The first time I saw Air Traffic Control, I immediately got addicted. This is one of those genre of games which are ideal for a tablet or phone: you draw lines on the screen to direct planes to their destinations. However, other line drawing games haven't been as good. Air Patriots, for instance, was just too hard and tedious.
Strikefleet Omega, however,gets the difficulty right, and is not at all tedious. The science fiction theme is that you're the commander of a fleet of battleships fighting for humanity's survival. You fly from star system to star system, warping in and then defending yourself from incursions from the enemy. Enemies come in 3 types: fighters (small planes), cruisers (larger flying saucers), and battlecruisers (giant ass ships or constructs). Correspondingly, you have 5 types of ships you can warp in to defend your flagship, 3 of which deal specifically with the different types of enemy. The 4th type is a mining ship that generates resources so you can pay for the warp ins. The last is a generic artillery unit which can be used to target small and large ships alike.
Most of the missions are fair. You'll win on the first try, just barely, and then be able to improve your performance. The game has two types of currency: alloys, and mega creds. The former are gathered by destroying large ships and scoring points, and the latter can only be attained by a flying saucer that can be shot with an artillery unit. The last 3 missions are exceedingly hard, and I found myself using mega-bombs twice. I had more than enough mega creds to do so, however, without having to spend real money on the game. I didn't do much grinding: I'd play each mission twice, and the last few missions just once each because I didn't want to blow mega creds..
I rarely get around to finishing games, on tablets or otherwise. That Strikefleet Omega got me interested enough to play it to completion speaks volumes about how well-designed and addictive it is. Recommended.
Tuesday, July 23, 2013
Thursday, July 18, 2013
Review: Weeride Kangaroo Childseat
It is clearly not a hidden agenda with me that I want my child to enjoy cycling, preferably from as early an age as possible. One of my fellow bike club members once confided in me that her biggest disappointment was that both her sons did not like cycling at all, so she has to ride "on the sly" as far as her family is concerned.
We did buy a trailer fairly early on, but he didn't like it. In retrospect, I shouldn't have been surprised. The trailer is much more like a car than like a bike: he's low to the ground, with limited visibility, and has to stare at daddy's rear wheels and legs. So we started shopping for a child seat. We ruled the rear carriers out of hand, because that was only a mild improvement over a trailer. I also wanted to be able to monitor Bowen, and a rear mounted seat doesn't work that well for that.
As far as front carriers are concerned, there are only 2 choices, the WeeRide, and the iBert.
We did buy a trailer fairly early on, but he didn't like it. In retrospect, I shouldn't have been surprised. The trailer is much more like a car than like a bike: he's low to the ground, with limited visibility, and has to stare at daddy's rear wheels and legs. So we started shopping for a child seat. We ruled the rear carriers out of hand, because that was only a mild improvement over a trailer. I also wanted to be able to monitor Bowen, and a rear mounted seat doesn't work that well for that.
As far as front carriers are concerned, there are only 2 choices, the WeeRide, and the iBert.
We picked the WeeRide because it was cheaper, and looked easier to install, and didn't have his legs sticking out under the bars, where it might interfere with cables, etc. We tried the iBert at a Co-Motion event in the middle seat of a triplet, and in that situation, the iBert is actually better, so whether you plan to use the seat on a single or a triplet makes a difference. In any case, both are so cheap that you could reasonably buy both and not break the bank.
Since both types of seats are suitable only for flat bar bikes, I decided to just buy a cheap bike for riding with Bowen. While I paid only $250 on BikesDirect, I'm not sure I would go quite so cheap next time. The big chainring on that bike bent on the first ride, and the wheels definitely needed additional tensioning. I'm equipped to fix the latter problem, but the former is just an indication of poor quality.
The problem with the Weeride is that unless you have an unusually long top tube on the bike, your knees will interfere with the seat. I ended up setting my saddle height low as a result so I could actually mount and ride the thing with Bowen on it. This is not a big deal for very short rides, but it does mean that any ambitious I have of towing a trailer as well are gone.
The mounting scheme doesn't let you adjust the seat height after you've set up the seat without a hassle, so no, you can't just set it up and then set up your saddle.
I might sound like I'm complaining a lot, but actually, we've been using the Weeride quite a bit! Bowen loves it and has started demanding bike rides, and has taken to imitating the Weeride on his strider. He now asks to listen to Queen's Bicycle race over and over again. So in terms of getting Bowen into cycling, it's working. We'll see how it goes when he masters the Strider.
Wednesday, July 17, 2013
My Books Are Discounted on Amazon
Those of you who visit my books' website know that I don't believe in discounting. But Amazon believes otherwise, and for now, print copies of my book are being sold at a discount:
- An Engineer's Guide to Silicon Valley Startups ($39.56)
- Startup Engineering Management ($35.96)
- Independent Cycle Touring ($26.01)
Independent Cycle Touring in particular is discounted by a huge amount (35%), and it works particularly well in print format, so if you've been holding off on buying it, this is the cheapest it's ever been and probably the cheapest it will ever be. If you have any interest in the topic at all, this is the best book on the topic, and of all of my books is the least likely to be outdated.
Monday, July 15, 2013
Review: Contagious
Contagious is a viral marketing handbook. Written by a professor of marketing at the Wharton business school, it promises to tell you how to make a sticky and effective marketing campaign by breaking down why and how certain videos/articles go viral while others languish in obscurity.
The author breaks down the five common denominators (plus an enabler) into 6 principles, providing a mnemonic STEPPS to hep you remember:
The author breaks down the five common denominators (plus an enabler) into 6 principles, providing a mnemonic STEPPS to hep you remember:
- Social Currency: the idea is that people share things that make themselves look good. This can be achieved through gamification, making a product rare, or some other means that ensures that people will rush to acquire your product or join your service.
- Triggers: the idea here is to attach your product to something that's encountered frequently, or failing that, to attach your product to an action or activity where buying your product is convenient. For instance, Rebecca Black's awful song, "Friday" gets triggered every time someone searches for Friday, whether or not they're looking for that song.
- Emotion. try to active high arousal emotions in viewers or the audience. Awe, Excitement, Amusement (seeing something funny), Anger and Anxiety are all far more effective than Contentment or Sadness.
- Public: make your product advertise its presence in as conspicuous a fashion as possible. Examples include Apple's white headphones, Macbook's Apple logos which glow every time a user opens it up, and of course, the bright-yellow Livestrong wrist-band.
- Practical: people love sharing practical tips, either big discounts or useful advice.
- Stories: this is the wrapper. What successful marketing campaigns achieve is to tie some (or all) of the above components together into a story in such a way that the product or brand is integral to the story.Without this last step your story/ad campaign might go viral, but your product will not benefit.
The biggest problem with books written by marketing people is that they're great at marketing themselves. For instance, Berger doesn't tell you which combination of the 6 principles work best together. They also use examples are have faded. For instance, FourSquare never did reach the kind of mainstream adoption that it's founders looked for. There's also nothing that tells you whether any of the successful campaigns used as part of the case studies are deliberately constructed that way, or just happen to be viral by accident. If it's the latter, you might actually not be able to replicated someone else's success.
What's most disappointing, then, is that there's no process detailed on how to achieve the results you want, and nor are effective ways for you to measure the success of a viral marketing campaign described and mentioned.
While this book was worth reading (it's very short and a quick read), I wonder how many people can actually effectively use this book.
Mildly recommended.
Friday, July 12, 2013
Review: Nickel Plated
Nickel Plated comes from the Amazon Encore Imprint of books. Judging by the quality (and price) of the book, traditional dead tree publishers have a lot to fear from Amazon Encore, if this is the type of author they've been passing on and this is the type of book that's the future of independent publishing.
Nickel is an all-round fixer. He charges people who can afford it $100/day to fix their problems. People can't afford it get the job done for free. Obviously, this can't possibly pay the bills, so he runs a business on the side selling weed that he grows in his backyard. Sounds like a typical action-hero thriller? Oh yeah, Nickel is 12 years old.
Not only is he a 12 year old, he's the one that you wished you were when you were 12. He lives alone, pays his own bills, run his own life, never has to go to school, and beats up bullies who tries to bully him. He's almost too perfect. The main plot around the novel starts when Nickel is approached by Arrow, whose sister has gone missing and whose dad becomes the prime suspect for the disappearance. Nickel investigates, while his life is complicated by a mom who is worried about her son's night life, his drug business, and the general problem of being 12 years old trying to get by.
The plot and story sounds outrageous, and it is, but Davis makes it all work, and work well. Nickel pretty much has to either take a cab or ride his bike everywhere, and he does. He talks about how he has to go grocery shopping and treat every trip as though he's running errands for his parents, and how to construct fake Facebook identities. He points out that in the modern suburban environment, most people don't even notice their neighbors, so never see that there's no one home next door but there's a 12 year old living there.
