Had some more time to digest Windows Vista and things are working overall. The thing that amuses me the most is the fact that the majority of the compatibility problems I've had are all Microsoft related. Office 2003 is particularly annoying, with things like multiple instances of Powerpoint unable to appear properly as previews (which would be genuinely useful) and I still haven't got to the bottom of that Word slowdown thing. Windows messenger doesn't seem to want to do the whole Aero translucent window thing either, which given that it is supposed to be Vista native strikes me as odd. Third party apps are more or less fine though. Funny that.
There are a few exceptions. CutePDF, despite claiming to be compatible, is a pain to install, which I put down to lazy programming on their part. Also, videos working in the previews work fine for everything EXCEPT Quicktime, so all the Apple fanboys out there can shut up.
Oh yeah, and I disabled the sidebar. Couldn't see the point in it.
Monday, 30 July 2007
Monday, 23 July 2007
It's the Sony Killstick!!!!
OK, even I'm not usually dorky enough to get overawed by cosplay but this one of Megatokyo's Piroko at Otakon is awesome. The Flickr album belongs to Hawk of Applegeeks fame.
What's wrong with the air in China
This report (or lack of) came as little surprise to me:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/6911784.stm
Basically, there is environmental research going on in China. It's not that the Chinese government don't know about things like all the smog and desert dust killing people and all the CO2 causing global warming and they do commit a pretty tidy sum towards researching it (although a big chunk is dedicated to researching weather modification). It's just that they don't like the results and they can't admit to having an environmentally unsustainable development policy. So they bury the bad news, pretend it doesn't exist and carry on regardless (as opposed to the western approach which is to at least pay it lip service and then carry on). Just goes to show that their policy on expression and access to information applies to science as well as everything else.
PS foreign scientists are very, very rarely allowed to do any atmospheric sampling in China, just in case you were wondering. They keep it staunchly in-house.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/6911784.stm
Basically, there is environmental research going on in China. It's not that the Chinese government don't know about things like all the smog and desert dust killing people and all the CO2 causing global warming and they do commit a pretty tidy sum towards researching it (although a big chunk is dedicated to researching weather modification). It's just that they don't like the results and they can't admit to having an environmentally unsustainable development policy. So they bury the bad news, pretend it doesn't exist and carry on regardless (as opposed to the western approach which is to at least pay it lip service and then carry on). Just goes to show that their policy on expression and access to information applies to science as well as everything else.
PS foreign scientists are very, very rarely allowed to do any atmospheric sampling in China, just in case you were wondering. They keep it staunchly in-house.
Wednesday, 18 July 2007
The weirdest Microsoft glitch ever?
Got a new computer at work. It's sweeeet. Dell Precision 390 with Core 2 Duo and a big-ass hard drive. However, I also saw fit to order it with Vista 64 installed, something that has confused the hell out of my coworkers, including Dave who ordered almost exactly the same computer with XP.
I do have my reasons; sooner or later I'm going to have to get a Vista machine working in the field (either ours or someone else's) and the sooner I learn how to hack about with it the better. Trouble is that any problems and I'm on my own. The university's IT Services quite sensibly don't support it yet.
So far though, it's not been all that bad. I like the new explorer interface and the new security model is long overdue. Aero and the sidebar haven't blown my skirt up yet but they're also largely unobtrusive. The only bit I don't like is Media Player 11, which I still haven't got used to. I liked 10.
As for snagging, getting it to talk to other computers on our antiquated network has been a pain thanks to the lack of IPX/SPX support. I've found the solution is to make sure whatever you want to talk to has IP NetBIOS enabled. Also, there was this weird thing where an mp3 would skip exactly 20 seconds before the end of each song, but an updated soundcard driver from Dell sorted that.
But here's the weirdest of the weird and I defy anyone to explain this to me: There seems to be a voodoo incompatibility with Word 2003. The symptoms are that the taskbar, sidebar and start menu slow to a crawl when I open certain documents. The odd thing is that there is still plenty of CPU and memory resources and the individual applications still run fine (although switching between them is a pain). The even odder thing is that it only happens for some documents and not others (I've not found a pattern yet) and if I have multiple documents open, it only happens if one of the offending documents is the topmost.
Bizarre as hell. Tried restarting the system, running in XP compatibility mode, turning off anti virus, disabling Aero and updating the graphics drivers and all sorts but nothing changes it. A couple of workarounds I've found is to make a new Word document and bring it to the front when I want to use the start menu. If a blank document is topmost, it seems to work fine. Or, if I copy and paste the contents of a nonworking document into a new document and close the original, that seems to work too. I've seen some pretty weird computer bugs in my time, but this has to be one of the weirdest. Hats off to you Microsoft.
