Non-logical Fragmentations

I hate mid day flights.... waiting to leave for the airport takes forever. morning okay, evening good, midday bad

While I fully agree that basically everything you read in a print journal is available online, there is something I just like about reading magazine and books. Last night I was reading the slew of articles in the current issue of Forbes about Steve Jobs being the CEO of the decade (not hear to discuss the topic, just the physical media), and this morning I was reading articles in the current print issues of IEEE Computer and CACM. The problem how to share?

When you read anything online, you have a multitude of methods to share, with multiple engines ranging from Digg/Reddit/Delicious/etc to Twitter to good old fashion email, but when you read in print... well you have nothing but maybe a notepad near by to write down a note, or maybe only the ability to dog-ear a page in hopes that you remember it later (this tends to be my option, only that I always forget later). Now one thing we do have typically nearby is our cell phone, which are more commonly actually smartphones. They have cameras and web browsers and most importantly the ability to text.

Why I mention this... why don't journals post URL references to the article you are currently reading? I know, URL's can get long, but today with the number of URL shortening tools out there... And its not like print media articles don't already have 'fixed' short ids built into them already. Every journal I know of has a volume and issue number (first part of shortened URL) and a finite number of articles in said issue (final part of a URL), so why can't they simply print that somewhere in the article, maybe at the end or something?

The way I see it, if journal's posted this kind of link information, readers would be able to quickly text the URL to themselves or others to share, or quickly post to their sharing service of choice. At the same time, readers who like to share, would be more likely to continue reading print material and less likely to discontinue paying for print material.

I don't know but it is a suggestion.

update: for those who are curious about what I was actually reading and wanted to share... well I've taken the time to track down the URLs...
1. CACM: Are Business Methods Patentable?
2. CACM: Scratch: Programming for All
3. IEEE Computer: Extreme-Scale Computing

of course tracking out some of these links reminded me that not all content is free on the web... another reason publishers should make it easier to share print material... it may actually drive up revenues by suggesting others subscribe.

Not much of an actual blog post as much as a reminder list for myself when it comes to setting up a new mac for developing code for science. A while back I posted an entry about selecting between MacPorts and Fink (link) so I won't discuss that here... bottom line is that they are both great and both work, it mostly depends on which you are more comfortable with and secondly specific individual ports that are not in both, but the number is few.

Anyways so here is my list that I install (and in order of how I installed them the last time):

1. gcc (latest version available unless otherwise needed, at the time of writing this, gcc45 is the latest and includes gfortran)
   
2. gcc_select (with mac ports, I don't think it is available on fink, but there is probably a similar package)
3. gnuplot
4. python (latest 2.x and 3.x versions)
5. python_select
   
6. netcdf, netcdf-bin
7. hdf5
8. grads
9. vis5d
   
10. gdal
11. grass
12. gmt
13. gnupg
14. wget
15. py26-setuptools (or latest/equivalent to the version of python installed)
16. py26-numpy
17. py26-scipy
18. py26-matplotlib

Now this is the list I've installed specifically, I won't even begin to list the number of packages that are prerequisites for packages that are installed as well.

A little over a month and half or so ago I wrote about switching from the JesusFreke Android Mods to the CyanogenMod (previous post). Shortly after that the Android community had its first scuffle with Google. When I initially switched to the CyanogenMod, I opted to stay with the 'stable' build, but as soon as I heard that Cyanogen was going to include Donut(1.6) in his experimental builds I had to switch to see what it was like. Unfortunately while all of us out there loved the fact that cyanogen was including 1.6, Google didn't like the fact that he was bundling 'closed-source' applications, and thus the scuffle began, and the community was in an uproar about Google not being as open as they claimed...

I made a few comments on Reddit and various blogs and news stories, but I never took the time to comment on my blog... well basically because I for the most part agreed with Google, there were other things that bothered me. As a developer I fully agree with the nature that some projects are and should be closed source applications while others should be open source. Android is an open source Operating System, not an open source bundle of applications... anyways so besides the slow-down to cyanogens mods, what bothered me with the whole situation was that the apps in question have all been available to other phones and devices for free for years, why couldn't Google just say "sorry modders, you can't include our closed sources apps with your builds, but we'll put the on Market or another location so your users can install them manually like they can on other smartphones and devices". Well from what I know they didn't, but thankfully Cyanogen stood up for what he wanted to do and work out a solution with Google where us users simply have to preserve the apps that are already on our devices and then install his updates and therefore he no longer has to include closed-source apps in his builds.

So with the solution at hand, cyanogen began work on the workaround and sure enough a short time later he had it up and working... only downside was that for the initial upgrade there were some significant additional steps. Between the following links, I'm sure you can figure them out... I did... well after a few tries... first the links then my issues with the process:
http://www.simplehelp.net/2009/10/04/how-to-install-cyanogenmod-4-1-99-on-your-g1-android-phone/
http://www.simplehelp.net/2009/10/06/how-to-update-cyanogenmod-from-4-1-99-to-4-1-999/
http://www.cyanogenmod.com/rom/cyanogenmod-4-1-999

So last week i upgraded... so some notes on my trials... well my first assumption was that I could skip the 4.1.99 build, and I probably could of... but my first attempt didn't work, so I tried again this time starting with the 4.1.99 build and as it turned out I didn't need to d the 4.1.99 build, but really we are only talking a few extra minutes (well maybe 15-20). So anyways my first mistake was that I decided to skip the initial 'WIPE' step... I figured whats the worse that can happen... well your phone will never finish the reboot that is what happened... well so I rebooted into the recovery system and restored from my nandroid backup (oh yes like I stated last time... NANDROID is your best friend when it comes to working with modded images).


