Archive for October, 2003

Primates are Here to Help

Thursday, October 16th, 2003

I recently remarked on this blog that the SUO debates can sometimes be absurdist. But day-to-day reality provides plenty of such absurdities. One of the most surreal to observe has been the transformation of western Christianity over the past few decades. Although I have been actively observing foronly 20 years, it appears to me that [...]

Elevator Design

Thursday, October 16th, 2003

When I first interviewed tojoin MSFT,I was asked to describe how I would design an elevator scheduling system. Prior to joining MSFT I worked on a couple of traffic flow sensor systems for roadways, so it was easy to make up some convincing suggestions, but I’ve often wondered about how it’s really done with elevators.Now [...]

Man in Space

Tuesday, October 14th, 2003

China has put a man in space nearly two hours ago, and CNN Headline News is still saying that China is “planning to put a man in space”. You can see it at http://www.cctv.com/

Words Mean Things

Friday, October 10th, 2003

An article running on Slate today makes the case that “no means no”:
“The problem is not one of nomenclature. Words signify concepts and “no” still signals the concept of non-consent, for 100 percent of the world’s English-speaking population, 100 percent of the time.”
The author is reminding us that, while convention and context can influence meaning, [...]

Switching ISPs

Friday, October 10th, 2003

I’m now using GearHost, based on recommendation from Omar Shahine. It’s about $500 per year less than I was paying at Verio (on FreeBSD), offers more transfer per month, .NET hosting, and runs dasBlog. Now I can dynamically generate the MSFT blogroll in different formats and do some other experimental things I’ve been wanting to [...]