Stickies

Simplify your code using Dictionaries

2008-11-11T19:12:00.000-08:00

Too complicated conditions?


if ([[self stateName] isEqual:@"Square"])
{
    if (self.clockwise)
    {
        return @"Animating around four points, clockwise";
    }
    else
    {
        return @"Animating around four points, anti-clockwise";
    }
}
else if ([[self stateName] isEqual:@"Triangle"])
{
    if (self.clockwise)
    {
        return @"Animating around three points, clockwise";
    }
    else
    {
        return @"Animating around three points, anti-clockwise";
    }
}


if ([[stateController stateName] isEqual:@"Square"])
{
    [path fill];
}
else if ([[stateController stateName] isEqual:@"Triangle"])
{
    [path stroke];
}

Keep it simple!


return [self.selectedItem objectForKey:[self clockwiseKey]];

and


SEL drawSelector = NSSelectorFromString(
    [stateController.selectedItem objectForKey:@"drawSelector"]);
[path performSelector:drawSelector withObject:nil];

Source

Back

2008-11-11T03:06:00.000-08:00

I'm back, with a new theme layout, and hopefully with more content.

Another Personality Test

2007-03-15T20:06:00.000-07:00

Personality Disorder Test Results

Paranoid	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	42%
Schizoid	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	54%
Schizotypal	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	50%
Antisocial	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	54%
Borderline	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	38%
Histrionic	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	54%
Narcissistic	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	34%
Avoidant	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	50%
Dependent	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	38%
Obsessive-Compulsive	\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|\|	50%

Take Free Personality Disorder Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

Update:
I am quite average, a little more anti-social than others, less paranoid, narcissitic and borderline, more histrinic, avoidant and obsessive-compulsive.
Oh well...

My Visual DNA :)

2007-03-14T19:23:00.000-07:00

Read my VisualDNA™ Get your own VisualDNA™

A few hours later...

2007-03-14T18:22:00.000-07:00

I really enjoy the Apple delivery service from Singapore. The same night, at 9pm, a courier called me asking me if I'm home, as he was ringing at the door and nobody answered. I had my headphones on :D
Anyway... here it is... my new USB stick.

Template update

2007-03-13T23:48:00.000-07:00

Today I updated the template. The photo badge should work properly under Internet Explorer.
I have to talk these days about the movies I've seen in the weekend. When I will catch the time.

Tuesday 13

2007-03-13T23:42:00.000-07:00

That was yesterday. I did not even realized it until the evening. Apparently, nothing went so wrong. I injured my knee a little at climbing, but nothing serious.
Today the flash drive died. I'm sorry about it, it was a gift from Claudia. I ordered a new one (actually a 1st generation ipod shuffle, with USB port). I hope it will have a longer life.

Later:
May it rest in peace:

One day as the year

2007-03-07T23:39:00.000-08:00

Well, yesterday (7 march) was my chosen day. Like that day it's suppose to be the whole year. So ... let's see... The weather was fine... I felt quite well (maybe except for a small tooth-ache). I had a presentation at SUN hq, which went fine (at least according to Claudia) and in the evening I saw "300".
You might say it went rather well. I think I babbled too much at the presentation. And I was just a little disappointed by ending of the movie. I was not really that "into" the movie, except maybe the battle scenes, which were ... superb. Blood flowing everywhere, action from different angles, hi-speed and lo-speed filming... really nice.

I do not see why the critics though about the "Freedoom!!!" ending of Braveheart when they saw "300". While Braveheart brings tears in your eyes, I could just laugh at this ending. 10 minutes of narration over Leonida's death. Waay too sloow.
However, overall, I liked 300. It could have been no other way :)

Just a reminder...

2007-02-28T19:50:00.000-08:00

You have to laugh sometimes, and remember than not only you are clumsy. So here is the reminder:

later edit: speaking of reminders... today I added the flickr badge...

Mac Os Apps

2007-02-19T23:53:00.000-08:00

After a looong night, I took some time and compiled a list of "must-have" utilities for Mac. You can find it here. I still have to add some labels for those not-so-free applications and, add links and group them better, but right now I'm gonna go eat :-).

