If I ever get some time, I'll try to install a web server on a TV. Just for the fun of it. :)
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Linux server on a TV
It just came to my attention today that the LG 6000 Scarlet television is running Linux on a 2.6 kernel, can be controlled remotely via serial port, and even includes a PCMCIA slot. Technically, since it is running Linux already, using a PCMCIA network card, one could even install a web server, or ssh server, or ...
If I ever get some time, I'll try to install a web server on a TV. Just for the fun of it. :)
If I ever get some time, I'll try to install a web server on a TV. Just for the fun of it. :)
Monday, September 29, 2008
Things that a Sane Person Hates
I had seen this list long ago on some website, which I unfortunately cannot remember. I tried looking for it again today but I couldn't - did it disappear from the Internet or what? I decided to "save" it from extinction by posting it on my blog - and give you people a good laugh :) So, here you go!
Oh, and leave a comment if you have anything to add :)
Things that a Sane Person Hates
*You have to try on a pair of sunglasses with that stupid little plastic
thing in the middle of them.....
*The person behind you in the supermarket runs his cart into the back of
your ankle.....
*The elevator stops on every floor and nobody gets on.....
*There's always a car riding your tail when you're slowing down to find
an address.....
*You open a can of soup and the lid falls in.....
*It's bad enough that you step in dog doo doo, but you don't realize it
till you walk across your living room rug.....
*The tiny red string on the Band-Aid wrapper never works for you.....
*There's a dog in the neighborhood that barks at EVERYTHING.....
*You can never put anything back in a box the way it came.....
*Three hours and three meetings after lunch you look in the mirror and
discover a piece of parsley stuck to your front tooth.....
*You drink from a soda can into which someone has extinguished a
cigarette.....
*You slice your tongue licking an envelope.....
*Your tire gauge lets out half the air while you're trying to get a
reading.....
*A station comes in brilliantly when you're standing near the radio, but
buzzes, drifts and spits every time you move away.....
*There are always one or two ice cubes that won't pop out of the
tray.....
*You wash a garment with a tissue in the pocket and your entire laundry
comes out covered with lint.....
*The car behind you blasts its horn because you let a pedestrian finish
crossing.....
*A piece of foil candy wrapper makes electrical contact with your
filling.....
*You set the alarm on your digital clock for 7pm instead of 7am.....
*The radio station doesn't tell you who sang that.....
*You rub on hand cream and can't turn the bathroom doorknob to get
out.....
*People behind you on a supermarket line dash ahead of you to a counter
just opening up.....
*Your glasses slide off your ears when you perspire.....
*You can't look up the correct spelling of a word in the dictionary
because you don't know how to spell it.....
*You have to inform five different sales people in the same store that
you're just browsing.....
*You had that pen in your hand only a second , a second ago, and now you
can't find it.....
*You reach under the table to pick something off the floor and smash
your head on the way up.....
*The change falls through the hole in the pocket and you can’t get it
out from between the two layers of the cloth…..
*You leave your IM program on for several hours and nobody's looked for you, but if you dare go to the bathroom for 5 minutes, you have 3 new query windows... (the author's recent addition)
Oh, and leave a comment if you have anything to add :)
Things that a Sane Person Hates
*You have to try on a pair of sunglasses with that stupid little plastic
thing in the middle of them.....
*The person behind you in the supermarket runs his cart into the back of
your ankle.....
*The elevator stops on every floor and nobody gets on.....
*There's always a car riding your tail when you're slowing down to find
an address.....
*You open a can of soup and the lid falls in.....
*It's bad enough that you step in dog doo doo, but you don't realize it
till you walk across your living room rug.....
*The tiny red string on the Band-Aid wrapper never works for you.....
*There's a dog in the neighborhood that barks at EVERYTHING.....
*You can never put anything back in a box the way it came.....
*Three hours and three meetings after lunch you look in the mirror and
discover a piece of parsley stuck to your front tooth.....
*You drink from a soda can into which someone has extinguished a
cigarette.....
*You slice your tongue licking an envelope.....
*Your tire gauge lets out half the air while you're trying to get a
reading.....
*A station comes in brilliantly when you're standing near the radio, but
buzzes, drifts and spits every time you move away.....
*There are always one or two ice cubes that won't pop out of the
tray.....
*You wash a garment with a tissue in the pocket and your entire laundry
comes out covered with lint.....
*The car behind you blasts its horn because you let a pedestrian finish
crossing.....
*A piece of foil candy wrapper makes electrical contact with your
filling.....
*You set the alarm on your digital clock for 7pm instead of 7am.....
*The radio station doesn't tell you who sang that.....
*You rub on hand cream and can't turn the bathroom doorknob to get
out.....
