Donnie’s Blog

I know it’s been six weeks, but I wanted to recount this little situation I overheard near the end of my Portland trip.

Everybody had boarded the airplane and we were waiting for all the final preparations to be taken care of, so that we could close the doors and push back from the terminal. Then a guy in the row ahead of me got out his cellphone and called his buddy:

Hey. How’s it going?

So, I have your keys.

Yeah, sorry about that…

I could barely keep from laughing out loud. How perfect.

Today I tried to use my iPod to temporarily store some large files on my laptop. See, the Microsoft disk defragmenter can’t seem to get anywhere unless it has at least 15% free disk space to use, and, well, I only have 14% free. So no defrag for me, until I can move some of these large files off of my lappy.

Now, these files are all around 4GB apiece, and my iPod is a 40GB version, so it shouldn’t be a big deal. Right? Well, unfortunately for me, I kept getting these “Disk full” errors, and I had at least 30GB free space. That was really frustrating!

But then I finally realized what the deal is. 4GB is the maximum file size that the FAT32 filesystem can handle, and now that my iPod is formatted for Windows, that’s just the limit I gotta deal with.

Apple has an information page about this issue, which is characteristically snippy and self-aggrandizing:

This is because the FAT32 file system–the Windows hard disk format used for iPod–limits files to 4 GB. This limitation does not apply to an iPod formatted for Mac, which uses the Mac OS Extended (HFS Plus) file system. Its file size limit is much larger, in case you were wondering.

Yes, thank you Apple. I was wondering whether Macs could possibly be as stupid and broken as Windows. A little worried, even. I’m so glad they aren’t. I can sleep again at night.

</sarcasm>

I realized today that I hate the whole concept of wraps. Wraps are for people who can’t decide if they want a sandwich or a burrito. Make up your mind. (And choose the sandwich.)

Today I made my first sourdough starter ever. It’s not much to look at - just a blob of flour and water that will hopefully start growing yeast and then fermenting. I call it Lil’ Blobby - it just looks like it needs a name. Plus, if I name it, it’s more likely that I’ll actually be responsible about feeding it and checking up on it, according to the schedule in the cookbook.

Of course, like any good pet, Lil’ Blobby will make a good meal in a few days. Lil’ Blobby’s just a giver.

This year’s taxes are done now, for all intents and purposes. Overall there is money coming back, which is always nice. I have wanted a new bicycle helmet and a new pair of running shoes for a really long time, so now I will be able to pick those things up. I might get an extra external HDD too, for backups at work!

If I could choose a superpower, the ability to walk with a full cup of coffee without spilling it on me would be a really useful one.

It’s a good thing my shoes are already brown.

If anything in my life is liable to push me over the edge, it’s Caltech’s voicemail system. Typically in software development, the mantra is, “Easy Things Easy, Hard Things Possible.” But this phone system seems to be modeled on the notion that “You’d better really want your voicemail, or you just ain’t getting it.”

Welcome to Audix. For help at any time, press *H.

“OK, I’ve called this voicemail system more than five times. Please stop telling me about the help feature.”

Please enter extension and pound sign.

“But I’m calling from a Caltech phone! It’s my Caltech phone!”

Enter password and pound sign.

“But I’m… ARGH, nevermind. Here you go.”

One new message.

“Awesome! So what is it?”

To record messages, press 1. To get messages, press 2. To administer personal greetings, press 3.

“Okay, I just got a message, so please, just let me get to it already.”

New messages. Voice call from blah blah [15 seconds of inane babble about this voicemail message]

(sound of blood-vessels popping)

To listen, press 0. To delete, press *D. To skip, press the pound key.

And then finally I get to the actual voicemail message, after four separate entries on the keypad. Not to mention having to call the voicemail system extension in the first place. What madness is this. I tell you, on a stressful day, this really gets me riled up!

Cellphone companies have it right. I hold down one button to connect to the voicemail system, and then I don’t do anything else - it just starts reading off my messages.

It’s officially here. Along with more CS11 students than we ever imagined would want to take the course. It’s nice because I get to do all of my previous tracks again (C++, Advanced C++, and Java), but I also get to put together an Advanced Java track as I go.

It’s a bit tricky to put together a new track on the fly; usually you like to plan those kinds of things out ahead of time, so you know it’s not too easy or too hard. This term we are building out a simple little game reminiscent of SubSpace, which I am hoping to use to illustrate all of the nice tools and features one can use in a larger-scale Java software project. Plus it’s a game, and students tend to like writing games.

Yesterday I finally got keyboard events hooked into the game, and that kind of led to me wasting a half-hour playing the dumb thing. But that’s the chance you take…