How I will die :-)

2007-02-17T22:21:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Grig, I found out how I'm going to die.

How Will I Die Quiz

You will die at the age of 86

You will be killed when the chimpanzee's rise up and take control of the planet

Find out how you will die at Quizopolis.com

Guitar masters

2007-02-17T22:12:00.000-08:00

Here are two really cool videos with some guitar masters doing their thing.
Bug, I hope you get to see this :)

iPhone = mobile computing

2007-01-21T05:02:00.000-08:00

I did not throw in saying anything about the iPhone until now, instead I digested anything that has been said. I laughed when I read comments about the iPhone not having an SD-card (why? it has 8GB! of memory). Instead of just watching the keynote, many hurried on criticizing, "reviewing". I even read one of those "reviews" saying that "too bad [the bluetooth] has no EDR". Huh?!
I've seen all the suppositions that were made about the software before Steve Jobs said the phone is (almost) locked down. Right from the demo it was obvious that iPhone's software makes use of Core Animation. Which is one of the features of Mac OS 10.5. It clearly runs Leopard. All the comments about being "stripped-off" are useless and pointless for now. If it does not have the command X, can you call it "stripped-off" ? If it's compiled for ARM (or as some rumors say, XScale), is it "stripped-off" ?
The main point that everybody should have remembered from the keynote is what Steve Jobs said: "Cocoa", "Desktop-class applications". Desktop class applications are possible because of these software technologies - Cocoa, Core Animation, Mac Os X, etc...
Now, after Apple confirmed that it controls the software, it may seem obvious why Steve emphasized widgets. I agree with Apple's decision to keep application development under strict supervision, as long as they don't abuse it. I also think that giving more slack to widget development would keep the developers close to the iPhone. I, myself, am not a big widget user of fan. I only keep and use several of them on my Mac, like a calendar and a couple of clocks, the thesaurus and weather. And for long time I did not understand why Widgets+Dashcode are heavily advertised in Leopard. I can only hope that widgets will be an important feature of all the hardware Apple is preparing, and Dashcode is the development platform for all of them. It seems logical and with sense.

There are several things missing on the current "smartphones" that iPhone adds in. Amongst them, a big screen and complete communication package: Bluetooth, WiFi, Edge. I am not one of those nit-pickers not satisfied by the lack of 3G. EDGE it is sufficient for where the iPhone is intended to be launched this year. I am almos sure that in 2008, when iPhone will hot the Asian market, a new version with 3G will exist. With all the current capabilities of the iPods and the new ones iPhone adds on, with all the accessories that are or can be, the iPhone can become the "swiss-army knife" of mobile computing, with limitless possibilities. And about this possibilities I want to write a few lines, trying to peek on what the iPhone I hope is really designed to be.

As an example, I remind you one iPod accesory that maybe is not taken too much seriously: the camera connector. How many carry around a laptop to copy the pictures off your camera? (listen to music, watch a movie...) With the beautiful photo interface that iPhone offers, managing photos becomes a beautiful experience. Just go on with your camera, fill it up and transfer all to your iPhone. Future versions of the software may even include basic photo tools to make your corrections on-the-spot. You are ready to send your picture directly to your home server, e-mail to friends, blog or whatever. I am not talking about the phone's camera, because I am talking about real photography here. The storage on the iPhone may be a little low for now, but next year we might also see improvement on that.

As many has already hurried to point out, there are not office applications for the iPhone. This was one of the things the iPhone was very criticized about. The way I see it, this is just software. It can come tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. Further more, an Internet connection is enough for you to make use of one of the online office suites, like Google Docs or the excellent ThinkFree Office (if Java will be available in Safari). My point is that this can be available in time. And combined with the iPhone may result in something spectacular. Imagine a presentation, where the projector is connected to an iPhone accesory that communicates with the iPhone using Bluetooth of Wifi. You would just have the iPhone in your hand, conduction a presentation, using your finger to highlight some data and so on. Although I think wireless projectors are already a reality.

