Planet Koalabs

Weblog 2.4 was released. It’s probably the last release of the 2.x series. I’m currently working on version 3, a major redesign of how Weblog works.

This new version fixes 2 bugs:

• Crash when a post contains a / or \\ character in its title
• Dates in the Atom feed now use the correct timezone

This version also improves speed. Weblog 2.4 only generate targets if their sources change.

Get it on the download page.

Don’t hesitate to ask questions or request support in the mailing list. Report any bugs and problems on the bugs & issues tracker.

Last week I tested Chromium. The Unix version of Google’s browser uses GConf. I prefer Chromium to Firefox, but I wont switch until GConf becomes an optional dependency or is completely removed. What’s the problem?

Without GConf:

Configuration file → Application

With GConf:

Configuration file → GConf → DBus → Application

I hate software that adds complexity for no real benefit.

If the place where you work is nice, you may be out of touch.

From the book Parkinson’s law, and other studies in administration:

During a time of exiting discovery or progress there is no time to plan the perfect headquarters. The time for that comes later, when all the important work has been done. Perfection we know is finality, and finality is death.

Recently in The Economist:

As a rule in the European Union, the grandeur of somebody’s office is inversely related to the sexiness of their work.

This seems to be true in the world of business too. Andrew Warner wrote how a new office in Manhattan cost him millions for almost nothing, and Steve Blank explained how a new building wasn’t only a waste of money but also impeded the company’s productivity and destroyed its culture.

In 2005, I was interviewed by Altran, a consulting firm, in a gorgeous building on the bank of the Seine river. The firm was famous for its excesses during the Internet bubble of the 90’s. They spent lavishly on office space in the most expensive parts of Paris. When I was interviewed in 2005 Altran was the only big French consulting company to lose money.

Mailing lists, and forums work well with few participants. As the number of participants go up: noise increases, and it becomes harder to follow conversations. Some people post lengthy unedited texts, which are hard to read and to understand. Others reply without even reading the original post, adding nothing to the conversation and creating confusion.

As far as I know, the only reliable way to keep the noise level low is moderation. A few moderators accept, edit, or reject posts from other members. It works well, but require lots of effort from the moderators.

Automatic means of limiting the noise are increasingly popular today. Many public websites use voting systems. Different algorithms were developed, some limit the noise up to a certain point. But those systems are vulnerable to the tyranny of the majority. Overall voting systems don’t work as well as classic moderation.

Limiting the noise by limiting the source of the noise

Another solution would be to limit the number of characters participants can use. For example everybody could be limited to 1000 characters a day on a high traffic mailing list. People would be clearer, as they try to make their point in fewer words.

Of course the most prolific contributors would also be impeded by this system. But it could turn a good contributors into a great contributor. Shortening a text usually makes it clearer.

I think limiting the number of characters subscribers can use each day, week, or month would have the following effect:

• Good contributors would be more concise
• Trolls and clueless subscribers would not be able to generate as much noise
• Part of the noise would turn into useful information as some people start to think or read other’s posts before posting

I’ve never seen such system in action. I’d like to see how it turns out in practice.

I usually turn to Google to find information about a Unix command or function. But there’s a faster and easier way to find what you’re looking for: apropos(1).

If you are looking for a way to turn a string into hexadecimal numbers:

$ apropos hex
ascii (7) - octal, hexadecimal and decimal ASCII character sets
hexdump (1) - ascii, decimal, hexadecimal, octal dump
od (1) - octal, decimal, hex, ascii dump
xxd (1) - make a hexdump or do the reverse.

“A simple rule is that if you want to know where the next crisis will be, then look at where the leverage is being created today,” says Martin Barnes of Bank Credit Analyst, a research firm. “The answer is in the government.”

From The repercussions of Dubai, The Economist December 3rd 2009.

I am glad to live in Canada, a country which started solving its fiscal problems during the past decade. Canadian politicians are aware of the problem that a mounting debt creates for the economy. Canada’s debt is raising again because of the financial crisis, but the outlook is better than all other G7 countries. There are plans to return to fiscal equilibrium in a few years.

France’s fiscal outlook is grimmer. Its annual deficit will be 8.2% of GDP in 2009, and 8.5% in 2010. The total deficit reaching more the 84% of GDP in 2010. Servicing such debt will impact negatively the economy, which in turn will make repaying the debt even harder.

Government bonds are considered safe, but during the past decade real estate was considered safe too. Argentina defaulted on its public debt in late 2001. After this crisis its GDP was divided by 3, and in October 2002 nearly 60% of argentinians lived under the poverty line. It took 6 years for the country to recover.

I have no idea how the world would react if a developed country defaulted. A crisis of confidence in government bonds could have dramatic effects on the world. Nobody can bail out the government.

Version 2.3 adds documentation for the slug field, this feature was present since 2.1 but wasn’t documented.

It also fixes 4 bugs reported by John Lenton. Many thanks to him.

Get it on the download page.

Don’t hesitate to ask questions or request support in the mailing list. Report any bugs and problems on the bugs & issues tracker.