David, you wrote about Class::DBI performance. Even without benchmarking you could have found out, that Class::DBI is quite slow. Fortunately there are some alternative object-relational mappers available in the perl universe. The best ones I found so far are Rose::DB::Object and DBIx::Class. I took a closer look at both and would like to share my experience. As this shows, RDBO is faster than DBIC in most of the case. The generated SQL doesn't differ too much and therefor it must be the perl side of things that makes the difference. Matt S Trout <dbix-class@trout.me.uk> says:

  However, RDBO achieves its perl speed by aggressive inlining of stuff
  etc. - for example the main object retrieval function in RDBO's manager
  class is >3000 lines in a single sub. DBIC values extensibility over a
  few extra sub calls, so methods are much more broken out and there are
  many more ways to hook into the DBIC execution process to extend.

Also its idea of resultsets is something I really love. Here's a small example to illustrate that:

  my $user_rs = $schema->resultset('User')->search(  registered => 1  );
  $user_rs    = $user_rs->search(
		    comment.title => 'Foo'  ,
		   
		  	join     =>   'article' => 'comment'  ,
			order_by => 'user.name',
		   ,
  );

  # no sql executed yet.
  # now you can use your resultset as an iterator or query a list of User
  # objects from it or ..

  while (my $user = $user_rs->next)  
	  ...
   

  # or

  my $count = $user_rs->count;

Using these resultset makes it extremely easy to built up queries piece by piece and to work together well with, for example, a templating system. You don't need to fetch all row-objects and give them to your template. You can just pass the iterator to the template library. There's a lot more to say about this two object-relational mappers (for example RDBO supports prefetching of multiple one-to-many at once, which DBIC doesn't), but maybe you just should take a look yourself. I personally prefer DBIx::Class for its vast extensibility.

Charles DiBona: “We think that Google poses a threat to Microsoft long-term by offering an alternate platform for application development. But we also believe that Microsoft recognizes this threat and is investing appropriately in its own operations to counter it.”

I had long thought that Sexism was a thing of the past; that women would have the ability to do what they wanted, and would mostly not be discriminated against. And while I was not so naive to think that there was no discrimination at all, I was under the impression that any such discrimination would mostly be something the discriminator did not think of consciously. That things like people being rejected outright for a job because they were women, and, well, "women can't work as well as men", were stories of the past. At least if I did ever discriminate against women, it never was intentional. Little did I realize how far away from the truth that was. As some troll's recent mails show, there are actually people out there who do thinkn that the influx of Women into Debian should be stopped, and that Debian should be a men only club. Our coward is too afraid to post under his real name, instead relying on tor and throwaway yahoo accounts to mask his identity. So let's call him 'Anonymous coward'. Occasionally, this is the main reason why I don't like tor; full anonymity should not be allowed, one should be able to have people stand up for what they say, and face the consequences. Anyway, that's a different story, for another time. What puzzles me is how anyone would think that there could possibly be a correlation between orphaned packages and the existance of Debian-Women. Personally, I've been happy that there is a Debian-Women which strives to make our community more complete; the lack of women (or any considerable part of the world population, for that matter) is a serious disadvantage for any community that tries to do something for the "greater good". Personally, I'm disgusted and offended by the mails this moron is sending; and even though I realize that there probably still is some (unconscious) discrimination against women, I can hope to safely say that Debian is tolerant regarding people that represent a minority amongst its community members. Even Jonathan Walther, whom we kicked out for (amongst other reasons) trolling on the debian-women mailinglist, never (to the best of my knowledge) said anything which implied that he thought Debian-Women should be disbanded (although he, err, had a "different" idea of what they should be doing). I guess all this only means we don't live in a utopia, and that Debian is not free of the plagues that will hit any sufficiently large community. But that doesn't negate the fact that I'm still offended by this lunatic.

