The short-form week of 7–13 Mar 2011

14 Mar 2011

The week in review, 140 characters at a time. This week, 95 messages in 85 conversations. (With 15 favorites.)

This document was created automatically from my archive of my Twitter stream. Due to limitations in the Twitter API and occasional glitches in my archiving system, it may not be 100% complete.

In a conversation that started on Sunday at 02:41pm

Dear iTunes, we had good times together, but this just isn't working out. It's not me, it's you.—@timbray

@timbray Got a replacement in mind?—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 03:49am

I like @jeniT's http://www.jenitennison.com/blog/node/154 which is detailed and level headed, but not the call to arms I might have written—@psd

@psd I don't think calls to arms are my strong point ;)—@JeniT

+1 I like @jeniT's http://www.jenitennison.com/blog/node/154 detailed and level headed, not the call to arms I might have written /via @psd—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 04:50am

http://bit.ly/eYkmi4 I will be speaking alongside Jakob Fix from the OECD #MLUC11—@xquery

@xquery I've managed to land a slot speaking with @ndw. Odd.—@ronhitchens

@ronhitchens congrats, look forward to meeting up—@xquery

In a conversation that started on Monday at 04:51am

can now say I work for MarkLogic ... enlightened company/people, great tech and looking forward to learning loads—@xquery

@xquery xdmp:congrats :-)—@andrewwelch

@xquery welcome!—@eedeebee

@xquery Welcome aboard, pal! The best place I've ever worked just keeps getting better! #MarkLogic—@ndw

@xquery Congrats Jim. Hope it's an enjoyable relation!—@dpawson

@xquery Congratulations!—@ebruchez

@xquery Yay, glad it's official.—@collwhit

@xquery awesome! i thought you could already say that, but great to know its officially been documented on the twitters. ;)—@peteaven

In a conversation that started on Monday at 04:58am

If your open source project is hosted on SourceForge today, I'm going to have a real hard time taking it seriously.—@robinberjon

@robinberjon Yeah. DocBook is there for historical reasons and everytime I think about it, I think about moving it.—@ndw

@ndw Yeah, I see why older projects would be there of course. Try GitHub!—@robinberjon

@robinberjon That's the obvious place. There's already a little work going on there, https://github.com/docbook—@ndw

Monday at 12:42pm

I'd like to write a virus that crawls the net, modifying html to be valid and upgrading old browsers. A revival of service attack.—@veen

Monday at 02:14pm

The section on addressing and state, by itself, is a must read: http://www.jenitennison.com/blog/node/154 (via @ndw)—@sgillies

In a conversation that started on Monday at 02:21pm

The headset wire on my desk phone (quaint, right?) is starting to fray. Replace or abandon, cancel and use mobile for everything?—@ndw

@ndw I'd suggest replacing the wire with Bluetooth. I got one of those earbud thingies that you can connect to phone or computer.—@pointybrackets

@pointybrackets Got an earbud thingy model you like?—@ndw

@ndw Yup - Plantronics 84100-01 Voyager PRO+. They occasionally have manufacturer defects, but when one works, it -works-. Get a warranty.—@pointybrackets

@ndw replace. redundancy is good.—@laurendw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 02:25pm

Abandoning iTunes ($DIETY, yes!) looks like it'll require abandoning DAAP too. Just mount the remote disk with FUSE and use that?—@ndw

@ndw check out mt-daapd and/or rythmbox on Linux—@wfeick

@wfeick Thanks Wayne. I use mt-daapd and would like to continue using it for smart playlists. Looking for Mac client that supports it.—@ndw

Monday at 02:33pm

Sky dude: "we can't protect our streamed content on Android to the needs of our rights-holders." That's why you will be disrupted. #momolo—@torgo

In a conversation that started on Monday at 02:38pm

Why has iCal suddenly started going "ga-dunk" randomly when I open it or edit an appointment? Sigh.—@ndw

@ndw It has a modal dialogue open somewhere, most likely lost by the window manager.—@jpcs

@jpcs Hmph. One that survives quit and restart?—@ndw

@ndw because ical is evil—@eedeebee

@eedeebee Perhaps. On the other hand, it's not iTunes evil. Or Outlook evil.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 02:53pm

<insert cliché moan about expense reports here>—@jpcs

@jpcs I feel your pain. I really do.—@ndw

Monday at 02:56pm

Hmm. Stumbled across git-annex today. That looks interesting. Anyone using it?—@ndw

