marramgrass

Just a few, tonight.

• Funky visualisations of the lives of code projects. The twitter one is amazing.
• The third-tallest Jesus in the world. All together, now: whut? (There’s some great photography on that site, but watch where you click as some of it isn’t work-safe.
• The physics of R2-D2’s flight.
• ffffl*ckr is a delightful way to explore Flickr and turn up new things to look at.
• Finally, the best of this bunch: the Big Picture set from Vancouver 2010. Wow, wow and wow.

‘Night, all.

Jings, it’s a while since I’ve done one of these. I still haven’t posted a photo this week, either.

• The Ultimate Productivity Blog. Aye.
• Apps.ie, showcasing Irish (of whatever variety) mobile software. There’s some excellent work in there.
• After I posted about a U2 track a while back, the Smashing Pumpkins cover it well.
• Sweet Child O’ Mine on the fiddle. Really.
• A thoughtful post on teachers using social networks.
• I’ve discovered a new comic — Dresden Codak. Check out Caveman Science Fiction, then read the beautifully whimsical The Sleepwalkers.
• We recently met photographer Emma Boyd. She’s good.
• I was invited to write a guest post for TotalApps. Check out my Five Apps Friday.
• Mike Johnston gives us an interesting essay on the ethics of reviewing.
• A postie’s perspective on the disputes and industrial action at Royal Mail.
• Every time I stumble across a post at Dooce, I think I should subscribe. This time I did.
• Mig does it again.
• Matt Gemmell on real-world usability.

That’s all for now.

The pile of interesting things I find online continues to grow.

• Some advice on how to fry an egg. That’s advice I need, desperately.
• A video explaining how a diff (the automotive kind) works. A brilliantly clear demonstration of something I have never previously been able to get my head around.
• In my recent run down of software I rely on, I really should have included Instapaper. It’s a simple little application for those times when you stumble across something online that you want to read, but you just don’t have the time. Especially useful is the way it can slurp text down to my phone for later offline reading.
• My dad’s training firm has a bright’n’shiny new website: Goody Training Solutions.
• One of my favourite SF novels is John Wyndham’s The Day of the Triffids. io9 flagged up an interesting essay that uses it to demonstrate a possible difference between the outlook of British and American science fiction.
• A little bit of Brian Houston, playing his first widely-heard track — but not the way he played it then.
• Further to my previous mention of Spotify, it’s now out for the iPhone.

‘Til next time…

In no particular order:

• Mig’s Metamorphosism was one of the first blogs I started reading regularly. It’s because he can write. For a taste, treat yourself to his travelogue of an Apline hike and follow it up with his experiences of nymphomania (safe for work, I assure you). I get the feeling the two posts are related.
• Les Paul died the other week.
• An interesting list of the 100 greatest sci-fi movies.
• If you know computers, or programmers, you might enjoy Stack Overflow’s best programmer jokes.
• KickStarter is an interesting micro-funding idea, especially if it ever reaches these shores.
• I thought about writing about the current debate over the freeing of the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing. But it turns out that William Crawley said most of what I wanted to say, and an Independent editorial said most of the rest. I find I’m with @jearle.

(It’s not terribly relevant to the discussion, but I find it interesting that I typed “the man convicted of the Lockerbie bombing” rather than “the Lockerbie bomber”. Analyse away.)

It’s a while since I last did one of these, so the links have built up a bit. They’re quite an eclectic lot, too. Here goes:

• Science and Religion are Not Compatible. I disagree completely with the main point of this piece (the one hinted at in its title), but it’s well-written and worth reading. It also makes a pleasant change to read a contribution in the tiring [atheist|naturalist] v. [theist|religious] debate that is written in a reasonable, sensible, even friendly tone, rather than, “You’re stupid!” “You’re damned!” — and that goes for both ‘sides’.
• Learn to Fly is a silly wee Flash game. Play it once, have a laugh, move on. Via Jason Kottke.
• I’ve made it to the cinema twice since Reuben was born. Once to see Star Trek, which was tremendous, and once to see Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen which was… not tremendous. This FAQ on Topless Robot identifies everything I thought was wrong with the film. The original review is also an entertaining read. (They both contain some pretty salty language, if that bothers you.)
• Everyone was linking this last month: 78 Photography Rules For Complete Idiots.
• Since I posted a couple of weeks ago on Mercurial, here’s a bit more: Five Features From Mercurial That Would Make git Suck Less.
• After yesterday’s rant about the pig-death-’flu, there are still some things need thought about: The Pandemic & the Eucharist.
• I’ve had a couple of interesting conversations recently about the impact of social media (I had to stop myself putting scare-quotes around that horrid phrase) on and for worshipping communities. Andrew Jones has a thoughtful and interesting post entitled The Virtual Church: Keeping It Real.
• Mark Jaquith educates on Words you probably pronounce incorrectly. Interesting. In the UK, a gyro is something different. I have always said ‘zoo’ in ‘zoology’, but am frequently annoyed (pedantically) by mispronounciation of ‘bruschetta’, ‘espresso’ and ‘et cetera’.
• Dan Benjamin explains Why isn’t that Buddha statue fat?

Okay. Back to it.

