| The REAL history of Ada Lovelace |
[06 Oct 2009|08:22am] |
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mood |
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 amused |
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As a Computer Science nerd geek student, I have a bit of an interest in the foundations of the Science. The underpinnings stretch a long way back, back to the foundations of logic in ancient Greek times by Aristotle and more recently with the ideas of computation, algorithms in the 19th and 20th century by folks like George Boole, Charles Babbage, Ada Lovelace and Alan Turning.
Here's a wonderful little Webcomic about Ada Lovelace, the first programmer (be warned, the comic appears to contain more than a little steam punk!)
Lovelace - The Origin
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Desktop Wallpaper Meme (via ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) janusd) |
[04 Oct 2009|04:54pm] |
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mood |
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music |
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Coldplay: Viva la Vida |
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The Rules:
- Anyone who looks at this entry has to post this meme and their current wallpaper.
- Explain in no more than five sentences why you're using that wallpaper!
- Don't change your wallpaper before doing this! The point is to see what you had on!
( Desktop Picture )
My current wallpaper is the westward view from Appleton Tower over George Square in Edinburgh. I think I'm having Scotland withdrawal symptoms. You can just see the Edinburgh Labyrinth in the middle of the park, the University Library and a number of the old buildings around the square (now part of the University). A few week ago I had a wallpaper where you could see Edinburgh Castle and Arthur's seat too.
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| Back in town |
[19 Jun 2009|10:14pm] |
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mood |
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 lonely |
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music |
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Team America: Montage |
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Well, here were are. The second week back home in Melbourne. And it's certainly been interesting. Catching up with family, friends, getting used to the old chores, fixing things that broke while away, getting used to not dropping down to the pub with Edinburgh mates every Monday.
This week has been pretty quiet since most of my friends have been in the middle of exams. It means it's been rather quiet at home at the moment. Filled in the day by stacking the firewood, sorting out a wireless network link out to Mount Dandenong and trying to get this old TV card working again.
Yesterday I spent the day at work yesterday fixing up small disasters that happened while away. Fortunately most of them were pretty straight forward things (such as the Access database reaching 2GB by not being compressed and teething issues with Office 2007). Pretty exhausting doing the whole 9-5 thing too (Especially when I'm slipping into holiday sleeping habits).
*sigh* Pretty quiet at home... Anyone want to go for lunch or somewhere next week?
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| Exams over = very yes! |
[24 May 2009|10:08pm] |
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mood |
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amused |
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It's finally over. After Ten exams I just crashed in a heap this weekend. None of them were too horrible, but 3 weeks with nothing but stress lurking over your back is never fun.
Friday night we had a BBQ in the Hollyrood Park as part of CompSoc's end of year celebrations. As only Australian present I was duly appointed head BBQer complete with over the top slang and accent. The little Tesco value BBQ's in tray were OK, but I don't think they were quite designed for cooking for 30 people. Real BBQs next time please. Other highlights included out door sports (10 person Human Pyramid and barrel rolling down the grassy slopes) as well as the strange French backpacker who turned up and asked if he could join us (complete with Bugle and home made schnapps. He played "Auld Lang Syne" for us as he left). Since the days are getting a lot longer it was still kind of light at 10pm, so we didn't end up leaving until almost 11pm. I made it back to the dorm and almost collapsed in bed - but was reminded that I'd promised to turn up to Bedlam's End of Year too. Quick shower and change of clothes (soot, smoke and ash!) and went and joined them for a bit of music and chat until 2pm.
Saturday I was supposed to be heading to Sterling Castle with a friend from Melbourne, but unfortunately she slept through her alarm... twice... So by the time she made it here, it was almost 2pm. Instead we walked up to the Royal Mile, visited the Scottish Museum, went for Dinner and then went to The Real Mary King Close. We decided that it was much better value than the Edinburgh Dungeon - while not as dramatic, it makes up with actual history. On the way back home we dropped in for Hot Chocolate and cake at Starbucks and then I crashed in bed.
Today's been rather quiet. Started sorting out paperwork and bags, spent a few hours on the phone to the folks fixing the router at home (somehow they appear to have completely fried the old one) and then joined some of the CompSoc guys for a bit of Team Fortress 2. Man, that game is a lot of fun. I'm quite fond of the Heavy - I've already managed to top my younger brother's score using him. *Bwahahaha*
Tomorrow it's off to start packing teh Suitcase and try and find some bathroom scales. Can only take 20KG on the plane and have picked up quite a few extras while I'm here. :D
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| Mr. Meme |
[10 May 2009|09:02pm] |
Oh, and have a Meme while you're at it! (janusd did it!)
- Who are you?
- Are we friends?
- When and how did we meet?
- Would you kiss me?
- Give me a nickname and explain why.
- Describe me in 1 word.
- What was your first impression of me?
- Do you still think the same?
