Author: harry

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Ignorance Arrogance or Autism

I had the pleasure of attending a technical talk the other night at the Morgan Stanley building down by the docklands. Or at least it was pleasurable when I was able to hear the speakers. Let me elaborate.
Lets for arguments sake say that you went to a talk by one of the following:

witten.gifEdward Whitten. One of the smartest guys on the planet. His brain generates so much heat they run a heat exchanger around his head. This runs a 2 Mega Watt steam turbine.

don.gifDonald Knuth Intel are experimenting with Knuth’s DNA in order to grow their next generation chips.

Would you take along your laptop. Some of you probably would. Would you plug it in? Possibly, you might want to record the talk. Would you type while they are talking. I wouldn’t, it’s pig ignorant. You might not know it but some of us want to hear them speak. The tapping on the keyboard is distracting.
Perhaps you’ve already had the pleasure a talk by Donald Knuth. We’d all be dying to ask him a question. I know I would. Some of us would be itching to stick our hands in the air and grab his attention. Should we talk to your mates or interrupt him with some witticism’s only you find funny. I think bloody not!
So why the hell do some people think its ok to inflict us with this crap when the speaker is not someone famous. These people took their time to do the talk and I was there to listen to it. I don’t want to hear the audience unless it’s relevant. If you really want to tap on your keyboard leave the room. If you have to interrupt make sure its something worthwhile or wait to the end of the talk or talk to the speaker after it. I am convinced that an awful lot of people in IT have Autism or Aspergers but don’t know it.
So, I ask, is it ignorance, Arrogance or Autism?

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Cruise Missile Going Cheap

Have you ever read something and thought that there is no justice in the world. Have you ever been pushed far enough that in an act of desperation you would do anything to keep yourself sane, Bruce Simpson has and he’s selling cheap cruise missiles because of it. The New Zealand Government has decided to persecute him because he showed that it was possible to build a cruise missile for 5000 dollars and they didn’t like it.
Bruce Simpson Cruise Missile Maker extraordinare
Now if I had been the government the last thing I would have done would have tried to draw any attention to him at all and possibly even hire him. It’s a shame he has been pushed to the point of offering to build a missile for anyone but if you treat a man like and animal you are sure to be bit.
I thought that the lady holding the torch stood for freedom and liberty so why do we still hear about governments persecuting people, particularly America. You would have thought that history (our greatest teacher) teaches that persecution is a fine way to shoot yourself in both feet at the same time whilst simultaneously lighting cigarettes near a gas leak.
Will we ever learn?

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Does Mathematics ever get any easier

I don’t think so. Just when I think I am getting to grips with something I get a good slap around the face from out of the blue. Is it this that has kept people all through the ages fighting for some insight in the hope that they might deliver a good slap back.
It all seems so much like an enormous quagmire were an unwary step might have you screaming for help before being swallowed up in muddy oblivion. On the other hand when you hear Ian Stewart describing Mathematics in his books he seems to alternate from quagmire to utopia. I have yet to find this utopia (but I’m still looking) and as far as I am aware there are no maps for sale down the local camping store.
I just wish I had a torch or even a compass, so even though I have no idea what direction is the best to take I have an idea what direction I am heading in and can be psychologically comforted.
Mathematics is the most frustrating yet fascinating subject I have come across. I just hope I find a compass soon and I imagine I am not alone.

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M203 Group Theory

Is over and thank the lord. My tutor had told me that the Group theory was much easier than the linear algebra, unfortunately for me this was not the case. It was only when I handed him the Tutor Marked Assignment ( TMA ) that I found out he had specialized in Group theory so I think he might be a bit biased 😉
I think it was because I was unable to see an immediate use for it. I loved its elegance and I enjoyed the course more than the linear algebra but I found it much tougher going. I have been using linear algebra during the process of building a vector space search engine so it is nothing new to me and I could see a use for it which I lacked with Groups.
Still haven’t decided what I am going to study next year but I would like to do a a bit more work on group theory. I have a summer school coming up soon and I am hoping to get some idea of what might be suitable for my level 3 courses next year.
I managed to get 92% for the TMA so I must have done something right.

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Science Toys

I like to play with gadgets etc and managed to come across the following website.
Science Toys
It has some very nifty little experimental toys on it.

