prof. dr. harald c. gall was appointed as an extraordinary professor in software engineering by the unizh/ifi. his current home page looks promising.
changes
a) blogrolling.com was way too unreliable and sluggish. i thus replaced it by the previous simple but reliable and fast link list. my suggestion to the blogrolling-gang: use active tracking of changes instead of just relying on pings.
b) added a new plugin called simplecomments. it treats trackbacks (“pings”) as comments which makes it handy for creating “last comments/pings” listings. the relevant code on this site is:
<div class="sidetitle"> Latest comments/pings </div>
<div class="side"> <MTSimpleComments lastn="5" sort_order="descend"> <:MTSimpleCommentIfTrackback> <a name="trackback-<MTPingID>"></a> » <b><a href="<MTPingURL>"><MTPingBlogName></a></b> (<a href="<$MTPingURL$>"><$MTPingTitle$>..</a>)<br /> </MTSimpleCommentIfTrackback> <MTSimpleCommentIfComment> <a name="comment-<MTCommentID>"></a> » <b><$MTCommentAuthorLink$></b> <MTCommentEntry> (<a href="<$MTEntryLink$>"><$MTEntryTitle$>..</a>) </MTCommentEntry><br /> </MTSimpleCommentIfComment> </MTSimpleComments> </div>
c) added a category archive and a listing of category mappings for each entry. further added some numbers for counting entries per category and per month.
semantic web vs. semantic web
mindmanager X5 Pro for the semantic web?
if we’re talking about the “semantic web” as basically just another “non-intelligent” tool for intelligent people, then tools such as mindmanager (as any other content editing/linking tool) might indeed be helpful for building it (why shouldn’t it be? ;)
my take is (as stated earlier), that this kind of “semantic web” is possibly fine for the next say ten years or so. it’s a rather pragmatic view of the “semantic web” but as a matter of fact this view suffers from an old-fashioned approach which will never allow the “semantic web” reach a higher level than that of just being a tool. (there are many problems with the current approach such as the frame-of-reference, categorization, generalization, adaptation, symbol grounding problems, lacking emergence etc.)
if however we are interested in making things intelligent, a new approach is needed. this approach should try applying some of the principles of “new ai” (brooks, pfeifer et al.) in “virtual worlds” (true “new ai” advocates may shudder when reading this ;). i have some ideas how to start with this.
a good starting point for anybody interested in this field is “understanding intelligence“.
secure filesystem synchronization across the internet
the secure shell filesystem can replace filesystem synchronization tools if used with a central linux server and linux clients. however, for cross-platform environments such as mine, the unison file synchronizer is the tool of choice.
apple 15″ aluminium powerbook: in no way..
..will i buy broken hardware! see
PowerBook-Käufer klagen über Display-Fehler (german only)
pictorial 1, pictorial 2, pictorial 3
apple discussion forum
online petition (if you’re already past the “point of no return”)
i’ll cancel my 15″ alu powerbook order on monday.
is this supposed to be apple quality? (source: ln -s)
2.6.0-test7 and gcc problems
first i’ve thought that the sudden gcc compilation failures have to do with a gentoo-specific gcc/headers problem, then i’ve stumbled over the following lkml message (see the whole thread)
[PATCH][2.6] constant_test_bit doesn’t like my gcc
so in case you experience the same problem, you know what to do :)
blogroll
i’ve finally migrated my tiny “blogroll” to blogrolling.com. no changes content-wise (so far). i’m still waiting for the most cynical blog (“the dullest blog in the world”) to rise from the dead. else i will have to remove it *sniff*.
blogrolling.com does not really offer the thing i am looking for (a pull to push converter for better scalability). looks like i’d need to implement such a service myself. like this, i could also implement notification upon new comments on others’ blogs. i don’t get why comments aren’t included in any bloggersoft’s rdf feed i know of. the rdf grammar is pretty general actually.
ada rocks
ada is a great programming language. i started reading a tutorial a while ago and i’ve even made initial gentoo ebuilds of gnat therefore (unfortunately i’ve lost those and several other nice ebuilds prior to submitting them). now all ada-related stuff in gentoo is maintained by david holm (which is a good thing as he’s proficient in ada).
i’m still a bloody beginner regarding ada, but i’m looking forward to digging deeper.
i’m im’ing now ;)
icq: 196122009 (thanx to stephan for tips). ids of other im providers will eventually follow. i know that i already have a msn id (iirc “h2o_ch”) (“thanx” to windows xp product activation), but i did not use it so far (i guess it’s not supported with my current im client). i also set up an icq account long ago, but unfortunately i don’t remember its id/credentials (r.i.p.). further, as soon as i got my powerbook i will create an id for the aol im (as this is supported by ichat). btw the powerbook will be shipped with mac os x 10.3 “panther” included :)
currently, sim doesn’t work as expected yet (my server-side contact list isn’t available and i doubt i can be contacted at all). might have to do with my firewall. beg your patience.
[update 20031013: it was a client problem. now i’ve rebuilt sim from cvs sources and it seems to work fine]
google.ch censors too..
..sadly (*). that’s the disadvantage (some follow-ups: 1, 2, 3) when using a us-based search engine from within switzerland where dmca fortunately doesn’t exist (yet?). at least google is clever enough to publish the complaint.
is there any more evidence needed why mr. stricker’s case is important to all of us who live in .ch?
(*) in german: “Aufgrund einer Klage, die sich auf den Digital Millennium Copyright Act bezieht, haben wir 1 Ergebnis(se) von dieser Seite entfernt. Wenn Sie wollen, können Sie die DMCA-Klage lesen, die zur Entfernung dieser Ergebnisse geführt hat.”