I do have my reasons; sooner or later I'm going to have to get a Vista machine working in the field (either ours or someone else's) and the sooner I learn how to hack about with it the better. Trouble is that any problems and I'm on my own. The university's IT Services quite sensibly don't support it yet.
So far though, it's not been all that bad. I like the new explorer interface and the new security model is long overdue. Aero and the sidebar haven't blown my skirt up yet but they're also largely unobtrusive. The only bit I don't like is Media Player 11, which I still haven't got used to. I liked 10.
As for snagging, getting it to talk to other computers on our antiquated network has been a pain thanks to the lack of IPX/SPX support. I've found the solution is to make sure whatever you want to talk to has IP NetBIOS enabled. Also, there was this weird thing where an mp3 would skip exactly 20 seconds before the end of each song, but an updated soundcard driver from Dell sorted that.
But here's the weirdest of the weird and I defy anyone to explain this to me: There seems to be a voodoo incompatibility with Word 2003. The symptoms are that the taskbar, sidebar and start menu slow to a crawl when I open certain documents. The odd thing is that there is still plenty of CPU and memory resources and the individual applications still run fine (although switching between them is a pain). The even odder thing is that it only happens for some documents and not others (I've not found a pattern yet) and if I have multiple documents open, it only happens if one of the offending documents is the topmost.
Bizarre as hell. Tried restarting the system, running in XP compatibility mode, turning off anti virus, disabling Aero and updating the graphics drivers and all sorts but nothing changes it. A couple of workarounds I've found is to make a new Word document and bring it to the front when I want to use the start menu. If a blank document is topmost, it seems to work fine. Or, if I copy and paste the contents of a nonworking document into a new document and close the original, that seems to work too. I've seen some pretty weird computer bugs in my time, but this has to be one of the weirdest. Hats off to you Microsoft.
Sunday, 8 July 2007
This one's dedicated to our favourite planet
Rant begin. Live Earth... well?
My first thoughts have to be how pissed off I am with the BBC for cutting off Metallica, the Beastie Boys and worst of all Spinal Tap, each of whom when they were getting to their best. I really hope 'Big Bottom' with all those basists on stage finds its way onto YouTube somehow, I really do.
But also I'm a bit weirded out. Everyone who organises a charity or political gig wants to capture the spirit of the two holy grails, the two magical points in history that can never be recreated, being Woodstock and Live Aid. Boy have they tried over the years and boy have they failed and today was no exception.
A big problem lies in the fact that the whole climate change movement lacks a flag carrier (James Lovelock doesn't count). Instead of Bob Geldof telling us to "get on the fucking phones" we have Al Gore giving us his seven pledges about reducing carbon dioxide emission by X percent. It's not like I blame him because he has a much bigger mountain to climb; Michael Buerk's pictures of starving children don't compare to a bunch of numbers from the IPCC saying we're all going to find it a little hotter in generations to come. It's just that being an ex vice president and the husband of the woman who gave us the parental advisory label do not make you cool by default, no matter whether you wear a polo shirt or not. The fact that he lacks any sort of charisma by anyone's definition only makes things much, much worse. Uniting behind that man takes effort.
But he has the message. Opening the US leg in a native American heritage centre (despite dropping a bollock when he said "God bless you" to them) reinforces the sea change that people in general need. We need to think global and we need to get into the mindset that we have this two-way relationship with our planet. Sounds a bit hippy, but that if anything will be the way forward and engaging the current generation is how to do that. As Arnold Schwartzenegger has pointed out, we need to make it fashionable. And that means going MTV.
Not that that showed for the most of this evening. The majority of the stars attacked it with the usual amount of conviction they approach charity events ("yeah, I think XXXX is a really important cause, I think it's great that we can raise awareness, etc. etc.") and it didn't help that the great British cynicism kicked in right from the get-go. We had Ricky Gervais gleefully pointing out the hypocrisy of the high-carbon lifestyles of the celebs and God knows how many stars joking about how they'd accidentally left their TVs on standby and such. And the peanut on the turd was Jonathan Ross, who was peddling his usual trademark of being simultaneously encompassing and dismissive at the same time. Why has committing to any sort of opinion become so uncool in this country?
So as much as it galls me to admit it, the Americans were the ones who lead the way. Al Gore started it and Madonna certainly finished it after a blistering set by the Foo Fighters. No apologies, they had something to say and they just went out there and they fucking said it loud, clear and on our turf. I've got to admit, that's something that we as Brits living in today's society can learn a lot from the Yanks. Hats off to them.