Monday at 03:34pm

Alas, Clementine, which looked promising, stutters during playback. Maybe only if Time Machine is running, but that's a showstopper anyway.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 03:39pm

plotting a post-Apple lifestyle. I sense I'm not alone.—@psd

@psd should be Android/Chrome I suppose but you get my drift :)—@tug

@psd No, sir!—@ndw

@psd nope you're not. Lion looks a step in the wrong direction. Hopes for Android + cloud but not sure...—@tug

Monday at 04:12pm

Holy moly! @jenit appointed to the @w3c TAG! Congratulations (and thank you)!—@ndw

Monday at 04:14pm

Congrats! Great news! RT @ndw: Holy moly! @jenit appointed to the @w3c TAG! Congratulations (and thank you)!—@azaroth42

Monday at 04:15pm

Congratulations Jeni! RT @ndw: Holy moly! @jenit appointed to the @w3c TAG! Congratulations (and thank you)!—@hippebrun

Monday at 04:17pm

excellent news RT @ndw: Holy moly! @jenit appointed to the @w3c TAG! Congratulations (and thank you)!—@xquery

Monday at 04:18pm

Now there's a smart move by the W3C RT @ndw: Holy moly! @jenit appointed to the @w3c TAG! Congratulations (and thank you)!—@uogbuji

In a conversation that started on Monday at 05:08pm

Emacs + org-mode + (AddressBook+iCal=>XML=>XSLT=>diary) FTW!—@ndw

@ndw re org-mode, tell me if u figure out the import ... export to ical is easy—@xquery

@xquery I generate a diary file automatically from iCal via sqlite->xml->xslt->text. I don't attempt to sync though, it's a one way bridge.—@ndw

@ndw check this out http://www.emacswiki.org/emacs/Elnode - thinking of making some code to do org-mode over the web—@nicferrier

@nicferrier That looks very interesting indeed!—@ndw

@ndw right. imagine if I can get autoparsing of org going to deliver ical... proper on the fly calendering. hosting is an issue tho.—@nicferrier

In a conversation that started on Monday at 06:22pm

RT @pixelmatrix: Check out this amazing typeface my pal @traviskochel just released for making charts: http://t.co/yTXhhl2—@jtauber

@jtauber Fascinating!—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 07:47pm

Considering implementing the rules for repeating iCalendar appointments in XQuery. Anyone beat me to it? Please?—@ndw

@ndw Generate recurrence rule string, call out to Java iCalendar lib with it? Or is dependency on iCal4j for that overkill?—@pdxleif

@pdxleif yeah, could do something like that, but initially looking for pure XQuery/XSLT solution.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Monday at 09:03pm

Go captain awesome! (@peteaven) http://bit.ly/fESeCF doin the #marklogic.#top10 booktitles—@eedeebee

RT @eedeebee Go captain awesome! (@peteaven) http://bit.ly/fESeCF doing the #marklogic #top10 book titles—@ndw

@eedeebee @ndw thanks for the shout-out dudes!—@peteaven

Monday at 10:36pm

I'm building a Twitter clone where the user registration CAPTCHA is a basic grammar test. Who's with me?—@diveintomark

Tuesday at 02:47am

RT @ndw: Holy moly! @jenit appointed to the @w3c TAG! Congratulations (and thank you)! #proud #womensday—@xmlguild

Tuesday at 06:04am

XML data modelling versus relational data modelling http://bit.ly/ftMntC #marklogic #xml #ftw—@jpcs

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 07:40am

Alas, Songbird isn't a success either. Weird message about watch folder and watched folders not editable. Meh.—@ndw

@ndw did you tried #banshee? http://banshee.fm/download/#osx—@olea

@olea Alas, #banshee skips too. And the machine isn't really working very hard.—@ndw

Tuesday at 08:38am

App developers: If you want me to buy your app, don't make the free lite version suck. Because I'll believe the paid version sucks, too.—@mikeloukides

Tuesday at 09:55am

Work only starts when the fear of doing nothing finally exceeds the fear of doing something badly.—@alaindebotton

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 12:24pm

Bloody obvious fact of the day: when the XPath expression you want is $var/path[@foo], the expression $var/path/@foo will not work.—@ndw

@ndw That's the wonderful thing about XPath: completely invisible failures. :(—@happygiraffe

@ndw mistyped that xpath myself many times.—@eedeebee

@ndw You know, that has NEVER been obvious to me. It's the one thing in XPath I really, truly don't get.—@RepoRat

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 01:11pm

RT @probablycorey: Last night I decided to makes something ridiculous: http://probablyinteractive.com/url-hunter—@dscape

RT @dscape RT @probablycorey: Last night I decided to makes something ridiculous: http://probablyinteractive.com/url-hunter—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 01:29pm

@ndw [when the XPath expression you want is $var/path[@foo], the expression $var/path/@foo will not work.] Not always, anyway.—@michaelhkay