So my next try... I WIPED my phone but this time I messed up again... I rebooted between the install of the HTC image and he cyanogen 4.1.99 image... I've read that it shouldn't make any difference, but in my case I was sure that was my next problem. But again it was not....

So again I restored from Nandroid... and this time I followed every step to the letter.. or so I thought... still had an issue... so I decided to connect my phone to my computer and lauch 'adb logcat' and sure enough, I finally saw my issue... while I thought I was wiping my phone... it turns out I was not. Turns out that the wipe feature on the cyanogen recovery images only blanks the built-in memory portion, not the portion moved to the sdcard's ext partition. So off to Google to research how to blank the ext partition...well I found many helpful sites even a youtube video.. and well none of  them worked for me... my solution just like last time... LINUX to the rescue. I popped out my card, stuck it in an SD adapter and into my computer, launched Gparted and reformatted the partition... I even upgraded it to ext3 from ext2 (probably could of selected ext4, but I didn't, if anyone has any suggestion or reason why I should, please share). I popped the card back into my G1 and ran through the update process again and yep everything worked...

So the moral of the story... WIPE WIPE WIPE before switching from Cyanogen 4.1.11 to 4.1.999

So a few weeks ago, I wrote about about possibly doing an MBA. So on Monday I took the GMAT. Lets put it this way... I did better than my practice exams, but I didn't do 'great' but I didn't do bad. I did well enough I think to get into an MBA program, but whether or not I did good enough to score decent funding is still a question.

So whats next? The GMAT is out of the way next step, select schools to apply to. Okay I lied... I already did that step... well I roughly did that step. Being that I am 'limited' (by choice) to programs in the area, it limits me to schools to the DC area which include Georgetown (but not really since they don't have  program that interests me), GW, UMd Smith, American, Catholic, and GMU. To be honest at this point I really like Smith and I like it's part time program. But I still need to do more research on each university to select exactly which to apply to. I sent my scores to all by Catholic, but that won't be a problem. I can always send them later.

So next step: research exactly which programs I want to apply to so that I can begin the application process, with the simultaneous step of researching additional funding, like NSHMBA.

Well I've been using Linux/UNIX a long time. I've been playing with cshrc, bashrc and profile files for a while to, but for the first time, today I stumbled across an interesting directory, the '/etc/profile.d' directory. Like all '.d' directories in the 'etc' directory this is a directory to put additional configuration files.

For sh-style shells (sh, bash...) /etc/profile.d/*.sh are read and run, for csh-style shells /etc/profile.d/*.csh are run. It's a great place and a clean way to easily plug settings (like $PATH) in and out for new programs you can't get RPMs for. In my case I did so to help setup my jboss installation.

This past May, Lauren completed her MBA program at Georgetown. She did amazing and also found a great job with Deloitte Consulting. We then spent the summer all over the place. We spend a month in India. Then 4th of July in Rochester for a wedding of a friend of Lauren's from high school. Next off to Atlantic City and Cliffside NJ to spend time with Lauren's grandparents. And then off to Miami for 3 weeks for me to work in my actual office for some time and to take care of some random work with others at the lab. ... so that is the summer in a paragraph, and Lauren starts work on the 8th....

Anyways... since for this visit to Miami we drove, we had lots of time to talk and think along the drive back. Plus along the way home we spend 2 nights, 3 days in Myrtle Beach, SC. So I had lots of time to think. I've been toying with the idea of following Lauren's footsteps and get my own MBA.  So with all this time, I came to the conclusion that an MBA would be useful no matter where my career takes me.

So step one... decide which schools to go to... pretty easy, since we are staying in the area for a few years since Lauren's job has us in the area. So basically my options are Georgetown, George Washington, American, Maryland and George Mason. As you can see Georgetown is crossed off the list... well, no, not because of Lauren's experience, but because I'm interested it tech, and Georgetown does not have a strong tech directed program. And based on the desire to do tech, really the two best programs in the area are Maryland (which happens to be one of the top ranked schools in the country and it specializes and promotes it technology program), and American which has lots of work in emerging markets and technology. Then there are GWU and GMU, both also happen to be part of the Federal CIO Certificate program which may be useful later along in my career.... On another note, they all have very good part-time programs.

So with step one basically out of the way, time to take the next step... the GMAT.... so a few weeks ago we walked into the local public library and Lauren noticed they had the new Princeton Review guide for the 2010 GMAT. I quickly skimmed the math and started on the verbal, but right away, I realized that I wasn't sure which sections I needed to study the most. Well logically I would  assume the verbal  section since that is the part I've struggled with the most on the SAT and ACT in high school, and also on the GRE after undergrad. But, that is not enough to go on since as everyone states, the GMAT is not a test like the others.

My solution to determine what to study.... take practice test. And that is what I did today. I expected to do better when I started, but when finished the math section I had a bad feeling.... And then the verbal.... well I knew  that was going to go bad. So when I finished... I was pleasantly surprised. It was not as good as I would have hoped... still below 600, but not by much, and like Lauren suspected, my math carried my score. What I assumed was a bad score on the the Math still put me in the 95 percentile against some of the average score listings I've seen  online and my verbal.... well we won't go there.

So next step... I need to review my wrong answers. From what I can tell, on the math I need to refresh my knowledge of some of the definitions and refresh my knowledge/tricks with powers and such. As for the verbal... well I need to study it all. I'm relatively okay with the basics, I just need to lots more practice and brush up my skills on the reading comprehension part.... not the comprehension part but the speed part... I remember there being tricks to use... I just need to look them up and again.... PRACTICE.

So as you can guess, that is what I'll be doing the next few weeks. My hope is to take the GMAT towards the end of September but no later than the first week in October... then based on score... I'll be starting the next step... filling out the applications.