeks to represent too many irreconcilable viewpoints and egos. In some cases, even the ideas behind it are inconsistent. Many (myself included) regard accessibility as being about ensuring a reader with a physical disability can make use of a site (think Steven Hawking). That's also what HTML is designed to support. Others are concerned with the mentally impaired, also a worthy cause, but one that becomes counterproductive when its advocates fail to distinguish between a site that's inherently inaccessible because it presents a complex and challenging subject, and one that's unnecessarily difficult due to poor presentation. Add the two together, blend in some stupidity, and you get "accessible" sites full of classic "friendly" little illustrations like a "helpful" government booklet, and a horribly intrusive "alt" to explain each pointless "ethnic mummy and child" picture."

I think a Work of Committee could be useful, as long as you have the right committee. Thinking about that, I found the group membership list and I'm not sure that's the right committee. For example, I think the ex-Adobe Google-worker must surely have an irreconcilable conflict of interest (inappropriate use of Adobe's Flash and PDF formats and Google's Web Apps have done more than many to harm accessibility in the past IMO), yet is a leading light of WCAG 2.0 - maybe that's why it's gone so dark? Update: Thijs Kinkhorst comments:

"As I read in the draft, suggestions are still possible until the 29th, not the 27th of June."

I'm sure that's different to the email which started me writing this, but please go comment and see if we can make WCAG-2.0 useful.

Guys.. meet Super Davem We did it again. After another *really* long session of super-tag-team play with Davem coding as hell and me testing like crazy we finally managed to do a full install of Linux (based on Debian/Ubuntu installer) on SUN's LDOM as guest host (similar to domU concept of Xen). There is still a lot of work to do and major problems to solve before we will able to call this "stable" for the generic user. David's blog has detailed instructions on how to install and a complete list of the issues. If you plan to try it, make sure to read David's blog! A net-boot gutsy installer image is available here and net-boot kernel here. The code published by David will hit the gutsy kernel as soon as we are satisfied with the overall situation. Most of the userland bits required to install are already in the archive and others will land soon after Tribe-2 release. STAY TUNED!

Leiden Lammenschans
Tiel Passewaaij
Capelle Schollevaar
Hoorn Kersenboogerd
Houten Castellum

The Search Keys extension for Firefox is perhaps my favorite plugin. I tweaked it so it will work with Google Patent Search as well. The only additional code needed is in the searchkeys.js file:

 
name: "Google Patents",
test: function (uri)   return uri.host.indexOf("google") != -1 && uri.path.substr(0,9) == "/patents?";  ,
testLink: function (linkNode)   return (linkNode.className == "big");  
 ,

I added a new minor version number and posted it here for download. Hopefully the patch will be adopted upstream.

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The new Dutch word list created by the OpenTaal project is now available from Debian unstable and testing in variants for ispell (idutch), aspell (aspell-nl) and OpenOffice/Mozilla (myspell-nl). It's also available in backports.org for those running stable/etch. Happy spellchecking!

From the Python 3000 Status Update:

Did I mention that lambda lives? I still get the occasional request to preserve it, so I figured I'd mention it twice. Don't worry, that request has been granted for over a year now.

Phew.

PriorityIncreaseIfBinariesFromTheSameSource:

It would be really useful if a -dev package's priority would inflate proportionally with every binary package originating from the same source as the dev package.

This way I would never see this[1]:

# LANG=C apt-get install libxmu-dev libagg-dev libgstreamer0.10-dev libgtkglext1-dev libmad0-dev libxul-dev libdirectfb-dev libkonq4-dev libcurl3-gnutls-dev libcaca-dev libboost-date-time-dev libavcodec-dev libavformat-dev libming-dev
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree... Done
The following extra packages will be installed:
kdelibs4-dev liba52-0.7.4-dev libacl1-dev libarts1-dev libartsc0-dev libasound2-dev libaspell-dev libattr1-dev
libaudio-dev libavahi-qt3-dev libcucul-dev libcupsys2-dev libdc1394-13-dev libdts-dev libfam-dev libfam0
libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libgsm1-dev libgtkglext1 libidn11-dev libjack0.100.0-dev libjasper-1.701-dev
liblcms1-dev liblua50-dev liblualib50-dev libmng-dev libmozjs-dev libmpeg3-dev libnspr4-dev libnss3-dev libogg-dev
libopenexr-dev libqt3-headers libqt3-mt-dev libraw1394-dev libsasl2-dev libslang2-dev libtheora-dev libtiff4-dev
libvorbis-dev libxslt1-dev libxt-dev mesa-common-dev qt3-dev-tools xlibmesa-gl-dev
Suggested packages:
libasound2-doc aspell-doc libqt3-i18n qt3-doc libraw1394-doc
Recommended packages:
fam gstreamer0.10-doc libqt3-compat-headers
The following packages will be REMOVED:
gamin libgamin0
The following NEW packages will be installed:
kdelibs4-dev liba52-0.7.4-dev libacl1-dev libagg-dev libarts1-dev libartsc0-dev libasound2-dev libaspell-dev
libattr1-dev libaudio-dev libavahi-qt3-dev libavcodec-dev libavformat-dev libboost-date-time-dev libcaca-dev
libcucul-dev libcupsys2-dev libcurl3-gnutls-dev libdc1394-13-dev libdirectfb-dev libdts-dev libfam-dev libfam0
libgl1-mesa-dev libglu1-mesa-dev libgsm1-dev libgstreamer0.10-dev libgtkglext1 libgtkglext1-dev libidn11-dev
libjack0.100.0-dev libjasper-1.701-dev libkonq4-dev liblcms1-dev liblua50-dev liblualib50-dev libmad0-dev libming-dev
libmng-dev libmozjs-dev libmpeg3-dev libnspr4-dev libnss3-dev libogg-dev libopenexr-dev libqt3-headers libqt3-mt-dev
libraw1394-dev libsasl2-dev libslang2-dev libtheora-dev libtiff4-dev libvorbis-dev libxmu-dev libxslt1-dev libxt-dev
libxul-dev mesa-common-dev qt3-dev-tools xlibmesa-gl-dev
0 upgraded, 60 newly installed, 2 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
Need to get 21.6MB/22.2MB of archives.
After unpacking 108MB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]?



[1] these are gnash's build deps, in case you're wondering

Good news: the OpenTaal Dutch word list (and spell checker) has gotten official approval from the TaalUnie, official authority on the Dutch language, which means that it's considered to be "just as correct" as the Green Booklet. The list is released under the LGPL licence. I've only contributed a bit to the project so far, but the next step will of course be to get it into Debian. The project originated to create a free update of the exising 1996 word list, according to the new spelling rules. Now that this is "finished", next projects are a grammar checker and thesaurus.

On our recent visit to Paris, we also went to La grande picerie de Paris (Rue de S vres), a supermarket-style store selling only very good food products. Highly recommended. On the cheese department, a cheese was on sale called Mimolette Hollandaise, in an Edam-style spherical shape and with a strange orange colour. I was quite surprised since I didn't expect to have to go abroad to discover a new kind of Dutch cheese. Of course I bought a piece. At home the cheese encyclopedia brought more clarity. In the 17th century, Colbert forbade the import of foreign diary products into France. The French who loved the Dutch Edam, simply started to produce their own copy, intended to be identical to the Dutch variety. It took until 1935 to officialise the Mimolette through a treaty between the Dutch and French. And the taste? It tastes good, it indeed resembles old Edam very well, albeit a bit more salty.