I hate to say it, but this is a novel that definitely demands a sequel, simply because the character is so compelling and has a great backstory that I would love to learn more about, and I will look for more books by Aric Davis in the future. Highly recommended.
Nickel is an all-round fixer. He charges people who can afford it $100/day to fix their problems. People can't afford it get the job done for free. Obviously, this can't possibly pay the bills, so he runs a business on the side selling weed that he grows in his backyard. Sounds like a typical action-hero thriller? Oh yeah, Nickel is 12 years old.
Not only is he a 12 year old, he's the one that you wished you were when you were 12. He lives alone, pays his own bills, run his own life, never has to go to school, and beats up bullies who tries to bully him. He's almost too perfect. The main plot around the novel starts when Nickel is approached by Arrow, whose sister has gone missing and whose dad becomes the prime suspect for the disappearance. Nickel investigates, while his life is complicated by a mom who is worried about her son's night life, his drug business, and the general problem of being 12 years old trying to get by.
The plot and story sounds outrageous, and it is, but Davis makes it all work, and work well. Nickel pretty much has to either take a cab or ride his bike everywhere, and he does. He talks about how he has to go grocery shopping and treat every trip as though he's running errands for his parents, and how to construct fake Facebook identities. He points out that in the modern suburban environment, most people don't even notice their neighbors, so never see that there's no one home next door but there's a 12 year old living there.
I hate to say it, but this is a novel that definitely demands a sequel, simply because the character is so compelling and has a great backstory that I would love to learn more about, and I will look for more books by Aric Davis in the future. Highly recommended.
Thursday, July 11, 2013
Review: The First 20 Minutes
The First 20 Minutes is a book about exercise physiology. It's been a number of very good years for exercise physiology since more and more research has been published about mind-body connection, and there's any number of fads and myths, which this book does a great job of debunking.
For instance, take barefoot running. It's been touted as the solution for everything related to running injuries, but it turns out that for instance, the natural walking position even when barefoot is heel striking first, not stepping on the balls of your feet. Interestingly enough, there's research showing that barefoot running doesn't solve all running injuries, and in fact may create different injuries, so choice of running footwear or lack thereof is largely a matter of personal taste.
The section on stretching is well known --- hopefully by now everyone knows that stretching before exercising is actually bad for you. What's oddly interesting is that she found research showing that most athletes overdo the warm up, wearing themselves out before the actual event.
Reynolds does a good job describing the difference between fitness and health, and points out that 20 minutes of exercise a day is all you really need to maintain health. But if you want to change your body shape, then you have to do quite a bit more (an hour a day). Worse, exercise isn't a great way to lose weight, unless you do a lot of it. She notes that vigorous intense workouts exceeding 800 calories burned do indeed give you an "afterburn", where your appetite gets depressed and your metabolic rate increases even post workout. Unfortunately, life's not fair. Apparently, this does not happen to women.
Ever wondered why women sweat less than men? This book has the answer. There's also sections on why more repetition at a lower weight is the preferred method for strength training now, and how exercise affects your brain (old hat to folks who've read Brain Rules), and how exercise affects your DNA at a deep level, provided you start early enough (in your 20s). There's also how exercise affects kids as well as older people (hint: it's good to start early, while the baby is in mom's womb!). All in all, the book is comprehensive, even more so than Which Comes First, Cardio or Weights.
I do have a few complaints about the book. First, Reynolds doesn't like cycling, so she gives cycling short shrift --- there's very little tips for cyclists that are useful, and she quotes an old study showing that 60rpm is more efficient metabolically than 90rpm. Anyone who does any amount of cycling knows that metabolic efficiency is unimportant in cycling --- cyclists are already the most efficient land animal on the planet. It's about endurance, and it's far easier to push a light weight for a long time than to push a heavier weight for the same amount of time.
With those criticisms aside, though, this is a great book and worth reading. Recommended!
For instance, take barefoot running. It's been touted as the solution for everything related to running injuries, but it turns out that for instance, the natural walking position even when barefoot is heel striking first, not stepping on the balls of your feet. Interestingly enough, there's research showing that barefoot running doesn't solve all running injuries, and in fact may create different injuries, so choice of running footwear or lack thereof is largely a matter of personal taste.
The section on stretching is well known --- hopefully by now everyone knows that stretching before exercising is actually bad for you. What's oddly interesting is that she found research showing that most athletes overdo the warm up, wearing themselves out before the actual event.
Reynolds does a good job describing the difference between fitness and health, and points out that 20 minutes of exercise a day is all you really need to maintain health. But if you want to change your body shape, then you have to do quite a bit more (an hour a day). Worse, exercise isn't a great way to lose weight, unless you do a lot of it. She notes that vigorous intense workouts exceeding 800 calories burned do indeed give you an "afterburn", where your appetite gets depressed and your metabolic rate increases even post workout. Unfortunately, life's not fair. Apparently, this does not happen to women.
Ever wondered why women sweat less than men? This book has the answer. There's also sections on why more repetition at a lower weight is the preferred method for strength training now, and how exercise affects your brain (old hat to folks who've read Brain Rules), and how exercise affects your DNA at a deep level, provided you start early enough (in your 20s). There's also how exercise affects kids as well as older people (hint: it's good to start early, while the baby is in mom's womb!). All in all, the book is comprehensive, even more so than Which Comes First, Cardio or Weights.
I do have a few complaints about the book. First, Reynolds doesn't like cycling, so she gives cycling short shrift --- there's very little tips for cyclists that are useful, and she quotes an old study showing that 60rpm is more efficient metabolically than 90rpm. Anyone who does any amount of cycling knows that metabolic efficiency is unimportant in cycling --- cyclists are already the most efficient land animal on the planet. It's about endurance, and it's far easier to push a light weight for a long time than to push a heavier weight for the same amount of time.
With those criticisms aside, though, this is a great book and worth reading. Recommended!
Tuesday, July 09, 2013
Review: Ghost Spin
I was all set to buy Ghost Spin, after enjoying Moriarty's previous books Spin State and Spin Control, but the Amazon reviews put me off, so I waited for the library copy. I shouldn't have waited, because the reviews are wrong and Ghost Spin is one of the best novels I've read all year.
It picks up after Spin State and Spin Control, but is a far more ambitious novel. The themes in this novel include the nature of identity (Are you your memories? Are you still you, if you can be replicated multiple times but the different versions of you have different experiences?), the nature of love and consciousness, as well as how we would treat AIs if emergent AIs truly did exist.
The novel starts with Catherine Li's AI husband, Cohen, committing suicide deliberately. His remains are (in accordance with AI traditions) are immediately auctioned off. As his widow, Catherine sets off immediately to try to recover and reconstruct her husband, but the path to doing so is filled with obstacles and she ends up scatter-casting herself through human space as well.
What makes the novel work for a computer scientist is the references scattered throughout the novel that are accurate and interesting. Moriarty clearly does her homework: references to Ada Lovelace, Alan Turing, and Lewis Carroll are all well made and taken within context. Her extrapolation on how an emergent AI would work, and how an AI could die or evolve is fascinating and interesting. For instance, something that no other AI-oriented novels ever cover is the fact that if your memory is perfect, and you were unable to truly forget, wouldn't that drive you crazy? Her characters are also worthy of being cared about, even though some of them do do despicable things. One of the main characters in the book (Captain Llewellyn) ends up having to share his brain/body with an AI, and the exploration of the themes emerge most thoroughly with the conversations he has with himself.
Where the novel fails is in plotting. I really liked the book for the first 20 minutes after putting it down, but then realized that the plot didn't make a lot of sense in retrospect. For Cohen to commit suicide doesn't make sense to me, even at the end of the novel. The big reveals in the novel, however, are very fair --- you get plenty of foreshadowing and all the clues needed to put together the reveal yourself.
This novel is not an action-packed one, especially in comparison with Spin State. A lot of the book just composes of conversations characters have between themselves or even with themselves. And the novel does have the one obvious failure. But the writing, the milieu, and the thorough exploration of fascinating AI themes are more than enough to let me overlook the failure. If you're a computer scientist who enjoys fiction this could very much be the perfect novel for you. If not, then be prepared to get a massive info dump and not quite enough context to understand fully what's going on.
Highly recommended.
It picks up after Spin State and Spin Control, but is a far more ambitious novel. The themes in this novel include the nature of identity (Are you your memories? Are you still you, if you can be replicated multiple times but the different versions of you have different experiences?), the nature of love and consciousness, as well as how we would treat AIs if emergent AIs truly did exist.
