(photography) Long Exposure Photography: 15 Stunning Examples

http://digital-photography-school.com/long-exposure-photography

(git) must read article on git

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/01/21/git_gaining_ground/print.html

Please ignore the bad language; El Reg is not known for being "business like", but they know their stuff.

Some quotes:

• Many enterprise developers just saw git's popularity as open source programmers suckling from the teat of Linus, but it kept growing. Programmers started to use git for their side projects and got hooked.
• Git is gaining traction because given all other source control systems out there, git is the superior technology.
• Developers will almost always select the best technology, and management must be dragged along kicking and screaming. It's no surprise that while git is making some headway in the enterprise, sometimes it's very under-the-radar and slow going.
• You can use git to manage all the source code on your machine, and to keep the PHBs happy, commit your finished product to Subversion without actually using Subversion. This "guerrilla git' movement is springing up around the world, as developers see the productivity boost they can gain, but don't want to undo it with a productivity loss in convincing the company to officially switch to git.
• So, if you're a developer and you haven't seen git before, there's a good possibility that you'll get a first hand demonstration when it starts to invade your company. If you like it, chances are it will help you get more work done in less time.

(CS,wow) Semantic patching with Coccinelle

what a cool idea and implementation!

http://lwn.net/SubscriberLink/315686/28939fbdde7c81fe/

(malware,office) Forrester: Companies use Word out of habit, not necessity

http://pcworld.idg.com.au/article/272644

lovely article!

The value of a high-priced analyst firm like Forrester is that, while
you can state the obvious as well as they can, no one listens when you do.

:-)

(standards) Microsoft disables automatic IE 8 downloads

Last week someone was saying that many current Windows-based, client-server, applications using a proprietary front-end called IE, might be forced to upgrade and actually become what they currently only claim to be -- proper "web applications".

And then along comes this, to dash all hopes:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/01/07/internet_explorer_8_blocker/

Especially note:

In a sign of the scale of the problem, Microsoft said the IE 8 Blocker does not have an expiration date. That means that until there's an official change of policy by Microsoft, users will not be getting IE 8 by default and will need to go on installing the software themselves.

(social malware) Fwd: Birthday request

On Wed, Jan 7, 2009 at 2:32 PM, <deleted> <do_not_reply@perfspot.com> wrote:
> I'm using a new service to keep track of the birthdays for my friends and
> family. Please click the link and enter your birthday for me.
>
> http://perfspot.com/b.asp?e=sitaramc%40gmail%2Ecom
>
> Thanks for your help.
>
> <deleted>

As a security guy, my first thought is that this is probably a scam to get lots of people's birthdays. Even if it is not *created* as a scam, all it takes is for someone to hack into their servers and get all that data.

Do you know that, in the US at least, I can get a credit card in your name by knowing only
- your full name
- your DOB
- and your SSN?

OK, we in India are a little behind, but not that far off, and the awareness is much less.

So, sorry -- even if you *know* my birthday, please do not put it on any online service to "remind you" of it.

I will not feel bad that you did not wish me, I promise :-)

(malware bugs) Zune hang explained...

Recently a Microsoft eqvt of the "iPod" (called the Zune), was found to
hang if it was booted on December 31st of 2008. The only solution was
to let the battery die, wait for the next day, and then reboot.

You'd think the cause might be something complex, deep in some really
arcane bit of the software, right?

Wrong! It's a piece of code that is so utterly simple even first year
college kids barely starting "C" should be able to understand the problem.

http://www.aeroxp.org/2009/01/lesson-on-infinite-loops/ explains the
cause of the hang is very nicely. The actual code is very simple: given
the "number of days since Jan 1, 1980" as input, return the current year
and the day-number within the current year. That's it. It even has a
helper function called "IsLeapYear()" to help it decide, so it's a very
simple, short, piece of code. Yet it got it wrong...

(git) one of the best responses on git versus svn I ever saw

http://developers.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1079921&cid=26321869

explains a DVCS workflow really well, including the common question of "how do we control things if everyone has their own repo?"

(funny,quote) The Berkeley of Linux...

I love this quote: "...the Debian project is the Berkeley of Linux: twice as many opinions as people, and four times as loud..."

[It's from http://www.linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2008-12-31-022-35-OP-DV but I must say I'm a little ambivalent on the issues raised in there; need to dig deeper into the background before I make up my mind.]