Miriam is worried that getting packages sponsored is a burden on DD's and that she's asking them a favour. I can understand where that comes from, but at least for me personally, that's definitely not the case. When I spend time to review and upload a package prepared by someone else, I don't do that just to help a friend, I do it because I've got a genuine desire to improve Debian. One way to do that is to work on my own packages, another is to help get the work done by others incorporated into Debian proper. I see that not as a burden or something they should be thankful for. Rather, I make it a habit to explicitly thank the sponsoree for their work after I've uploaded it. Just like I would thank someone that has provided a patch for my personal project. It's great that so many people are willing to contribute to Debian, and this needs to be encouraged wherever we can.

While I was in Paris, I used a FON WiFi Access Point a couple of times. The rate seemed very reasonable - EUR 3 for a day's access compared to 10 (EUR 15) per day for The Cloud - and I paid with some money that's currently trapped by paypal's incompetence (they wouldn't accept letters in a UK Companies House registration number). I'm wondering whether to run a FON point. I've line-of-sight down the hill to a holiday park less than 400m away. If I aim a 6dBi directional antenna at it from inside a window, will it reach? Would the 2dBi built-in antenna reach the pub and shops 100m away? I used wifi while on a city break, but do people want internet while on a seaside holiday? Fon has adopted Ubuntu as its preferred operating system and the CEO also wrote:

"Fon already is an Open Source company and our software is an Open Source project called http://www.openwrt.org and we should support other Open Source movements/companies"

which is a good cooperative viewpoint, in my opinion. I'm a bit troubled by its Skype, Paypal and Google promotions, BBC Panorama: Wi-Fi: a warning signal and Andrew Savory's Fon not so much fun but it seems like a good idea at the moment because it would save or make money and I'd finally have OpenWRT on a router. Are those good enough reasons? Are there other options? What are they?

This thread on the Sun initiative to produce a more Linux-like distribution of OpenSolaris is interesting not so much for the technical goals, but as an insight into the community. The immediate response to the proposal? A set of complaints that it hasn't followed the correct process.

Now, to be fair, there have been other threads discussing the technical and social desirability of such a distribution already and some are still ongoing - it's not like the OpenSolaris community has ignored it entirely in favour of process fetishising. However, it's indicative of a community that's more concerned with procedure than it is with producing high quality software. What I suspect has happened is that Sun felt it was important to ensure that procedures were put in place before creating a community in order to avoid the problem of it immediately turning into low-grade anarchy. The problem with this is that if you create procedures before you create community, the people who end up enforcing the procedures tend to be the sort of people who find enforcing procedures to be the interesting part of the job rather than the ones who see them as necessary evils to enforce moderately sensible community development.

Sun's clearly stuck between a rock and a hard place here. They don't want to be seen to be directing the community too strongly, or they'd end up like Red Hat did with Fedora - you alienate your community by giving them the impression that they have no influence over the direction of the distribution. On the other hand, the rapid growth of the Ubuntu community strongly suggests that having a strong leader can ensure that people don't get too bogged down in procedure at the cost of technical progress.

I suspect that Sun made the wrong call here. Having more corporate influence to begin with might have put off some contributors, but it would also have allowed the development of a functional community at an earlier stage. Sun could then gradually withdraw (as Red Hat have been doing with Fedora) and let the community play a larger role. Perhaps that way we'd hear more about the technical contributions coming out of OpenSolaris and they wouldn't be left with just the same two cards they've been playing for a couple of years now - dtrace and ZFS.

On something of a tangent, I don't think their choice of license has helped a great deal here. Two of the areas where OpenSolaris is most behind Linux are hardware support and desktop/kernel integration. The choice of a GPL-incompatible license strongly discourages any Linux developers from working with the low-level code of OpenSolaris due to the perceived risk of contaminating the Linux codebase at some later point. That rules out a huge pool of skilled developers (I'm going to be potentially controversial here and say that I suspect Linux has a larger skillset here than all the BSDs put together, and quite possibly Solaris added to that) who are writing a good deal of advanced code. Meanwhile we're left with OpenSolaris having even worse laptop support than FreeBSD. These are people who could have added to the community socially as well as technically. Instead you've got a community led by a set of Sun staff who are paranoid about doing anything that might make it look like Sun controls the community. Score.