The novel starts with Catherine Li's AI husband, Cohen, committing suicide deliberately. His remains are (in accordance with AI traditions) are immediately auctioned off. As his widow, Catherine sets off immediately to try to recover and reconstruct her husband, but the path to doing so is filled with obstacles and she ends up scatter-casting herself through human space as well.
What makes the novel work for a computer scientist is the references scattered throughout the novel that are accurate and interesting. Moriarty clearly does her homework: references to Ada Lovelace, Alan Turing, and Lewis Carroll are all well made and taken within context. Her extrapolation on how an emergent AI would work, and how an AI could die or evolve is fascinating and interesting. For instance, something that no other AI-oriented novels ever cover is the fact that if your memory is perfect, and you were unable to truly forget, wouldn't that drive you crazy? Her characters are also worthy of being cared about, even though some of them do do despicable things. One of the main characters in the book (Captain Llewellyn) ends up having to share his brain/body with an AI, and the exploration of the themes emerge most thoroughly with the conversations he has with himself.
Where the novel fails is in plotting. I really liked the book for the first 20 minutes after putting it down, but then realized that the plot didn't make a lot of sense in retrospect. For Cohen to commit suicide doesn't make sense to me, even at the end of the novel. The big reveals in the novel, however, are very fair --- you get plenty of foreshadowing and all the clues needed to put together the reveal yourself.
This novel is not an action-packed one, especially in comparison with Spin State. A lot of the book just composes of conversations characters have between themselves or even with themselves. And the novel does have the one obvious failure. But the writing, the milieu, and the thorough exploration of fascinating AI themes are more than enough to let me overlook the failure. If you're a computer scientist who enjoys fiction this could very much be the perfect novel for you. If not, then be prepared to get a massive info dump and not quite enough context to understand fully what's going on.
Highly recommended.
Thursday, July 04, 2013
Review: The Ocean at the End of the Lane
Garrett was kind enough to get me an autographed copy of The Ocean At The End Of The Lane, so I could skip the queue at the library and get to reading Gaiman's latest.
The novel starts out autobiographically, and one could be almost forgiven for thinking that Gaiman has decided to move away from his usual genre. (In his blog, Gaiman states that he started the novel slow so that younger readers wouldn't persist and read a book meant for adults) We get some insight about how someone who's going to be an author grows up, and there's a good description of the house Gaiman grew up in, as well as his room.
Then one day, a paying houseguest commits suicide at a neighbor's, leading the protagonist (who's unnamed through the entire novel) to meet the Hempstocks, who live on a farm at the end of the road. The Hempstocks, however, are not just farmers, and we are quickly introduced to Lettie, her mom Ginnie, and grandmother Old Mrs Hempstock. In a bit of a head fake here, I thought Gaiman was going to reuse the tropes of the three Fates, but instead, the Hempstocks are quite a bit different.
Our protagonist gets taken away on an adventure, but in the tradition of such stories, he fails to obey all the rules exactly, and brings home a hitch-hiker, which proceeds to wreck havoc with his life and his family. The correspondence with Coraline is clear here. The Hempstocks come to the rescue, but the results teaches our young narrator the meaning of sacrifice, as well as the nature of story and the purpose of life.
In many ways, I feel like Gaiman is reusing the same themes from his previous books. Each part of the story draws from so many traditions that the entire novel feels inevitable. The prologue and epilogue, however, nicely frames the story and gives us more than the usual fairy tale. I recommend this book, though not as highly as say, Stardust.
The novel starts out autobiographically, and one could be almost forgiven for thinking that Gaiman has decided to move away from his usual genre. (In his blog, Gaiman states that he started the novel slow so that younger readers wouldn't persist and read a book meant for adults) We get some insight about how someone who's going to be an author grows up, and there's a good description of the house Gaiman grew up in, as well as his room.
Then one day, a paying houseguest commits suicide at a neighbor's, leading the protagonist (who's unnamed through the entire novel) to meet the Hempstocks, who live on a farm at the end of the road. The Hempstocks, however, are not just farmers, and we are quickly introduced to Lettie, her mom Ginnie, and grandmother Old Mrs Hempstock. In a bit of a head fake here, I thought Gaiman was going to reuse the tropes of the three Fates, but instead, the Hempstocks are quite a bit different.
Our protagonist gets taken away on an adventure, but in the tradition of such stories, he fails to obey all the rules exactly, and brings home a hitch-hiker, which proceeds to wreck havoc with his life and his family. The correspondence with Coraline is clear here. The Hempstocks come to the rescue, but the results teaches our young narrator the meaning of sacrifice, as well as the nature of story and the purpose of life.
In many ways, I feel like Gaiman is reusing the same themes from his previous books. Each part of the story draws from so many traditions that the entire novel feels inevitable. The prologue and epilogue, however, nicely frames the story and gives us more than the usual fairy tale. I recommend this book, though not as highly as say, Stardust.
Wednesday, July 03, 2013
Review: Lance Armstrong's War
I picked up Lance Armstrong's War from the library on a whim, since it's Tour de France season, and I figured it would be amusing to see how things looked a few years ago.
Written by Daniel Coyle, who was a writer/editor for Outside magazine, this book tries very hard to introduce non-cyclists to the world of the pro peloton. What's interesting in the aftermath of history, of course, is how much this book reads like a fan-boy account of Armstrong. The author moved to Girona, works in his rivals, team-mates, mechanics, and others into the story, and then largely takes Armstrong's side against the accusations of doping. This is American journalism at its worse --- the author even gives up all pretense of independence by submitting drafts of the book to Armstrong and his publicity team
In retrospect, David Walsh's criticism of Armstrong's connections to doping has been largely vindicated by history. However, as an unintentionally funny read (as well as an indictment of American-style OMG/Engadget journalism), this is a book worth picking up at the library. (The book has also now been bargain-binned by Amazon, for good reason) It's not recommended if you're going to read the book unironically, though!
Written by Daniel Coyle, who was a writer/editor for Outside magazine, this book tries very hard to introduce non-cyclists to the world of the pro peloton. What's interesting in the aftermath of history, of course, is how much this book reads like a fan-boy account of Armstrong. The author moved to Girona, works in his rivals, team-mates, mechanics, and others into the story, and then largely takes Armstrong's side against the accusations of doping. This is American journalism at its worse --- the author even gives up all pretense of independence by submitting drafts of the book to Armstrong and his publicity team
In retrospect, David Walsh's criticism of Armstrong's connections to doping has been largely vindicated by history. However, as an unintentionally funny read (as well as an indictment of American-style OMG/Engadget journalism), this is a book worth picking up at the library. (The book has also now been bargain-binned by Amazon, for good reason) It's not recommended if you're going to read the book unironically, though!
Monday, July 01, 2013
Negotiation Consultancy Back In Operation
While I was working for Quark Games, I stopped accepting clients for my private services. (There would have been something wrong with working somewhere while negotiating on behalf of engineers) As of last week, however, I am no longer associated with Quark Games, so I am now reopening my service.
It's good to be back!
Friday, June 28, 2013
Review: Funky Gourmet, Athens
To begin with, the restaurant is in a house set in a neighborhood which not even taxi drivers can necessarily find. What you do is call the restaurant with your cell phone and have them talk to your taxi driver. Secondly, the house has no signage proclaiming the presence of a restaurant. What it does have is a little tag next to the door bell proclaiming the name of the restaurant.
Inside, the restaurant is beautifully decorated and the wait staff is attentive. This was my first Michelin-star-rated restaurant experience, though I've since been to higher-rated Michelin restaurants and have been unimpressed by them in comparison to Funky Gourmet. I've since decided that TripAdvisor ratings are a much better gauge of restaurant quality than Michelin ratings. Most Michelin-star rated restaurants are not very welcoming for families, but this one very tolerant of Bowen. They brought him his own plastic cups, and gave him as many straws as he threw on the floor. When the time came that he couldn't stay in his seat any more, they were happy to let him run around.
I have high standards for food, though I'm unimpressed by price and service. Funky Gourmet exceeded my expectations. The self-made pesto pasta was the best I've had anywhere, and the scallop impressed even my wife. The presentation of every dish was great, and the desserts (the 13 course menu had 3 of them) were nothing short of excellent. The early dishes had quite a bit of greek influence, while the later dishes (except for the desserts) were more conventional. The only miss was the mini-burger. All in all, a great restaurant/experience, and highly recommended if you're in Athens.
Review: Blood Rites
Blood Rites is book 6 of the Dresden files series. In this book, Dresden foils a plot involving murder of various women who are working at a porn studio. Unlike previous books, one of the mystery puzzles in the novel is actually fair: in other words, you have all the clues needed in order to actually solve the puzzle.
Tangled up with this main plot is one of the recurring villains from a prior book returning to make Dresden's life and revealing more details about the White Council as a result. This also includes Dresden's relationship with his mentor, as well as his long lost brother.
