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VOTE [1] Mark Twain
I'm slowly making progress with my website on the freebie MSDN hosting deal. I've been mucking about with the security framework, finding out how forms authentication works and so on. A neat package, and I got it working with a bit of tweaking, but it's not quite what I need. I don't need to secure the whole site - I need to have some pages available for everyone, and some information needs to be restricted to the people with a need to know. It's a space empire game, so obviously if a player gives orders to a spaceship, I want only that player to be able to do it. Nor do I want the opposing team to see the forces opposing them. Not until they are actually in contact, anyway. Or maybe they'll have to do a spy mission.
I think I can get away with a fairly low level of security, using session variables based on a username/password table in the SQL Server database they provide.
As I mentioned some time back, I've been keeping a blog on my development struggles as well as the various geeky things I do in my career as a dotnet junkie and I discovered today that Frank Arrigo, Microsoft's Australian MSDN manager, has added it to his list of Australian developer blogs. Heaven knows I'm no great coding wizard - I'd best try to be entertaining instead.
I've been away from programming for too long. It's all very well to watch as a presenter steps through some canned code, but it's not the same as writing something, running it up and getting a bucketful of errors to work through. Best done about one in the morning...
No word from Kerri since LAX. She should be on her second night in Washington now. It's about seven in the morning now, according to my Skyhawk watch which does timezones at the press of a button. I usually keep it on the date setting, but I've got it on NYC time now, which adds to my general confusion, but at least when I stop to think I've got a rough idea of what stage of the day it is for Kerri.
Bookcrossing Meetup tonight. I think I made a mistake in giving away American Gods, but it seemed a bit supernatural and I'm not a big fan of that sort of stuff. I like my stories to be solidly in the plausible zone. Which explains my huge SF collection. Yeah.
Looks like I'd best read some Jasper Fforde in a hurry.
HeidiAussie showed up and we curled up by the fireplace, sipping Mr Starbucks' weird and wondrous coffee products. I had something I think was called a Cafe Misto which was fairly milky but nice. I snaffled the BCIDs of the books she brought along, and took one with me to release at Logical Choice tomorrow. A nice colourful cover to go with the colourful window display. A pity kerri's got the camera, I'll have to fall back on the old Aldi special with no LCD screen and the hit and miss focus.
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sabriela turned up just as we were leaving, along with a mate of hers whose name I didn't catch but had been watching us weirdos from a safe distance. Pile of books on the table and a Bookcrossing sign. Not to mention my bright yellow BC tote bag which sort of sheds a cheery brilliance along the dark streets on the way back to the car.
Nice to meet another Livejournaller - hope to meet a ton of Bookcrossers in Fort Worth next year. And some in London. Touch wood.
Which reminds me. We've got an election coming up (actually we have two coming up, but the Territory election is pretty low key and the outcome is fairly predictable - the current government will be returned because they are doing a reasonable job, considering) and aomeone on the BCAUS list suggested an election day release stunt. I dunno how it is overseas, but here we have "how to vote cards", which the various parties prepare to show the voters how to vote in an optimum fashion. The idea is that the voters look at the slogan, make a snap decision on who to vote for and then follow the numbers to vote 1,2,3, 4, 5 for the candidates in order of preference. Party preference that is. I generally vote for some struggling but worthy independent and put the established scumbags in reverse order of frightfulness.
Anyway. These cards get handed out by the party workers outside the polling booth and voters have to sort of run the gauntlet, with several people thrusting different how to vote cards at them. The key position is right at the end, apparently, because that card will be the one on top and the voter may decide to vote that way, rather than trouble themself to look at the ones underneath. Sad to think that people's votes depend on such trifles, but there it is. The Bookcrossing stunt will be to join the lineup, but instead of handing out HTV cards, hand out books. One from the Liberals, one from Labor, a card on recycled paper from the Greens, a double-sided one from the Democrats, Huckleberry Finn from the Bookcrossing guy. Huh?
Heh. Looking forward to it. I'll have to get my daughter to take a picture - her first election as a voter, BTW - because it will make a great final chapter for my book. The front line of Australian democracy with a Bookcrossing twist.
I'll get a few dozen books to give away at the upcoming Lifeline Bookfair and have them in crates ready to go.
Stumbled in the newsagent today and bought the first issue of a new partwork magazine. This one is on calligraphy, in which I dabble, mainly because my handrwiting is so awful and I can't afford for all the books I post out to go astray. So I developed a workmanlike italic hand a couple of years back and use a calligraphic felt pen to address the parcels. The first issue comes with a pen and ink so you can get stuck into it rightaway. Second and third issues come as one for a low price and then each one is $7.95 thereafter. That's the time to pull the plug, otherwise you end up paying five hundred dollars for a bunch of cheap pens and what amounts to a couple of books on the subject. They generally turn up in thrift shops a couple of years later for $20, minus the pens or brushes or models or coins or whatever.
I like calligraphy. As I said, my handwriting is awful and so it's a bit of a buzz for me to create something at least partly elegant. Besides, the differing thickness and angles of the ink lines produced make for an interesting product. The steel nibs of the calligraphy pens produce a finer line than the felt pens I use for addresses - I essayed a couple of squiggles and flourishes and they came out rather nicely.
