I’m off to the IEEE’s 2004 “Cluster Computing and Grid” conference in Chicago, so updates will be, by necessity, infrequent and access to email will probably be very unlikely.
Should be an interesting conference though!
I should really create a category for HPC stuff.. 🙂
Thanks to this posting on the Jabber AU forums I’ve found out you can insert a link like this:
<IMG SRC="http://rhinosw.com/tools/jabber/chris@jabber.org.au/status.gif">
to show whether or not you’re online on the Jabber Instant Messaging system.
So, for what it’s worth, I’ve added to the sidebar on the left.
Pondering what to have for breakfast this morning I came up with this, which turned out rather nicely..
Ingredients
Method
First chop the tomato, mushroom and ginger and fry in some oil with garlic and herbs until cooked. Remove from the pan onto a side plate. Beat the eggs in a cup with a little salt and start the omlette cooking in the pan.
When the omlette is almost ready add the pre-cooked tomato and mushroom mixture to one half of the omlette and slice the mozzarella ball on top before folding the empty side over the top.
Leave for a couple of minutes on a very low heat so the omlette finishes cooking (you can try and turn it if you feel brave) and for the mozzarella to start melting.
Serve and (hopefully!) enjoy. 🙂
ABC News are reporting a forthcoming anti-trust trial against Microsoft "alleging it broke fair trade rules by bundling its instant messenger service with its Windows XP operating platform".
Sounds similar to the EU anti-trust trial where MS took advantage of its monopoly on desktop OS’s to extend their reach into media playing software, thereby giving themselves a large captive audience to persuade media companies to go with their format instead of any competitors (such as Real Networks.
Here it’s the fact that every XP box comes with MSN Messenger instead..
Linux Australia has published
the first draft of their position paper on US – Australia “Free” Trade Agreement and Open Source
This talks about some of the possible chilling effects of the AU-US “Free” Trade Agreement, including many interesting things such as the fact it will prevent Australian consumers from buying DVDs from the US by making it illegal to use a region free DVD player, not what I’d call helping free trade.
There is also a warning on the introduction of software patents through this (although they may already be possible under current statutory instruments) including the fact that had Dan Bricklan been able to patent Visicalc in 1979 then any future spreadsheets until 1999 would have been illegal or required a license from Visicalc. Of course, as we’ve seen in lots of other areas, where there is a monopoly it’s not the market that gets to set the price for such things..
Here is a really illuminating, unambiguous warning on all of this from Bill Gates:
If people had understood how patents would be granted when most of today’s ideas were invented and had taken out patents, the industry would be at a complete standstill today.
And one final, rather chilling, warning from the paper.
Note that the US has constitutional protections which limit these laws when they conflict with “freedom of speech”. Australia has no such limits.
How to Help
If this worries you (and believe me, it should), then please write a letter to your elected representatives, in your own words, telling them why you oppose this. Give reasons for why you think this will be a bad thing for Australia.
Sign the online petition. I’m not a big believer in such things, but if you do write to your representatives then sign this and say that you’ve done so.
Read the Linux Australia FTA page and use some of their suggestions to.
Spread the word! Link to stories like these on your sites, write blog entries about it, spread the word. Democracy can only really function when people know what some of the issues are. Research other effects that haven’t been considered yet. Will Apple iPod’s become illegal because you are not currently legally allowed to rip songs from CD’s you own for your personal use ? etc..
I’ve just received another of those really annoying virus warning messages telling me that I’ve just sent another virus. Well of course, running only Linux, that’s not possible and sure enough it’s from another Windoze virus that forges the recipient.
This is what I sent in response..
On Friday 09 Apr 2004 5:28 am, you wrote:
> Attention: xxxx@xxxxxx.org
That would be me.
> A virus was found in an Email message you sent.
I think that’s highly unlikely.
> This Email scanner intercepted it and stopped the entire message
> reaching its destination.
Quite possibly.
> The virus was reported to be:
>
> the W32/Netsky.d@MM virus !!!
Strange, that only affects Windows systems as far as I’m aware and forges the sender of the message, like virtually all these days, making these sort of replies a nuisance at best to those who know better, and distressing to those who may not.
The IP address that sent it (from the headers you forwarded) was 144.139.67.224 which is a Telstra IP address, and I am not a Telstra customer.
> Please update your virus scanner
My virus scanner updates itself twice an hour, just to filter out those annoying Windows viruses that don’t affect Linux users such as myself.
> or contact your IT support personnel as soon as possible as you have a virus
> on your system.
I am my IT support personnel, and I don’t have this virus..
I’ve been certified!
Er, well, I’ve actually just passed my
Cisco Certified Network Associate (CCNA) exam today with a score of 987/1000 which I’m pretty pleased with, especially as I’d convinced myself I’d failed before I saw the printout!
I am now a CCNA.
Ph3Ar my 3l33t Cisc0 Sk1lls – or something.. 🙂