Butcher is a decent novelist, but unfortunately I have a hard time feeling for his characters, who act pretty much like puppets in the plot. All in all, it's a good book in the series, but it would lost most of its impact if you hadn't read the previous books, which I'm not sure I would consider. I'm going to take a break from the Dresden files for a while. Nevertheless, I'd recommend this book if you've read the other books in the series as it does add a lot to the mysteries previously detailed.
Tangled up with this main plot is one of the recurring villains from a prior book returning to make Dresden's life and revealing more details about the White Council as a result. This also includes Dresden's relationship with his mentor, as well as his long lost brother.
Butcher is a decent novelist, but unfortunately I have a hard time feeling for his characters, who act pretty much like puppets in the plot. All in all, it's a good book in the series, but it would lost most of its impact if you hadn't read the previous books, which I'm not sure I would consider. I'm going to take a break from the Dresden files for a while. Nevertheless, I'd recommend this book if you've read the other books in the series as it does add a lot to the mysteries previously detailed.
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Review: Death Masks
Death Masks is the fifth book in the Dresden files. It continues the series' trend away from the private investigator schtick towards the super-powered magical hero set in an urban environment. In this novel, everything that's happened in the previous four come together in a climax that's worthy of Joss Whedon's Buffy.
We have the war between the wizards and the vampires, we have his former reporter girlfriend (now a proto-vampire), we have a stolen magical artifact (the Shroud of Turin), and we have the Knights of the Cross, as well as Chicago's crime boss. To me, this is the first novel where Dresden doesn't seem like a barely competent wizard, but actually seems to be effective at doing stuff other than dropping his implements and tools, and is able to achieve effects other than dropping unconscious any time anything contacts his noggin.
The novel seems built for the movies: lots of set-piece action sequences, fancy sword play, demons, and no less than 3 showdowns and a Mexican standoff. While it's all a lot of fun, it also feels like Jim Butcher's deliberately holding out on us: there's lots of hints about how Dresden is special, and lots of big actors are afraid of him, but no actual exposition on his past or his parents.
A fun summer read. Mildly recommended.
We have the war between the wizards and the vampires, we have his former reporter girlfriend (now a proto-vampire), we have a stolen magical artifact (the Shroud of Turin), and we have the Knights of the Cross, as well as Chicago's crime boss. To me, this is the first novel where Dresden doesn't seem like a barely competent wizard, but actually seems to be effective at doing stuff other than dropping his implements and tools, and is able to achieve effects other than dropping unconscious any time anything contacts his noggin.
The novel seems built for the movies: lots of set-piece action sequences, fancy sword play, demons, and no less than 3 showdowns and a Mexican standoff. While it's all a lot of fun, it also feels like Jim Butcher's deliberately holding out on us: there's lots of hints about how Dresden is special, and lots of big actors are afraid of him, but no actual exposition on his past or his parents.
A fun summer read. Mildly recommended.
Sunday, June 23, 2013
Review: Summer Knight
Summer Knight is the fourth book in the Dresden files. This time, Jim Butcher focuses on the Faerie, while providing more background for Harry Dresden's past. We finally get to see the White Council in action, as well as some the werewolves from Fool Moon.
There are several problems with Butcher's milleu, however. For instance, given an apparently large number of Wizards, they seem ridiculously ineffectual. While you might dismiss most of them as being perhaps researchy/ivory-tower types, it does seem like Dresden is the only Wizard who's actually actively involved in the world, leading to what I call the "player-character-problem". In other words, it's a world where that does seem like it exists only give give Dresden meaning. While this is common in fantasy, by setting Dresden in Chicago, the milleu means that Chicago is at the center of the universe.
That might be ok if Butcher has Dresden doing his best to reset everything into status quo after each book, but given the huge world-changing events that tend to happen, it's a wonder that not everyone in this universe knows all there is to know about the monsters in the night.
Nevertheless, if you can put all this behind you, it's a fun summer read that doesn't require a lot of thinking. Mildly recommended.
There are several problems with Butcher's milleu, however. For instance, given an apparently large number of Wizards, they seem ridiculously ineffectual. While you might dismiss most of them as being perhaps researchy/ivory-tower types, it does seem like Dresden is the only Wizard who's actually actively involved in the world, leading to what I call the "player-character-problem". In other words, it's a world where that does seem like it exists only give give Dresden meaning. While this is common in fantasy, by setting Dresden in Chicago, the milleu means that Chicago is at the center of the universe.
That might be ok if Butcher has Dresden doing his best to reset everything into status quo after each book, but given the huge world-changing events that tend to happen, it's a wonder that not everyone in this universe knows all there is to know about the monsters in the night.
Nevertheless, if you can put all this behind you, it's a fun summer read that doesn't require a lot of thinking. Mildly recommended.
Review: Before Midnight
I saw Before Sunrise/Before Sunset as a set of movies years ago. Those were great films, so when XiaoQin mentioned that Before Midnight was in the theaters, I was happy to see it with her.
Before Midnight is set in Greece, 9 years after Before Sunset. Like the other films, the film is shot in almost real time. Like many couples in their 40s, they have three children, one divorce, and a family life under pressure, though given that Jesse is a successful writer, they do not seem to be under financial stress.
As with the prior two films, the dialogue is beautiful and real, and even the depiction of the people involved seem real. Whatever make-up is on Julie Delpy, for instance, isn't there to make her look like an ultra-beautiful mother, but serves the story and role she plays. Even the fights between the couples and the extremes they go through seems real. I like it quite a bit better than Before Sunset, where I felt that the plot leaned too hard against what the character might do.
Obviously, this isn't a movie that needs to be seen in the theaters, but it does deserve your viewing. Highly recommended.
Before Midnight is set in Greece, 9 years after Before Sunset. Like the other films, the film is shot in almost real time. Like many couples in their 40s, they have three children, one divorce, and a family life under pressure, though given that Jesse is a successful writer, they do not seem to be under financial stress.
As with the prior two films, the dialogue is beautiful and real, and even the depiction of the people involved seem real. Whatever make-up is on Julie Delpy, for instance, isn't there to make her look like an ultra-beautiful mother, but serves the story and role she plays. Even the fights between the couples and the extremes they go through seems real. I like it quite a bit better than Before Sunset, where I felt that the plot leaned too hard against what the character might do.
Obviously, this isn't a movie that needs to be seen in the theaters, but it does deserve your viewing. Highly recommended.
Friday, June 21, 2013
Review: Don't Turn Around
Don't Turn Around is Michelle Gagnon's YA thriller. It does seem custom-written for Hollywood as far as facing the latest trends. The teen heroine protagonist, Noa, wakes up on an operating room table and immediately manages to run from her captors despite having what looked like pretty major surgery. She soon teams up with rich boy Peter, who while hacking into a corporate site gets his house broken into and his laptop taken away. They then work to figure out why this corporate site is so important, why Noa was operated on, and the latest nefarious scheme to kidnap runaways.
The treatment of computers is very much like a Hollywood movie: being good at computers means you're good at breaking and entering corporate sites and running your e-mail through multiple proxies to hide where you're from. The evil people are cartoon villains who have enormous resources behind them. The ending has light bulbs exploding, etc.
The heroine, Noa, draws immediate comparison with Lisbeth Salander in Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Unfortunately, with an even more unbelievable plot, I cannot recommend this novel. Go elsewhere for your summer reading.
The treatment of computers is very much like a Hollywood movie: being good at computers means you're good at breaking and entering corporate sites and running your e-mail through multiple proxies to hide where you're from. The evil people are cartoon villains who have enormous resources behind them. The ending has light bulbs exploding, etc.
The heroine, Noa, draws immediate comparison with Lisbeth Salander in Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Unfortunately, with an even more unbelievable plot, I cannot recommend this novel. Go elsewhere for your summer reading.
Thursday, June 20, 2013
Review: Grave Perils
Grave Perils is the first Dresden book that feels like it's a good novel. It starts out with Dresden and his friend Michael trying to figure out what's causing the ghosts in Chicago to go crazy, and rather than trying to follow the private investigator genre that's not working for the a Wizard who's none too good a putting clues together, the Butcher goes the route of the thriller.
We get large set pieces involving ghosts, faerie, and of course, a vampire masquerade party. We get grudge matches, and Dresden at last seems to show that he's actually a somewhat competent Wizard, even though he does seem to spend a lot of the novels almost completely bereft of power.
The lows: the novels don't seem to provide a coherent view of magic and what it can or cannot do, and so what Dresden does doesn't always feel like something the reader could anticipate in the first place. Lois Bujold does a much better job in her Chalion novels.
Nevertheless, if you're interested in a fantasy thriller, this was a fun read. Recommended.