I do not consider it necessary to examine the iPod part from the iPhone. It is extraordinary, though I'm not sure if I have seen something like a search bar. The only thing that worries me so far is the battery time. 16 hours of mp3 playback are impressive, but I have to remind you that this time probably is just that: playback. If you add on some album browsing, I'm afraid the time goes down to maybe half. If you also include the phone part in the equation, you see that the battery time is not very good. I really hope in the future they will improve on that.

Although the iPhone is not perfect and, as any new product, lacks in software and accesories, I believe it will be a total success. It provides enough to satisfy a large "marketshare" and has tons of possibilities. I can only hope Apple will not go wrong with their policies and try to have way too much control over the user. Other than that, I am eager to be amazed.

EDIT: some things to add:

iPod has TV-OUT, so it's reasonable to assume the iPhone will also sport one. I also can think of a VGA adaptor/connector, such that you can connect it to your monitor. Plus that the answer to the question: "Can I pair it with a bluetooth keyboard" may be "Yes" and you can see further uses.

Vindows Wista

2007-01-17T06:09:00.000-08:00

Well, I managed to get Vista installed on my MacBook Pro. It was quite a hassle, I will tell you later about why (and how).

Right now I would like to share with you what I learned recently: Windows is actually an application!!! Really!

And, like many other Windows applications, THE "Microsoft Windows" application may crash!

Photon Universal Binary

2007-01-06T21:40:00.000-08:00

If you are one that arrived here by searching after "photon", "plugin", "universal binary", "intel mac", "iphoto", "export", "movable type", "macbook", "mac", "mac os x" - than chances are you want a universal binary of Photon.
You can find it here.

The dark side of PhDs...

2007-01-03T20:14:00.000-08:00

Here is the e-mail I just sent to the SoC dean and secretary:

Hello,

I was not aware that not participating in the feedback exercise will result in 5 days postponement of the results. Nevertheless, I would like to provide some feedback for the QE exams - if this thing is possible.
The main thing I would like to point out is the lack of interaction between SoC and the graduate students. The only (online) places (at least that I know of) students can access this information is the modules' websites and the (relatively new) PhD Corner. We have Prof. Wei Tsang Ooi to thank for the updated information on the PhD Corner and the CS5202 module. However, things are different for CS5201.
Like other graduate students, I got the information for CS5201 from the module site:
http://www.comp.nus.edu.sg/~cs5201/Quals/
Also, additional information is available at:
https://mysoc.nus.edu.sg/admin/general/info/graduate/phdgp_currQE.htm
(the file can be found at: http://www.comp.nus.edu.sg/graduateprog/CS5201.pdf).
Please pay attention at:

D. Logic and Formal Reasoning: The students will be tested on the fundamentals of logic and deduction as well as their use in computer science. In particular, they should have an in-depth understanding of proof systems and semantics for propositional and first-order logic. They also need to develop basic understanding of program verification, Floyd-Hoare logic as well as modal/temporal logics.

Reading Materials

D. Logic and Formal Reasoning: Logic in Computer Science by Huth and Ryan, Cambridge Univ Press 2nd Edition, 2004.

After receiving the QE results I was a little puzzled about the Logic question results (as I was about the questions also), and I asked other students about it. Some were also puzzled about it, but I also found out from a fellow graduate that I have been reading all the time the wrong book! As it turns out, there is a (updated) page for the CS5201:
http://www.comp.nus.edu.sg/~abhik/CS-QE/

where there is no "Logic and Formal Reasoning" at all:

D. Logic and Artificial Intelligence: The students will be tested on the fundamentals of logic and deduction as well as their use in computer science. The students should be familiar with the syntax and semantics of propositional and predicate logic, and be able to do inferences in such logics with a good understanding of the concepts involving unification, forward chaining, backward chaining, conjunctive normal form, resolution (completeness of resolution and resolution strategies). They also need to develop basic understanding of program verification and Floyd-Hoare logic.

Reading Materials

D. Logic and Artificial Intelligence: Relevant portions of "Artificial Intelligence: A modern approach" by Russell and Norvig, 2nd Edition, 2003.

