Gotta get one of these, baby!
Category Archives: Technology
CPAN vs. dot-underscore
I was so keen on the idea of pushing a module to CPAN that I almost didn’t catch a fatal flaw in my scheme. Mac OS X (motto: It Just Works) was doing something odd to my tarball as it was created: it was adding a whole host of files that weren’t there originally. Not just the .DS_Store files we all know and love (and learn to remove), but odd shadow files like ._foo.txt for foo.txt and ._Makefile.PL for Makefile.PL.
Yep. Now you might see the problem.
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seeing around corners
I’ve been trying desperately to determine why this technique for “reconstructing a scene from a different vantage point”:http://graphics.stanford.edu/papers/dual_photography/ is useful (as opposed to just a neat trick). It’s probably a great technique for use with live-action-plus-CG films, but I’m at a loss to find any other application.
Still, it reminds me of a discussion I had with Adam Houston a while back about using a regular wall as a mirror by reconstructing the paths of all the light rays hitting it. They aren’t quite doing that, but they can still see the back face of a playing card using a similar trick. (View the video at the bottom to see the trick in action.)
the best they can do
Oh, this is just too sad for words. The other day I noticed an ad for the new “GMC Sierra Hybrid Pickup”:http://www.gmc.com/sierra/hybrid_popup.jsp. I was surprised by the idea that US automakers were finally getting on the hybrid bandwagon. Turns out I shouldn’t have been.
Read on for the rant…
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Izzard Tones
I don’t have the right phone to get these neat Eddie Izzard ring tones but some of you might (Chris, I’m looking at you). For the rest of us, you can at least listen to them on the site above. Just press the buttons on the little phone picture.