This May I spent four consecutive weeks abroad, visiting first Debconf6 (including the Debcamp that preceded it), and then Los Angeles afterwards. I won't write a detailed report of everything that happened; nobody likes to read pages after pages of descriptions of meals and such. Instead, I'll jot down a few memories of moments. It's still long, sorry about that. May 6, about 3 AM, at home. Waiting outside for a taxi. Pretty tired already: spent the night frantically weighing all my clothes to optimize my packing. It is warm enough to wait outside without a jacket. The night is calm and beautiful. Mankind is so much nicer when it sleeps. May 6, about 4 AM, the Helsinki airport. I bump into Tuukka and Tulitar, who are on the same plane. Kaol also joins us, but that I knew beforehand. I'm suddenly much less apprehensive about the long flight. May 6, Mexico City airport. We meet more Debian people. The first taxi driver we're assigned seems to be suspect somehow. The other taxi drivers rebel and our luggage is put into another car, with another driver. I have no idea what is actually going on, but that develops into a theme for the Mexican part of the trip. May 6, Oaxtepec. We're finally here, but it seems very difficult for us to get rooms. While we wait, we and some of the people who arrived earlier go to a restaurant. The Germans want to order the same thing for everyone, but fail to agree on what, so eventually we order all the steaks on the menu. The food is good, but the restaurant staff would probably have preferred to go home at closing time. We eventually get rooms and I collapse into bed. Debcamp week, Oaxtepec. We have network. We don't have network. We have network. We don't have network. We have network. We don't have network. We're frustrated all the time. I was supposed to do billable work (related to Debian, even), and can't. Should've prepared for this possiblity. I'm too dependent on a good Internet connection, need to figure out to reduce this dependency. To have something else to do, I start the Mugshots project: take a photo of everyone together with a paper with their name, or IRC nick, or anything else they want to say about themselves. Debconf, late one evening. Everyone is partying one way or another, drinking, dancing, discussing. Lots of people around already. Nice people. Still I withdraw into myself. I'm physically present, but not interacting. Never know what to say; exhausted by having to remember who everyone is. I'm introverted, and deal better with smaller gatherings. My life's ambition is to become a multi-millionaire recluse. Debconf, late another evening, Oaxtepec. Everyone else is getting drunk, and it affects me. I make the silly bet about Debian releasing on time: if we do, I'll get a Debian tattoo. Not to worry, I win either way. Debconf, some evening or another. I participate in a game of Mao. It is an unpleasant game, for me. I suspected this beforehand, but now I've verified it. It is best for everyone if I never play again, now that I know enough to at least try to reach my personal, alternative goals in the game, which make the game less fun for everyone else. (Better for me too, since I make fewer enemies.) Debconf, day after formal dinner. I learn that Jonathan (Ted) Walther is gone. Good riddance. I suprise myself with the amount of glee I feel when removing him from the Mugshots gallery. (That, incidentally, was something I decided all by myself. It's my gallery, after all.) Debconf. The sponsored food is quite acceptable, but eventually becomes boring and bland. Mass-kitchen food can't but help to be like that, I guess, unless it gets expensive. I don't want to see another chicken leg ever. Debconf, early in the week. Droidy (Leena) and Burger (Ville) arrive. Very nice. Helps massively with my withdrawnness to have real life friends around. I still go early to bed, though, instead of participating in the partying. Debconf, late in the week. I get Ville and Frans Pop to talk and Ville agrees to have look at the installation manual. He's an actual (former) professional tech writer, so hopefully will be able to improve it a lot. May 22, Oaxtepec. Last day. I spend all morning packing, checking out, and waiting for a taxi. Strangely relaxing. Debconf is finally over, and although I did enjoy parts of it, and don't regret coming, I'm not sad it's over. May 22, evening, Los Angeles. Julie and Kristian meet me at the