Well ... I guess that explains why the QE question was entitled "Logic and Artificial Intelligence" (I did not gave it much thought in the middle of the exam).
I'm sorry my e-mail got so long, it is not intended to be a complaint (if I would want that, I would have applied for a review). However, I would like a better interaction between the school and the students. I would like that at the next exam I will not have to read "Artificial Intelligence: A modern approach" to find out after the exam that the book was changed again. Even though there is almost no posting from the students on PhD Corner for example, this does not mean that we do not read it. If information is updated, the official module page should be the first place to post it, not some duplicate page that nobody knows about.

In the end, I must also point out that some subjects were not so well formulated - for example the Architecture question was using a notation different from the book and the Operating System question was somewhat assuming that we know the unix manpages in depth.

With respect,
Marian Mihailescu,
Graduate Student, SoC, NUS.

P.S.: A Happy 2007!

On 29 Dec 2006, at 11:02 AM, Jane Lim wrote:

Hi,

This is because you did not participate in the feedback exercise. Hence, you will only be able to access results via the internet five days after the release of the examination results.

regards,
Jane

Chemistry

2006-12-16T19:29:00.000-08:00

Here is a little experiment I had the "privilege" to experience in one culinary extravaganza this morning. Eat breakfast with garlic. Lots of garlic (salted of course). It's great, yeah, but at the end you gotta get rid of the stench. So, try with some Fisherman's Friend. This is the second main ingredient :-) Your tongue will fell asleep and dream about tongue heaven. But wait, you get thirsty. So go get that cold water glass and you'll have an extra half an hour of extensive pain. Mix than with a chocolate and some Pepsi (Twist of course, the extra lemon is everything). Where does all this get us? To the lab, of course :)

Singing animals...

2006-11-22T21:26:00.000-08:00

Here is the hippo:

And the little worms:

Bush

2006-11-21T03:24:00.000-08:00

What was I saying about Americans?

One more thing...

2006-11-21T02:56:00.000-08:00

Bill Gates runs like a girl!

Apple and Microsoft

2006-11-21T02:24:00.000-08:00

First, let's introduce the new CEO of Microsoft - Steve Ballmer.

And now, here is the story:

In the end, there was the Apple-Microsoft deal:

Sheesh...

Stupid americans

2006-11-21T01:21:00.000-08:00

Ok, here are two:

- The iranian student gets 5 times zapped with a taser by the campus police because he refused to show his student ID

- Borat tricks poor romanian villagers

BONUS: The americans that kicked their *** waiting in line for PS3's.

Copiii precoce din zilele noastre...

2006-11-13T18:27:00.000-08:00

Pai eu... cand aveam 15 ani ..

Sick of school

2006-11-09T06:58:00.000-08:00

For anybody else that is sick of school... listen here:

Reset

2006-10-31T20:37:00.000-08:00

Here it is, folks! Just after 26 hours after I ordered my new laptop, in the middle of some Haloween preparations (see the face :D), the Apple guy "broke the party" :)
Sometimes it pays off to be closer to China.

The King is dead!
Long live the The King!

More photos here.

Here I come to save the world...

2006-10-31T20:32:00.000-08:00

Yap, it's true folks! Vista code seems to have gone gold! And as everybody knows, the Windows team spent a lot of time to make a real nice Vista experience.
Here are some of the sounds that Vista will present you with. Enjoy :)

They say I'm a monkey

2006-10-03T18:29:00.000-07:00

But I know better :)

You Are A: Monkey!

Monkeys are intelligent and agile, well-adapted for jungle life as they swing happily from tree to tree. As a monkey, you are a social animal who is quick to learn new things, loves to climb and is known to show off. A monkey's tiny primate features are irresistable, as is his gregarious personality!

You were almost a: Duck or a Parakeet
You are least like a: Turtle or a Groundhog Discover What Cute Animal You Are!

Happy Feet

2006-09-24T21:45:00.000-07:00

Happy Feet will NOT be available on IMAX3D this year :-( So I guess November 17 will find me in a "normal" theatre.
Meantime, here is a new trailer.

