Present Perfect

I've been listening to the StackOverflow podcast for a few months. I never was into podcasting but decided I should give it a try and I decided around the time Joel Spolsky and Jeff Atwood started their podcast. I've followed both of their blogs for a while now, mostly because Joel is very good at explaining his opinions and has lots of experience to build on, and Jeff is refreshingly down-to-earth and prolific as a blogger. I use them as my conduit to the non-Linux side of programming, as a crutch to keep me a little bit grounded into the real world out there where 95% of people never use Linux and get their job done as well.

So, I applied for the beta, but didn't have time this month to actually use it. I started using it last weekend, browsing, answering some questions, and so on. It's actually a fun site, and I think it will end up being very useful. In the beginning I couldn't do much because you need reputation to do certain actions, like voting questions up. But today I hit the 3 digit reputation score, I've had some questions answered, and I've had some answers voted up or promoted to the right answer, and it starts being useful.

It's too soon to say, but it might end up being the single best new web site this year, and one of the few directly useful for my work. And it's all running on Windows!

I sincerily hope us Free Software people can get past that 'it runs on Windows' hangup and seriously use the site when it's available. I've already run into one of us going through some of the Python questions. Instead of asking the intarweb, I'm now going to ask technical questions over there. I hope you will too.

I've been listening to the StackOverflow podcast for a few months. I never was into podcasting but decided I should give it a try and I decided around the time...

There's a guy in Barcelona who runs an antique store. Well, maybe it's not an antique store, because it doesn't like like stuff my mom would actually buy. And I'm not even sure if he's selling.

But he cooks for anyone who comes in, whatever is available, and turns it into honest and magical meals. He's probably Barcelona's best kept secret - he's not in any guide (which is a good thing), and I doubt he even has a license to do what he does.

He gives you whatever he has, and what he has is always excellent quality. He probably goes by the farmers and vineyards himself to select his products. No is not a word he accepts, and there's no way you can eat everything he gives you.

I'm always a bit worried when I bring people there because it takes some time to get there, it's always difficult to organize it, and you just never know how people will react, or how Angel will react if he happens to be in a less sociable mood and gets asked to cook something non-meaty for example. But I've just never been disappointed, so I don't know why I worry.

Today we went there to kick off our developer meeting now that everyone's back from holidays and Julien, a new guy, just started. We got chorizo, manchego cheese, beans, a huge tortilla, a special Cabrales cheese which was very strong but good, bread, and duck pate. And those were just the starters, I had to explain to my surprised collagues. After that, we got blood sausage, cutlets, and hake. All of this with some wine, and desert and coffee at the end.

And when you get up and leave, you ask him for the price, and he makes one up on the spot for the whole group. Rumour has it it's cheaper if you're a girl and can part with some pecks on the cheek.

If you ever get to Barcelona, drop me a line for the address. And let me know if you write for a tour guide or travel magazine, so I can give you the wrong information. I don't ever want to see it get ruined.

There's a guy in Barcelona who runs an antique store. Well, maybe it's not an antique store, because it doesn't like like stuff my mom would actually buy. And I'm...

Every time I have to write a spec file and do something specifically for a certain distro version (like, for example, packages were renamed or split or ...) I end up trying to remember what the last package was in which I used it to have the most up-to-date version of that macro.

And once in a while I try one and it doesn't work, for some silly reason. And these macros are always very fragile.

So, this weekend I rebuilt a package for RHEL5.2 and the spec was supposed to BuildRequire: libXv-devel for RHEL5 and onwards. But the check didn't take the 5.2 version number (with a period) into account and it failed.

So this time I decided to just create a wiki page on my wiki that I will update if I ever run into problems again, and will reference back to next time I need it. In the process I managed to simplify the macros and make them more correct, so everyone wins. And that includes you - because now you can go there too if you care! *

* Of course, if you're part of the 99.99999999% of people that doesn't write spec files for fun or money, then you probably don't!

Every time I have to write a spec file and do something specifically for a certain distro version (like, for example, packages were renamed or split or ...) I end...

Arek and I have spent the weekend working - it's been so hard to get a block of continuous time to work on deploying a new version of our platform that I decided I would set aside a weekend for it to get started and convinced him to trade two working days for two weekend days. It's the only time I'm guaranteed not to be interrupted by everyone else at the time.

We decided we wouldn't actually discuss stuff, just get things done. Of course, Saturday ended up being nothing but discussing every possible topic. While it was exhausting for both of us, it seems it was unavoidable, even when we both were planning to avoid discussions. I did get to understand a bunch of things a lot better, so I spent Saturday night staying up too long and synthesising the discussions into things to do for the future.

Today, Sunday, was more productive - we're advancing on the list of tasks still left to do. In the evening I agreed to meet up with Mariette and friends to go see a movie, and Arek went along.

I was actually pretty impressed with the movie. Arek thought it was artificial, which I can see, but I really like a well told story. I only found the basic premise artificial in the sense that I couldn't believe someone would start out doing something like that.

There are two things I really like about the movie beyond the obvious (Philip Seymour Hoffman turns in another stellar performance).

A good piece of art makes you project your own ideas onto it, making you think that the piece of art is telling you something that in fact is coming from the other direction - you. In this particular case, I felt the movie showed what happens when a dysfunctional family dynamic, which is relatively harmless when kids are young, persists into adulthood. The same basic motivations and behaviours they had as kids bring on much bigger consequences when the now-adult kids have real lives and access to more powerful or dangerous resources.

You see this family interact in probably much the same way they did when the sons were kids - but the consequences of every action - stealing from your parents, harassing your little brother into doing your dirty work for you, stealing something from your older brother, fighting over a girl, whatever - are so much more far-reaching when the toy guns are real, when the money is more than what's in a wallet, and when the girl is more than just yesterday's crush.

Like I said, I'm probably projecting my thoughts on the movie.

The second thing I liked is how such a simple but clever premise births subsequent situations that are refreshing yet still entirely logical. The premise is so simple yet unbelievable that I'm surprised I haven't seen it before in a movie - what would happen if two sons rob their parents' store ? The rest of the story has its drama unfold in ways that you've probably not seen happen in the more standard thrillers, but it's still predictable even in its originality. I can't talk about any examples without giving plot away, though. But I very much appreciate how such a simple idea for a movie can be so powerful and basically write the whole movie on its own.

I understand what Arek doesn't like about the movie, but I'm still pretty impressed - a good spur of the moment movie choice as far as they go.

Arek and I have spent the weekend working - it's been so hard to get a block of continuous time to work on deploying a new version of our platform...

Every time I go to a festival I prepare a festival playlist to get amped up.

This year's Pukkelpop playlist has 942 songs, good for 2 days and 22 hours of non-stop listening. And I have some more songs arriving through the tubes.

Every time I go to a festival I prepare a festival playlist to get amped up. This year's Pukkelpop playlist has 942 songs, good for 2 days and 22 hours...