. .

st4u

Smalltalk 4 U 11: Getting Started with WebVelocity

November 2, 2010 7:17:26.276

Today's Smalltalk 4 You looks at the process of installing WebVelocity. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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posted by James Robertson

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news

Contrarian

November 2, 2010 7:25:11.536

I was over on Facebook this morning getting the daily screencast online, when I noticed the big "go Vote" banner they are running. As it happens, I'm something of a contrarian on the whole "make sure you vote" thing. In fact, I'd prefer fewer people voted based on one small thing: if you can't name your current:

  • Local representative (state and town/county)
  • House of Representatives Congressman
  • 2 Senators in the US Senate

Then please, do the rest of us a favor: stay home. An uninformed vote is worse than no vote at all. Pick whatever set of ideas you think represents you best; that's not the part that bothers me. Just make sure you have a a clue as to who is running, and what they all stand for :)

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smaller Smalltalk

November 2, 2010 15:00:58.995

Spotted in Planet Squeak

Pavel continues with his work on a small Pharo Kernel. The latest release not only contains a headless 2.2 MB image but also a small 3MB image with KomHttpServer.

That's pretty cool - I know that a lot of commercial customers of VA and VW would like to see something like that.

posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

LightsOut game

November 2, 2010 17:34:33.589

Pharocasts has a nice demo of the "Lights out" demo from the "Pharo By Example" book.

Follow the Lights Out game exercise from the book Pharo By Example.

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posted by James Robertson

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web

How Not to Run a High Volume Site

November 2, 2010 18:12:35.509

If you're running one of the higher volume websites - and today (election day in the US), many of the political blogs are in that category - you don't want to see this:

Error establishing a database connection

I really wonder how many people don't know that they need a caching solution until they get hammered?

posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Parallel Execution in Squeak

November 3, 2010 6:03:20.569

IBM has open sourced the RoarVM work:

"RoarVM, formerly known as the Renaissance Virtual Machine (RVM) is developed as part of a IBM Research project to investigate programming paradigms and languages for manycore systems of the future. Specifically, this VM is meant to support manycore systems with more than 1000 cores in the future.

It's compatible with Squeak 4.1 and Pharo 1.2 - follow the link for details. This is the fun part:

It is compatible with Squeak 4.1 and Pharo 1.2, has full closure support and was tested with 8 cores, 16 hyperthreads on Intel systems/tested with 56 cores on Tilera TILE64/TILEPro64 processors

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js4u

Javascript 4 U 2: Web Page Execution Model

November 3, 2010 6:58:47.169

Javascript 4 U

Welcome to Javascript 4 You - a new screencast series devoted to Javascript tutorials. We are starting with the basics - what is Javascript, and how can you get started learning it? Today's screencast follows from the first, with some more introductory material. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube.

Join the Facebook Group to discuss the tutorials. You can view the archives here.

To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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posted by James Robertson

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copyright

How Stupid is Copyright Law?

November 3, 2010 12:29:23.000

The Library of Congress tells us:

"Were copyright law followed to the letter, little audio preservation would be undertaken. Were the law strictly enforced, it would brand virtually all audio preservation as illegal," the study concludes, "Copyright laws related to preservation are neither strictly followed nor strictly enforced. Consequently, some audio preservation is conducted."

That sounds like hyperbole, but keep going:

The consequence is that all sounds recordings made before 1972 will have their copyright expire in 2067 - 95 years after the placement of these recordings under federal protection in 1972. This means that the oldest sound recordings in the US dating from 1890, will only enter the public domain after 177 years.

So something that gets recorded now is locked up for - literally - generations. It's beyond stupid and straight into the absurd. Truth really is stranger than fiction....

posted by James Robertson

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fnvdiary

That Podcast 7: Quests Everywhere

November 3, 2010 23:11:54.344

That Podcast: FNV Diary

Welcome to episode 7 of "That Podcast: An FNV Diary" - a podcast where Michael Lucas-Smith and I document our trials and tribulations in Fallout: New Vegas.