We get large set pieces involving ghosts, faerie, and of course, a vampire masquerade party. We get grudge matches, and Dresden at last seems to show that he's actually a somewhat competent Wizard, even though he does seem to spend a lot of the novels almost completely bereft of power.
The lows: the novels don't seem to provide a coherent view of magic and what it can or cannot do, and so what Dresden does doesn't always feel like something the reader could anticipate in the first place. Lois Bujold does a much better job in her Chalion novels.
Nevertheless, if you're interested in a fantasy thriller, this was a fun read. Recommended.
Monday, June 17, 2013
Quantifying the Apple Tax
The last time I was a Mac user was in 2009 when I upgraded to the Canon 5D Mk 2 and got rid of my Mac Mini as being too slow to run Lightroom. Before 2006, I was a PC user and never bothered paying the Apple tax. It wasn't until I joined Quark Games, which was a mostly Mac shop that I ran into the Apple tax again.
The Apple tax impacts small development shops. Large corporations like Adobe or Google aren't cash constrained. In fact, at Google, most developers wouldn't even be aware of the Apple tax because most of their computation is done in the cloud. At a small shop like Quark, however, we are cash constrained and most of our computation is done locally, at the developer's desk.
Most of Apple's desktops are incredibly under-powered. For instance, the iMacs don't even let you replace a hard drive, which means that you have to pay Apple's incredible markup for SSDs, and in the case of the smaller iMacs, you can't even upgrade the memory yourself. For a developer workstation that potentially needs more than one SSDs, this is unacceptable. Yes, you can upgrade to a 3.4 GHz Core i7, but that's even more expensive than a Mac Pro and you end up with a machine you cannot upgrade.
Then there's the Mac Pro. It's mid-2013, and they cost $2500. What's worse, is that they use a 2009 Xeon CPU which under-performs my 2008 home desktop! And that machine cost me $1200 back in 2008! You can compare it with a current Dell with the latest Haswell i7-4770 processor. That machine would cost $750, with twice the processing power of the Mac Pro! Sure, the Mac Pro has a nicer case which makes it easier to upgrade. And it has ECC RAM (for all the good that'll do you --- I can't remember a single instance where I wanted ECC RAM for any of my development needs). The fact is, Apple has no mid-range towers, but if you need to deliver iOS applications to your customers you have no choice: you have to buy an Apple product. Yes, I'm aware Apple has a new Mac Pro at the end of the year. However, the new machine has no room for hard drive expansion at all, so I might as well buy an iMac!
At Quark, our solution has been to buy the 13 inch non-Retina Macbook Pros. With a couple of screwdrivers you can take those apart and upgrade the memory and hard drive. Unfortunately, when you need to process a lot of art and music assets, the CPUs on those machines bog down. Even then, using Macbook Pros save you because when we bought our Mac Pros, we could take the hard drives out of the laptops and stuff them into the desktops and get immediate productivity gains, without the pain of reinstalling all our software and losing a day in the process.
What's amusing to me is that the art team tells me that the rest of the industry has gone to Windows PCs for 3D-modeling and other art needs precisely to escape the Apple tax (and these despite Apple's reputation as the go-to computer for artists!). So it's only engineering that's stuck paying the Apple tax. Certainly, if Android were too crush iOS devices, small development shops will be the first to switch sides completely just to avoid paying the Apple tax, which stands at $1700/developer. I know I'll be switching our art team over at the next available opportunity. In the mid-1990s, I dreamed of the days when we'd escape the Microsoft hegemony. But now that we've largely escaped it's clear the Apple overlords are much worse than the Microsoft ones ever were.
The Apple tax impacts small development shops. Large corporations like Adobe or Google aren't cash constrained. In fact, at Google, most developers wouldn't even be aware of the Apple tax because most of their computation is done in the cloud. At a small shop like Quark, however, we are cash constrained and most of our computation is done locally, at the developer's desk.
Most of Apple's desktops are incredibly under-powered. For instance, the iMacs don't even let you replace a hard drive, which means that you have to pay Apple's incredible markup for SSDs, and in the case of the smaller iMacs, you can't even upgrade the memory yourself. For a developer workstation that potentially needs more than one SSDs, this is unacceptable. Yes, you can upgrade to a 3.4 GHz Core i7, but that's even more expensive than a Mac Pro and you end up with a machine you cannot upgrade.
Then there's the Mac Pro. It's mid-2013, and they cost $2500. What's worse, is that they use a 2009 Xeon CPU which under-performs my 2008 home desktop! And that machine cost me $1200 back in 2008! You can compare it with a current Dell with the latest Haswell i7-4770 processor. That machine would cost $750, with twice the processing power of the Mac Pro! Sure, the Mac Pro has a nicer case which makes it easier to upgrade. And it has ECC RAM (for all the good that'll do you --- I can't remember a single instance where I wanted ECC RAM for any of my development needs). The fact is, Apple has no mid-range towers, but if you need to deliver iOS applications to your customers you have no choice: you have to buy an Apple product. Yes, I'm aware Apple has a new Mac Pro at the end of the year. However, the new machine has no room for hard drive expansion at all, so I might as well buy an iMac!
At Quark, our solution has been to buy the 13 inch non-Retina Macbook Pros. With a couple of screwdrivers you can take those apart and upgrade the memory and hard drive. Unfortunately, when you need to process a lot of art and music assets, the CPUs on those machines bog down. Even then, using Macbook Pros save you because when we bought our Mac Pros, we could take the hard drives out of the laptops and stuff them into the desktops and get immediate productivity gains, without the pain of reinstalling all our software and losing a day in the process.
What's amusing to me is that the art team tells me that the rest of the industry has gone to Windows PCs for 3D-modeling and other art needs precisely to escape the Apple tax (and these despite Apple's reputation as the go-to computer for artists!). So it's only engineering that's stuck paying the Apple tax. Certainly, if Android were too crush iOS devices, small development shops will be the first to switch sides completely just to avoid paying the Apple tax, which stands at $1700/developer. I know I'll be switching our art team over at the next available opportunity. In the mid-1990s, I dreamed of the days when we'd escape the Microsoft hegemony. But now that we've largely escaped it's clear the Apple overlords are much worse than the Microsoft ones ever were.
Friday, June 14, 2013
Review: Fool Moon
Fool Moon is the second book in Jim Butcher's Dresden files series. It's clear how Butcher's approaching the series. Each book is going to be the paranormal monster of the moment, and we get to see Dresden repeatedly beat up and tortured until he limps across the finish line.
The theme in this novel is the werewolf. Again, Dresden solves problems mostly by getting beaten up, spat out, and getting screwed over. He also demonstrates that he's not much of a wizard by running out of power repeatedly, dropping his tools at crucial moments and in general failing to do wizardly things.
I've been told that the novels get better. The voice is good enough that I'll give a 3rd novel a try in the hopes that it does get better. In any case, skip this one.
The theme in this novel is the werewolf. Again, Dresden solves problems mostly by getting beaten up, spat out, and getting screwed over. He also demonstrates that he's not much of a wizard by running out of power repeatedly, dropping his tools at crucial moments and in general failing to do wizardly things.
I've been told that the novels get better. The voice is good enough that I'll give a 3rd novel a try in the hopes that it does get better. In any case, skip this one.
Review: Storm Front
Storm Front is the first book in the series known as the Dresden Files. The series has been around for a few years, and there's even a TV series (that failed after one seson) based on the books, though the series is very much different from the books.
The premise of the series is that it's about Harry David Copperfield Dresden, who's a hard-boiled, wise-crackingdetective wizard. Unlike other fantasy stories where the world of magic is hidden and wizards hide themselves from the prying eyes of the public, Jim Butcher's Dresden lives in the public eye, listing his business on the phone books and has contacts with the local police department, just like any self-respecting private investigator would.
The story begins with Dresden brought in by the police department to help investigate a double murder. The plot then weaves between explanation of how magic works in this world, the investigation, complications (including the local mob), and a secondary plot involving a missing husband. As you would expect from this type of novel, Dresden gets beaten up, threatened, conked on the head multiple times, encounters femme fatales and resists them, and then eventually "solves" the plot, but not through cleverness but by simply being beaten up enough times.
One reviewer said that the Dresden novels are like Philip Marlowe but for the fantasy set. Jim Butcher is no Raymond Chandler, however, and his novels say much less about the human condition than Chandler's. Furthermore, there isn't as much pessimism, despite the fact that Dresden gets beaten up a lot. For instance, none of Dresden's females betrays him, while Chandler's females frequently get him into trouble or turn out to be the antagonist.
All in all, the book wasn't a waste of time, but pales compared to say, Altered Carbon or any of Chandler's novels. Nevertheless, suitable beach reading or vacation reading. Mildly recommended.