Hi. Recently, on planet.debian.org, there were quite a few posts relating to blood donations. I must say that I really only live thanks to people donating blood. As many might know, I had a freaking motorcycle accident about 9 years ago. Well, apart from loosing my right leg in the weeks following the accident (irreparable damages to tissues led to amputation), I also lost a lot of blood after the accident. In the six hours following the accident, I got no less than 65 blood infusions (approximately 24-30 litres or 6-8 US gallons). As you can imagine, this is about 3-4 times as much blood as my body normally carries around. At least I can say that I didn’t receive blood without giving some before, though certainly I wasn’t able to give that much blood (I donated about 10 times, approx. 0.45 litres each time). However, due to the medication I now need, I can’t donate blood anymore. Anyhow, I strongly suggest to anyone who is capable of donating blood to do so. And regarding Thijs comment about the frequency of donation and payment: This is highly depending on the area you live in and the organisation who manages the donations. For example, while I donated blood in Dortmund, Germany, I had two options to donate blood: German Red Cross, who would accept a donation every 6 weeks, with free sandwiches, drinks and chocolate but without payment and the city-owned hospital’s blood bank, which allowed a donation every 3 month, with free drinks and a 50DEM (approx. 25EUR/30USD) payment. This sounds as if the city-owned blood bank could attract homeless and junkies who were in for the money, but from my experience, the blood bank did far stricter pre-donation tests (I can’t tell what they did after donation for either organisation) than the red cross. And knowing how much money can be earned with the blood donated, I certainly think that payment is fair, though not strictly necessary. And the blood bank people did a much better job when applying the needle than the red cross people did, which might be because they were used to taking blood from people with bad veins (mostly patients donating blood for themselves for use in a later, planned surgery). But to be fair: I know from other people who had very good experiences with the red cross staff in this respect. Once again: Please donate blood if you can. If you are uncomfortable with the choice you made on your first donation, check out other options for donations. For example, if you almost collapsed when donating blood, try out the plasma donation if it is offered. They usually take the plasma, but give back an equal volume of a substitution, so your circulation isn’t disturbed as much as by taking approx. 0.5 litres from it within an hour. If you feel that the person who applied the needle did a bad job, ask for someone else next time or try a different organisation altogether. cu,
Sven

Euro Disney S.C.A. owner of Euro Disney Associ s S.N.C. operator of Parc Walt Disney Studios are opening two new attractions and myself as a shareholder of the first has been invited for a preview of those. At first my attempt to R.S.V.P. was rejected by their broken website, but as it turns out I'm still welcome to the park this Saturday. I'm not really a fan of the mouse with the big ears and his zany adventures, but these attractions are inspired by Disney/Pixar films. Crush's Coaster is a spinning indoor coaster based on Finding Nemo, and Cars Race Rally is a teacups-style ride based on, indeed, Cars. Curious as to what they've created, and as a good excuse to add a few days in the real Paris, I've booked two Thalys tickets.

On my most recent visit to the blood bank, faithful and friendly receptionist Leo handed me this guy on the right: a stuffed pelican as an acknowledgment of my 40th donation. Thanks! I've been a blood donor for some years now, but my blood type is not that useful for regular donations: I've got type AB, which means I can receive any other type of blood, but mine can only be given to others that also have AB (about 3% of the population). That's why they've asked me to become a plasma donor, meaning that during your donation, the blood cells are returned to you while they get to keep the plasma. One advantage is that this is less strenuous and thus can be done more often than regular donations. Donating blood is really easy: register at the blood bank, and get a call around 2-3 times a year. You then may show up at any moment in the two weeks following the call. You get free coffee, a sandwich and a medical check. I can recommend it to anyone (who's eligible). And to answer the FAQ: no, you don't get paid. Edit: facts apply to the Netherlands only. No pelicans were hurt in blogging this post. Your blood type may vary.