- What reminds you of me?
- If you could give me anything, what would it be?
- How well do you know me?
- Are you gonna put this in your journal and see what I say about you?
- Would you meet up with me?
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| The Final Countdown~ |
[10 May 2009|07:11pm] |
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mood |
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 reflective |
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Apologies for the long silence over the last couple of weeks, but I'm smack bang in the middle of exam season (A horrible combination of Study, Sleep, Procrastinate, Panic, Revise, Exam). Thankfully almost halfway through them already (Also, ten exams is just cruelty to poor dumb students like me!). We shall preserver!
So, May 2009 already. Eight months in the Scotland and the United Kingdom. Less than one month until I head back home to Australia. I even know the date and time that I fly out, so you can wave as I fly out from Heathrow (Evening of Wed 3rd June). I must say, the Scottish experience has been interesting. In my time here I've: - Completed a full year of my course
- Learnt new words (Such as NED, Chav, Naff, Pish, Sederunt, PubPubPubPub, Ban Balloon, Convict)
- Eaten new food (Including Haggis. At least 3 times!)
- Drunk new beverages (I'm going to sorely miss the Irn Bru)
- Seriously ruined the reputation of Australian's as beer swillers
- Become a System Administrator for the student run computing service
- Worked out how to use the pound correctly
- Climbed Arthur's Seat in the middle of a winter night, without a torch just to 'see the stars'
- Toured the east coast by train (Durham, York, Nottingham, London)
- Been caught in a hotel fire
- Cooked my own meals for a full month
- Been rather sick a couple of times (nothing to do with my cooking, thankfully!)
- Managed my personal affairs for almost a year
- Grown quite an out of control "fro".
- Precariously rigged lights in the loft of Bedlam Theatre
- Been in the winning team for this years System Design Project Robot
Soccer Football cup - Almost managed to stop calling Football Soccer
- Visited Bletchley Park (the home of WW2 cryptography and arguably one of the cornerstones in computing history)
- Become a member of the British Museum
- Almost worked out how to understand the Scottish accent in a Pub
- Met a whole bunch of interesting people and made quite a few new friends
It's going to be quite sad when I get on that plane. Soon I'm going to have to start thinking about how on earth I'm going to pack up all the stuff I've collected here, take my final look around Edinburgh (still have to go to the Camera Obscura or Mum will never forgive me!), pick up a few souvenirs and then head back home. Sad to think that I'm almost down to "tourist" territory now. *sigh* Where did all those days go!
Hopefully you should hear a bit more from me in a little over a week once exams are out of the way. Freedom!
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| How to resign in style |
[29 Apr 2009|08:50am] |
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mood |
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music |
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Super Mario Super Star |
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Jarrard Wood, a developer for 2K Australia (developer of Bioshock), has decided to resign to go into work in indie games. But not before he sent this little game around the office.
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| *omm nom nom nom* |
[02 Apr 2009|08:49pm] |
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mood |
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 hungry |
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Oh! Why didn't anyone tell me that English Muffins were so tasty!
Sure we have them back home, but not like this. *ommnomnomnomnom*
*Sitting quite contently with a Cup o' Tea and a freshly toasted English Muffin with Jam and Butter*
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| Save IE 6! |
[01 Apr 2009|05:19pm] |
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mood |
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 silly |
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As a long time web developer I've seen standards come and go. From the original Netscape Navigator to the W3C to the WHATWG. Each new standard would subtlety break every things over and over again. Through one browser has been rock solid and consistant over the years. Internet Explorer 6! Still in use by almost 1 in 4 users, it comes with XP, the most popular OS on the planet and can be relied on to do things the 'Microsoft Way'. Quite recently there's been a disturbing campaign to stomp out IE6 for a more "standards compliant" browser. Come on. They haven't even got CSS1 working in almost 25% of browsers!
http://www.saveie6.com/ - If we don't, who will?
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| Since Semester 1 has officially started back home... |
[11 Mar 2009|09:26pm] |
I'm a 5th year?! Bloody hell! How did that happen...
The only appropriate phase that comes to mind was the Topics on the old MUCSA forums:1st year: Brand new and just starting out in Computer Science. Welcome Newbs!
2nd years: These guys are stuck in Limbo... some skills... but much to learn
3rd years: Wisened elders of the CSSE department
I think I've seriously fallen of the end of the list now. Oh dear...
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| The Internet is really, really great! |
[09 Mar 2009|12:12am] |
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mood |
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 annoyed |
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Arrgh. Bloody MSN Spam has reached an all time "pain in the ass" level. I'm now blocking everyone who is not on my friends list. If you want to contact me using MSN email me first, or try another account (AIM is probably your best bet).
Grrgh! Why do spammers have to ruin everything that's good. I've heard that Twitter spam is starting to take of now too. =/
Scrambling to finish assignments this week. You may not see or hear much from me until Friday.