The premise of the series is that it's about Harry David Copperfield Dresden, who's a hard-boiled, wise-cracking
The story begins with Dresden brought in by the police department to help investigate a double murder. The plot then weaves between explanation of how magic works in this world, the investigation, complications (including the local mob), and a secondary plot involving a missing husband. As you would expect from this type of novel, Dresden gets beaten up, threatened, conked on the head multiple times, encounters femme fatales and resists them, and then eventually "solves" the plot, but not through cleverness but by simply being beaten up enough times.
One reviewer said that the Dresden novels are like Philip Marlowe but for the fantasy set. Jim Butcher is no Raymond Chandler, however, and his novels say much less about the human condition than Chandler's. Furthermore, there isn't as much pessimism, despite the fact that Dresden gets beaten up a lot. For instance, none of Dresden's females betrays him, while Chandler's females frequently get him into trouble or turn out to be the antagonist.
All in all, the book wasn't a waste of time, but pales compared to say, Altered Carbon or any of Chandler's novels. Nevertheless, suitable beach reading or vacation reading. Mildly recommended.
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Review: Kinivo Bluetooth Headset
My Ericsson MW600 died from the inevitable: it was so small that when it was left in my pocket for a laundry run it was put through the washing machine and didn't survive. Sony promised to honor the warranty, but for whatever reason my MW600 didn't make it to them so I never got a replacement. So it's back to the drawing board and looking for a bigger bluetooth headset that I won't accidentally leave in my pockets.
The Kinivo BTH220 looked a lot like my old beloved SBH-500, so I ordered it. While it looked like the SBH-500, it's actually quite a bit more compact, with swivels built into the earpieces so the whole device collapses down to a small package. The battery life is pretty good --- I have yet to have to charge it more often than once a week (or even every two weeks), and it gets used often enough that I never think about it.
The biggest problem is that it can' pair with more than one device at a time, but in practice, that's not as big a deal as you might imagine, since I pretty much pair it with my phone and leave it that way. Sound quality is decent, but the big problem is with voice. The microphone pickup isn't as well designed as the SBH-500, so if there's any noise at all the other side has a hard time hearing you. I've used the headset a lot for hour long interviews in quiet rooms, and it works great. But outside of those situations don't expect it to perform.
I managed to snag a deal on one of the deal-a-day sites for $20. But even at the full Amazon price of $30, this won't break the bank and so far has lasted long enough that I'd buy another if this one died tomorrow.
Recommended.
The Kinivo BTH220 looked a lot like my old beloved SBH-500, so I ordered it. While it looked like the SBH-500, it's actually quite a bit more compact, with swivels built into the earpieces so the whole device collapses down to a small package. The battery life is pretty good --- I have yet to have to charge it more often than once a week (or even every two weeks), and it gets used often enough that I never think about it.
The biggest problem is that it can' pair with more than one device at a time, but in practice, that's not as big a deal as you might imagine, since I pretty much pair it with my phone and leave it that way. Sound quality is decent, but the big problem is with voice. The microphone pickup isn't as well designed as the SBH-500, so if there's any noise at all the other side has a hard time hearing you. I've used the headset a lot for hour long interviews in quiet rooms, and it works great. But outside of those situations don't expect it to perform.
I managed to snag a deal on one of the deal-a-day sites for $20. But even at the full Amazon price of $30, this won't break the bank and so far has lasted long enough that I'd buy another if this one died tomorrow.
Recommended.
Saturday, June 08, 2013
Review: Every Day
Every Day is a young adult romance. If there's ever a transparent voice, David Levithan has achieved it in this novel. The book reads effortlessly, transparently, and the pace is such that you'll turn the page hurriedly, breathlessly, in search of what happens next.
The premise of the book is straightforward: the protagonist, A, wakes up every day in a different body. He can access the body's memories, but has no connection to the emotions. He's always woken up in a body that's appropriate for him chronologically (at the start of the novel he is 16). He's learned to deal with this daily switch and has (surprisingly) evolved rules to live by. This changes when he wakes up in Justin's body and meets Justin's girlfriend, Rhiannon. He doesn't believe that Justin treats Rhiannon very well, and so for his one day in Justin's body he treats Rhiannon nicely. Unfortunately, the result is that A falls in love with Rhiannon, and this knocks his previous equilibrium off-kilter.
One of the best things about this novel is that Levithan explores lots of different situations that A wakes up in. A is alternatively male, female, straight, gay, Black, White, Asian, nerdy, athletic, drug-addicted, suicidal, etc. Levithan spans the gamut of the teen experience. While some of A's statements seem heavy-handedly politically correct, I've met my fair share of teens who sound like that so it's not jarring.
If the book does hit a false not, it's in the ending. For me, the ending is either a blatantly obvious setup for a sequel, or the author screwed up and makes A's character deliberately weaker by introducing a subplot that is left unresolved and yet drives his decision to resolve the situation. While the book does clearly standalone, without a sequel I feel that Levithan diluted the strength of the ending for no good reason.
Nevertheless, this is one of the better novels I've read in a while and a relentlessly compelling read. Recommended.
The premise of the book is straightforward: the protagonist, A, wakes up every day in a different body. He can access the body's memories, but has no connection to the emotions. He's always woken up in a body that's appropriate for him chronologically (at the start of the novel he is 16). He's learned to deal with this daily switch and has (surprisingly) evolved rules to live by. This changes when he wakes up in Justin's body and meets Justin's girlfriend, Rhiannon. He doesn't believe that Justin treats Rhiannon very well, and so for his one day in Justin's body he treats Rhiannon nicely. Unfortunately, the result is that A falls in love with Rhiannon, and this knocks his previous equilibrium off-kilter.
One of the best things about this novel is that Levithan explores lots of different situations that A wakes up in. A is alternatively male, female, straight, gay, Black, White, Asian, nerdy, athletic, drug-addicted, suicidal, etc. Levithan spans the gamut of the teen experience. While some of A's statements seem heavy-handedly politically correct, I've met my fair share of teens who sound like that so it's not jarring.
If the book does hit a false not, it's in the ending. For me, the ending is either a blatantly obvious setup for a sequel, or the author screwed up and makes A's character deliberately weaker by introducing a subplot that is left unresolved and yet drives his decision to resolve the situation. While the book does clearly standalone, without a sequel I feel that Levithan diluted the strength of the ending for no good reason.
Nevertheless, this is one of the better novels I've read in a while and a relentlessly compelling read. Recommended.
Friday, June 07, 2013
Review: The Corpse Reader
The Corpse Reader is a strange novel as far as origin, subject matter, and story is concerned. Originally written in Spanish and translated/distributed/published by Amazon, the story is set in ancient China and his historical fiction about Song Ci, regarded by many as the father of forensic medicine.
In many ways, Song Ci is almost a perfect person for such a treatment. While he has written a massive treatise which serves as much of his legacy, little is actually known about the person. The author, Antonio Garrido, writes an afterwards where he reveals what his own research has said about Song Ci, and the life that he appears to have led does not seem to be particularly drama-filled. Nevertheless, Song Ci appeared to be much more politically inept as a person, in contrast to his pioneering competence in forensic science. In that regards, Garrido's portrayal of Song Ci in the novel is fairly accurate.
The story revolves around Song Ci, who like many heroes is deprived of his family early in the story and begins a journey to maturity. He makes many many stupid decisions very early on, but does show some great qualities as well. Some of the stupid decisions are ridiculously stupid (Ci basically gets taken in by every woman he's ever met who wants to fool him), but the rest of the plot isn't terribly bad. Well, the motivation of one of the major villains makes no sense to me, but the plot moves fast enough that even that realization doesn't come until after you've zipped through the book.
What's the most disappointing to me about the book is that there's no sense of progression for our protagonist. There isn't a series of challenging investigations where Ci is stretched to learn new things about Forensics. In some ways, the book focuses on his journey rather than his investigative challenges, so at the end you're left with very little impression of how he came to understand forensics.
All in all, this is a decent summer read. Very mildly recommended.
In many ways, Song Ci is almost a perfect person for such a treatment. While he has written a massive treatise which serves as much of his legacy, little is actually known about the person. The author, Antonio Garrido, writes an afterwards where he reveals what his own research has said about Song Ci, and the life that he appears to have led does not seem to be particularly drama-filled. Nevertheless, Song Ci appeared to be much more politically inept as a person, in contrast to his pioneering competence in forensic science. In that regards, Garrido's portrayal of Song Ci in the novel is fairly accurate.
The story revolves around Song Ci, who like many heroes is deprived of his family early in the story and begins a journey to maturity. He makes many many stupid decisions very early on, but does show some great qualities as well. Some of the stupid decisions are ridiculously stupid (Ci basically gets taken in by every woman he's ever met who wants to fool him), but the rest of the plot isn't terribly bad. Well, the motivation of one of the major villains makes no sense to me, but the plot moves fast enough that even that realization doesn't come until after you've zipped through the book.