The Concerned Inventor

2006-09-24T21:28:00.000-07:00

My Personal DNA Map

You are an Inventor
Your imagination, self-reliance, openness to new things, and appreciation for utility combine to make you an INVENTOR.
You have the confidence to make your visions into reality, and you are willing to consider many alternatives to get that done.
The full spectrum of possibilities in the world intrigues you—you're not limited by pre-conceived notions of how things should be.
Problem-solving is a specialty of yours, owing to your persistence, curiosity, and understanding of how things work.
Your vision allows you to identify what's missing from a given situation, and your creativity allows you to fill in the gaps.
Your awareness of how things function gives you the ability to come up with new uses for common objects.
It is more interesting for you to pursue excitement than it is to get caught up in a routine.
Although understanding details is not difficult for you, you specialize in seeing the bigger picture and don't get caught up in specifics.
You tend to more proactive than reactive—you don't just wait for things to come to you.
Your independent streak allows you to make decisions efficiently and to trust your instincts
You do your own thing when it comes to clothing, guided more by practical concerns than by other people's notions of style.
Generally, you believe that you control your life, and that external forces only play a limited role in determining what happens to you.

You are Concerned
Your understanding of others' emotions, your sense of right and wrong, and your skeptical nature make you CONCERNED.
Your observations of your environment, in concert with your clearly defined worldview, leads you to be aware of the feelings of others.
Because you can read people well, and because you can understand their feelings, you are often bothered by others' insensitive behavior.
While you appreciate others' emotional nature, you don't think their emotional concerns should take precedence over their obligations to society.
You prefer to be in smaller groups, as big groups can occasionally get out of hand.
Order and structure are somewhat important to you—you believe that people's feelings are better protected when others are respectful and follow certain societal guidelines.
You tend to share your feelings with a few individuals who are close with you, but otherwise you are a somewhat private person.
Your independent streak allows you to make decisions efficiently and to trust your instincts
You do your own thing when it comes to clothing, guided more by practical concerns than by other people's notions of style.
Generally, you believe that you control your life, and that external forces only play a limited role in determining what happens to you.

The most unromatic man in the world

2006-09-23T07:58:00.001-07:00

Movie review.

"I guess that some things never change."

If you just dumped somebody or if you were just dumped ... you gotta see this ... documentary. It will give you a better perspective (about the other). You can watch it of course with your {girl,boy}friend ... it will give you something to talk about :-).

Mammoths will roam again...

2006-08-25T04:50:00.000-07:00

You might not know this, but our ancestors (homo erectus that is) are belived to be the cause of the extinction of the mammoth. They over-haunted. In a attempt to bring them back, scientists today believe that they could impregnate a lady-elephant with the frozen sperm of some 23000 years old mammoth.
It's like Jurassic Park, folks!

The perfect setup

2006-08-18T00:30:00.000-07:00

I want to share here the perfect system that I have in mind .... and how I got there.

1. HARDWARE

Between a desktop and a notebook, of course I would go for the notebook. It's portable, and you can just plug it in a monitor and have the desktop system. I am not looking for the ultimate computer powered by quad xeons ( :-d ) so core 2 duo is enough.

1.1 Manufacturer

This is the easy one. Apple. Why? Well ... let's take Dell. They are trying to cheat you and on top of that they have problems with their batteries. Yeah it's cheap, but you get what you pay for. And you can double that for Sony. Except maybe for the cheap part.
Moving next, it's Toshiba. They had a really really bad design in the past. They changed it now in the new (Quasimodo) Qosmio line, and also Sattelite line looks a little better. But they lost my trust. I had one Toshiba laptop, and I was not very impressed. Just mediocre. Ans also I have friends that had Toshiba and with that a lot of trouble. Fujitsu I guess are ok, but a little expensive for the medium cathegory I am placing them into. Nothing extraordinary, but you can get more for the same money. Acer has a great offer, but I am no fan of their keyboards. And the keyboard in a notebook is very important. And I end here with (IBM) Lenovo Thinkpad. I currently have one (Tankpad) Thinkpad and I am more than pleased with it. It's great. I love the design, I love the keyboard, I love that I had no problems with it. So in the final we have Apple and Lenovo. But Apple has some advantages. You can run one extra OS on it, and it's more "sleek". Maybe it's not so robust, but it looks better. Also, I am a little dissapointed how the new Thinkpads turned out to be. The gray color and the new keyboard layout... it's just not IBM anymore I guess.