airport. Hugging happens. Happiness happens. I get my first taste of LA traffic, which seems to mostly consist of people complaining about how slow it is while driving very fast. May 23, the Promenade, Los Angeles. A three block long walking street of shops, with three (count them: three) bookstores. The two I have time for even smelled nice. I am in hog heaven. Colossal credit card cringing. May 24, Getty Center. A very nice, very impressive place architecturally. The art is good too. As usual, the impressionists make the strongest impression on me, but there's lots of other good stuff, too. Not everything, though: Robert Adams's photographs leave me unimpressed, possibly I lack the cultural reference points necessary to appreciate them. He has many photos of shabby temporary shelter-like houses that in reality seem to be nice south-western US houses from the 60s and 70s. My intuition just screams that the houses and their inhabitants won't survive their first winter. But of course, they don't have a cold winter there. The rest of the exhibition (or what I have time to see) has way too many portraits for one session. Portraits get boring after the first dozen or so, I'm afraid, unless there's something extraordinary about them. They are several rooms rebuilt from 18th century French aristocratic houses. Very nice, very pretty, but I would not like to live that uncomfortably. I have a small epiphany about nudity in art in one of the rooms with statues. I've always known nudity could be portrayed erotically, such as having two lovers embrace passionately; or that it could be portrayed more or less abstractly, using the human body, or parts of it, just because it can be a very beautiful subject, just like a flower, but without giving it a greater significance. It's decoration, nothing more. There are two statues in the Getty collection that show me a third way. They are exquisitely sensual, evoking a sense of form and texture that make me think of human skin and flesh, a sense that if one were to touch the statue, it would feel like touching a live human. Yet none of this is erotic at all. I'm not sure I can explain this, one may have to experience it for oneself. Unfortunately, I was too overwhelmed to write down the names of the statues. May 23, Los Angeles. The food takes me by surprise. Julie has always told me that food in LA is good, much better than in Finland, but she hadn't prepared me for an all-out assault on my palate. Dine well in LA and die happy. (When I go back to Finland, I will have to learn again how to cook, dammit.) May 25, Los Angeles. Jesus reminds me via SMS about the Towel Day. I participate. My hosts think I'm a bit weird, but in a funny way. Many happy days in May, Los Angeles. I visit the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (exhibiting a weird Italian designer, some boring Klimt paintings, and a very nice general collection); the Natural history museum of LA (dinosaurs! real skeletons! big ones! T.Rex! for the first time in my life! they're huge!); the Museum of Jurassic Technology (weird); had dinner with some local Debian people, and visited the local Google office afterwards; the Hollywood Boulevard at night (funny, for a while). And other places I've forgotten already. LA is not small. I visit a political theater play that is brilliant. I also visit my first American BBQ, and have my first experience with the LA gay community at the same time. I'm later told that these two are separable. I enjoy them both a lot. I visit more bookstores. My hosts keep finding new ones they want to recommend to me. Parking would be a pain in LA, except that it means that people do actually walk a lot, since the nearest parking space is always three blocks away, or five levels up without an elevator. May 28, Los Angeles. I innocently mention that LA is such a nice place, with nice people and gorgeous food, that I wouldn't mind living there. Julie's brother hears this and immediately connects me with someone he knows whose company is looking for new people. During the next three days, we meet and talk and things seem favorable. Even if I decide not to go (it may be too huge a change for me now), it's nice to feel appreciated. June 1, Los Angeles. Leaving for home. Not a sad thing, but I'm definitely feeling wistful. I get hugged about fourteen thousand times. Parting is such sweet sorrow. I will definitely have to go back to LA, one day.

