Monthly Archives: November 2005

Firefox 1.5

Posted on November 29, 2005 by Kelson

The waiting is over!

Most of the changes since 1.0 have been under the hood. The most noticeable are probably the vastly-improved update system, rearrangeable tabs, a one-button function to clear all private data, and a new preferences setup. There are also improvements to Mac OS X integration (though not as much as one might have hoped for), performance, pop-up blocking, etc. From a web developer’s POV, there’s a lot of neat stuff including partial SVG support and the new <canvas> element from WHATWG (and of course improved HTML/CSS/JavaScript support).

If you’ve already installed Firefox 1.5 Release Candidate 3, this is exactly the same program. Nothing’s been changed except the name on the installer.

On the annoying side, they’ve temporarily closed Spread Firefox to prep for their video marketing campaign. I hate it when people close down a site to prep for a relaunch. It’s not like a building, where you have to keep people away so you can remodel. You can do all the remodeling on a copy, and just drop it into place when it’s done.

Then there’s the drag-n-drop/save-as bug in Linux, where the first time you try to rearrange tabs or bring something up with a file picker, it decides the GTK theme has changed and hangs while it redraws everything. They’ve fixed it for the long-term, but the fix just went in yesterday, so it’s not in the 1.5 release. I’d guess the Linux distros will apply the patch when they build their own packages, and with luck the fix will show up in 1.5.1.

And on a completely unrelated note, this is the 1,000th post on this site. *whew*!

Upgrade to Firefox 1.5!

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Venus Shadows

Posted on November 28, 2005 by Kelson

Venus is apparently so bright this month that it’s casting visible shadows. Now that’s cool! Unfortunately, while I can see Venus perfectly well, there’s way too much light around to see anything resembling a Venusian shadow. I don’t think I’ll have a chance to drive out into the desert by sunset in the next few days.

(via Slashdot)

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Retroblogging

Posted on November 27, 2005 by Kelson

Store sign: Yarn Yarn (Yarn Yarn Yarn)
On Friday, Katie wanted to look for some craft supplies at a store we’d seen before, called—believe it or not—Yarn Yarn. We’d first noticed it a couple of years ago, and took a picture of the sign for blog purposes.

The store was closed, but on our way back to the car, we spotted the Puzzle Blimp flying around. So here we had two old blog posts coming together.

Except there was one problem. It turns out that when we took pictures of Yarn Yarn and the nearby Holy Computer, we never got around to posting them online. So here, delayed by two and a half years, are those photos, plus a couple of new shots.

The Puzzle Blimp Returns
The Puzzle Blimp Returns! (As noted last time, it’s Ameriquest’s Soaring Dreams Airship [archive.org].)

Store sign: Holy Computer
Hmm, is this what Robin says when Batman analyzes evidence using the Cray he has in the Batcave?

Store sign: The Enlarger
Maybe it’s just the fact that I see so much spam, but the first thing this name makes me think of isn’t photography.

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Christmas is still safe

Posted on November 23, 2005 by Kelson

Salon has a great piece on how there is no left-wing war on Christmas. This “OMG the blue staters want to ban Christmas” tripe was idiotic last year, and it’s back with a vengeance this year.

Honestly, all this fuss over things like “Happy Holidays,” an expression designed to avoid offending people? Remember, in most cases a store clerk has no way of knowing your religion ahead of time. If you happen to be buying a wreath, a stand-up Santa, a pair of decorated red-and-green stockings and a nativity set, then it’s probably a fair guess that you’re celebrating Christmas, but if you’re buying an Xbox, how are they supposed to know?

(I’m also rather partial to the descriptions of the ACLU defending Christians’ religious freedoms! That ought to make some people question their assumptions.)

Get a grip, people! Christmas is not in any danger, and hysterical whining and knee-jerk boycotts aren’t going to accomplish anything except making you look like a tinfoil-hat conspiracy theorist.

Posted in Politics | Tagged , , , | 17 Comments

There Goes the Hogwarts Express

Posted on November 20, 2005 by Kelson

Movie marquee: Jarhead Derailed Harry Potter

Is this what he saved those mean girls from?

Posted in Harry Potter, Signs of the Times | Tagged , , | 5 Comments

Amazonia, Flash and Joss

Posted on November 20, 2005 by Kelson

[Buffy: The Chosen Collection]Yesterday our copy of Buffy The Vampire Slayer: The Chosen Collection—all seven seasons—arrived. (It’s supposedly a limited edition, but I don’t see anything to that effect on our box.) Since we’d been listening to the soundtrack of “Once More With Feeling” on the drive home last night, we immediately put on the episode.

