The Musings of Chris Samuel

Now that was a nice break around Hobart and Port Arthur!

Photos to follow..

Just chatted to a friend of mine who’s in Singapore airport at the moment, when I asked him how the flight was he said:

when they tell the flight attendants to tighten their seatbelts you know you’re in for a rough ride!

Apparently there are 1.3 million of us here in Australia, according to the Institute for Public Policy Research.

I’m here at SuperComputing 2006 (SC06, booth #1938) and whilst wandering around during the exhibition setup yesterday (Sunday) spotted that the folks running the NOC¹ for the conference (called SCinet) are running Bro to capture passwords that are going across the network in the clear and publishing them on a set of screens on their booth.

They’re also up on the web here:

https://scinet.supercomp.org/security/passwords06.html

I like these folks style..

1. Network Operations Center [back]

From that ever reputable source of news, The Onion:

Under the proposed reforms, the FAA would institute a strict ban on adult passengers, passengers 18 and under, international travelers, and domestic customers. A battery of questions and ID checks will be used to determine whether an individual is a pilot, flight attendant, or federal security officer—the only humans who will be allowed to board an aircraft flying within or headed for the U.S.

Sounds like someone’s finally done a root cause analysis and come up with the obvious solution, a sensible policy from the US at last!

“Frankly, we’ve tried everything else,” Blakey said. “We’ve put up more metal detectors, searched carry-on luggage, and prohibited passengers from traveling with sharp objects. Yet passengers still somehow continue to find ways to breach security. Clearly, the passengers have to go.”

Via the ever good Mikal.

I’ve got a friend, to protect his identity we’ll just call him “Mike“, who’s currently touring China and Mongolia for a month. Well it looks like even he couldn’t resist the call of the Internet, so I got this last night and it’s posted with his permission:

Hi from a dodgey internet cafe in Ulaanbaatar.

A land of slow internet connections and suspicious meat dishes. The landscape is rather amazing, - loads of open grasslands and blue sky, somewhat reminiscent of the the windows default backdrop. Only add more horses, goats, yaks, eagles and gers.

Managed to get caught in a terrific storm yesterday, minutes after pitching a tent on a sand dune ridge. Apart from the tent nearly blowing away, the best part was being pinned on the ridge and then it starting to strike lightning.Nothing like sitting under a shell of aluminum poles with bolts flying overhead. My other career after scientist when I was a kid was going to be a orchestra conductor and it look like for an ironic moment that I might fullfil at least half of that. Luckily after an hour or so the storm passed to reveal one of the best sunsets ever.

More dodgey roads to condend with later this week where I hope to get to some other park and try my luck again with the tent.

Anyhow, painfully slow connections. Take care back there,

I’m starting to like the taste of mutton which seems to taint every meal that you order. See if the can make a special dish at the curry place.

Downloading now - you can grab yours from the Google Earth Downloads Page, you need to look for Beta 4 on the right hand side.