My last.fm status is "subscriber", though I never subscribed. Interesting. I thought maybe it was a test subscription of one month for my birthday or so (which was less then one month ago), but why didn't I get any mail to tell me of this test subscription then? Weird. So if anyone "secretly donated" this subscription to me, please, don't. But who would do so without telling me? I'm happy with their free service... So if you insist on wasting some money on me, consider my amazon wishlist instead (though I don't really care much about that stuff either...). Well, maybe the "ad" message was just delivered to the spam folder. After all, there is still a "subscribe" button on the last.fm page.

I think the current brouhaha surrounding PDF functionality in Office 2007 is an excellent object lesson in why software patents shouldn’t be allowed anywhere near an Open Standard (and software in general!). I’m not sure if a patent is the tool of choice that Adobe is wielding in this particular example, but even if it’s not Patent’s present a large risk to Open Standards and should be resisted. It’s the same as the distinction between a Shared Source program and Open Source or Free Software. You may have the source code for a shared source program and be able to see how it is implemented and how it operates, but there are restrictions preventing you from doing anything with that information. Likewise a standard shouldn’t be called Open simply because you have details on how it is implemented (although that is undoubtably a critical part of openness). An Open Standard should be one which is openly specified and completely free of any other encumberances (such as patents). Unfortunately I don’t see any of the standards bodies making this a priority. My understanding of the IETF RFC process is that you have to file a statement stating any IP claims but you’re not prevented from standardising somethign that you hold a patent on. W3C and the IEEE seem slightly less prone to this problem as they tend to have committee oriented standards process that require more interaction, but I’m still not aware of any direct efforts to prevent parts of the resulting standard from becoming patent encumbered. If the lack of truly Open Standards can bite Microsoft it can bit any of us. It’s not an issue we should be ignoring.

Recently I was working on an application for ICRA2006 and I needed to output some data to be read by Excel. This would seem like an easy problem, just output in CSV and Excel can open the text just fine. Unfortunately Excel has one of the most backwards implementations of international character support that I have ever worked with. Being nieve to this, I simply tried UTF-8. I was greeted with multiple strange characters in the place of my normal umlauted and tilde-d letters. A quick search turned up that when Excel reads a CSV, it assumes that it is in ASCII or . However, you can import the CSV as a text file and select it as unicode. This is where my real pet peeve is: You can't select the character set of a CSV in Excel. You have to rename the file as a .TXT file and go through a wizard, basically spelling out that yes, it is comma separated and yes, this is the data I want to import. There's one drop down box which specifies the character set. Of course Unicode is supported there.

In the search for a solution to this problem which didn't involve a 10-step process for the customer, I discovered the Unicode marker which is supported by Wordpad, but amazingly, does nothing but add a bit of garbage in Excel. The sad part is that I can be almost certain that the next version of Office will continue to have this problem. My only hope is that somehow the XML format will be open enough to just create a native Excel file.

SELinux is an official release goal for etch. However, we're currently far from that. So far, very few developers are actually using SELinux (if any), or even testing it. I won't be doing anything on SELinux for the next 6 weeks at least, more likely 6 months. So currently I don't see how we can manage this goal, unless more DDs (and of course users; you don't need to be allowed to upload packages) help getting SELinux properly integrated. (You can run SELinux on etch without having to recompile any software I think, but you'll have to do quite a bit of customizing yourself right now.) For a coordinated effort to get SELinux into shape for etch, there are Debian SELinux mailing lists, but so far they're basically unused. [Update: yes, one option is to remove SELinux from the etch release goals. I was in fact rather surprised to see SELinux listed there.] [Update #2: It was pointed out, that the first occurence of "release goals" in that mail is prefixed by "pet". Don't ask me what the difference between a release goal and a pet release goal is, though. I guess something like being in an official wishlist...]

Since the prolific-based 3.5" firewire+usb external HDD box I have is total crap (it often stops and restarts the disk, going readonly and losing data), I've been looking for a different drive. Unfortunately, I havn't been successful so far. The cheap computer stores around here all seem to only have drives with (probabliy newer revisions of) this chipset... and I'd really like to avoid buying another prolific crap. I updated yesterday to the latest firmware for the PL3507, and I also checked that the drive I put in the box doesn't have any errors. Didn't help. The drive still is very unreliable, in both firewire and USB mode. Unfortunately, my laptop only has USB 1, otherwise I'd buy an USB-only box which supposedly uses a different chipset.