Comic Cavalcade Archives v.1I’ve been slowly working my way through the Comic Cavalcade Archives. I’m determined to read the whole thing, but I have to take it in small doses. Partly the target audience is much younger than me, partly the storytelling (and art) I’m used to is much different, and of course partly it’s a very different time. It was the middle of World War II, and half the stories involved fighting Nazi spies or, in some cases, wreaking havoc in Germany itself. (The Ghost Patrol should have been able to take Hitler out on their own, but they seemed more interested in sabotage and practical jokes.) The original setup for Wonder Woman was that she left Paradise Island to help America defeat the Axis!

The Golden-Age Flash hunt continues. I’m now up to three issues of All-Flash with an issue of Flash Comics on its way. So far I’ve discovered that the Turtle didn’t have a costume the first time he appeared. He was just a guy in a green suit who used slowness against a guy who was used to moving fast. Next up: the original Thorn. I’ve bid on a lot of eBay auctions, expecting to win only a fraction of them. Everywhere else I look online, people are selling collector-grade books at much higher prices. I just want to read the original stories, write down who appears, and scan the occasional panel that I’m going to clean up anyway.

Golden Age Flash Archives vol. 2Amazon has finally put a discount on the Golden Age Flash Archives vol.2, so I’ve pre-ordered it. While there I looked around on my wish list and noticed that the Mirrormask DVD page (which still shows the wrong date) is recommending, “Buy this DVD with Serenity (Widescreen Edition) DVD ~ Joss Whedon today!” That seems like an appropriate pairing!

Posted in Buffy/Angel, Comics, Sci-Fi/Fantasy | Tagged , , , , , | 2 Comments

Low-Tech Phish

Posted on November 16, 2005 by Kelson

I found a flood of crude phishing attempts in our postmaster account this morning.

How crude?

The hook was, “Simply reply to this email with your online login and password.”

No forms, no imitation websites, no swiped logos, no links of any sort at all. One of them even had multiple recipients visible on the To: line. It’s like a throwback to the early days of spam-n-scam.

The headers were full of things like %RNDDIGIT27, suggesting a broken spam generator, and of course there’s the fact that they actually targeted the postmaster account.

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Bacchanalia Supplies

Posted on November 14, 2005 by Kelson

Shelf of cans labeled Bacchus

It appears to be an energy drink, which is kind of ironic, considering how closely Bacchus was associated with wine. On the other hand, his followers would work themselves into a frenzy.

A word of advice: If any Maenads drop by with a few cans of this stuff, run. They may look cute, but they’ll tear you apart.

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Online Organleggers

Posted on November 14, 2005 by Kelson

Here’s the WTF?!?!?!!!! moment of the day. Actual spam received over the weekend:

Sell Your Organs Online!

Reply to this message if your interested in selling your organs!

Seriously, what the hell?

Forget the fact that selling organs is illegal in the US. And I’m sure mailing them across state lines would be a felony. And you sure as heck can’t list them on eBay. Or Amazon—can you imagine? “15 new and used livers available.” “Customers who purchased kidneys also bought…”

Posted in Spam, Strange World | Tagged , , , | 9 Comments

Starbucks Early Holiday

Posted on November 13, 2005 by Kelson

I stopped in a Starbucks after lunch last Wednesday. I confused the barista by ordering a frappucino—he said something about how I was going to freeze my kidneys or something, and when I remarked that I was going to be in the office, he said he was joking with everyone who ordered anything cold. (Local readers may recall that last week was not particularly warm by SoCal standards.)

I also noticed a stack of boxes by the wall, all of them like this:

No Peeking. The holidays are coming November 10.

(For the record, this was November 9.) I assumed they were full of Starbucks’ Christmas and holiday-themed merchandise, but it was the phrasing that got me. The holidays start November 10? That’s kind of early, isn’t it?

I suppose it depends on which holidays we’re talking about. Usually, “The Holidays” refers to the Thanksgiving–Christmas period that also manages to encompass Hanukkah, Kwanzaa, and Boxing Day. (Wait, no one actually observes Boxing Day? Well, never mind, then.) They could be including Veterans’ Day, but there’s not much in the way of decorations, and the merchandising possibilities don’t tend to overlap much with coffee paraphernalia.

Hmm, here’s an odd thought. In America, we always associate snow with Christmas. Hence the snowflakes printed on the box. But in the southern hemisphere, December is the beginning of summer. I suspect Christmas songs like “Winter Wonderland” don’t get much play in Australia.

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