Author: Owen

a backtrace with umph

not what you expect to see when debugging an app:

Unhandled Exception: System.DllNotFoundException: sqlite
in <0x00053> (wrapper managed-to-native) Mono.Data.SqliteClient.SqliteConnection:sqlite_open (string,int,string&)
in [0x00031] (at /cvs/mcs/class/Mono.Data.SqliteClient/Mono.Data.SqliteClient/SqliteConnection.cs:157) Mono.Data.SqliteClient.SqliteConnection:Open ()
in [0x00063] (at /home/owen/src/gnome/dashboard/index/sources-manager.cs:101) Dashboard.Index.SourcesManager:.ctor (string)
in [0x00070] (at /home/owen/src/gnome/dashboard/index/index-manager.cs:93) Dashboard.Index.IndexManager:.ctor (string)
in [0x00013] (at /home/owen/src/gnome/dashboard/index/text-indexer.cs:38) FuckNut:Main (string[])

Grueling work

I’ve been putting in a ton of hours at work trying to get a show out the door to Discovery Channel. Here is what happens while online editors are waiting for complicated effects to render.

Windows jump around when clicking on workspaces in pager

If you are running Fedora Core 2 with Sawfish as your window manager, and you notice that when you click on workspaces in the pager your windows jump around randomly, there’s an easy fix to get it working again:

Download the source code to libwnck, build it, and install it on top of the rpm Fedora Core 2 provided to you. This was an old bug that was fixed long ago, but for some reason the RPM of libwnck still has it.

software I need

I often have ideas for software projects, some of which I even think I might be capable of writing. I don’t make time for writing software, however, so they never get done. In case I get amnesia and forget, here are some programs I wish I had (you can also interpret this as lame-o nerd posts wishlist):

  • GNOME panel rss ticker applet: Straw should integrate with the gnome panel to provide a ticker applet. Headlines would run by, and a click could either bring up the article in straw or the link in a browser. Perhaps it could sense mouse proximity and slow down the ticker as the mouse gets close. You could do cool things like make make stories which are repeated among multiple blogs bolder or bigger (could look at link targets or common keywords)
  • Live squencer / sampler for DJing: You could do live electronic music based on the idea of initiating samples and letting them loop. You could gang loops together and alter them (pan, pitch, etc) in real time, allowing a dj to do live production. The interface should be totally keyboard driven for convenience. On import, loops would be bpm’d so that they all line up perfectly
  • GStreamer-based video editing: Obviously people are working toward this and thinking about it, but after being trained on an Avid Nitris DS I think the OSS community should really aim high and look at what other people have done. Things like unbiquitous keyframing and a line graph view for those keyframes are extremely powerful features. This is one application where the HIG might have to go out the window. Editors don’t care about discoverable, they want every possible way to color-correct their video. The HIG is important, but don’t let it stand in the way of a top-class app. In other words, aiming to be an Adobe Premiere replacement isn’t going to cut it. If you can replace a 150,000$ package you’re going to be attractive. The product doesn’t have to have chroma-keying with spill mattes from day one, but someone on the project should at least know what that means, and the software should be extensible enough to support it.
  • Web-based RSS feed reading for mobile phones. oh wait I wrote that

Providence Trip

So about, uh, a month ago, Char and I took a day-trip to Providence. It was meant to be a “week-end
getaway,” but I’m a slacker so we couldn’t get a hotel for the night. But we had a very enjoyable day.

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Char on the train

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A town square along the way

We took the Amtrak train down to Providence, and it was fast and cheap. We even got Acela tickets, so it
only took 30 minutes to get there. Basically it’s as fast to get to Providence than it is to get to Davis Square.

When we got to Providence, we bought a map and started wandering around to get a feel of the place. I’d never been there, so I didn’t really know where to start. We knew we were going to the zoo later on, and we knew we wanted to eat breakfast in a diner, but finding a diner was more difficult than you’d think.