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Stag Weekend

We went to Estonia for the Stag weekend and I must say it is a very nice place. I get the feeling that it is becoming a popular venue for stag weekends due to the amount of lads on the plane some of which were dressed as women, most entertaining.
We arrived there on Thursday night and where met by a girl called “Kulli” which we were told is pronounced “Gooley”. Well you can guess what happened next.
GING, GANG, GOOLEY
Ging, gang, gooley, gooley, gooley, gooley, watcha,
Ging gang Goo, ging gang Goo
Ging, gang, gooley, gooley, gooley, gooley, watcha,
Ging gang goo, ging gang goo,
Hayla, Hayla shayla, Hayla shayla, Hayla ho. Hayla,
Hayla shayla, Hayla shayla, Hayla ho.
Shalli, walli, shalli, walli, shalli, walli, shalli, walli,
Ump pah, etc.
It wasn’t me that started it, it was the groom to be. We very nearly never got out at all on the first night due to a bit of an escapade in the lift. Seven lads in a small lift is not a pretty site. Anyway we pressed the button for floor 14 and went straight to floor 20 and back to the bottom. We all asked Rob if he was playing silly buggers and he assured us he wasn’t. Off we went again. Floor 14 came and went up to 20 then back down. We were all convinced that Rob was messing around. On the third attempt everyone but Rob and I got out of the lift at 18 and they walked down. We went back down to the bottom and got out of the lift and we told one of the porters it was not working. He smiled knowingly and asked for my room key which he then used to activate the lift. We were not embarrassed at all.
Anyway we went out and ended up in some sports bar or at least this is how we referred to it because it seemed to have some sport on television. We stayed there until rather late then made our way back to the Sokos hotel “which is a very nice hotel”. We were of course completely sobre, not!
Day 1 Paint ball
The next day came around much too fast for my liking and we were wisked away in a minibus feeling a bit hungover. The next thing we know we are in some woods near Estonia for paintball. We were met by a tall bloke called Vakuur, or something like. He gave us a quick lesson in paintball then divided us into teams.
I didn’t do too badly at the paintball except getting repeatedly shot in the leg by Rob which made me bleed like hell. I gave as good as I got though and managed to get the flag once. My second attempt at getting the flag was going swimmingly until I bent down to pick it up. I was shot in the ass by Colin, the little fscker had been hiding behind a wall and let off two rounds into my scratcher. That hurt like hell and I could hardly walk out of the bloody building. Then on proceeding out of the building Tosey, who had managed to ensconce himself behind a tree “For tosey this is no mean feat”. The bloody bastard shot me in the back of the head, admittedly I was letting a few rounds go into the building when I was meant to be dead but hey, my ass hurt. I turned on Tosey who then proceeded to scramble half way up the hill before going arse over tit and I managed to get my own back on him. I can safely say that I was glad when the paintball was over and I think everyone else was because we were all a bit sore.
Back to the hotel two hours kip then burgers then sports bar then drunk.
Day 2 Go Carting
We were all feeling very bad. We arrived at the race track on time and were given some instructions as to what was going to happen. I managed to convince the bloke that I was to get the fastest go-cart in the whole place. This did me absolutely no good because I won the booby prize which is a go-cart tyre with a little silver plate on it. I have no idea what the silver plate reads but I doubt its anything particularly flattering. Colin weighing in at 3 stone won every race.
It was bloody hard work racing those go-carts and I have bruises in my inner thigh which I was using to grip the steering wheel. I know it sounds daft but I am nearly 2 metres tall and the go-carts were not very big.
Back to the hotel 2 hours kip then burger then sports bar then drunk
Day 3 Home
Thank god. I don’t think I could have handled another night out there. I felt fine until I got home and then I was as sick as a dog, sweating like hell but freezing my ass off “which hurt like hell from paintball (see above)” . Jenny noticed that the bed was soaked through when she got in from work. I am pretty sure that I managed to get some sort of bug when I was out there because I have been on bigger benders than that and not blinked an eye except for being tired. I also found out that another of the party had the same problem so I can rest easy, at least its not my age. I was as sick as shit for 2 days sitting on a towel in the living room to avoid getting the seats wet from sweat.

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Bloody Lazy

I really should try and keep up to date with this blog. I have been a wee bit busy lately trying to get some coursework finished and I also had to got to Estonia on a Stag weekend which was compulsory due to me being the best man.

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Handy Website

Have you ever wondered how many telephone lines there are in Antarctica or what type of government is running Bolivia then look no further, our friends at the CIA have decided to publish a world fact book and its available on line. It has lots of interesting facts about more countries than you could imagine.

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New Service on UKlug

I have now added the facility for users to add jobs to their own web pages It’s a simple operation of cutting and pasting two lines of HTML into a web page and you will get a feed from the database appearing. The feed can be customised with no knowledge of CSS. For those that know some css then you can customise the feed completely by writing your own CSS.

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Burma Campaign

I went looking for a jacket the other day and decided to see if the “Savoy Tailors Guild” would be open. On searching around the internet for a local branch I came across

this article. Its quite enlightening. As a quicker reference the article suggests that the following companies will not disclose if they are sourcing any of their materials from Burma. There are a good few household names in this list.
Harrods, Bay Trading, By Design Plc, Benetton, Ciro Citteri, Elle, Etam, French Connection, Intersport, Karen Millen, Liberty, Mothercare, TCS, Animal, Naf Naf, Jo Bloggs, Jeffrey Rogers, Pied a terre, Savoy Tailors Guild, Shellys, Calvin Klein, La Coste, Young Fashion, Great Universal Stores(GUS), Argos Ltd, Claire’s Accessories, MK One, Shoe Box, First Sport, Lillywhites, Hawkshead, Urban Outfitters, Mambo, Mexx, Paul Smith, Reiss, Hobbs, Jane Norman, Miss Sixty, Boxfresh, and LK Bennett.