1.2 MBP vs MB

13 > 15 ?
Now it really depends. On many things. I, for one, think that 13.3" are enough. But if you think that "Size Does Matter" than you should go for the MBP. Also, I do belive that professional photographers, for example, need more space on their desktop. So the increased resolution of MBP is a blessing. I for one am no professional photographer, so I would go for the MB.
ATI vs Intel
Here we might have a problem. I am no gamer, but I do play from time to time. Mainly "oldie but goldie" games. So I would say GMA950 is enough. But what do you know, Heroes 3 has a new brother... Heroes 5 that is, which is more 3D than ever and need a good video card. It may run on GMA950 (I have no idea), but probably on 800x600 with very low detail. I don't know if that would be enough. What's more important, I want my video card to be DirectX 10 ready. I've seen some of the things DirectX10 brings, and I want them. Also, I want to be (aqua) aero compatible. From what I understand, GMA950 runs aero. So in the end, I would say GMA950 would pass at the limit, event without DX10 support and with the low gaming performance. Like I said, I rarely play a 3D game. I do however hope that GMA3000X is not the fiasco I read it is and those hw shaders do bring some improvemnets, Because it's clear that this is the next MB videocard.
Plastic vs Aluminium
Well... I am just going to say that MB can be "assorted" with an iPod (and maybe with a future iPhone). And I like the keyboard also in the MB (I did not say I don't like the one in MBP).
Conclusion
It's definetely a Macbook (with Core 2 Duo :-d), but if in the near future we have a GMA3000X with good performance, it's worth waiting for it.

1.3 White vs Black

Well, I have to say that I'm biased. As I currently have a Thinkpad, black is my color. I would also go for a black iPod. With white, I always have that feeling "be careful... do not get it dirty...". White in MB is just too.... white.

2. SOFTWARE

Here I got it all figured it out, because of my previous experiences with Linux and Windows.
As my hardware (1.) permits it, I would go for Mac OS X as my primary OS (don't ask me if it works on my Thinkpad... you know the answer to that. YES it's FULLY supported! wireless, QE, you name it!).
Now I would have, of course, multiple virtual desktops. With that nice cube rotating when you switch them. I would use Mac OS for music (iTunes), photos (iPhoto), movies (frontrow), chatting + some fun (YM, iChat, photobooth), mail (Mail.app). These are all fantastic applications. But summing it up I am not too pleased with Mac OS X. Finder and the Dock are not for me. So one of my virtual desktops would run a full-screen virtual machine with Ubuntu. That's because I love Gnome. It's so.... productive. I hope for some 3D support in the virtualization, so I would have XGL's expose in the VM. Why is Gnome so great? Well... it's best at what I hate more about Mac OS: it has a very customizable "dock" and also I find Nautilus very nice, with the built-in search and the little things (for example, one feature that is also present in Leopard is renaming a file, when it is selected only the filename, and not the extension).
Let's not forget Microsoft. True, Windows sucks - internet explorer, media player are really bad. But they have nice things. Microsoft Office is one of them. Have you seen Office 2007? Really cool. I can't wait for the UB. Or it that turns out bad, I hope for a good wine/crossover office. And of course Windows might still be handy for those cases when virtualization is no solution and wine does not work. Mac OS X would be primary, used daily for entertainment and such, Ubuntu for work and Windows for gaming.

To sum all up:
Mac OS X (+iLife) dual boot with XP(Vista maybe) and a Ubuntu VM shared between those two. All on a Macbook. Black.

Nacho Libre

2006-08-01T19:27:00.000-07:00

Movie review

Bleah. Horrible. You call that comedy?! Better write a research paper than watch this crap.

Magnolia

2006-07-08T10:27:00.000-07:00

Movie review

"But it did happen"
One movie that you HAVE to see ONCE. Complicated and catching, if you like the type. Music is nice, you always think that something awful is going to happen next, and waiting to see what it is. Reminds me of Crash.