On today's podcast, we talk about the huge number of side quests available in the game, and James goes into some detail about solving Cassidy's (one of the companions) problems.

You can subscribe in iTunes (or any podcatcher) using this feed, or this one for the AAC edition. You can get to the podcast directly in iTunes via this link. You can also go to the iTunes store and leave a comment, or join the Facebook Group and discuss the podcast.

If you want to download the podcast directly, I've provided it in three formats:

Got feedback? Send it to James. We'd really appreciate it if you head on over to iTunes and leave a comment - enjoy the podcast, and we'll see you in the wastelands!

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fnvdiaryAAC

That Podcast 7: Quests Everywhere (AAC)

November 3, 2010 23:11:56.684

That Podcast: FNV Diary

Welcome to episode 7 of "That Podcast: An FNV Diary" - a podcast where Michael Lucas-Smith and I document our trials and tribulations in Fallout: New Vegas.

On today's podcast, we talk about the huge number of side quests available in the game, and James goes into some detail about solving Cassidy's (one of the companions) problems.

You can subscribe in iTunes (or any podcatcher) using this feed, or this one for the AAC edition. You can get to the podcast directly in iTunes via this link. You can also go to the iTunes store and leave a comment, or join the Facebook Group and discuss the podcast.

If you want to download the podcast directly, I've provided it in three formats:

Got feedback? Send it to James. We'd really appreciate it if you head on over to iTunes and leave a comment - enjoy the podcast, and we'll see you in the wastelands!

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[fnvdiary7.m4a ( Size: 11238189 )]

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st4u

Smalltalk 4 U 12: Getting Started with F-Script

November 4, 2010 6:30:27.293

Today's Smalltalk 4 You looks at the process of installing F-Script on the Mac. F-Script is a scripting language (like AppleScript) for the Mac, with Smalltalk syntax. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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posted by James Robertson

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development

Language Wars are Back

November 4, 2010 7:58:24.849

There was a point a few years ago when many developers thought that the "language wars" were over: Java (or at least the JVM) was the new standard, and everything going forward would revove around that. Oh sure, things like Smalltalk would still exist around the periphery, but the thinking was that "everything" would end up on the JVM.

Things didn't quite end up that way, and Apple's dominance in the mobile space has a lot to do with that. While they are no longer forcing their favored languages on IOS developers, it's clear that most IOS work will be in Objective-C. That left Apple free to deprecate Java for the Mac, which makes a rather large dent in the Java "write once, run everywhere" story".

Not that Java is hurting - it's the preferred language for Android development, and Android is surging. There are a few issues, notably Oracle's lawsuit - but Java will remain one of the main development tools.

Another consensus changer over the last few years has been Ruby - it didn't all end up on the JVM. Meanwhile, Microsoft has had bigger problems with .NET than they thought they would. The upshot? It's still a diverse landscape for software developers.

posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smalltalk in the Browser

November 4, 2010 13:02:18.000

Torsten points to some work on the Omni-Browser running via Seaside:

since browsing Smalltalk directly in the webbrowser is easy to do Lukas today updated the packages for "OB-Web" to use OmniBrowser (the Smalltalk browser used in Pharo) to be accessible from a webbrowser too. Just download Pharo 1.1. and follow the simple instructions to run it and see yourself. Browsing the code you will find out that it is a nice example how to use the Comanche webserver (KomHttpServer) to write own web based services. It's also a nice example for AJAX communication between client side JavaScript and server side Smalltalk code using JSON.

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gadgets

iPhone Users Want Flash?

November 4, 2010 13:40:32.887

Skyfire was providing an iPhone browser that promised Flash access yesterday:

Skyfire for iPhone promises to transcode Web-based Flash video on the fly to an iPhone-friendly format.