As promised before, I uploaded the medium and high quality photos from DebCamp, DebConf, the daytrips to Teotihuacan and Xochicalco, and LUG Camp into my gallery. Have fun. Update: Unfortunately I forgot to adjust the date on my digicam from CDT back to CET, so the time in the exif tags from the photos I made at LUG Camp was 7 hours behind. This problem can be fixed using the -ta option of jhead, thanks Colin for the hint.

Robert Love: “In Google’s calculation, the cost of a native port outweighed the benefit of a native [port] v s-a-v s a WINE-fueled Picasa. Is that really unexpected? Our development platform is no shining star. We have two toolkits, poor binary compatibility, and unclear direction. To be sure, vendors such as Novell are devoting increasing effort toward improving the Linux ISV and platform story. But the community must make it a priority as well, from the kernel up through the highest levels of the graphical desktop.” That’s part of it (and certainly an accurate assessment of the kind of thinking we need as a community to make Linux a better platform). I think there’s another part of it, though, and that’s that operating systems in general are fundamentally uninteresting to Google as platforms in themselves, as well they should be—after all, the web is Google’s platform, and they dominate there, so why should they promote an alternative where they are much weaker? In my view, the (fat) client bits merely exist to ease the transition from the current, predominantly desktop centric world to a new web centric world where Google naturally thrives. After all, such paradigm shifts are always gradual. There’s the offline question too—if all your data is in the cloud, how do you get to it when you’re not online?—though I suspect over time the browser will provide offline capabilities of some sort, so this is largely a temporary problem too. So, using Wine in ports not only minimizes the incremental cost of building out a foothold on the client (which, again, is a necessity for Google, given that Google’s biggest competitor is between them and 90% of their customers), but it raises the fat client platform up a level too. In other words, it builds a fat client platform with a consistent look and feel across desktop environments; and with this, the operating system underneath rapidly becomes irrelevant. The real question is when Google will hook Picasa into a photo sharing service of its own. I already keep my photos in the cloud, and I’d love to organize and edit them in Picasa (Organizr is nice, but nowhere near as nice as a desktop application, and it doesn’t have some basic functionality, like import from camera and red eye repair). Of course, this is just one example of Google having some platform thinking issues of its own, though that’ll have to be a rant for another day.

This page uses the motion sensors present in some new harddrives in an interesting way. Check out the flash/youtube video. It's too funny. My laptops harddrive doesn't have motion sensors - but it has two very nice keys I use for desktop switching, right next to the cursor keys. Of all key combinations I've used so far for desktop switching this is the one I love most... Unfortunately, this is a very unusual keyboard layout, and I think even IBM/Lenovo doesn't have these keys on newer models any more. A shame.

Since many "office" people love to send "funny" powerpoints around via email (which is stupid, because email is ~40% slower than others) we need to provide them with an application to do this much easier. Time to create the first pptcast. Or is ist pptfeed? pptlog? Fortunately I'm not interested in reading them.

I have to agree with Joey, I have the feeling that we’re not doing many “transversal” improvements and that we’re busy enough simply trying to keep up with new upstream version of software. That’s not completely true but I also wouldn’t want Debian to evolve in that direction. I think that less people are interested in doing large scale changes because the coordination with 1000 maintainers and 10000 packages is simply too complicated and taking too much time. Luckily we had significant improvements recently that should ease that coordination work. I’m thinking mainly of the usertags that allow us to use the BTS as big TODO list. But usertags are obscure to many people and not well documented yet. So there’s room for improvements: that’s why I proposed a project for Google’s Summer of code called “Distribution-wide tracker tools” (see list of accepted projects here). Check the project proposal of Arnaud Fontaine to have a more precise idea of what it could give. I want this infrastructure because I think it may help Utnubu to effectively coordinate the integration of Ubuntu improvements and because it may help Debian be more on the leading edge (instead of trying to catchup with derivatives). And last but not least, I believe many more people (with different level of skills) will be able to effectively work on some projects once the work to do has been clearly identified and registered in such a system. The project is about to start, so all ideas/comments are welcome of course!