Daynotes 1999 week 7

Daynotes: Week of 15 - 21 February, 1999

Daily notes and commentary -- Week 7

* Link to: last modified 14:10 GMT+1 on 21.02.1999

Hi, welcome to this seventh week's daybook page.

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Monday 15.02

Today was a nightmare on wheels. We had arranged to leave the car for some minor repair work at a place across town. I had never been there before, but I knew from the address, sort of, where.

Now I should explain two things...

I normally have an excellent sense of direction.
Where we live is a kind of black hole for this sense.

What I mean is, that even though I can see the sun over there at noon, in this town my sense of direction will often as not insist that way is North. Even after soon seven years here, my internal map of town has fogged out areas, so that I can form one block to the next go from "ok I'm here" to "where am I?" to "oh, I'm here -- how did I get here?". Navigate in some other town, no problem.

Anyway, I figured this would be fairly simple, because I would head out towards Edward's school, loop around a main road the way the bus goes, and look for a particular sign on my right. It would take maybe 15 minutes, and I had an hour.

First problem, the weather. That end of town, it was foggy!

Second problem, a couple of poorly signed roundabouts that ambushed me out of the fog. Ok, straight ahead!

Third problem: where am I?

Believe it or not, I was totally lost for an hour! I could neither find my way back, nor find my way home, but instead found myself in one improbable dead end location after another. Attempting to either follow signs, main routes, or simple "dead reckoning" had me making convoluted circles or reaching new districts I had never seen before. I could not believe it! The only street map in the car was a 20 year old taxi map -- out of date, and hopelessly split up into a mass of non-overlapping pages.

It was downright scary after a while. I could for example run across a divided four lane street that looked to be a main artery, follow it in one direction past several lights and end up in a dead end. Turn around and follow in the other, find a sign for "city center", turn and end up in a residential district with no through lanes. Twilight zone.

And time was running out. Therese expected me to pick her up ten minutes ago. Edward was on a bus headed for home. Nobody was home. Daddy doomed to circle the suburbs of hell...

Finally, I hit main road leading in to the center, and despite a few wrong turns got home, only half an hour late for Therese. I would never have believed it, unless experiencing it myself.

On a completely different tack, I can't make up my mind which unified theory of money to accept:

The Static Attractor one -- money attracts more money, lots of money attracts even more, sort of like mass and gravity.
The Dynamic Vacuum one -- impart money with enough velocity (spend it fast enough) and you create a vacuum that sucks in more money at the source.

There is a risk that both paradigms apply, so that spending money with great velocity imparts the spent money with so much relativistic worth (mass) that it attracts all the other money to itself, thus overcoming any vacuum at the source. I.e. the more you spend, the more you lose.

Tuesday 16.02

Based on some of the comments about yesterday's adventure, I should emphasize the first point I made there that passed largely unnoticed: that I normally have an excellent sense of direction. In effect, the "built-in compass" some refer to, which has stood me by anywhere I've been. Except here. The problem here is that where I live seems to be the "Bermuda Triangle" of the Baltic. The internal compass spins aimlessly. It does not help that seemingly straight streets shift direction 5-10 degrees every or every other block, and "main streets" are limited in scope to ill-defined districts. Trust me, were the sea level to rise and flood the place, as it assuredly will one day, this area would become a feared navigational sinkhole.

I am not the only one to remark on this -- others who visit this city find themselves turning right when they should turn left, getting lost two blocks from where they are staying. You with "absolute sense of direction" have to personally experience this to appreciate what it does to your internal compass. It was driving me nuts the first few years.

Anyway, I'm glad the episode provided some entertainment value to start the week with.

It's been a while of doldrums lately, but "the meter is ticking" again as some billable work arrives on the desktop. Discipline!

No, sorry folks, I did not mean by the above to give the impression I was in any way getting bad responses to my story, only that several readers commented that since they had built-in compasses this sort of thing never happened to them. My mistake perhaps for getting the implication that they had understood that I didn't have a sense of direction at all.

No matter, after due consideration, I am moved to continue with this follow-up...