I suspect that the demand made Steve Jobs a bit unhappy:

Skyfire Labs was caught off guard by the demand for its services, and the company was forced to stop selling the Skyfire browser on iTunes just hours after the app debuted.

While I'm no fan of Flash, here's the thing - the iPad is a great device for watching streaming video, and all of the major TV sites - the network sites and Hulu being the ones I'm thinking of - use Flash. I'm somewhat surprised that the app got approved in the first place :)

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podcasting

Now in iTunes

November 4, 2010 23:13:48.069

My new Javascript series is now available through the iTunes store.

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posted by James Robertson

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gamecast

James and Michael on Games 4: The Civ-Cast

November 4, 2010 23:56:02.049

James and Michael on Games

Michael Lucas-Smith and I are fans of a number of video games - we both like the Fallout series quite a bit, for instance. Since we end up talking about the games we play so much, we thought it might be fun to do a podcast on the subject. Here's episode 4.

In this podcast, we talk about Civ IV and Civ V - we've both played Civ IV quite a bit, and appeared on Polycast to talk about it. Michael carries the chat about Civ V; I don't have it yet, since I'm on the Mac.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the Ogg Vorbis edition. You can subscribe to the MP3 edition in iTunes using this feed. You can subscribe directly in iTunes as well.

If you have feedback, send it to James Robertson.

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posted by James Robertson

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js4u

Javascript 4 U 3: Functions and External Files

November 5, 2010 7:24:35.072

Javascript 4 U

Today's Javascript 4 You - looks at Javascript functions, and how to execute Javascript code that comes from files external to your html page. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube.

Join the Facebook Group to discuss the tutorials. You can view the archives here.

To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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posted by James Robertson

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humor

How Smart Phone Users See Each Other

November 5, 2010 9:25:30.000

It's funny, but it's so true :)

posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smalltalks 2010

November 5, 2010 14:35:07.000

The schedule for Smalltalks 2010 is online - it looks quite good. Sadly, traveling to Argentina is not in my budget this year - I hope there's video.

The link doesn't go directly to the schedule - it's a Seaside app, and they didn't create a direct link. Go to the "Schedule" tab at the top of the page.

Hat tip Andres Valloud.

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posted by James Robertson

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itNews

Something's Afoot in Cable-Land

November 5, 2010 15:43:31.000

Spotted in Engadget

Last quarter was the first time ever that US pay TV subscription rates were down. Now, according to GigaOM's calculations, big cable suffered another set back in Q3, waving goodbye to over 500,000 subscribers in total. Comcast was saddled with over half of the carnage and lost 275,000 customers, while Time Warner took a 155,000 subscriber hit. Charter Communications and Cablevision fared slightly better, but still added 63,800 and 24,500 respectively to the industry pit of despair.

The easiest thought is that with a weak economy (and high unemployment), one of the simplest cost savings measures available is the cable bill. We returned one of the cable boxes that had built up around here when I got laid off, for instance, and would have done more had I not gotten offers immediately.

Here's my question though: when things pick up, will those subscribers come back, or will streaming TV (such as Hulu and Netflix) be enough? Gaming consoles like the XBox and Wii are inexpensive, hook right up to the TV, and give you all of that. Then there are the newer settop box entries, like the AppleTV. This could be the sort of disruptive event that ends up kick starting a transition...

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esug2010

Pharo Achievement and Progress at ESUG 2010

November 6, 2010 0:06:13.151

Here's another video from ESUG 2010, which was held in Barcelona, Spain, the week of September 13, 2010. In this presentation, Marcus Denker talks about the progress that Pharo has made recently. You can watch using the embedded player below, or follow this link to Vimeo.

Pharo: Progress and Achievement from James Robertson on Vimeo.

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smalltalk

Cuis 2.9 Ships

November 6, 2010 0:37:08.601

Juan Vuletich has announced the release of Cuis 2.9

Cuis 2.9 is available at www.jvuletich.org/Cuis/Index.html . The release notes describes changes in recent versions (starting at 2.0). I believe many of the enhancements could be also useful for Pharo and rather easy to harvest. So, take a look!