I think I can get away with a fairly low level of security, using session variables based on a username/password table in the SQL Server database they provide.
As I mentioned some time back, I've been keeping a blog on my development struggles as well as the various geeky things I do in my career as a dotnet junkie and I discovered today that Frank Arrigo, Microsoft's Australian MSDN manager, has added it to his list of Australian developer blogs. Heaven knows I'm no great coding wizard - I'd best try to be entertaining instead.
I've been away from programming for too long. It's all very well to watch as a presenter steps through some canned code, but it's not the same as writing something, running it up and getting a bucketful of errors to work through. Best done about one in the morning...
No word from Kerri since LAX. She should be on her second night in Washington now. It's about seven in the morning now, according to my Skyhawk watch which does timezones at the press of a button. I usually keep it on the date setting, but I've got it on NYC time now, which adds to my general confusion, but at least when I stop to think I've got a rough idea of what stage of the day it is for Kerri.
Bookcrossing Meetup tonight. I think I made a mistake in giving away American Gods, but it seemed a bit supernatural and I'm not a big fan of that sort of stuff. I like my stories to be solidly in the plausible zone. Which explains my huge SF collection. Yeah.
Looks like I'd best read some Jasper Fforde in a hurry.
HeidiAussie showed up and we curled up by the fireplace, sipping Mr Starbucks' weird and wondrous coffee products. I had something I think was called a Cafe Misto which was fairly milky but nice. I snaffled the BCIDs of the books she brought along, and took one with me to release at Logical Choice tomorrow. A nice colourful cover to go with the colourful window display. A pity kerri's got the camera, I'll have to fall back on the old Aldi special with no LCD screen and the hit and miss focus.
sabriela turned up just as we were leaving, along with a mate of hers whose name I didn't catch but had been watching us weirdos from a safe distance. Pile of books on the table and a Bookcrossing sign. Not to mention my bright yellow BC tote bag which sort of sheds a cheery brilliance along the dark streets on the way back to the car.Nice to meet another Livejournaller - hope to meet a ton of Bookcrossers in Fort Worth next year. And some in London. Touch wood.
Which reminds me. We've got an election coming up (actually we have two coming up, but the Territory election is pretty low key and the outcome is fairly predictable - the current government will be returned because they are doing a reasonable job, considering) and aomeone on the BCAUS list suggested an election day release stunt. I dunno how it is overseas, but here we have "how to vote cards", which the various parties prepare to show the voters how to vote in an optimum fashion. The idea is that the voters look at the slogan, make a snap decision on who to vote for and then follow the numbers to vote 1,2,3, 4, 5 for the candidates in order of preference. Party preference that is. I generally vote for some struggling but worthy independent and put the established scumbags in reverse order of frightfulness.
Anyway. These cards get handed out by the party workers outside the polling booth and voters have to sort of run the gauntlet, with several people thrusting different how to vote cards at them. The key position is right at the end, apparently, because that card will be the one on top and the voter may decide to vote that way, rather than trouble themself to look at the ones underneath. Sad to think that people's votes depend on such trifles, but there it is. The Bookcrossing stunt will be to join the lineup, but instead of handing out HTV cards, hand out books. One from the Liberals, one from Labor, a card on recycled paper from the Greens, a double-sided one from the Democrats, Huckleberry Finn from the Bookcrossing guy. Huh?
Heh. Looking forward to it. I'll have to get my daughter to take a picture - her first election as a voter, BTW - because it will make a great final chapter for my book. The front line of Australian democracy with a Bookcrossing twist.
I'll get a few dozen books to give away at the upcoming Lifeline Bookfair and have them in crates ready to go.
Stumbled in the newsagent today and bought the first issue of a new partwork magazine. This one is on calligraphy, in which I dabble, mainly because my handrwiting is so awful and I can't afford for all the books I post out to go astray. So I developed a workmanlike italic hand a couple of years back and use a calligraphic felt pen to address the parcels. The first issue comes with a pen and ink so you can get stuck into it rightaway. Second and third issues come as one for a low price and then each one is $7.95 thereafter. That's the time to pull the plug, otherwise you end up paying five hundred dollars for a bunch of cheap pens and what amounts to a couple of books on the subject. They generally turn up in thrift shops a couple of years later for $20, minus the pens or brushes or models or coins or whatever.
I like calligraphy. As I said, my handwriting is awful and so it's a bit of a buzz for me to create something at least partly elegant. Besides, the differing thickness and angles of the ink lines produced make for an interesting product. The steel nibs of the calligraphy pens produce a finer line than the felt pens I use for addresses - I essayed a couple of squiggles and flourishes and they came out rather nicely.
Calligraphy is relaxing
Re: Calligraphy is relaxing
I made up a project a while ago. If you know anything about the books of Patrick O'Brian, you'll know the name Jack Aubrey. I extended the upstrokes of J, k and b to form the three masts of a sailing ship, and brought the tail of the y around underneath to form the hull. I also extended the J into a bowsprit.
Must do it again and scan it in somewhere.
Re: Calligraphy is relaxing
I would love to see that ship someday.
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