Rant over.
My first thoughts have to be how pissed off I am with the BBC for cutting off Metallica, the Beastie Boys and worst of all Spinal Tap, each of whom when they were getting to their best. I really hope 'Big Bottom' with all those basists on stage finds its way onto YouTube somehow, I really do.
But also I'm a bit weirded out. Everyone who organises a charity or political gig wants to capture the spirit of the two holy grails, the two magical points in history that can never be recreated, being Woodstock and Live Aid. Boy have they tried over the years and boy have they failed and today was no exception.
A big problem lies in the fact that the whole climate change movement lacks a flag carrier (James Lovelock doesn't count). Instead of Bob Geldof telling us to "get on the fucking phones" we have Al Gore giving us his seven pledges about reducing carbon dioxide emission by X percent. It's not like I blame him because he has a much bigger mountain to climb; Michael Buerk's pictures of starving children don't compare to a bunch of numbers from the IPCC saying we're all going to find it a little hotter in generations to come. It's just that being an ex vice president and the husband of the woman who gave us the parental advisory label do not make you cool by default, no matter whether you wear a polo shirt or not. The fact that he lacks any sort of charisma by anyone's definition only makes things much, much worse. Uniting behind that man takes effort.
But he has the message. Opening the US leg in a native American heritage centre (despite dropping a bollock when he said "God bless you" to them) reinforces the sea change that people in general need. We need to think global and we need to get into the mindset that we have this two-way relationship with our planet. Sounds a bit hippy, but that if anything will be the way forward and engaging the current generation is how to do that. As Arnold Schwartzenegger has pointed out, we need to make it fashionable. And that means going MTV.
Not that that showed for the most of this evening. The majority of the stars attacked it with the usual amount of conviction they approach charity events ("yeah, I think XXXX is a really important cause, I think it's great that we can raise awareness, etc. etc.") and it didn't help that the great British cynicism kicked in right from the get-go. We had Ricky Gervais gleefully pointing out the hypocrisy of the high-carbon lifestyles of the celebs and God knows how many stars joking about how they'd accidentally left their TVs on standby and such. And the peanut on the turd was Jonathan Ross, who was peddling his usual trademark of being simultaneously encompassing and dismissive at the same time. Why has committing to any sort of opinion become so uncool in this country?
So as much as it galls me to admit it, the Americans were the ones who lead the way. Al Gore started it and Madonna certainly finished it after a blistering set by the Foo Fighters. No apologies, they had something to say and they just went out there and they fucking said it loud, clear and on our turf. I've got to admit, that's something that we as Brits living in today's society can learn a lot from the Yanks. Hats off to them.
Rant over.
Wednesday, 4 July 2007
Inevitable global warming rant
OK, saw this, got pissed off and just had to this it off my chest...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6263690.stm
Apparently, there's a majority of UK adults out there that think that we scientists are exaggerating the whole climate change thing. That in itself isn't the thing that pisses me off or is even unexpected really; collective denial is a powerful force when people are presented with something they don't want to hear. The thing that really annoys me is that the army of staunch disbelievers out there will somehow treat this as evidence that we are in fact making it all up, that somehow the science can be voted incorrect.
As far as they're concerned, we're just making this up to get more funding and the government is happy to play along because it gives them more things to tax. I can't comment on the latter (they could have a point there for all I know) but the thing that ticks me off about the former sentiment is that it shows a profound lack of comprehension of what climate science actually is. The whole scene moved on from the questions of whether the earth is getting hotter or colder and whether it is or isn't a result of human activity a very long time ago. Now the funding agencies are paying us not for simple yes/no answers but to actually attach numbers to the situation. Governments want to know exactly how much hotter it is going to get, which cities are going to be underwater by 2100 or which countries' populations are going to be displaced by drought so they can plan for the future. This means that beyond making wild theories, we have to put numbers on things and most importantly, these numbers have to be right.
The key thing here is that this involves taking detailed account of everything - solar cycles, the earth's orbit, the biosphere, ocean currents and of course man-made emissions. It just happens to be that the man made stuff is the biggest change in recent years. However, this is the bit that the press and the general public don't seem to pick up on - they seem to think that we're solely in the business of creating headlines and scaring people silly and that all the work we do is simply a means of achieving that.