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| My Haunted Laptop |
[25 Feb 2009|10:30pm] |
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mood |
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 nerdy |
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Apologies for the journal spam. I write nothing for several days and then flood everyone in a single night.
Anyone like Ghost stories? Because my laptop is haunted.
( Spooky! )
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| On the mend |
[25 Feb 2009|05:05pm] |
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mood |
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 recumbent |
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Well, that was certainly a fun couple of days. Turns out I caught a nasty bout of gastro that has been going around here and it's knocked me around a bit. It sounds like eileanach earlier comment was right - I really am out to get every northern hemisphere ill known (An alternative theory was that I was just suffering from all this standing on my head. Quite possible too! :p).
Really do appreciate having the wardens at the halls. It would have been quite miserable if I didn't feel there was someone else to be able to call on (This is one plus for housemates). Two of them dropped past to check that I was doing OK and Marie the lady who cleans our hall made me a cupah (She's wonderful!). Still not quite up to full meals, but been having soup and a light breakfast now that I'm feeling a tad peckish again.
One upside of being bedridden is I've finally started to watch some of the videos that I haven't seen. Slowly been making progress on Zoids: Genesis, The IT Crowd (Season 2) and ReBoot (Season 3). All quite good. Sometimes that's the hardest part - sitting down for a couple of hours to start a series. Watching the rest of it is really quite easy.
Ducked into Uni today for one of Robot project submission. While we had a few technical glitches, we managed to show that most things worked as intended. Next week will be the first friendly match, so I'm going to see if it's possible to record it. If you're lucky we might even be able to stream it live.
Finally, Orange Lucozade has much more of a kick to it than I remember. Somewhere between the last time I had it in Primary School and today it became an Energy Drink. I must say it has a real kick on an empty stomach - must be almost pure glucose.
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| *gurgle* |
[22 Feb 2009|02:26am] |
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mood |
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 sick |
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Oh stomach... when did you decided to hate me....
*would go to bed but lying down makes me feel more ill*
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| Inkspots |
[17 Feb 2009|07:35pm] |
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mood |
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 numb |
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*sigh*
Buries himself in work.
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| 1234567890! |
[13 Feb 2009|11:31pm] |
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mood |
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geeky |
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music |
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Final Countdown! |
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▌ ▌ ▌ ▌ ▗ ▛▀▘▛▀▖▞▀▖▞▀▖▌ ▌▐▐▐▐
▙▄▌▝▀▖▛▀▖▛▀▖▌ ▌ ▌ ▌▛▀▖▄ ▚▗▘ ▙▄ ▙▄▘▌ ▌▌ ▙▄▌▐▐▐▐
▌ ▌▞▀▌▙▄▘▙▄▘▚▄▌ ▌ ▌▌ ▌▐ ▗▚ ▌ ▌ ▌ ▌▌ ▖▌ ▌▝▝▝▝
▘ ▘▝▀▘▌ ▌ ▗▄▘ ▝▀ ▘ ▘▀▘▘ ▘ ▀▀▘▘ ▝▀ ▝▀ ▘ ▘▝▝▝▝
*Crashes into bed after the party in AT*
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| Urgh! What!?! |
[11 Feb 2009|08:38am] |
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mood |
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 angry |
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What an utter TWAT!. How can people listen to this guy without being sickened.
Pushing your political bandwagon on the back of a horrific natural disaster. Myers had it right. Ghoul.
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| ~Her beauty and her terror~ |
[08 Feb 2009|11:12pm] |
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mood |
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 shocked |
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There's been a real heatwave through the south-east states of Australia over the last two weeks. This weekend was the worst with the temperature reaching reached 46.4°C on Saturday - the hottest day on record. A terrible consequence of the temperatures are the bushfire which rip through the dry undergrowth.
I was chatting to my family this morning and found out that almost the towns of Marysville and Kinglake have been burnt to the ground. Marysville is one of this wonderful little country towns about an hours drive north-east from my house - it's lovely place to go for a Sunday drive and pick up lunch at the bakery. It's almost unbelievable to think that most of it is gone. The people who live out that way are a pretty hardy bunch and know the risks of living so close to the bushland and I'm sure that the town will eventually recover, but it's still a bit of a shock when you see the photos. It's a terrible thing to happen.
At the moment the death toll is 108 (and they're still counting). That alone makes it probably the worst bushfire disaster in Australian history easily outstripping the Ash Wednesday and Black Friday bushfires. Thankfully there's been somewhat of a cool change and that's helping to get the fires under control. I still worry that a few people I know live quite close to some of the places where fires are burning. Hopefully I'll be able to get in touch with them soon.
Sometimes it sucks to live in a "Sunburnt country".
And then you hear news that some of it may have been deliberately lit... Damn... the world is full of some utter trash...
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