And a little bit more:

• Via Glenn, Surviving the World. Go get lost in the archives for a while.
• I really enjoyed the audiobook of METAtropolis a while ago. Now it’s coming out on dead trees.
• Kodachrome has passed. I love my Kodachrome, and have a small stockpile that I use very sparingly. Now that there’ll be no more, I suppose I’d better use it while there’s still a lab in the world that can process it (yes, only one).
• I was looking for something (serious) on YouTube, yet stumbled across Trap Door episodes. The show was one of my favourites as a little kid. Ah, nostalgia.

I have things to do, now, so I’ll step away from those links and leave them for you.

Just a few this time round. I’ve been doing much less random surfing around lately. I wonder why?

• Via Gizmodo, the iPhone stencil kit, for UI designers and cool-bits-of-metal geeks everywhere. Did I order one? Not saying…
• How to Use Twitter for Marketing and PR. Yes and no. It has its place and can be a useful tool.
• Unrelated (really!), the Skainos project now has a Twitter feed.
• Interesting idea: Decisions For Heroes is an Irish-made web-app for rescue teams. It’s for measuring all kinds of performance and outcomes to ultimately save lives. It’s an example of the kinds of really cool yet completely unexpected things being done with communications tech.
• Via Ian Robinson’s Twitter feed, it’s How to be a prospective father.
• Finally, from the Guardian today, Charles Arthur calls shenanigans on music industry claims about the amount of revenue lost to piracy, with a reference to Ben Goldacre in the same publication. One of the key points is recognition of the fallacious, but oft-assumed, idea that a downloaded item is equal to a lost sale. That’s just not true.

There you have it. A few more things to keep you diverted on a Thursday lunchtime.

• Maggi Dawn picks up on the Real Live Preacher to ask about real faith in ministry. I’ve asked these questions of myself in the past, and will again.
• Mig highlights the importance of historical context. Brilliant.
• A uniquely recorded music video on Gizmodo.
• The Tarantino Mixtape is unlikely to be safe for work, but I enjoyed it. I watched Pulp Fiction at a stag do a couple of weeks ago, and was surprised and pleased that it’s as good as I remembered.
• Scott Paget provides some thoughtful reflection on sex and the church.
• I picked this up on Twitter, can’t remember who from. Sorry. It’s very geeky humour, but if you get it, you’ll love it.
• If you enjoyed yesterday’s musical interlude, you might enjoy this very different version.
• Via Kottke, the thickening plot of The Usual Suspects. I love that film.

Right. I’m off to change a nappy.

The spice of life, and all that.

• Alan in Belfast has pointed out that the Moderator-Elect of the Presbyterian Church in Ireland, Stafford Carson, is blogging. A fellow who has managed to attract some controversy over the last couple of years, if he allows it to get a little personal then it should be interesting.
• Via Phil O’Kane’s Twitter feed, how to spot an ATM card skimmer.
• Thoughtful writing, as ever, from Rands. Although it’s not actually about bridges, the tale of bridges is powerful.
• It’s lengthy, but Clay Shirky’s Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable is both frightening and exciting.
• I’m not following it tightly, but I am keeping half an eye on Nick Page’s Longest Week Timetable. (Via Maggi Dawn.)
• There’s lots of interesting things going on in Ireland around mobile, often iPhone, development. I’m planning to be at the Belfast Dev Day. I’ve been coding various things since before I was a teenager, but developing for the iPhone is the first time I’ve been grinning with mad excitement since I made coloured blobs float around the screen of my old Amiga 1200.
• I remember standing in the back of a school concert while I was in Sixth Form, listening to a suspect cello solo. A friend described it as “a brilliant study in microtonality”. He still talks like that. The memory was returned to me when I read Mig’s post On Microtonaility…. (Incidentally, Mig’s was one of the first blogs I discovered and got hooked into that was written by someone I didn’t know in real life. He’s brilliant.)
• And finally, Javagate. Full disclosure: I’m sitting in our kitchen, surrounded by the smell of Andrew’s Old World Blend, and he’s a good guy. Independently of knowing him, I fear for Lisburn’s Farmers’ Market — we went along on Saturday, and you can do a turn round every stall, buying from most of them, in under ten minutes. That’s surely not enough to sustain interest in it.

It’s been an eventful few weeks in the House of Marramgrass, with even more eventful to come. Posting here will probably remain intermittent for a while, so trawl through the above to keep you going.

Diversity is a strength, apparently, so how’s this?

• There was a fire at the old courthouse on the Crumlin Road, yesterday. Zcott grabbed the photo of the day.
• The Guardian has opened up its data. Boy, do I have ideas for this.
• At FOWA Dublin last week, I spotted the guy beside me making notes with FreeMind. Davy Mac then pointed me towards XMind, which looks more powerful but maybe a little more involved to use. I will try them out and return anon with a comparison.
• The question came up of when the clocks go forward, so Google turned us up a handy list of holidays and so on.
• Is typing knackering your handwriting? For a guy who spends so much time with a pen in his hand, my scratchings are atrocious.
• I’ve been seeing this in all kinds of places, and if I had somewhere to hang posters, I’d see it there, too: Keep Calm and Carry On.
• Insight from a young man with Asperger Syndrome. Read it.
• And finally, a little something I made last week while I was sitting in a Dublin hotel room watching my wife study: all about me.

Enjoy.