New webpage

2006-07-08T02:07:00.000-07:00

Ok guys and girls .... here it is ... new and shiny:

http://www.comp.nus.edu.sg/~marianmi

Enjoy :)

Sunset in Pra Nang beach

2006-06-27T05:21:00.000-07:00

Sunset on Pra Nang beach
Originally uploaded by The appie appie penguin.

I couldn't let the time pass and not write here about the beautiful holiday in Krabi. Mostly on Tonsai and Railey beaches, but Pra Nang Beach and Phi Phi Don Island should be also mentioned.
Paradise!

My new climbing shoes

2006-04-26T08:20:00.000-07:00

Here is a pic with my new climbing shoes: Rock Pillars Zeal

First photo-blog (powered by Flickr)

2006-03-27T00:59:00.000-08:00

In Malacca
Originally uploaded by Sheep in the big city.

Rules of thumb

2006-03-24T01:21:00.000-08:00

Two rules of thumb about cabs:
- wait them in a taxi station; trust me, it's better than waiting on the street, trying to get that taxi that you think would evantually get to the station
- if you are really in a hurry and you see that the driver is a woman, don't dispare :) just tell her to go faster...

Time reuse

2006-03-23T18:07:00.000-08:00

This is an extraordinary concept. We would be able to preserve time. Make it go faster when we are waiting, slow it down when we need it most. Time reuse.

Lost paradise

2006-03-23T07:25:00.000-08:00

Tonight I found my secret place. It was so close, right under my nose. Tonight I sat on grass with my bare feet. It's been a while since I did that the last time. Tonight I listened to music like I've never listened before. What shall I do? Half of me wants to bring her, to show her the lost paradise. Half of my wants to keep it secret and unspoiled. Somehow one half will have to go away...

Flickr

2006-03-22T01:07:00.000-08:00

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

The king is dead, long live the king

2006-03-03T23:23:00.000-08:00

It's not long since Lenovo acquired Thinkpad, and already they are trying to destroy it.
Step 1: change the black to silver - the new models of Lenovo Thinkpad will have silver something-alloy case
Step 2: stay up-to-past with technology - only 2 models with Intel Core Duo, and those without ATI graphics - just that Intel shared "accelerator"
Step 3: make a duplicate with another name - the new Lenovo C3000 series, with its full-size Thinkpad keyboard. Interesting design changes, though again no ATI graphics.
Sad what the name Thinkpad become.

About dogs

2006-02-27T22:59:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I had a rare sight: 3 stray dogs in Singapore. Had to write abou this.

Simulating Java

2006-02-23T20:15:00.000-08:00

Eventually it did turn out rather fine (with the simulator I mean), but I decided to write my own. In Java. And what I discovered, while working with threads, is this: make some threads, add them as observers to an object, terminate the threads (from the run() method I mean), and still your threads can wake up and do something when someone sends a message through the object observed. This is pretty cool...

Roar!

2006-02-20T23:04:00.000-08:00

I managed to install some goodies in Tiger. Now it becomed my main operating system. Between those goodies: a blog poster inside dashboard. Maybe I will be able to blog more often ;). This is my first post where I'm using it. Hope it works! Meantime, still trying to install the Network Simulator in Mac OS. Hope it will work eventually.

Strange religions

2006-02-18T19:35:00.000-08:00

A strange thing I thought of today. I've seen whites converted to muslim, I've seen Christian chinese, but I have never ever seen a muslim chinese. If any of you have seen one, please send me a pic. I have still have 6 lives.

Tamed Tiger

2006-02-18T05:28:00.000-08:00

It's been a while now, almost a week, since I managed to install Mac OS X 10.4.3 (Tiger). It is soo cool :) I will write more on this in a next blog. For now, I must go and count: 1, 2, 3, ...

Into the jungle

2006-02-12T03:06:00.000-08:00

You can say that most of the good things you got, just came to you. You didn't have to sweat. What about when you try and try and try something and it's just not working out? Is it worth it? Or are they good?

Garden of Eden

2006-02-08T17:37:00.000-08:00

Intel decided to bite the Apple. Or it is the Apple who decided to get biten. Either way, the result it is the one that matters: Mac with Intel Core Duo.

What's an Intel Chip doing in a Mac? A whole lot more than it's ever done in a PC.