Hat tip Torsten

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smalltalk Browser in the Browser

November 6, 2010 7:08:34.774

The Seaside project to present a useful browser-based Smalltalk code browser is being hosted on Google code:

Smalltalk Labs Browser, or SL-Browser for short, is a (hopefully) modern approach to create a web based code browser for the Seaside web framework in terms of both design and functionality.

There are instructions - including a walkthrough video - at the link.

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posted by James Robertson

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general

Awesome, or Scary?

November 6, 2010 19:27:09.466

I'm not sure what I think about this :)

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posted by James Robertson

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podcast

Independent Misinterpretations 4: War Stories

November 7, 2010 10:13:48.996

Welcome to episode 4 of Independent Misinterpretations - a new Smalltalk and dynamic language oriented podcast with James Robertson, Michael Lucas-Smith, and David Buck. This week David and I talk about some of our "war stories" - things we've seen on various projects over the years.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed directly or in iTunes with this one.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

If you like the music we use, please visit Josh Woodward's site. We use the song Troublemaker for our intro/outro music. I'm sure he'd appreciate your support!

If you have feedback, send it to jarober@gmail.com - or visit us on Facebook - you can subscribe in iTunes using this iTunes enabled feed.. If you enjoy the podcast, pass the word - we would love to have more people hear about Smalltalk!

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posted by James Robertson

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podcastAAC

Independent Misinterpretations 4: War Stories (AAC)

November 7, 2010 10:14:19.126

Welcome to episode 4 of Independent Misinterpretations - a new Smalltalk and dynamic language oriented podcast with James Robertson, Michael Lucas-Smith, and David Buck. This week David and I talk about some of our "war stories" - things we've seen on various projects over the years.

You can subscribe to the podcast in iTunes (or any other podcatching software) using this feed directly or in iTunes with this one.

To listen now, you can either download the mp3 edition, or the AAC edition. The AAC edition comes with chapter markers. You can subscribe to either edition of the podcast directly in iTunes; just search for Smalltalk and look in the Podcast results. You can subscribe to the mp3 edition directly using this feed, or the AAC edition using this feed using any podcatching software. You can also download the podcast in ogg format.

If you like the music we use, please visit Josh Woodward's site. We use the song Troublemaker for our intro/outro music. I'm sure he'd appreciate your support!

If you have feedback, send it to jarober@gmail.com - or visit us on Facebook - you can subscribe in iTunes using this iTunes enabled feed.. If you enjoy the podcast, pass the word - we would love to have more people hear about Smalltalk!

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posted by James Robertson

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books

Disintermediation Comes to Books

November 7, 2010 10:39:43.656

Independent book stores have been falling to the big box stores for awhile now, but the recession and the rise of popular e-readers (iPad, Kindle) seems to be putting the final nail in the coffin. Here's a story out of Knoxville:

“When we opened, we knew there was a void—there wasn’t an independent new-books store in Knoxville,” McNabb says. “There were just the chains. And that’s where we came in. So that was early 2005, and at that point our main concerns were the chains and Amazon—but we thought we could live that way. And then late 2007, everything started changing.”

2007 is right about the time that e-readers started to pick up, and it was also the start of the recession - so I think it's been a nasty 1-2 punch to those outfits. The big box stores shouldn't get smug though; I can't recall the last time I visited one, and my wife and I read a lot. The Kindle store on the iPad is now our "go to" place.

My guess is that the big stores will hang on for a bit, but like the big record stores (remember those?), they're doomed. The thing is, a small independent store might be more helpful than one of the big box stores, but neither is as useful as "people who bought X also bought Y" - the Amazon recommendation engine. I've bought a ton of stuff that I never would have seen through that, and many of the books I've bought that way were self published, or from very small publishers. Which means that ultimately, this transition should be good for authors.