*People behind you on a supermarket line dash ahead of you to a counter
just opening up.....
*Your glasses slide off your ears when you perspire.....
*You can't look up the correct spelling of a word in the dictionary
because you don't know how to spell it.....
*You have to inform five different sales people in the same store that
you're just browsing.....
*You had that pen in your hand only a second , a second ago, and now you
can't find it.....
*You reach under the table to pick something off the floor and smash
your head on the way up.....
*The change falls through the hole in the pocket and you can’t get it
out from between the two layers of the cloth…..
*You leave your IM program on for several hours and nobody's looked for you, but if you dare go to the bathroom for 5 minutes, you have 3 new query windows... (the author's recent addition)
Friday, September 12, 2008
Jigoku Shoujo, Part 2
So, the third season of Jigoku Shoujo has just started. Even though I've seen a few more episodes since the last time I blogged about it, I haven't finished the first season or found a definite answer to my question yet. If there are, say, 26 episodes per season, at the end of the third season we'll have 78 episodes. I wasn't willing to go through all of them without knowing whether my question will be answered: who would be stupid enough to gain temporary relief and pay it with eternal suffering?
So, I had to ask a person who has seen the first two seasons. My question isn't directly answered so far. However, there are so many examples, and they have one thing in common: they are so easily influenced by seemingly unsolvable problems and the impact of society's negative opinion on them. So, they consider hell to be "not too bad" as an option. It is the only reasonable answer, since not knowing how much they'll suffer or not being completely conscious of what they're doing is out of the question: the Enma gives them a preview of Hell and they are instantly shocked, and then she lets them think about it.
However, the series gives more interesting information, such as the Enma's past and future. I was suggested to watch the first 2-3 and the last 2-3 episodes of each season and read the rest of the plot summary on Wikipedia. And I guess I'll do this, since it looks like there's more interesting information to come, but I'm not enjoying its typical episodes: they are too dark and sick-minded for my taste.
So, I had to ask a person who has seen the first two seasons. My question isn't directly answered so far. However, there are so many examples, and they have one thing in common: they are so easily influenced by seemingly unsolvable problems and the impact of society's negative opinion on them. So, they consider hell to be "not too bad" as an option. It is the only reasonable answer, since not knowing how much they'll suffer or not being completely conscious of what they're doing is out of the question: the Enma gives them a preview of Hell and they are instantly shocked, and then she lets them think about it.
However, the series gives more interesting information, such as the Enma's past and future. I was suggested to watch the first 2-3 and the last 2-3 episodes of each season and read the rest of the plot summary on Wikipedia. And I guess I'll do this, since it looks like there's more interesting information to come, but I'm not enjoying its typical episodes: they are too dark and sick-minded for my taste.
Saturday, September 6, 2008
Feeling lovesick?
I read in an article recently (EDIT: this one) that, when we fall in love, our serotonin levels fall, just like in depression, and this is what makes us never stop thinking about the other person. I suppose you know the feeling: you try to force yourself to think about other things but can't seem to get it right, all your brain seems to be able to focus on is your beloved one, and it's nothing but negative thoughts. Well, apart from psychological help, it seems we're also able to target those hormones playing all these tricks to your brain! :)
First off, serotonin levels increase by exposure to daylight. Which means: go out in the sun as much as you can! :)
Second, it also increases by exercising. Combining this with the above, try playing your favorite outdoor sport, and relaxing in the sun when you feel tired.
Third: As Wikipedia-sensei informed me, an enzyme called tryptophan has the ability to increase serotonin levels. Which means, go ahead and eat chocolate, eggs, parmesan cheese, and other foods rich in tryptophan. Don't worry about the calories, just exercise enough! :P
First off, serotonin levels increase by exposure to daylight. Which means: go out in the sun as much as you can! :)
Second, it also increases by exercising. Combining this with the above, try playing your favorite outdoor sport, and relaxing in the sun when you feel tired.
Third: As Wikipedia-sensei informed me, an enzyme called tryptophan has the ability to increase serotonin levels. Which means, go ahead and eat chocolate, eggs, parmesan cheese, and other foods rich in tryptophan. Don't worry about the calories, just exercise enough! :P
Tuesday, August 5, 2008
Jigoku Shoujo
Here's the entry I promised you!
So, I watched the two first episodes of Jigoku Shoujo and I feel I have a lot to comment on. Of course, it's only the two first episodes so the anime is very likely to change in the next ones, but, in short, my first impression wasn't too positive. However, it's still enough for me to keep watching. I'm not dropping it (yet).