@michaelhkay You know, I thought of that while typing and added "in all cases" (or words to that effect), but that was 144 characters.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 01:49pm

Need an XML doc to include /*/* of other XML. Anything more current than abandoned XInclude xpointer() scheme?—@ebruchez

@ebruchez The xpath() scheme is supported by some implementations.—@ndw

@ndw Seems to be an unofficial scheme, isn't it?—@ebruchez

@ebruchez It's as official as they get these days: http://www.w3.org/2005/04/xpointer-schemes/—@ndw

@ndw Good enough, xpath() could be spec'ed in a single tweet ;)—@ebruchez

Tuesday at 04:02pm

@JeniT is on TAG? That's bloody awesome.—@tommorris

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 04:08pm

This one is for @JeniT :) http://probablyinteractive.com/url-hunter—@robinberjon

@robinberjon Oh god.—@JeniT

@robinberjon @JeniT @noahmendelsohn it gets better.. http://bit.ly/haupta [try it out]—@webr3

@webr3 Truly awesome. /cc @robinberjon @noahmendelsohn—@JeniT

@robinberjon Oh, c'mon Robin. Let her get one meeting under her belt before you start heckling! :-)—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Tuesday at 05:25pm

thx to everyone for getting me onboard the W3C XML Proc Working Group, http://bit.ly/g0az7l hoping I can contribute (and learn) #w3 #xproc—@xquery

@xquery You'll have to track down the miserable sod who's your AC rep and persuade him (beer or scotch suggested) to appoint you.—@ndw

@ndw so what kind of scotch would that be then ?—@xquery

@xquery Yeah. Unfortunately, as an employee of a member company, I don't think you're allowed to be an invited expert.—@ndw

Tuesday at 09:40pm

Wanna make a dork upset? Add "sent from my iPad 3" to the end of all your emails.—@GuyEndoreKaiser

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 07:54am

No, I'm not having a bad day; why do you ask? http://picplz.com/user/ndw/pic/r6swv/—@ndw

@ndw should say 'warning: this is what may happen to you when you install this wiki'—@xquery

@ndw OMG there should be a content warning on that picture, I almost fell back off my chair.—@robinberjon

@robinberjon Surely that's true of any pic that includes my ugly mug?—@ndw

@ndw Not at all, you're generally pretty much the face of sexyness.—@robinberjon

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 08:24am

Man Arrested in US for linking to web sites. An issue taken up by the W3C Technical Architecture Group http://bit.ly/gLydGF—@bblfish

@bblfish @torgo The #W3C TAG has made no decision on whether to take up http://tinyurl.com/4vw45jl -- some members have suggested we do—@noahmendelsohn

@noahmendelsohn FYI: I think tinyurl.com is borked this morning. Doesn't work for me, in any event.—@ndw

@ndw tinyurl working for me right now—@noahmendelsohn

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 08:45am

Another three hours of total #FAIL trying to get the #DocBook wiki back online. AAAURRGHGGHHHH!—@ndw

@ndw Is it a MediaWiki? Anything I can do to help?—@morbusiff

Wednesday at 09:20am

I wonder if the right answer is to move the DocBook wiki under github.com/docbook. How do github wikis deal with fscking spammers?—@ndw

Wednesday at 09:27am

@ndw maybe @joeyh's ikiwiki could give you some ideas?—@tmarble

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 11:04am

Doodling in Math class http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DK5Z709J2eo—@joshbloch

@joshbloch All of the http://vihart.com/doodling/ doodles are amazing!—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 01:45pm

Reserve your connect.me username http://cxt.me/ndP1SQ—@jtauber

@jtauber Bleh. Another service that wants to use (twitter|facebook|...) as a proxy for my identity but wants *update* access to my acct. No.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 02:34pm

Hmm. Went to garage for oil change w/o power cord. Maybe this wasn't the time to start that big build...—@ndw

@ndw ^Z—@bcharder

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 02:35pm

This is unbelievably pathetic: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1969/12/secret-fears-of-the-super-rich/8419/—@kendall

@kendall I suppose I could try to be sympathetic, but I think it would be *a lot* of work. And I'm not really motivated to try very hard.—@ndw

@ndw Indeed; it's much less work & infinitely more fun to say "schmucks" and go back to work. :>—@kendall

Wednesday at 02:56pm

WebShell is a sweet beast. I will have to try it instead of curl https://github.com/fictivekin/webshell #confoo—@karlpro

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 03:05pm

Just learned why SSDs are still that rare and expensive for end users.—@martin_probst

@martin_probst Are ya gonna share?—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 03:40pm

