Massless

Click for larger picture. A co-worker sent me a pic of the campus at Infosys in Bangalore, India.

So, onto different things:

Houman walked into my cube wearing the coolest and most comfortable looking cotton shoes I've seen. They're called giveh and they're from Iran...

Segue alert! A question: Can browsers work as application GUIs? I wonder. They certainly seem adequate, that is, until you use a native application to perform the same task. As an example try thinking about performing the tasks you can typically accomplish in Excel. To my mind, it would be a frustrating experience to attempt those same tasks within the limitations of the HTML widget set. And how could large sets of data be easily managed? What about drag and drop functions? Multiple worksheets? Macros?

And yet...Houman and I have to figure out a way to approach the problem. We're tackling it by re-conceiving Excel-like functionality and design (a decent model given our needs) as an internet application served through standards-compliant browsers. Sheesh. Which would actually be a fun challenge...but the browser war and differing implementations of the W3C recommendations for the Javascript DOM sure take much of the fun out of the exercise.

Scary thought: it might not be possible.

Strike that. It seems likely that the current state of browsers makes it too difficult to achieve or maintain.

Really Basic Origami. Check out "ball."

Ascii.cl is one of my favorite online reference sites. Web developers are directed to their HTML Codes section.

Have U.S. courts ruled that an integer is illegal? Phil Carmody discovered a prime number that, converted to an hexadecimal value, forms a gzip file of the illegal DeCSS code.* That the legal status of a single number is in question helps to outline the concept that data cannot intrinsically be illegal and that the only benchmark for illegality should be how data is used. As a programmer it seems self-evident but I'm involved in a myopic, navel-gazing culture and I'm sensitive to the fact that this concept might be new and challenging for many people.

*Oh, DeCSS, I get it that's very funn...whuzzhuh? (Did you just make that sound?) To explain: DeCSS is often described as a "program that makes it possible to decrypt DVDs," such as those we rent from Blockbuster. You'd think use of that program would be considered illegal. It is. But...what's also illegal is simply the code to create that program.

What's wrong with that? Well...that's a good question. Should the instructions for committing a crime be considered "restricted" speech? Current practices tell us that it simply depends on the crime. For example, I can tell you the chemicals and process required to make crack cocaine. I can even publish it online and others can link to that information.

However, it is illegal to link to the instructions to decrypt a DVD.

Does that seem fair? When evaluating the answer we should consider that not just the program itself is illegal, but linking to the instructions to making that program is illegal. (Memorandum Order, in MPAA v. Reimerdes, Corley and Kazan)

Side note: Assistant U.S. attorney Daniel Alter argued in federal appeals court that DeCSS is just like "software programs that shut down navigational programs in airplanes or smoke detectors in hotels."