What's the most disappointing to me about the book is that there's no sense of progression for our protagonist. There isn't a series of challenging investigations where Ci is stretched to learn new things about Forensics. In some ways, the book focuses on his journey rather than his investigative challenges, so at the end you're left with very little impression of how he came to understand forensics.
All in all, this is a decent summer read. Very mildly recommended.
Wednesday, June 05, 2013
Review Kindle Basic
My Kindle Keyboard 3G died on the flight back from Zurich to San Francisco, and Amazon offered me a replacement refurbished Basic Kindle for $50. The alternatives were the Kindle Touch and the Touch 3G, but the discount on those were not as good, and I felt that I might as well buy a Paperwhite rather than take those deals.
What impressed me upon unboxing the Basic Kindle is how light it is. I measured it at 190g even though Amazon claims 170g. Regardless, it's light, and small enough to almost fit in a pocket. It truly is a carry everywhere device. I expected to miss the keyboard but the reality is that I haven't really. The hardware buttons for turning the page work, and the nice thing about not having a touch screen is that your screen never gets smudged with fingerprints, etc. I tested it side by side against a Kindle Keyboard and the page turns are definitely faster on the Basic Kindle than the Kindle Keyboard 3G (3rd generation).
The price of the lighted cover accessory is ridiculous: new, it is almost the same price as the Basic Kindle as well. Fortunately, Amazon's warehouse occasionally sell refurbished covers for $13.50, which is a good price. The cover + Kindle weighs 310g, which is very good. The Kindle Keyboard with an SFBags Slipcase, for instance, weighs 340g, and that doesn't come with a light!
All in all, I've enjoyed reading on the Kindle Basic and can recommend it. As previously mentioned, I might not bring it on the next bike tour as the Nexus 7 is too useful for photo processing and can also be used as a reader, but for home use this is just as perfect as they come. Recommended.
Using the Nexus 7 as an on-the-go photo editing device
On the Greece Trip, I decided to be radical and leave the laptop at home. Part of it was just that traveling with a child mean you had too much to carry anyway. Part of it was just to see if it could be done. I'm very pleased to say that the Nexus 7 came through with flying colors as far as casual photo-editing and posting is concerned.
To begin with, you need a 32-GB Nexus 7, which would have the required storage to off-load photos (in the form of 20MB raw files) from the Sony RX-100. If you're traveling in Europe where data SIMs are cheap, you might want to consider the HSPA version of the Nexus 7.
In addition, you'll need the following pieces of hardware and software:
Overall, I've been very impressed with the results. Imports are relatively fast, even for hundreds of RAW 20MB shots. PhotoMate does a great job with RAW, and has a built in JPG converter that lets you post to your favorite social network (Facebook, etc) using the built-in Gallery App after the JPG conversion. (For whatever reason, PhotoMate's direct sharing feature is broken and doesn't work)
Adjusting the exposure, cropping, tweaking the white balance are all easy and usable on the Nexus 7 with its quad-core processor. My biggest complaint is that displaying the results of your adjustments is slow, but these are on RX-100 raw files. With a lesser camera you shouldn't have any problems. The only major feature that's available in Lightroom but not PhotoMate is ND grad filters. I basically relegated features that needed such work to the desktop with Lightroom for when I got home after the trip.
The availability of these apps and these features have turned the Nexus 7 from an unnecessary luxury on trips to an absolute necessity. Not only is the Nexus 7 now a suitable posting tool for my non-wifi enabled cameras, the Nexus 7 is also a reasonable backup for the photos in case the camera got stolen or something bad happens to SD Card! Add in the ability to run a data SIM and the Nexus 7 would be even more useful.
I never thought I'd say this, but for my next Europe trip I can see myself ditching the Kindle and just bringing a HSPA+ enabled Nexus 7 along with the above kit. Needless to say, that means I'll look forward to the next iteration of the Nexus 7.
Highly recommended.
To begin with, you need a 32-GB Nexus 7, which would have the required storage to off-load photos (in the form of 20MB raw files) from the Sony RX-100. If you're traveling in Europe where data SIMs are cheap, you might want to consider the HSPA version of the Nexus 7.
In addition, you'll need the following pieces of hardware and software:
- OTG Cable
- Memory Card Reader (this one does CF cards so you can use it for your DSLR as well!)
- Nexus Media Importer
- PhotoMate Pro
- PhotoMate Pro Raw extension
Overall, I've been very impressed with the results. Imports are relatively fast, even for hundreds of RAW 20MB shots. PhotoMate does a great job with RAW, and has a built in JPG converter that lets you post to your favorite social network (Facebook, etc) using the built-in Gallery App after the JPG conversion. (For whatever reason, PhotoMate's direct sharing feature is broken and doesn't work)
Adjusting the exposure, cropping, tweaking the white balance are all easy and usable on the Nexus 7 with its quad-core processor. My biggest complaint is that displaying the results of your adjustments is slow, but these are on RX-100 raw files. With a lesser camera you shouldn't have any problems. The only major feature that's available in Lightroom but not PhotoMate is ND grad filters. I basically relegated features that needed such work to the desktop with Lightroom for when I got home after the trip.
The availability of these apps and these features have turned the Nexus 7 from an unnecessary luxury on trips to an absolute necessity. Not only is the Nexus 7 now a suitable posting tool for my non-wifi enabled cameras, the Nexus 7 is also a reasonable backup for the photos in case the camera got stolen or something bad happens to SD Card! Add in the ability to run a data SIM and the Nexus 7 would be even more useful.
I never thought I'd say this, but for my next Europe trip I can see myself ditching the Kindle and just bringing a HSPA+ enabled Nexus 7 along with the above kit. Needless to say, that means I'll look forward to the next iteration of the Nexus 7.
Highly recommended.
Review: Happy Money
I wanted to like Happy Money. As Meng once said to me, "Those who say that money can't buy happiness don't know where to shop." And indeed, the premise of the book is sound: there are many things that most people do with their money that buys a lot of frustration instead of happiness, and they're well documented in literature:
Recommended.
- Buying a bigger house doesn't buy you happiness, but buying a shorter commute (one you can walk to or bike to) does.
- Buying experiences like great vacations is far better than buying the latest Apple/Android/Lenovo product. You get used to your faster computer quickly, but you'll always remember the great experiences you had on your vacation.
- Whenever possible trade money for time, so that you can have more time for yourself. This is hard because if you're paid more, you value your free time even more, so it's difficult to buy enough free time. House-cleaning services and yard work services are examples of such valuable money/time trade-offs.
- Spending money on other people is better than spending money on yourself.
- The book claims that interacting with children is the highlight of many people's days. This contradicts many other studies I've read where interacting with their children usually leaves parents unhappy. In fact, most studies I've read indicate that having children is a surefire way to destroy your happiness.
- The book claims that paying for something first and then enjoying it later gives you the feeling that what you're enjoying is "free", which is nice. I personally find myself skeptical of this experience.
- Apparently, even bad vacations are better expenditures than buying a bigger house. But there are no studies on how small a house you can have before having a bigger house makes you happier just because you're not hitting something every time you turn around.
Recommended.
Review: Sony RX-100
My Canon S100 was out for a (free) repair due to the dreaded lens error, and I wasn't sure it would make it back from Canon in time for the Greece trip, so I went out and bought a Sony RX-100. Others have raved about the image quality on this camera, and indeed the photos are outstanding. It was the only camera I relied on in Greece, and it delivered!
The photos are outstanding, and even my wife noticed the difference. There's no question that the RX-100 beats the pants off any other compact camera that's even remotely pocketable. It's bigger than the S100, and doesn't have GPS, but it's a great enough camera that I can recommend it for everyone, even non-photography enthusiasts.
There are, however, a few glitches, which would cause me to tell you to wait until the next version, which is surely due out soon:
Highly recommended.
The photos are outstanding, and even my wife noticed the difference. There's no question that the RX-100 beats the pants off any other compact camera that's even remotely pocketable. It's bigger than the S100, and doesn't have GPS, but it's a great enough camera that I can recommend it for everyone, even non-photography enthusiasts.
There are, however, a few glitches, which would cause me to tell you to wait until the next version, which is surely due out soon:
- Startup and shut down time is slow. It's on the order of 1.5s, and I don't know what it's doing because there's a significant pause between pushing the power button and the lens moving. It gets to the point where when you first use the camera, you push the power button, wait and see nothing is happening, then push it again, which of course results in the camera immediately powering up and shutting down. Once the camera is up, however, all annoyances are gone. The shot-to-shot time is outstanding (on the order of 300ms), and you can fire off a burst mode very quickly. This is a delightful camera to use.
