Phone Home: Google Maps Street View Found E.T. – Gizmodo

Phone Home: Google Maps Street View Found E.T. – Gizmodo

Six ways to write more comprehensible code

Six ways to write more comprehensible code

This is a great article. I try to follow guidelines similar to this when I code. Sometimes I do it better than others. I constantly have to revisit my applications, and anything I can do to minimize that “What the f*ck was I thinking!?!?” feeling when looking at old code- makes my life easier later on.

BBC NEWS | Technology | US arrests internet ’spam king’

BBC NEWS | Technology | US arrests internet ’spam king’

YAY!!!

Yet Another Strange Hex Integer in the Wild – Google Search

Yet Another Strange Hex Integer in the Wild – Google Search

I really wish they would give up on this shit already. DRM has been undergoing a slow-agonizing (to consumers) death and it needs to just be put to a stop for good.

Boing Boing: WiFi slurper grabs up to six open networks and makes one connection

Boing Boing: WiFi slurper grabs up to six open networks and makes one connection

All your wifi are belong to us…

This is seriously illegal in many states. Also- for the price you could buy yourself your own legitimate high speed Internet connection for at least a few years.

Boing Boing: Google Maps is spying on my cat, says freaked out BB reader

Boing Boing: Google Maps is spying on my cat, says freaked out BB reader

There is a blurry view of the trailer park I live in if I do this for my address. It’s pretty creepy the way this whole thing works, but pretty cool at the same time. The only complaint I have at this point is the picture quality stinks.

Lime Technology, LLC » MD-1200

Lime Technology, LLC » MD-1200

Pretty cool. I’m going to look at these the next time we need to expand our storage at work (currently at 4TB). Might be good for higher-end home media center use too.

(I’m stating the 4TB since I’m sure in a few years I can look back fondly on that number and say “Remember when…” I still remember when 10MB was huge. )

LXer: Five Tired Old Myths About GNU/Linux

LXer: Five Tired Old Myths About GNU/Linux

This a great rebuttle to the earlier story from ZD-Net: Five crucial things the Linux community doesn’t understand about the average computer user

We’re all Linux users

We’re all Linux users

Nothing else really to say- it’s true. Even if you don’t think you are, it is pretty likely you use Linux every day.

The top 10 dead (or dying) computer skills

The top 10 dead (or dying) computer skills

This list is great…

I can’t believe COBOL is still in-use, but I suppose there are still a lot of legacy apps running on mainframes out there.

I’d say the same for Non-Relational DBMS, except that I know there is still one department in my company that is using old Paradox and Access tables. I’ve tried to get them moved to MySQL several times- but they just keep holding on to them. Eventually it will get to the point where it just won’t run. SQL is just mind-boggling for them.

Macromedia/Adobe Coldfusion can burn in hell as far as I’m concerned.

One thing I disagree with is the author’s assertion of the impending doom of Network Administrators. Small business and home networks are pretty-much plug-and-play now, but large corporations and companies with a large Internet presence have complex networking needs and need professionals to architect and manage them. This really becomes true as more companies move to VoIP and VCoIP solutions which involve QoS and VLAN tagging and more robust and fault tolerant networking systems. I suppose I could just be biased too- as it’s what I do for a living…

Lastly- Netware and OS/2. Are you kidding me?! Linux largely replaced these several years ago. I suppose the remnants of these will go away with COBOL.