Well, OK, that could be said about a minority of scientists; our line of work is by no means immune to media whores and they exist on both sides of the debate. However, if you want a balanced culmination of the state of the credible science out there, I suggest going to the IPCC report's faq (link below) because that's what it's there for. I actually know a handful of the authors personally and if nothing else, I can vouch for at least those ones not being sensationalists or part of some mad conspiracy or anything. The vast majority of scientists out there would rather be right than famous - history has judged the incorrect but noisy ones very harshly (faked clones and cold fusion anyone?).
http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Pub_FAQs.pdf
For my part, as much as it galls me to admit it, I'd love us scientists to be wrong and the deniers to be right because that would mean we won't be spending our coming decades living in a crappier world (although we'd have a lot of humble pie to eat). However, given that every single climate model out there comes up with more or less the same answer to the original yes/no questions stated earlier, I'm not counting on it.
Rant over.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6263690.stm
Apparently, there's a majority of UK adults out there that think that we scientists are exaggerating the whole climate change thing. That in itself isn't the thing that pisses me off or is even unexpected really; collective denial is a powerful force when people are presented with something they don't want to hear. The thing that really annoys me is that the army of staunch disbelievers out there will somehow treat this as evidence that we are in fact making it all up, that somehow the science can be voted incorrect.
As far as they're concerned, we're just making this up to get more funding and the government is happy to play along because it gives them more things to tax. I can't comment on the latter (they could have a point there for all I know) but the thing that ticks me off about the former sentiment is that it shows a profound lack of comprehension of what climate science actually is. The whole scene moved on from the questions of whether the earth is getting hotter or colder and whether it is or isn't a result of human activity a very long time ago. Now the funding agencies are paying us not for simple yes/no answers but to actually attach numbers to the situation. Governments want to know exactly how much hotter it is going to get, which cities are going to be underwater by 2100 or which countries' populations are going to be displaced by drought so they can plan for the future. This means that beyond making wild theories, we have to put numbers on things and most importantly, these numbers have to be right.
The key thing here is that this involves taking detailed account of everything - solar cycles, the earth's orbit, the biosphere, ocean currents and of course man-made emissions. It just happens to be that the man made stuff is the biggest change in recent years. However, this is the bit that the press and the general public don't seem to pick up on - they seem to think that we're solely in the business of creating headlines and scaring people silly and that all the work we do is simply a means of achieving that.
Well, OK, that could be said about a minority of scientists; our line of work is by no means immune to media whores and they exist on both sides of the debate. However, if you want a balanced culmination of the state of the credible science out there, I suggest going to the IPCC report's faq (link below) because that's what it's there for. I actually know a handful of the authors personally and if nothing else, I can vouch for at least those ones not being sensationalists or part of some mad conspiracy or anything. The vast majority of scientists out there would rather be right than famous - history has judged the incorrect but noisy ones very harshly (faked clones and cold fusion anyone?).
http://ipcc-wg1.ucar.edu/wg1/Report/AR4WG1_Pub_FAQs.pdf
For my part, as much as it galls me to admit it, I'd love us scientists to be wrong and the deniers to be right because that would mean we won't be spending our coming decades living in a crappier world (although we'd have a lot of humble pie to eat). However, given that every single climate model out there comes up with more or less the same answer to the original yes/no questions stated earlier, I'm not counting on it.
Rant over.
Tuesday, 3 July 2007
This paper is taking ages...
Yippee! My first ever blog. So what do I say?
How about talking about my Puerto Rico paper? A project I did back in December 2004, designed to study the effect of organic aerosols on clouds in tropical marine environments? What do you do when all the gear arrives late and you only get two weeks' worth of data (about half of what was planned)? And what happens when you don't get any organic aerosols?
The paper is almost ready to go into ACP, but not quite. Bouncing back and forth between me and Darrel. So close I can almost taste it. But not quite. It's not that there isn't a story or some decent science there, it's just that we were hoping to be able to say something more headline-grabbing. Plus we're going to annoy everyone who has been saying the organics are important for the last ten years.
Ah well, better get back to it I suppose. My future posts will be more interesting I imagine. This was only really a test.
How about talking about my Puerto Rico paper? A project I did back in December 2004, designed to study the effect of organic aerosols on clouds in tropical marine environments? What do you do when all the gear arrives late and you only get two weeks' worth of data (about half of what was planned)? And what happens when you don't get any organic aerosols?
The paper is almost ready to go into ACP, but not quite. Bouncing back and forth between me and Darrel. So close I can almost taste it. But not quite. It's not that there isn't a story or some decent science there, it's just that we were hoping to be able to say something more headline-grabbing. Plus we're going to annoy everyone who has been saying the organics are important for the last ten years.
Ah well, better get back to it I suppose. My future posts will be more interesting I imagine. This was only really a test.
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