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Simple Morphic for Pharo

November 7, 2010 15:00:11.915

There's a new rev of Morphic available for Pharo - check it out. Hat tip Torsten.

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posted by James Robertson

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itNews

The Walls Go Up

November 7, 2010 16:59:41.000

While I'm no fan of formalized net neutrality rules (I worry a lot about rent seeking opportunities in any large dscale regulatory environment) - the way networks are blocking Google TV is over the top - and since it's aroused precious little protest, is likely to lead to a very "walled garden" sort of future, where you'll need a bunch of devices in order to get access to all of the content you want:

Now as it turns out, browser client info is not the primary blocking mechanism being employed by Hulu, NBC, and other sites engaging in GTV blocking. On all affected sites I've tested so far, the serious blocking occurs during the process of Flash video playback startup, where an "unsupported device error" will appear.

Google customizes the Flash Player ID, which can't be (easily) mucked with by the end user. This has its stupid aspects as well; all Google really needs to do is stop customizing that ID, and the problem will vaporize (at least until the networks come up with some other lame blocking scheme).

That's the thing we'll see more of, I think - stupid cat and mouse games where content is there, and then isn't. That serves the interests of the big providers, of course - they would rather keep you glued to the time slot driven, well understood ad model world of broadcast TV.

posted by James Robertson

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copyright

How Copyright Kills Culture

November 7, 2010 18:52:18.403

If this article doesn't lay out just how stupid our current copyright system is, nothing does.

posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

More Smaller Smalltalk

November 7, 2010 19:12:07.448

The Pharo Kernel project is making good progress:

I successfully loaded the the rest of PharoCore packages into the PharoKernel.

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posted by James Robertson

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st4u

Smalltalk 4 U 13: Learning Smalltalk with ProfStef

November 8, 2010 6:26:04.007

Today's Smalltalk 4 You starts a Smalltalk walkthrough using "ProfStef", which is part of the "one click" Pharo download. Over the next set of screencasts, we'll cover Smalltalk syntax and basic libraries.. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube. To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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posted by James Robertson

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fnvdiary

That Podcast 8: Skirting the Endgame

November 8, 2010 8:30:10.530

That Podcast: FNV Diary

Welcome to episode 8 of "That Podcast: An FNV Diary" - a podcast where Michael Lucas-Smith and I document our trials and tribulations in Fallout: New Vegas.

On today's podcast, Makahlua joins us again as we skirt around the end game. We talked aboiut crashes (we've started hitting them big time), companion quests, and some of the more remote areas of the game map, like Guardian Peak. We also mention a couple of spots with good treasure you might have missed - but the hidden cache I mentioned towards the end is actually near Searchlight, not Primm. To find it, go around the irradiated Searchlight to the north, and you should "stumble" on it.

You can subscribe in iTunes (or any podcatcher) using this feed, or this one for the AAC edition. You can get to the podcast directly in iTunes via this link. You can also go to the iTunes store and leave a comment, or join the Facebook Group and discuss the podcast.

If you want to download the podcast directly, I've provided it in three formats:

Got feedback? Send it to James. We'd really appreciate it if you head on over to iTunes and leave a comment - enjoy the podcast, and we'll see you in the wastelands!

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[fnvdiary8.mp3 ( Size: 12343983 )]

posted by James Robertson

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fnvdiaryAAC

That Podcast 8: Skirting the Endgame (AAC)

November 8, 2010 8:30:28.550

That Podcast: FNV Diary

Welcome to episode 8 of "That Podcast: An FNV Diary" - a podcast where Michael Lucas-Smith and I document our trials and tribulations in Fallout: New Vegas.

On today's podcast, Makahlua joins us again as we skirt around the end game. We talked aboiut crashes (we've started hitting them big time), companion quests, and some of the more remote areas of the game map, like Guardian Peak. We also mention a couple of spots with good treasure you might have missed - but the hidden cache I mentioned towards the end is actually near Searchlight, not Primm. To find it, go around the irradiated Searchlight to the north, and you should "stumble" on it.