Markup design is hard. API design is hard. Modelling an API in markup, well...—@ndw

@ndw Use microparsing :) http://dev.w3.org/2009/dap/ReSpec.js/documentation.html#webidl-support—@robinberjon

@robinberjon Uhm. No. Actually, I don't really see the connection your making, but to the extent I do see it, I believe it's wrong. :-)—@ndw

@ndw Well, I don't know what kind of modelling for what kind of API you're making. For WebIDL-based descriptions, microparsing works nice :)—@robinberjon

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 03:50pm

Completing the #census. If your 5yo says they believe in God, but your household is not religious, should you say she is Christian?—@JeniT

@JeniT I suppose that depends on which god she believes in...—@ndw

@ndw multiple gods?—@webr3

@JeniT yeah, why not—@iand

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 04:08pm

Someone clarify this - if Apple is charging $5 for Xcode, then does that mean people need to PAY APPLE to do serious Ruby dev on the Mac??—@bphogan

Almost every day it seems more likely that this will be my last Mac laptop. RT @bphogan ...$5 for XCode...pay Apple to do Ruby dev?—@ndw

Wednesday at 04:12pm

scalability and performance needs to be balanced of with the need for fidelity and expressiveness—@xquery

Wednesday at 04:13pm

Michigan's governor wants to be able to sell towns to corporations: http://t.co/TgFZ1RT Welcome to the end-game of the billionaires coup—@dhmspector

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 04:28pm

I think it would be interesting to see the tweets that people write, but ultimately don't send.—@thebrianmanley

@thebrianmanley The email I write and don't send would be much more interesting.—@ndw

@ndw Yeah, that too. :)—@thebrianmanley

In a conversation that started on Wednesday at 06:37pm

Next year we'll have to pay #Apple for rebooting the system and unlocking the screen, too.—@bnjmnbck

@bnjmnbck Don't give them ideas.—@ndw

Thursday at 06:57am

Chanting "shame" to a bunch of WI Republican senators is like chanting "banana" to a bunch of monkeys: fun, but ineffective.—@kendall

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 09:55am

Dear printer manufacturer, if your basic driver download is 240Mb, you're doing it wrong.—@ndw

@ndw Dear printer manufacturer, if your basic driver download is 240Mb, you're doing it wrong. - plus all their crappy programs!!!!—@pmvallone

@ndw Any chance you can use AirPrint or something similar instead?—@robinberjon

@robinberjon No, this was the drivers for Deb's HP printer. Had to put it on her laptop while I configure the new desktop.—@ndw

Thursday at 10:08am

OMFG #HP, that is the *ugliest* desktop wallpaper I have ever seen.—@ndw

Thursday at 10:53am

Oh, of course XP wouldn't boot (swapped hard drives), the new desktop is a 64 bit thingamajig. Apps better bloody work. #windows #it #pain—@ndw

Thursday at 11:15am

Windows 7 access controls preventing me from reading files off old drive. A new joy.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 01:49pm

On the #hashbang debate, I'm solidly in the #REST camp. Why do people want make something simple, like loading web pages, so hard?—@david_megginson

@david_megginson Amen, brother.—@ndw

Thursday at 02:07pm

I'm way more scared of Republican congressmen than Muslims.—@40goingon28

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 02:36pm

Oh, good, the wireless network has gone down now. Because there wasn't enough fail in the day already.—@ndw

@ndw Dude, I'm up to 6 hours of commute today. Still an hour from home. Your fail is a fail compared to my day so far.—@ronhitchens

@ronhitchens Lucky you. For some definition of "lucky".—@ndw

@ndw For very small values of lucky.—@ronhitchens

@ndw in the face of #fail there is no shame in admitting defeat and tactically retreating for the day ...—@xquery

@ndw I assume you are tweeting from a wired connection then.—@ebruchez

@ebruchez some of the afternoon. But the wireless did spontaneously recover. Just to fsck with me. #tech #mystery #paranoia—@ndw

@ndw Have you upgraded to 802.11 N? I didn't *think* my old, rusty WRT54G was sad, but was *much* happier when I switched—@abdelazer

@abdelazer I think it's N. I dunno. It's worked fine for months and just spontaneously stopped b/c it sensed the least convenient moment.—@ndw

@ndw you need a mojito. Go do.—@JeanKaplansky

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 04:07pm

Hmm. Chrome has started displaying a blank address bar for every page. That's, uhm, unhelpful.—@ndw

@ndw same happened to me today... bad update?—@dscape

@dscape Are you using the Custom New Tab extension? I’ve turned that off to see if it was the problem.—@ndw