It seems that Providence has fallen victim to a giant sucking leach of a mall, which is situated right next to the train station. It’s a few football fields long and 4 stories high, and has every single stupid chain store you’ve ever heard of. Just when Char said “boy too bad there’s no Guess store!” We turned a corner and found one. We left the mall, and tried to find our little diner. We walked around the downtown, and found just about every single store and restaurant closed and boarded up. There was abosolutely no business being done outside the mall. Finally we found one last little place called the Metro Cafe (189 Weybosset St) and ate there.

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Char matches the restaurant

We went to the zoo in Providence, and other than it being overrun by kids it was nice. Zoos are depressing places, because rather than being gleefully ignorant we’re crushingly aware of the general cruelty of keeping wild animals in small places with nowhere to run and nothing to do but follow the shady spot around the pen all day. I don’t think it’s a matter of being too PC either, I think zoos are a concept whose time has passed. When was the last time you heard of a brand new beautiful zoo going up somewhere?

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Temporary holding pen for giraffes while the new (quite large) pen gets finished

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giraffe: wha?

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Cutey lamb

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Cutey bunny

Char demanded a new friend, so I got her a cute little snow leopard. She named it “Mocha chip.”

We also saw the real thing

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Snow Leopard chillin’

When we left the zoo we saw one of Char’s favorite animals, a wood duck

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Wood ducks, actually

I still feel bad for screwing up the hotel thing and only getting one day in Providence, but we’re probably going to go back again, next time to Newport. We’ll get a cute bed and breakfast and everything, really.

tip: apache won’t start, semphore problems

if you’re getting things like:

(28)No space left on device: mod_python: Failed to create global mutex 23 of 32 (/tmp/blahblahblah).
[Wed Apr 14 11:53:47 2004] [error] mod_python: We can probably continue, but with diminished ability to process session locks.
[Wed Apr 14 11:53:47 2004] [error] mod_python: Hint: On Linux, the problem may be the number of available semaphores, check 'sysctl kernel.sem'
(28)No space left on device: Couldn't create accept lock

then this tip is for you!
Continue reading “tip: apache won’t start, semphore problems”

A grand night out

WELL WELL WELL. It’s been a long-ass time since I last wrote an entry with actual large photos instead of small mobile phone photos. The simple reason for this was that my digital camera batteries
were dead. My rechargable batteries had been dying for a while, so that they lasted not very long at all on
a charge. I decided it was time to pony up and buy some new rechargable batteries. I paid 30 bucks or so and
got a really nice set of 2200mah batteries with new charger. I took them home, charged them up, and dropped
them in my camera.

And nothing happened. The camera didn’t turn on. I have since tried the batteries in other devices, and
they work fine. But for some reason my camera just refuses to acknowledge their existence. I don’t get it at
all. I thought perhaps it had something to do with the voltage of the rechargables, which is 1.2v, whereas
normal AA batteries are 1.5v. But my old rechargable batteries were 1.2 volt too.

So, I had spent a ton of money on batteries that didn’t work, and I still had no batteries for my camera. And
that’s how I’ve left it since December 6th. It’s amazing how frustration over nonfunctional batteries has
kept my nice digital camera in its bag for four months, a third of a year. Eventually I decided I had to get
new batteries, and I picked up some heavy-duty CR-V3 batteries at a local shop. We’ll see how long they last

So last night Char and I hung out with Mike, Char’s friend that she met on an airplane from Chicago; Jesi and Ragnar, two of Mike’s friends; and Marissa, our roommate. Mike, Jesi, Ragnar and I started the night off by playing some bridge (not photographed, except maybe Ragnar has a picture). Ragnar was apparently on the Icelandic national bridge team, so he’s a much better tutor to us than I was to my friends at school. While we were nerding it up, Char and Marissa went to a local bar/club/bowling alley for salsa night. They came back quite quickly, saying it was lame. Apparently the club was overrun with strange guys that weren’t worth picking up, or something.

After a few more hands of bridge, someone got the idea that we should all go back to the club and go bowling.

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Take the lamers bowling, take them bowling.

