FCHouse

Spectacles!

Posted by Carlo - 31/08/07 at 09:08:49 pm

After few years without them, today I finally convinced myself and I went to the optician. A good visit revealed that my eyesight is not as perfect as it once was, so I bought a new pair of spectacles.

I cannot complain about the result of my visit, but lately I had my eyes very tired and I saw the world under a “blur effect” too many times.

The optician told me that I shouldn’t wear my new glasses all the time, just when I watch TV, go to the cinema, read or work with a computer… Ok, she probably meant that I can avoid wearing them when I sleep! :)

PS: should I cut my beard?

GIT Version Control System

Posted by Carlo - 30/08/07 at 09:08:33 am

Some days ago I finally remembered to install GIT, a quite recent Version Control System built by Linus Torwalds (does anybody know him?). The logic behind GIT is quite different from those commonly used to manage the Versions of the source code. The most important difference is that there is no central repository: you do not have a main server where all your code is stored, available to everyone. GIT uses a distributed system, where everyone is server and workstation at the same time. If this can be quite scary, it is a complete different approach after all, I think that it is quite brilliant! If you want to have the “central repository” on a specific server, you can always copy one repository in a single server, but just for backup reason…

How many times you needed to create a branch of a specific code, just to test something, merging the modification with another version modified by someone else. Never, I bet, because only to think about it with CVS or SVN (not talking about the shitty SourceSafe) it is a pain. Even with SVN, which should be more user-friendly, it is not.  With GIT you can do it easily: I’ve taken some code I had and I started playing around. EASY!

More than this GIT is much more faster than SVN. Having the main repository on your machine means instant commit, means that you work on YOUR branch, completely, and you can commit whenever you want, not only when you have tested everything! I am one of those who thinks that in a SVN style version control system you should update your code only when you are sure it works, otherwise those who will download your modifications will find themselves dealing with a bugged code. I think so, but I do not think this is a good solution, because I believe that a good tagging on the commit is the best way of keeping track of the changes (and the reason of the changes) in the code. GIT welcomes the idea of “commit every time you want” because when you have finished everything you needed to do, committing 1.000 times, you can send your branch to those who need it. Plain and simple.

If you are a developer I strongly encourage you to take a look at it. It may not be as perfectly supported as SVN, but it is much faster and merging/branching is a child game!

BBC iPlayer is threatening the ISPs bandwidth? Who cares!

Posted by Carlo - 16/08/07 at 09:08:58 am

BBC is ready to launch its new internet TV on demand: iPlayer. Who Cares?

Various UK internet providers fear this: they feel that there will be not enough bandwidth. Who Cares?

I mean, we are on the verge of what? Do you call it technological advancement? I think that Henry Ford told something like “There is real innovation only when a new technology is for everyone“. iPlayer is NOT for everyone, because it is limited to the Microsoft world. This is the first step towards the “BBC: I do not Care!” . Despite being a Mac user (and supporter) I would not have changed my opinion if the iPlayer would have been limited to OSX or Linux. What if BBC would say: from tomorrow the broadcasting will be limited to the LG televisions? In that case we would see a revolution, but we are talking about IT, and who cares? I do not, BBC.

On the other hand the internet providers are crying because they fear that the iPlayer will kill their bandwidth. Starting from the point that buying a DSL connection is like buying a bottle with the note “up to 1 lt“, I did not expect them to be less than that. I am paying to receive 24MB at home, but you know… I’m far from the exchange… the line is quite noisy in my area… the cables are old… the result is that I get less than 3 MB! I have bought a bottle thinking to drink a liter and I realized that after a sip of one tent of liter the bottle was empty.  Does the ISPs fear the lack of bandwidth? I do not Care! The infrastructure is old, it is not ready for the next technological jump, but their lack of investment is one of the reasons.

Where is the WiMax? Will we be able to use it or will it end like the 3G, where the prices for the licenses were so high, that all the costs were set on the customers? The 3G has not been an innovation, because it was NOT for everyone, and after all these years I should pay 3£ per 1MB. Ridiculous!

iPlayer and ISP is another news that I will soon forgot, first of all because it is played by two players I do not respect any longer. On a side note it is my personal opinion that entities like BBC should care a little more about the availability of the technology they use.

Evolution and The Selfish Gene

Posted by Carlo - 14/08/07 at 09:08:30 am

This night, during my sleepless hours, I started reading a new book: The Selfish Gene. Usually I tend to finish a book before writing something about it, but in this case there has been some passages in the first pages that I consider really interesting.

Richard Dawkins writes that the species are competing in what Darwin called “the struggle for existence“, where the individuals seems best regarded as pawns in the game. So the species with a large number of individuals ready to self-sacrifice themselves for the good of the specie itself are the less likely to go extinct. This is the theory of the “group selection“, quite different from the “individual selection“. If in a group where the people are ready to sacrifice themselves there is one selfish rebel, prepared to exploit the altruism of the others, then he is likely than the other to survive and, in the game of reproduction, to have children. In the long run, however, the more the selfish individuals there will be, the less the group will be altruistic, lowering the possibility of survival of the specie itself.

Maybe it has been the sleeplessness, but I have found this idea quite interesting.

A selfish individual is therefore highly likely to succeed when he is in an altruist group. But he must remember that to maintain his status he should not allow the other selfish individuals to became the majority of the group, or he will lose all his benefits. This sounds quite interesting while thinking to a villain for a book: too many times they are so unrealistically evil, selfish and idiot that they destroy everything they have.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy

Posted by Carlo - 11/08/07 at 12:08:41 pm

Just finished this hilarious book! Different from every other I’ve read lately, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is a nice book to read!

Douglas Adam’s book is an Absurd Science Fiction, where the robot is depressed, the President of the Galaxy is a scapegoat and the Bureaucracy is so similar to the Italian one that it is hardly believable. Nevertheless Douglas Adam started writing this book after a travel in Italy…

If you wanna read something funny, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy is the book for you. And remember: take your towel with you and…

DON’T PANIC

Canon IXUS 950 IS: point and shot!

Posted by Carlo - 05/08/07 at 03:08:33 pm

Yesterday we decided to take a compact camera, one of those point and shot to bring with us every day. We were aimed to the Canon IXUS 800 IS, but the only shops that had it were pricing it a little higher than expected (over £250 in sale, it is a theft!). We opted for a Canon IXUS 950 IS, priced less than the 800, in a shop that was aimed to sell, not just to expose.

Luckily the batteries were half charged, so we started using it immediately after buying it.

Coming from the Olympus E 500, a digital SLR, taking photos with this one is like playing with a toy: you point, click and a very nice picture is taken. As easy as you can think: this small jewel does everything by itself.

Clearly you cannot expect the level of freedom a digital SLR gives you in terms of artistic photos; you cannot have a overexposed or underexposed shot, the manual function does not allow you to decide the aperture or the shot time, but for what it is supposed to be, a super compact digital camera, the Canon IXUS 950 IS is definitely a good choice!!!

The “IS” in the name stands for “Image Stabilizer” and I have to admit that it does his job extremely well: very few of the hundred of shots taken yesterday were moved! More than this, this little camera has a nice feature of Face Detection, that helps taking amazing portraits!

I’ve just uploaded some shots taken in these few hours in our photo gallery!

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Carlo Nicora is at home in London.