Monthly Archives: September 2008

Purple Sunset

Posted on September 6, 2008 by Kelson


Purple Sunset, originally uploaded by Kelson.

On Monday evening, I looked out the front window and saw an unusually purple sky. I immediately went out to snap a few pictures, though the camera tried to adjust the exposure too much in most of them, making it really light. This one turned out very close to what I actually saw.

Since then, I’ve discovered (via Bad Astronomy) that it’s the result of volcanic eruptions in Alaska last month. The sulfur dioxide sprayed into the sky has been traveling around the globe, and made it to Southern California by September 1. More photos at SpaceWeather and kbaird.

Posted in Photos | Tagged , , | 1 Comment

On Original Ideas

Posted on September 4, 2008 by Kelson

Newsarama’s Ambidextrous column has a post on Original Ideas and Influences. Brandon Thomas talks about coming up with ideas only to find out someone else has already written them, and about how easy it is to unconsciously incorporate concepts you’ve been exposed to as you write your own material.

Something to consider in the next plagiarism scandal.

Posted in Comics, Writing | 1 Comment

First Impressions of Google Chrome

Posted on September 2, 2008 by Kelson

Now that it’s live, I’ve downloaded the Google Chrome beta on my Windows box at work.  Thoughts so far:

Good:

  • Site compatibility seems to be fine so far, with a couple of minor issues (see the “Bad” section).  Mostly I’ve tested it with a couple of forum sites, LiveJournal, Slashdot, and WordPress.
  • I like the simple settings box, with “Basics,” “Minor Tweaks,” and “Under the Hood.”
  • It does feel fast.
  • Showing the URL of links in the lower left-hand corner is a perfect compromise between the spatial advantages of a permanent status bar and the extra room provided by leaving it out.
  • I like the task manager for the browser itself.  It’ll be good for developers, but it’ll also be good for users: as the comic points out, if your browser starts chewing up all available resources, you’ll be able to tell what page/plugin/program is at fault instead of just blaming the browser.

Bad:

  • Gears support doesn’t seem to work quite right.  WordPress.com doesn’t detect that it’s available.  Local WP installs with Bad Behavior can’t sync completely.  (It doesn’t send an Accept header on the request for one of the TinyMCE files, which causes Bad Bahavior to think it’s a spambot and triggers a 403.)
  • Cookie management is too simplistic.  I like to accept all cookies temporarily, but clear everything when I end my browsing session, with exceptions for sites where I want to stay logged in.  This is easy in Firefox, a little trickier in Opera, and doesn’t seem to be an option in Chrome.
  • I have seen it pause a couple of times, with as few as 5 tabs. [edit: these seem to be related to Flash content]
  • No Incomplete spell-check.
  • I keep hitting the forward-slash key to search within a page, since that’s the shortcut I’m used to in Firefox and Opera.
Debatable:
  • The UI does indeed stay out of your way.  I guess this sort of makes Chrome the Anti-Flock.
  • DNS Pre-Fetching is enabled by default.  This is different from full HTTP pre-fetching in that all it does it look up the IP addresses of the links that you might click on.  It’s not clear at what point it does this — I don’t remember seeing it mentioned in the comic, which (ironically) isn’t searchable.  I suppose it could either hit the domains of all the links on a page, or just those that would trigger HTTP pre-fetching, or even just send the query when you hover over a link (to get a split-second head start before you click). Update Sep. 17: Google has a blog post explaining pre-resolving in detail. Apparently it does check the domains for all the links on the current page.

Posted in Browsers | Tagged , , , | 12 Comments

Do No Evil?

Posted on September 2, 2008 by Kelson

Catching up on Slashdot this morning, I found the article on Google Chrome. Check out the number of comments:

666 comments

Posted in Browsers, Humor | Tagged , | 2 Comments

New Browser: Google Chrome

Posted on September 1, 2008 by Kelson

Google Chrome seems to be a multi-threaded open-source browser based on WebKit (with some code from Firefox as well), focusing on making a browser that will work well with web applications.

It’s got built-in support for the Gears API (not surprising). And, like Firefox 3, IE8, and Opera 9.5, it’ll do full-history search & auto-suggest in the location bar. Interestingly, they’ve adopted a couple of UI elements from Opera, including thumbnails of your most-visited pages when opening a new tab (like Opera’s Speed Dial, though in this case the list is automatically generated from your browsing behavior), and putting the tabs above the main toolbar — something that Opera has taken a lot of flack for.

According to the blog post, the first preview release should be out for Windows tomorrow, with Linux and Mac following.

Oddly enough, I found out about it through comics blogs (A Distant Soil, specifically), not tech blogs, because Google hired Scott McCloud (Understanding Comics) to explain what makes the browser different in comic-book form.

Posted in Browsers, Comics | Tagged , | 1 Comment

Dawn from BTVS: Irrational Character Hate

Posted on September 1, 2008 by Kelson

This post on 20 things I learned at Dragon*Con reminded me of something Katie and I noticed at Comic-Con. During the screening of the musical Buffy the Vampire Slayer episode, “Once More With Feeling,” it seemed like half the audience would boo Dawn, and would shout out things like, “Shut up, Dawn” when she spoke, or “No!” when she sings, “Does anybody even care?”

Okay, I get that you don’t like the Scrappy… but shouting “Shut up!” when she’s spilling the beans about Willow & Tara’s fight? That sorta implies that you don’t want Tara to find out that Willow has been altering her memories. That’s psychological abuse by any standard. Is it better for Tara to stay in an abusive relationship than for Dawn to be the one to open her eyes?

Or how about when she mentions to Sweet that her sister is the Slayer? That sets the rest of the story in motion — in fact, it sets the rest of the season in motion. Not only does it make it possible for them to “beat the bad guy,” but it sets up that Buffy/Spike relationship, and I’d bet 90% of the people booing Dawn just lurve “Spuffy” to death. (Excuse me while I gag.)

It’s hate for the sake of hating the character, even when she does things you like — or things that are necessary.

Personally? I couldn’t stand her through most of 5th season. I’m not sure what turned me around, but it was during the last episode, “The Gift,” that I decided, y’know, she’s okay. Katie, who has a younger sister, found Dawn to be the best characterization of a younger sister on television…and couldn’t hate her for that reason.

Perhaps it was the realism of that sister relationship, seen through Buffy’s eyes, that made so many viewers dislike her. Well, that and the Scrappy effect.

(20-Things post found via Blog@Newsarama)

Posted in Annoyances, Buffy/Angel, Comic Con 2008 | Tagged , | 3 Comments