I did a sequel to the leave-the-car attempt this afternoon. No fog. From different direction. Only took the wrong turning three times or so, by which time the setting sun had vanished from my eyes, and the rush-hour nuts had filled the lanes (causing wrong turn 3, me being locked in wrong lane). Really amazing, for I had carefully studied the map this time, and partly figured out where I must have gone wrong yesterday (second roundabout should have been sharp right), and plotted a "failsafe" route for today from home. Hah! I felt the internal compass jiggle and swing madly as I traversed singularity <blank> spots in my mental map; here, there, <blank>, huh? where??, <blank>, here!?, there!, turn!, huh? shit!, back, where?, <blank>, but...? -- Absolutely absurd. There must be micro black holes or UFO warp drives buried here!
Oh well, I got there, and left the car, just in time for a nasty but short snowstorm that swept up from the sea as I headed for the bus stop. Life... goes on.

The feedback suggests overall that many experienced last week and the beginning of this one as somewhat Ungood on many fronts, badly in need of comic relief. I would here end with some witty saying or saw pointing out that the mould is greener on the other side of the rainbow, or some such enlightening wisdom, but I wouldn't presume. We all know what is around the corner: more interesting challenges to provide spice to life, carefully guaged to test our full mettle and push the envelope a bit further each time.

Saw, n. A trite popular saying, or proverb. (Figurative and colloquial.) So called because it makes its way into a wooden head. - Bierce

Wednesday 17.02

Legacy: that which repainted and refurbished is sold as next year's model. In software, where the same bugs with new extensions come from.

I dropped by the ROM-Logicware site (they have an English page under construction, look for the link-button on the front page -- framed site) yesterday, and picked up a new (German) demo version of their Papyrus Word 7. This small German software house is going bigtime head-to-head now with the release of Papyrus Office 7 -- and you will simply not believe what 2 Mb of software gets you in terms of speed and full featured functionality! Ulli Ramps adivsed me that the English release for Wintel 32bits should be shipping by CeBIT time, USD 99 shipped email attach. German versions for Wintel and OS/2 have been available for a time.

I'll return with a more detailed report of this later, hopefully based on the English version. For now, I'll just note that PapyrusWord7, like the earlier version 6, understands Word5/6/7 doc and can both save and load this format transparently to the user. Not all Word2000 docs will load yet, however, but W2k is after all still beta. There is of course html and rtf file support also, and I particularly like the configurable save to html option which gives clean html source and converts embedded images to gif. There is normally a set of html-tag styles that name-correspond to the actual html paragraph tags, making it easy to edit a webpage in Papyrus.

Thursday 18.02

Today was largely devoted to translation work.

Minor administrative notes (mostly for own reference):

updated Papyrus demo (see above) to v7.09
updated WS_FTP_LE to version 4.6

(later) Realized that there had been numerous updates to Pegasus Mail since my version, and that the ftp-site I had bookmarked had not kept up to date on this. Will install the latest version and see if that cures the "letterbomb" effect.

installed Pegasus Mail v3.01d to replace my previous v2.5

Friday 19.02

Running the new Pegasus Mail is interesting -- a lot of new and handy features and reworked interface, and it may well prove to be the fix needed for the "letterbomb" problem. Some of the issues specifically addressed by the newer versions since 2.5 deal with more forgiving handling of mangled html and inclusions in messages. Apparently a lot of mail packages out there do the weirdest things, as seen from the specifications point of view. Although they specifically mention Netscape in this context, I would not be surprised if it also applies to Outlook-Word files.

Cleanly and intelligently handled upgrade. I had zipped the working mail archives and settings, just in case, but the install correctly detected and preserved everything. And although freeware, this products is really well supported, and constantly evolving to adjust to the ever-changing email situation. I find the on-line help not only excellent and comprehensive, but also very informative about current arcana in email handling.

One thing I found especially good is the totally reworked message editor, a side-effect of which is easier copy&paste into the mailnotes pages here.

Highly recommended!

Once upon a time, in English, the scope of originally plural and formal "you" was extended to also replace singular and familiar "thee". In Swedish, much more recently (mid-60s), the singular and familiar "du" was by decree, and after much heated discussion, made to replace the formal "ni" (plural use retained), in an attempt to abolish "unnecessary formality" at the workplace and in daily use. Not all the elderly or people in authority were at the time thrilled about the loss of "respect" shown them by this abrupt change. Oh well, change propogates, you know, and after initial confusions the use became ubiquitous. I can, however, recall meeting elderly people who invariably spoke with the even older custom of always using third person titular -- very disconcerting to have a conversation with someone, where all personal references sound like to absent dignitaries. ("Would the Undergraduate care for a cup of tea?"

