Paul Kuliniewicz

I would therefore like to posit that computing’s central challenge, “How not to make a mess of it,” has not been met.

– Edsger Dijkstra

You learn that it’s snowing, not by looking out a window, but from reading the away message of someone who lives in the same city you do.

*sigh*

If you’re at Purdue, be sure to come down to the Purdue Improv Club / Ship of Fools callout! 7:00 pm in BRNG 2280. Find out who we are, what we can do, and how you can do it too!

I came so close to finishing the first Programming Languages project in a single day. Pretty much all the code’s written, but neither of the two test cases provided quite pass. (All of the ones I wrote pass just fine, for whatever that’s worth.)

No big deal, really, since it’s not due until Wednesday anyway.

The project is a type-checker for MiniML. Jeff, care to guess who’s teaching the class? <g>

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I swear, I’m this close to just writing my own.

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A whole bunch of new pictures recently got uploaded to the Ship of Fools website. There’s also a bunch of teeny tiny video clips in the Videos section. Be sure to check out the 60 Second Alphabet one, wherein Chuck (left) and I (right) make with the funny in alphabetical order.

Like what you see? The new Ship of Fools callout will be this Friday, January 28, at 7:00 pm in BRNG 2280, whereat you can learn how to get weekly doses of the funny, all from the comfort of your own campus (offer only valid at Purdue University’s West Lafayette campus)!

An update to version 0.1.4 of Rhythmbox Applet has been released. Changes include:

• Added German (de) translation, contributed by Hendrik Brandt. Thanks!

For any stupid thing chosen at random, you’ll find at least 5 people on the Internet who think it’s a good idea.

– Steve Langasek

I saw one of these callout flyers in the Recitation building and did a double-take. Yes, it’s legit; the group has the room reserved and everything.

I’m scared.

(Photo thanks to Tom McHenry.)

(Purdue terminology: a “callout” is a club meeting held primarily to attract prospective members. For example, the Ship of Fools / Purdue Improv Club’s callout will be this Friday at 7:00 PM in BRNG 2280.)

Good thing I didn’t have any pressing homework for tomorrow. That let me spend most of the evening migrating content from the old Ship of Fools web site to the new one.

This wasn’t just copying files over, but a whole rewrite of everything. OK, most of the content is relatively unchanged, but now it’s all in PHP and XHTML and CSS and no frames or tables for layout whatsoever. Net result: the underlying code is a lot cleaner, and I should be able to do neat things with the pages now (like putting a random quote at the bottom, perhaps?).

Also of note: new bios for the two newest members of the performing group. And a significantly expanded games list. And a (proper?) backend for hosting images.

The new site shall be unveiled officially at the next meeting. If you’re reading this before then (hi, Wes!), consider this a sneak peek.

It just occured to me I hadn’t follow up on my installing XP rant with how an install of Ubuntu Linux went.

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Yeah, I haven’t been too good about posting here lately. Here’s a recap of anything moderately interesting that’s been going on the past couple of weeks.

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Random numbers should not be generated with a method chosen at random.

– Donald Knuth

The primary purpose of the DATA statement is to give names to constants; instead of referring to pi as 3.141592653589793 at every appearance, the variable PI can be given that value with a DATA statement and used instead of the longer form of the constant. This also simplifies modifying the program, should the value of pi change.

– FORTRAN manual for Xerox Computers

I’m in the middle of installing Windows XP on the shiny new hard drive in my parents’ computer. (ObLinuxGeek: after copying the data off the old hard drive, Ubuntu’s going on there.)

I haven’t yet installed Linux on the computer, but comparing the XP install with the Debian install on kryten — and keep in mind that Debian is notorious for its allegedly painful installation process — let me tell you that installing Windows XP is no walk in the park.

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