| Heading out |
[Nov. 13th, 2009|12:13 pm] |
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OK, I am just a few minutes away from going wheels up in the trip to Windycon. That should reliably get me there somewhat before three o'clock. (Damned 'burbistans.) I'll be hybrid packed so I can bail on my one-day commute, one-day overnight plan if I am feeling like it. No laptop since it is acting very dicey, so blogging from the con is unlikely. The cat has two food and water bowls out, and so far hasn't knocked any of them over. I haven't finished The Difference Enginer yet and will be reading it on the way there and at the con proper. Look out for my 'oops I should have picked a larger version of the logo' flyers for said event. Sadly, it looked fine in PDF form and there's no time to fix it now. |
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| Regretsy |
[Nov. 12th, 2009|02:05 pm] |
 "Really? That's interesting. Because to me, this is a $200 necklace of worms fucking." |
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| I'm not ignoring the world.... |
[Nov. 12th, 2009|01:20 pm] |
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It is just that my laptop is fighting me tooth and nail. I thought it had completely stopped holding a charge as it wouldn't boot for a day, but here it is with more than fifty percent on the battery. Curiously it won't run off the ac adapter alone. There's got to be a short somewhere, and I'm hoping that short is in the battery and it is somehow interrupting the adapter's current, otherwise this will be rather more expensive than I had hoped for. |
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| Little Lessons from the Masters IX (I think) |
[Nov. 12th, 2009|09:41 am] |
"An artist should ruthlessly destroy his manuscripts after publication, lest they mislead academic mediocrities into thinking that it is possible to unravel the mysteries of genius by studying cancelled readings. In art, purpose and plan are nothing; only the results count."
-- Vladimir Nabokov
Quoted by Alexander Hemon in his review of the new Nabokov fragment appearing now with publishers' brass band fronting. www.slate.com/id/2235023/
Of course Nabokov wasn't in the business of selling his drafts to collectors -- a nice source of income for those who need it.
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| Girl Genius Comic for Wednesday November 11, 2009 |
[Nov. 10th, 2009|09:49 pm] |
<3 Oh, dear. I was running around with my cordless drill tearing up my kitchen and banging together a reasonably sturdy makeshift counter so my Mom has something to make sandwiches on while we're gone, and completely forgot what day it is. (All right, it's a long story. Just accept that I was distracted.) So, yes, Phil and I will be at Windycon this weekend. I am really looking forward to it. Also, We now have SQUEEZY CASTLE WULFENBACH AIRSHIPS in stock! |
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| Inhuman |
[Nov. 10th, 2009|05:20 pm] |
Go over to ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) pgdf posting in ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) theinferior4 and follow the links he gives to the amazing robots being built in Boston, which include a plan for a squishy robot -- soft-bodied and able to contract like a leech, but with legs like a millipede. No prototype on that one, but theo thers are up and (literally) running. Very Uncanny Valley. Comic, nightmarish, and wonderful all at once.
It makes you wonder what a species of discrete individuals powering themselves and moving in an environment (as opposed to a giant spreading fungus, or other model) has to actually possess in the way of powers, senses, etc. Depends on the environment, I suppose; but the models for these bots are clear (dog, bug, person). Does the physics constrain?
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| starting over, ending up |
[Nov. 10th, 2009|07:39 am] |
I'm theoretically starting work at Boston Sci tomorrow- I'll get the green light today as the background check and drug screen come through. It might be as late as Thursday, depending on how fast the service providers get back to the agency. I have a few things I need to get done today in preparation for it- the big thing being getting my clothing in order.
Transoma allowed me to be really lazy about looking professional, because they knew I could walk the walk- they didn't care how I looked. Most days I could have showed up in cowboy boots and a tutu and no one would have said a damn thing to me. As a result, I've spent a lot of the past nine years in jeans and stompy boots.
This is not gonna fly in the new assignment. I'm going to be in MG Building One with the rest of Regulatory, so I'm going to need to look professional as well as act it. It's going to be an interesting change.
I'm cleaning out my closet and drawers today and taking an inventory of the items that fit me. Items that don't fit or are too worn to look good are getting pruned out, and then I'm going shopping to fill in the gaps. I will probably pack up a lot of my older Good Suits and donate them to the local Helping-Women-Get-into-the-Workforce charity while I'm at it.
Otherwise, I'm ready. My cubicle stuff is nestled in its box, ready to go to its new location; I've got my commute planned and my lunchbag cleaned out. More, mentally I'm ready to move on. And it's a good feeling.
( of course, when something begins something else ends... ) |
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| more abstract modelling |
[Nov. 9th, 2009|09:00 pm] |
Ok, I managed to make testThatSelfExists() a passing test in Java.
Let's take a stab at getting a little deeper...
I'm just making up the language as I go along now, so please bear with me. I'll see if I can connect it with working code in a bit.
abstract Thing
abstract Thing initialThing()
abstract Thing finalThing()
abstract boolean isSameThingAs(Thing otherThing)
boolean hasChanged( return not initialThing().isSameThingAs(finalThing()))
OK, seems pretty sane so far. We can prove whether a thing has changed or not. But it might not be very easy to implement. We have have three concepts to prove: initial, final, same.
Let's see if we can back off the abstractions a little bit:
abstract ThingInTime extends Thing
abstract Thing thingAtTime(Time time)
abstract Time initialTime()
abstract Time finalTime()
Thing initialThing( return thingAtTime(initialTime())
Thing finalThing( return thingAtTime(finalTime())
Now we can make the whole thing work if we can just implement:
ThingInTimeImplementation implements ThingInTime
Thing thingAtTime(Time time)
Time initialTime()
Time finalTime()
boolean isSameThingAs(Thing otherThing)
Ah, shit, the abstractions just seem to be growing. Now we've introduced Time as a variable. It could be a bumpy ride. |
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| Strange |
[Nov. 9th, 2009|02:48 pm] |
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I wonder why the thinly pseudonymous blog and LJ mirror of that sf short-form author mysteriously disappeared a couple days ago? |
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![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/syndicated.gif){kind=small}
morose
busy