Spoiler warning: watch what you read if you're planning to watch it :)
In the whole, the anime is about Jigoku Shoujo, which translates as Hell Girl. Desperate people contact her and she agrees to take revenge for them, taking their tormentors straightly to hell. However, people who make such a contract with her also agree that, when they die, their soul will also be sent to hell. So, the anime has got to answer this question for me: Hell means eternal suffering. This is confirmed in the anime. I mean, I don't care what hardships you're facing in this life, but who would be stupid enough to knowingly earn temporary relief in exchange for eternal suffering?
So let's go to the first episode. It starts with a class of (I think) 14-year-olds in a girls-only school, who were collecting money for some reason - charity perhaps, I don't remember very well, and it doesn't matter either. They managed to collect 100 000 yen, which is given to the class rep for keeping - in front of the whole class. The class rep, in turn, puts the money in her bag.
This means two things:
First, the teacher is acting without thinking. Who would trust 100 000 yen to a 14-year-old?
Second, the girl herself is also acting without thinking. You wouldn't put that money in your bag and leave the bag unattended. I'd go for an inner pocket instead - or, at least, I wouldn't leave the bag unattended.
As expected, the money is stolen. Then you see a second girl who lends the money to the class rep, but starts threatening and abusing her until she can return it. Knowing that not many 14-year-olds manage to collect 100 000 yen of pocket money that they can easily lend to a classmate, and that equally few fathers would lend this money to their daughter's classmate, it seems kind of obvious that this second girl stole the money. So it's yet another one of those cases where you know the end and you end up thinking "come on, reveal it already!"
Which makes me think about the stupidness of the class rep, once again. Her first mistake is that she couldn't think that the other girl must have taken the money. Her second mistake is that she was too shy to inform her parents or her teachers - if she didn't think about it, someone would probably have done it. But no, she had to be "proud" - really, what is the limit where pride ends and cowardice starts?
Then again, this might be the answer to my first question: what kind of person would ask for temporary relief in exchange for eternal suffering. The answer, judging from the first episode, is: a coward who acts without thinking. Still, the episode could have been presented a lot better, without having you think about how stupid everyone acts.
The second episode, though, is far better - this stupidness factor has certainly decreased and the person involved is indeed in a desperate condition. I'll surely keep watching, probably after I come back from holidays though, because the anime looks promising, and I've been told that the scenario becomes a lot more original after the 5th episode or so.
Until then, take care! (@)
So, I watched the two first episodes of Jigoku Shoujo and I feel I have a lot to comment on. Of course, it's only the two first episodes so the anime is very likely to change in the next ones, but, in short, my first impression wasn't too positive. However, it's still enough for me to keep watching. I'm not dropping it (yet).
Spoiler warning: watch what you read if you're planning to watch it :)
In the whole, the anime is about Jigoku Shoujo, which translates as Hell Girl. Desperate people contact her and she agrees to take revenge for them, taking their tormentors straightly to hell. However, people who make such a contract with her also agree that, when they die, their soul will also be sent to hell. So, the anime has got to answer this question for me: Hell means eternal suffering. This is confirmed in the anime. I mean, I don't care what hardships you're facing in this life, but who would be stupid enough to knowingly earn temporary relief in exchange for eternal suffering?
So let's go to the first episode. It starts with a class of (I think) 14-year-olds in a girls-only school, who were collecting money for some reason - charity perhaps, I don't remember very well, and it doesn't matter either. They managed to collect 100 000 yen, which is given to the class rep for keeping - in front of the whole class. The class rep, in turn, puts the money in her bag.
This means two things:
First, the teacher is acting without thinking. Who would trust 100 000 yen to a 14-year-old?
Second, the girl herself is also acting without thinking. You wouldn't put that money in your bag and leave the bag unattended. I'd go for an inner pocket instead - or, at least, I wouldn't leave the bag unattended.
As expected, the money is stolen. Then you see a second girl who lends the money to the class rep, but starts threatening and abusing her until she can return it. Knowing that not many 14-year-olds manage to collect 100 000 yen of pocket money that they can easily lend to a classmate, and that equally few fathers would lend this money to their daughter's classmate, it seems kind of obvious that this second girl stole the money. So it's yet another one of those cases where you know the end and you end up thinking "come on, reveal it already!"
Which makes me think about the stupidness of the class rep, once again. Her first mistake is that she couldn't think that the other girl must have taken the money. Her second mistake is that she was too shy to inform her parents or her teachers - if she didn't think about it, someone would probably have done it. But no, she had to be "proud" - really, what is the limit where pride ends and cowardice starts?
Then again, this might be the answer to my first question: what kind of person would ask for temporary relief in exchange for eternal suffering. The answer, judging from the first episode, is: a coward who acts without thinking. Still, the episode could have been presented a lot better, without having you think about how stupid everyone acts.