You can subscribe in iTunes (or any podcatcher) using this feed, or this one for the AAC edition. You can get to the podcast directly in iTunes via this link. You can also go to the iTunes store and leave a comment, or join the Facebook Group and discuss the podcast.

If you want to download the podcast directly, I've provided it in three formats:

Got feedback? Send it to James. We'd really appreciate it if you head on over to iTunes and leave a comment - enjoy the podcast, and we'll see you in the wastelands!

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Smalltalk in NYC

November 8, 2010 13:46:56.128

Florin Mateoc will be talking about Smalltalk and algorithms on December 1st in NYC:

Florin Mateoc is a professional programmer for more than 20 years. He has programmed in Fortran, assembly, Basic, C, C++, Smalltalk, Java and C#. He is not a Smalltalk bigot,he does not think that Smalltalk is either perfect or the end of the evolutionary line of programming languages. He just thinks that nothing better has come along yet.

Follow the link for the location and lore details.

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posted by James Robertson

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sports

Best Trick Play Ever

November 8, 2010 18:28:49.792

This is the sort of thing that only works once, but boy - it's an amazing football play:

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posted by James Robertson

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smalltalk

Seaside 3.0 for Dolphin

November 9, 2010 6:08:52.949

Looks like you can get your Seaside (3.0) fix for any Smalltalk now - here's news of the Dolphin port of Seaside 3:

I've ported the final release of Seaside 3. This version is like the previous (2.9) ported one year ago. Differences are on the portability layer and some configuration tools. Now Seaside uses Pharo's Grease. I think that Grease will contribute to make easy the job when porting other Frameworks related to Seaside or Pharo and currently ported to other Smalltalk dialects (Magritte, Pier, etc, I think will be funny porting both ;) Another difference is the Welcome application, very nice Welcome to newcomers!

Hat tip Torsten.

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js4u

Javascript 4 U 4: Beginning Javascript Syntax

November 9, 2010 6:30:00.029

Javascript 4 U

Today's Javascript 4 You - starts in on Javascript syntax. We'll be covering that topic for the next few screencasts on Javascript. If you have trouble viewing it here in the browser, you can also navigate directly to YouTube.

Join the Facebook Group to discuss the tutorials. You can view the archives here.

To watch now, use the viewer below:

If you have trouble viewing that directly, you can click here to download the video directly. If you need the video in a Windows Media format, then download that here.

You can also watch it on YouTube:

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posted by James Robertson

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general

Where Does the Space Go?

November 9, 2010 6:56:54.869

It's times like this that make me wonder about the data I save. I've been archiving data off a drive that has to go back to my former employer - I had filled a 1 TB drive with stuff. Over the last day (on and off as I was able to muster interest) I copied the stuff that I thought I actually wanted over to a new drive. The results were fascinating.

I started with a drive that had 995 GB on it. I ended up with a new 1 TB drive with only 52 GB taken up. So... what the heck was I doing with the other 940 or so GB? Makes me go Hmmmm...

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posted by James Robertson

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itNews

Things are Shaky in Java-Land

November 9, 2010 17:38:24.274

Things are looking shaky in the JCP - the Apache Foundation is distinctly unhappy:

"Why would we want to be in an organization where the rules of law don't matter? Our being on the [JCP Executive Committee] would be a sham. It would show that the community doesn't matter, that we'd basically cave into Oracle pushing stuff through, whether or not it would be in the best interest of the community," said Jim Jagielski, president and cofounder of the Apache Software Foundation (ASF), in an interview with the IDG News Service.

I'm very curious to see how this will work out for Oracle. I understand their desire to monetize Java, but it brings to mind my teaching experience (many years ago, during my first year on the job): if you're too easy at the start, tightening up later is really, really hard. And that's where Oracle is at - Java has been "loose" for a long time, and they are trying to tighten things down.

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