Lately, increasing concern is being voiced that the uninformed youth of today is reinstating formality by spontaneous and unreflective use of formal "ni" when addressing strangers and people older than the speaker, especially in shops and restaurants. I suppose there is a parallel to the increased use of "sir" in English, as used in the service occupations.

The problem is apparently that "middle aged" people of today have negative associations to the formal "ni", because its use lingered on after the reform in "telling off" situations. Thus, while the young feel they are being polite, the addressed person may well feel told off or insulted. Ah, the intricate art of social exchange. Heaven forfend that this should lead to a national referendum... :)

Lengthy exchange about the word "doozy", Eleanora Duse, and the Duesenberg car in mailnotes. You can learn something new every day.

Saturday 20.02

"Good morning! Office of National Interests. How may you help us?"

* I was reflecting this week on the process of getting information.

Something that has been happening rather quickly here of late, is the ubiquitous replacement of your usual phone-up-and-ask with new menu-voice services, dial-up-listen-select-listen-select-... I suppose I should have expected this, because I was after all consulted about a year ago by the telco on some menu-voice formulations in English and saw some of the services documentation. Given the all-or-nothing nature of this country, rapid deployment of new "services" is nothing new. But like with the cash-card machines, I am somewhat taken by surprise when running into to it.

Now, hierarchical menu systems can be bad enough visually, just see your typical MS product, but listening to synthesized voices giving a list of numbered selections several levels deep can get enervating. The selection options are both too complex, yet not detailed enough in terms of desired result. The telephone is a proven bad user interface even for the simplest automated tasks, and there is some really deplorable design of selections out there.

As a practical example, I wanted to check some inter-urban bus services. Phoning up the company number yielded the synthesized recitation of initial selections (1,2,3). Drilling down a couple of levels for timetables I am asked for where I am (areacode), where I want to go (areacode) and specific day (YYMMDD) -- Duh? I hadn't decided that yet. Nope, can't get further without a date.

So ok, I pick a reasonable date and restart the process (areacode, areacode, date), then have to specify whether I intend to go to the end stop. Ok, yes. Then I am summarily dropped into a recitation of:

bus-code, departure time, stops, arrival-time, price, notes
next bus-code, departure time, stops, arrival-time, price, notes
...and so on...

After about half-a-dozen of these lengthy items, in that inimitable breaking-voice concatenation of synthesized phrasing, all of which suggested an 8 hour trip via an inland destination I didn't want, I gave up with the distinct impression that a direct service (3-4 hours) was no longer offered, which I thought strange.

What was that, not paying attention? Distracted? Missed a time? Back up to (areacode), (areacode), (date) and restart the list from the beginning... Geez...

Later, I found the same company on the Web. There was a certain similarity in interface design, though the selection process was somewhat less obnoxious on screen, with fewer steps. Still couldn't see the timetable without a specific date, however.

No matter, at least visually I get a list of departures on a scrollable page, and can quickly see that a direct 4-hour service is offered -- about half the departures in fact, at a significantly lower price, and that there are rebates for e.g. children. This list was sorted with the direct connections first, the phone one was not. Weird.

At any rate, now I had found a suitable departure time -- but wait, that was for a specified date. What about the following day? How to find out? Back up to the main page, wait for the large route-map gif to slo-o-wly reload from the server again (dynamic perl pages, always expire, natch) before the form rebuilds, specify (from), (to), (new date), and wait for a new list to build. Ok, same departures, maybe. Check against the previous page? Not in cache, back up, wait for rebuild, respecify, wait for search and rebuild... Argh.

This is not how to build good automated services! Feh and Double-Feh! A pox on your designers and consultants.

Sunday 21.02

A wise government never trusts its armed forces; in troubled times, organizaed manpower can be dangerous.

I'm finding a lot of interesting material in Jerry Pournelle's AltMail section; though it does take time to read through it all. (And it can be tricky for outsiders to find their way there, hence I give the main links here.)

AltMail 1 -- discussions of politics and the theory of the state
AltMail 2 -- Marxism in the modern age: an exchange of views
AltMail 3 -- the new era of big government

These are long and dense texts; you may well want to save them locally for reading when convenient.

Office for Special Requisitions: that section of the secret police which goes out and brings back people for questioning.

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