@ndw nop—@dscape

@ndw LOL, maybe you should take the day off. :-)—@evanlenz

Thursday at 04:17pm

Oh, fsck me. I forgot to put anchors on the shortform essay pages. Fsck! Fsck! Fsck!—@ndw

Thursday at 04:48pm

RT @peteaven Looking forward to this! RT @dscape HackDay I call it. Hack all night long at #MLUC11 ! http://bit.ly/if10hm—@ndw

Thursday at 04:56pm

Chrome 10 seems to have some annoying bugs. I wonder if I can go back a version.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 05:09pm

Day. Fork. Stick. Done. Martini.—@ndw

@ndw The Reverend Horton Heat would agree.—@JeanKaplansky

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 05:26pm

There's. No. Gin. Well played, #fail, well played.—@ndw

@ndw I'd suggest Vodka, but that's an abomination.—@mnot

@mnot Indeed. I knew had too much taste to suggest that.—@ndw

@ndw yes. At home, I have 14 kinds of rum, 3 kinds of gin, and no vodka. Need a bit more gin, I think.—@mnot

@mnot I eye your rum collection with envy. But I've got maybe a half dozen single malts at the moment. There's no question I need more gin.—@ndw

@ndw @mnot I sense a topic for 26 March.—@roessler

@mnot I'm enjoying looking at your liquor. Can I say that on Twitter?—@TerrisLinenbach

@TerrisLinenbach you're a bad man.—@mnot

In a conversation that started on Thursday at 05:30pm

ical is hosed up again #worstosxapp #whyiscalendaringstillhard—@eedeebee

@eedeebee iCal is a distant second to iTunes in #fail. iCal's never bitten me. I'm impl iCalendar calculations in XQuery. 's complex.—@ndw

Friday at 09:08am

If there are free hugepages and swapping, maybe the hugepages aren't helping. Let's try turning them off again.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Friday at 12:19pm

Sweet, personal blacklists for Google results: http://t.co/cawkNlCC. See you in hell, experts-exchange.com!—@ashooner

@ashooner Yes indeed. I did a search for "expert" just for that purpose.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Friday at 12:21pm

Kudos to MS. Ten year old 32 bit x86 programs run flawlessly on 64 bit AMD Windows 7 system.—@ndw

@ndw Unfortunately, 16 bit progs. don't run on 64 -- I can't upgrade.—@noahmendelsohn

@noahmendelsohn It wasn't an upgrade by choice, Deb's bus. machine died suddenly. But what 16 bit progs do you use? Tried virtualization?—@ndw

Friday at 12:39pm

@dscape had a chat with @ndw but missed you this am... will catch up next week. get some sleep please!—@eedeebee

In a conversation that started on Friday at 12:43pm

Hello W3C, I want to screw you. Why won't you let me screw you? http://bit.ly/hxJkap—@shelleypowers

@shelleypowers *chuckle*—@ndw

Friday at 02:46pm

Must follows #ff@Mark_McGee @antonyslumbers @Simon_Swan @copyblogger @jensKsorensen @davidschneider @paulrouke @ndw—@gregghoulden

Friday at 03:24pm

RT @daveewing: The headline you won't see: "Millions saved in Japan by good engineering and govt building codes". But it's the truth.—@iansmall

In a conversation that started on Friday at 04:07pm

Bought @hibariapp. Ability to block 'sxsw' tweets for the next week or so totally worth $14.—@ndw

@ndw It's a nice profile for Twitter too. I find others too freaking big.—@bsletten

Friday at 04:09pm

Twitter users to @twitter: Stop developing second rate Twitter clients. Run a website and API, we got this.—@jongalloway

Friday at 04:50pm

Spring in New England: http://picplz.com/user/ndw/pic/rh06b/—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Friday at 04:52pm

Just tested and wrote about the new PDF 'sticky note' feature in Renderx: http://www.eccnet.com/blog/?p=76—@harveybetty

@harveybetty Very cool. I’ll have to hack the DocBook XSLT Stylesheets to support annotation markup that way.—@ndw

In a conversation that started on Friday at 04:54pm

Striking back against fail: http://picplz.com/user/ndw/pic/rh0gt/—@ndw

@ndw take that #fail ! :)—@peteaven

Friday at 05:04pm

@ndw I have been looking for this for a while now - very excited about finally having it! I can envision all kinds of uses.—@harveybetty

In a conversation that started on Saturday at 05:22pm

Starting to think about #Balisage paper deadline of 8 Apr. I wonder if I've done anything paper-worthy in the past year...—@ndw

@ndw dude, i'm pretty sure you do something paper worthy every day. lookin forward to seeing what you submit.—@peteaven