The second episode, though, is far better - this stupidness factor has certainly decreased and the person involved is indeed in a desperate condition. I'll surely keep watching, probably after I come back from holidays though, because the anime looks promising, and I've been told that the scenario becomes a lot more original after the 5th episode or so.
Until then, take care! (@)
Lost in the query
It's great of people who run a store to try to attract foreign tourists, even if they don't speak English. It's acceptable to use a translation engine. However, proofchecking is necessary:
(source: AdFreak: Then we'll grab a bite at 404 Not Found )
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Not to mention proofchecking the ingredients label of your own product:
(source: thedailywtf.com )
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
which, in turn, reminded me of a good webcomic strip:
(source: xkcd )
(source: AdFreak: Then we'll grab a bite at 404 Not Found )-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Not to mention proofchecking the ingredients label of your own product:
(source: thedailywtf.com )-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
which, in turn, reminded me of a good webcomic strip:
(source: xkcd )
Sunday, August 3, 2008
New search engines
And so, the cat is back, after several months of nothing really special to write about. Don't you worry though; "no news, good news"!
I keep reading about new search engines that appear lately and some of them do sound interesting. I think it's time to close this connection in your mind where "Internet search" equals "Google", as I have two interesting ones:
The first one is Powerset : http://www.powerset.com . It accepts questions in natural language, such as "What is the population of Tokyo?" or "Where is Sapporo?". For now, it only searches Wikipedia articles. I tried feeding it a few more difficult questions, such as "Which voice actor plays the X role in the Y anime?" or "What is the effect of chocolate on blood pressure?" and it answered perfectly. I've already asked it more than a dozen of times and it's never disappointed me. Maybe the correct answer is second or third, but it's always there. One little drawback is that it cannot deal very well with synonyms - yet? Or am I asking for too much?
EDIT: Actually, Powerset can deal with synonyms as well, maybe it was just me picking a tough one. However, it's constantly progressing. Also, the Powerset staff is cool and they care about their product: I even had the honor of having them post comments on this very article!
The second one is Cuil - http://www.cuil.com . It uses context-relevant search rather than ranking pages according to number of visits - which means, if there are 100 pages relevant to your search, it will rank them according to how relevant it judges them to be rather than how many people visit them. This one is very promising, but its results are a bit disappointing for now - I certainly hope that they will improve their algorithm with time. For example, I was looking for the download page of a certain software, so I just typed "software_name download" and it didn't return the download page. However, I did like the way results are presented: tiled up in a grid, like magazine articles, rather than a list.
Last but not least, a small flash of my news: I've planned a holiday which is really about to start (countdown launched), but I hope to get back to you before I leave - this time with comments on Jigoku Shoujo, an anime I just started seeing. And, by the end of August, I might come up with a dissertation describing the relationship between the number of people staying in the same house and the entropy inside the house. However, that's going to be a difficult task, as it actually depends on each person involved!
I keep reading about new search engines that appear lately and some of them do sound interesting. I think it's time to close this connection in your mind where "Internet search" equals "Google", as I have two interesting ones:
The first one is Powerset : http://www.powerset.com . It accepts questions in natural language, such as "What is the population of Tokyo?" or "Where is Sapporo?". For now, it only searches Wikipedia articles. I tried feeding it a few more difficult questions, such as "Which voice actor plays the X role in the Y anime?" or "What is the effect of chocolate on blood pressure?" and it answered perfectly. I've already asked it more than a dozen of times and it's never disappointed me. Maybe the correct answer is second or third, but it's always there. One little drawback is that it cannot deal very well with synonyms - yet? Or am I asking for too much?
EDIT: Actually, Powerset can deal with synonyms as well, maybe it was just me picking a tough one. However, it's constantly progressing. Also, the Powerset staff is cool and they care about their product: I even had the honor of having them post comments on this very article!
The second one is Cuil - http://www.cuil.com . It uses context-relevant search rather than ranking pages according to number of visits - which means, if there are 100 pages relevant to your search, it will rank them according to how relevant it judges them to be rather than how many people visit them. This one is very promising, but its results are a bit disappointing for now - I certainly hope that they will improve their algorithm with time. For example, I was looking for the download page of a certain software, so I just typed "software_name download" and it didn't return the download page. However, I did like the way results are presented: tiled up in a grid, like magazine articles, rather than a list.
Last but not least, a small flash of my news: I've planned a holiday which is really about to start (countdown launched), but I hope to get back to you before I leave - this time with comments on Jigoku Shoujo, an anime I just started seeing. And, by the end of August, I might come up with a dissertation describing the relationship between the number of people staying in the same house and the entropy inside the house. However, that's going to be a difficult task, as it actually depends on each person involved!
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