But let’s not jump ahead! On the way to the bowling alley, we saw the most nerdy graffiti ever.

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WGBH graffiti

WGBH is the local public television station in Boston, if you didn’t know. Why anyone would scrawl
their callsign on a bus seat is a mystery to me, although the other marks may be a clue. I can’t read them.

So we went bowling! Here’s me:

I spent the first 7 frames of the night trying to figure out how to bowl straight, and in the last
two I finally felt like I had figured it out. Unfortunately by then it was too late. Marissa, with her
classic between-the-legs consistancy style, had bowled her way to a close victory over Jesi.

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Mike, Jesi, and Ragnar havin’ fun

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Char gets unwanted affection from Mike

I should mention that bowling was not cheap. There was a ten dollar cover at the door, and it was twenty-five dollars an hour to bowl. So it came out to about 75$ for six people for one hour of bowling. Of
course there was more in the club than just bowling. It was salsa night! Everyone (minus me) danced a bit,
and when it was over, the DJ mentioned that it wasn’t 1:30, it was actually 2:30. Ho ho daylight savings! (Astute readers will note that daylight savings doesn’t really come into effect until 2:00am, but whatever.)
So we left the club, and walked back to the bus stop. We waited for the bus, wondering if the bus was running as if it were 1:45 or 2:45. We waited a while. We were getting bored, and everyone was talking about how they
were’nt tired, and then Ragnar mentioned there was a Japanese restaurant in Chinatown that is open til 3:30 or
later. We got the number thanks to my little phone, and called them up. Thanks to daylight savings, they were
staying open to 4:30 that night. Score!

We did some gymnastics involving my taking a cab home to get a map and the car and packing everyone into my
tiny acura, and then we were off to Ginza in chinatown. I made many amazing maneuvers avoiding potholes and
cutting people off necessarily. We got a great parking space.

And so, we had Sushi in Boston at four in the morning

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Char, me, Mike, Ragnar, Marissa, and Jesi

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Mike always makes faces

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Beware if you are playing bridge with this man

I also took some stupid movies with my camera. They are about 4 megs each, and use some form of quicktime.
They work on linux (Fedora is what I have), so if they don’t work for you you have no excuse.

We had an awesome time, and even though it was expensive and I didn’t get to bed until around six it was
totally worth it. I have photos around my room of my old group of friends, like Nick and Grant and Alex and
Meaghan, and I was looking at them the other day wistfully. I don’t know if we’ll ever be all together like
that again. Probably not. That group had its moment, and its unlikely it will ever be reformed. I look at the group photo I took last night, and I see that although my friends from college have
spread out, I have a new group of buddies to play bridge with and eat sushi with — at least for now. College students will graduate, people will move on, but at least right now I have mike and jesi and ragnar and marissa. Thanks guys.

Kerry Kontribution

In honor of Atrios’ John Kerry Thursdays, I gave 25$ to the campaign. Hopefully that will buy the beta tape that the next killer campaign ad goes on. Kerry’s up against a 250$ million war chest, so I’m willing to help out a bit.

Grey Tuesday

A musician named DJ Danger Mouse took two albums — The Beatles White album and Jay-Z’s Black Album — and mixed them together, resulting in The Grey Album. I’m not a hip-hop fan, and I get uncomfortable when my speakers start shouting “nigga,” so I normally wouldn’t be interested in something like this. Except that DJ Danger Mouse is not being allowed to sell his record because the Beatles’ people (EMI) won’t allow him to infringe on their copyright. Jay-Z specifically released a vocals-only version of his album so that people could do exactly this, but EMI is living in some sort of rhetorical hole where artistic creations and variations based on their “properties” are somehow dangerous.

In honor of the right to create new culture based on existing culture, 40 years old and otherwise, today has been declared Grey Tuesday, and sites across the web are posting The Grey Album in protest of EMI’s pigheaded actions.

I downloaded the entire album off of Limewire in about five minutes. I’ve removed the local version, I don’t have the bandwidth to keep it up for any period of time.