- You must shoot in RAW. Exposure compensation is a pain to use in this camera. Just do it in Lightroom or Photomate afterwards and you won't be unhappy. And there's no point shooting JPG if you're going to blow $650 on a camera.
- There's no cheap underwater housing. The Ikelite housing for the camera is $400, and is incredibly big and bulky. Just for that alone, I'm still going to retain the Canon S100 for underwater photography. Fortunately, there was nothing worth shooting underwater in Greece that I saw.
- There's no GPS. No Wifi. The lack of wifi doesn't bother me, but the lack of GPS does.
- The panoramic mode is impressive, firing off lots of shots in rapid succession. But having had a chance to see the results afterwards, I'm concluding that the best way to shoot a panorama in this camera is the traditional way: shoot in RAW in burst mode (hold down the shutter), and then stitch it all in ICE afterwards.
Highly recommended.
Tuesday, June 04, 2013
Greece Conclusions
As far as I could tell, the sailing in Greece is not very good. You either get no wind, or too much wind. If the snorkeling/diving/hiking or other outdoor activities made up for it, I'd be inclined to recommend it. Unfortunately, the snorkeling was mediocre, and the swimming frequently took you to polluted waters. The sailing might be decent if you got luckier than we did, but the unpleasant experience of pulling up at a berth only to have your power/water snatched away left me with a nasty feeling. Compared to the BVIs where people were much more relaxed and you weren't fighting with people over scarce resources, it made Greece feel much less like a vacation and more like a stressful battle every day.
The big difference between the BVIs and Greece is that Greece docks in towns are very pretty. With a small boat, it is conceivable you could dock every night in town and experience the Tavernas, if that was your thing. But if you just wanted to see the pretty towns (and there are admittedly a lot of them), you don't need to charter a sailboat. Just use the ferry to go island hopping instead.
All in all, sailing in Greece (and the Mediterranean) has been a big disappointment. I would not do so again, and wouldn't recommend it to anyone when there are better destinations. It is indeed dawning upon me that the Caribbean is to sailing what the Alps are to cycling.
Athens
We were so tired upon returning to Athens that we spent the rest of the day sleeping and dealing with the unpleasant base manager as well as all the sundries required in returning the boat. So it wasn't until the next morning when we moved back to Hotel Tony's that we could explore the city in earnest. We first visited the Acropolis museum, which was interesting. The heat was turned up pretty high so we were pretty glad to return to the hotel at 3pm to rest and then leave for the Funky Gourmet.
For our last day, we visited the Acropolis proper, as well as the Agora. The lines were long, the place was exceedingly crowded, and it was too warm for me. In the evening, we explored Filopauppou Hill near Hotel Tony, and were rewarded with a beautiful glimpse of the sun setting over the area near Athens.
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Sailing in the Argolic and Northen Cyclades
We flew back to Athens and then Taxi's to Alimos Marina, where the checkin process had to be delayed until the boat was cleaned. That gave us plenty of time to sign the liability waivers and get lunch. The checkin process was relatively straight-forward, and light. Our first sign that there was something less than dreamy about Dream Yacht Charters was that the marina did not actually have enough power to run our AC unit and our house lights with the water heater on, and the marina didn't have hot showers! Our boat had a glitch that I did not expect, which was that the V-berth was not connected to the main cabin, which meant that my original plan of having my son sleep in the V-berth wasn't going to work. So I ended up in the V-berth, as did Arturo.
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Sunday, June 02, 2013
Thira/Santorini
We flew on Swiss International Airlines to Zurich, where we stayed for a night and then flew to Athens the next day. While it would have been possible to fly on the same day to Athens, we would have arrived near midnight, and when travelling with a child I decided it was better to spend a night along the way because of baby jet-lag. The hope was that we'd be able to find some afternoon sun.
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The flight to Athens was delayed because of a technical problem with the airplane, and as a result we ended up at Hotel Tony at 4pm. The room had been recently renovated and I was quite impressed with it. We went out to dinner at a recommended place and had great views of the Acropolis in the backdrop. After dinner, we visited the Acropolis, but it was closed to visitors after 5pm.
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Friday, May 31, 2013
Greece 2013
We went to Greece this year for a sailing trip, bookended by days in Athens and Thira (on Santorini). I'll break up the visit thus into those 3 sections. This is the index page. I'll post links to other people's pictures as they get them up.
Photos:
Trip Report:
Thursday, May 30, 2013
Review: The Best American Essays 2011
I picked up The Best American Essays 2011 during an Amazon sale for about $1.99. At that price, it was a good buy for the 3-4 good articles in it. The articles span a lot of topics, and too many of them are simple mood pieces or have too much literary flourish for me to have patience. There are a few deeply analytical ones, but even the piece on say, the slow decline of Detroit read too much like a fancy pansy literary piece rather than hard hitting journalism. At the default Kindle price of $8.99, this is a rip off.
Not recommended. I had to force myself to read about half the book.
Not recommended. I had to force myself to read about half the book.
Review: The Fine Print
The Fine Print is David Cay Johnston's book about how corporations rip off the American people. The book starts with a great science fiction story: imagine a world where after a strange event happens, some people are discovered to be immortal. They can still be killed and die through accidents, but they will not age and will not die of old age. Further, the strange event has changed them so that they are now solely motivated by money. The answer of course, is that this science fiction story is not science fiction at all, but the "people" involved are called corporations.
In chapter after chapter, Johnston takes on one aspect after another of corporate malfeasance. Whether it's AT&T/Verizon/Comcast ripping you off on your phone bill and charging you insane amounts of money for service that would cost one third what citizens of other developing countries pay, or PG&E neglecting maintenance of gas pipelines leading to massive explosions and people dead, there's even grist here to get your blood boiling and hopefully you mad enough.
Johnston knows all of these topics well, and leverages his facility with numbers and his strong sense of journalism to bring the stories to life. Some chapters are short (like the ones on Hollywood tax breaks), and some are long, but they all go a long way to debunk the myth that there is such a thing as a virtuous, successful capitalist in modern American society. Neither Google nor Warren Buffett come off as the heroes they are portrayed as in popular press.
Despite all that Johnston shrinks back from the obvious conclusion: the modern limited liability corporation is a terrible legal construct and a lousy way to run society --- there are no circumstances under which a society with such entities wouldn't end up corrupt and undemocratic. Yes, there are other developed countries that do a good job of keeping such entities under control (Western Europe, for instance), but they're also societies that come under frequent pressure to follow the Washington consensus.
This is a book that won't get read by enough people to make a difference, but you know what, you should read it anyway. Highly recommended.
In chapter after chapter, Johnston takes on one aspect after another of corporate malfeasance. Whether it's AT&T/Verizon/Comcast ripping you off on your phone bill and charging you insane amounts of money for service that would cost one third what citizens of other developing countries pay, or PG&E neglecting maintenance of gas pipelines leading to massive explosions and people dead, there's even grist here to get your blood boiling and hopefully you mad enough.
Johnston knows all of these topics well, and leverages his facility with numbers and his strong sense of journalism to bring the stories to life. Some chapters are short (like the ones on Hollywood tax breaks), and some are long, but they all go a long way to debunk the myth that there is such a thing as a virtuous, successful capitalist in modern American society. Neither Google nor Warren Buffett come off as the heroes they are portrayed as in popular press.
Despite all that Johnston shrinks back from the obvious conclusion: the modern limited liability corporation is a terrible legal construct and a lousy way to run society --- there are no circumstances under which a society with such entities wouldn't end up corrupt and undemocratic. Yes, there are other developed countries that do a good job of keeping such entities under control (Western Europe, for instance), but they're also societies that come under frequent pressure to follow the Washington consensus.
This is a book that won't get read by enough people to make a difference, but you know what, you should read it anyway. Highly recommended.
Friday, May 03, 2013
Review: Redshirts
I'm a big fan of John Scalzi's sense of humor, especially in Old Man's War. However, when I heard about Redshirts, I was less than 100% excited. While it is ridiculous that Red-shirts dropped dead all the time on away team missions, I didn't think that the joke itself could sustain an entire novel. As a result, I waited until I could check it out from the library before reading.
Unfortunately, I was right. The central premise is funny. You've got a crew that's scared to go on away missions, and you've got characters that get shot and wounded only to recover all the time on missions. You've got technical gobbledy gook with ridiculous technical solutions, how despite how advanced the ship is, nobody sends e-mail and messages are always delivered in person. It's pretty funny, but it lasted about half the book and then the rest of the novel becomes a farce, barely worth reading.
I eventually limped along to the end, but only out of a sense of masochism. I wouldn't recommend anybody put themselves through the entire novel. Read until the sense of fun is over and then abort the mission.
Not recommended.
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