Author: Paweł Gościcki

Ruby/Rails programmer.

WP Movie Ratings v1.6 released

This is just a bugfix release updating the compatibility issues with WordPress versions higher than 2.6. It works nicely with the newest 3.0.1 too.

Here’s the changelog for this version:

  • full compatibility with WordPress 2.7.*, 2.8.*, 2.9.* and 3.0.*.
  • fixed: when ‘only_rated’ or ‘only_unrated’ option was used the ‘count’ argument the for wp_movie_ratings_show() function was ignored.
  • removed automatic pingerati.net pinging (pingerati.net is AWOL).
  • fixed: fetching movie title from IMDb (after IMDb has changed their website).

And here’s the download link.

William Blake FTW

First, there was Schiller and their track Lost (collaboration with Odette Di Maio). Not fully understanding the lyrics (my English being not perfect, etc.), I googled for them. And so I listen. And read. And listen. And there I am thinking omg those are surely some beautiful lyrics!

Lost again
Lyca’s parents go away
Over the valleys deep

They are lost again
Arm in arm for seven days
They traced the desert ways

They are lost again
Seven nights they sleep and dream
They see their child
Captured in the desert wild

Lost again
Till before their way
a couching lion lay

Follow me, he said
Please weep not for the maid
In my palace deep
Your Lyca lies deep asleep

They looked in his eyes
His eyes filled with deep surprise
And wondering behold
A spirit armed in gold
(…)

And another google away and it’s all clear. It’s William Blake and his poem The Little Girl Found. Really beautiful. And it has a prequel too, The Little Girl Lost. Marvellous.

2009 achievements

In no particular order:

  • finally learned how to type properly with all of my 10 fingers (instead of just 5-6 before). I’m at 25 wpm right now and that kind of blows, still, it was well worth it, although the learning curve was quite steep. And I’m still not pressing all the right keys with all the right fingers.
  • learned vim. The learning curve was even steeper than the typing one. Literally hundreds of shortcuts to remember… Vim is the best editor out there, no doubt about it and I’m very grateful to have finally found out about it.
  • first trip in my life to the west (west of Eastern Europe or Poland, my home country). Italy. Snowboard.
  • built my own custom stereo speakers system. Top class monitors based on the Peerless drivers. 5.1 system coming in 2010/2011…
  • finally moved out of my parent’s house. Still both happy and sad about it.
  • quit an uninspiring and not too much intellectually and professionally developing day job.
  • took out a mortgage to buy a new flat. A wonderful flat.
  • got significant financial help from the government to start my own company. Almost started it in 2009. I’m starting in the first days of 2010.
  • planted a seed. A significant seed.

The best goals list for 2010 is to have no goals. Come what may. Embrace the chaos.

Dream notebook for 2010

Would include:

  • 14-15″ OLED screen
  • <1,0 kg weight
  • 100GB on-board integrated SSD (pushing 1GB/s read/write speeds)
  • >3GHz Core i3/i5 (yet TBA on 2010/1/3)
  • no ide, no sata, no cd/dvd/bluray just USB 3.0 and hdmi

All of this is possible to make. No new technology needed. There are SSDs on PCI-E. There are OLEDs like this (AUO, LG). There are laptops on CULV processors below 0,8kg (Vaio X). There is just not a single laptop (not even announced!) that would combine it all.

I’m quite positive there would be lots of folks willing to pay the premium price (around 3-4K$ should be sensible) for this package. I would probably buy it for 50% a year later. Sadly, this system is just a dream.

On the other hand – I’m certain we will see similar designs in 2012/2013.

Happy New Year!

Update: Concept 16″ OLED Dell laptop is here. That’s a first.

Mocha. The stubbing library

This example (shortened here):

class Order
  def shipping_cost
    total_weight * 5 + 10
  end
end

require 'test/unit'
require 'rubygems'
require 'mocha'

class OrderTest < Test::Unit::TestCase
  # illustrates stubbing instance method
  def test_should_calculate_shipping_cost_based_on_total_weight
    order = Order.new
    order.stubs(:total_weight).returns(10)
    assert_equal 60, order.shipping_cost
  end
end

and this snippet (emphasis mine):

The more interesting discussion deals with whether to mock or stub your database-backed model. One upside is speed: This test case will not hit the database at all. Another is independence. I completely isolate the code under test to the controller layer.

convinced me that there just might be some treasure to be found beyond the Test::Unit. And I know that it’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Debunking the stupidity myth

From Why can’t we concentrate? by Laura Miller:

IQ tests have to be regularly updated to make them harder; otherwise the average score would have climbed 3 percent per decade since the early 1930s. (The average score is supposed to remain at a constant 100 points.) And IQ measures problem-solving ability, rather than sheer data retained, which has grown even faster over the same interval.

And here I was thinking all these years that we, as a global population, are in fact getting more and more stupid. People getting lower and lower grades, coming out of the Universities knowing less and less – it was all just an illusion. Average IQ is climbing. Steadily. Decade after decade we are getting smarter. It’s only that there are too few measures noticing it. Are IQ tests the only ones measuring it?

(via Brutto)

Moore’s law, 40 years later, still in effect

From the informal version of the Moore’s Law:

Moore’s original statement that transistor counts had doubled every year can be found in his publication “Cramming more components onto integrated circuits”, Electronics Magazine 19 April 1965. Moore slightly altered the formulation of the law over time, bolstering the perceived accuracy of Moore’s Law in retrospect. Most notably, in 1975, Moore altered his projection to a doubling every two years. Despite popular misconception, he is adamant that he did not predict a doubling “every 18 months”. However, an Intel colleague had factored in the increasing performance of transistors to conclude that integrated circuits would double in performance every 18 months.

December 15th, 2007: Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB – 427 PLN

May 11th, 2009: Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 1000GB (1TB) – 419 PLN

Same price, twice the capacity. Roughly 17 months and one financial crisis later and the price per GB is almost exactly two times lower. Incredible.

The case of Benjamin Button and 1080p

From an imdb review:

Pitt plays the character at almost every age, but it’s almost impossible to tell when the CGI is being used on him. You know it’s there, obviously, but you can’t tell it’s being used. When the transition is just smooth enough for the Visual Effects to be retired, but just rough enough to use makeup, it’s absolutely perfect. If you’ve ever wanted to see Brad Pitt look 20 again, look no further, as the effects that make our actors young again (the same goes for Blanchett) are just as stunning as those that make them older.

Thing is with screen big enough and a 1080p source – you can tell the difference between Brad Pitt and CGI. And you can do it quite easily. Both old and young Benjamin look very much CGI alike. And it’s not that the effects are bad, because they’re not, it’s just that at this level of details (and face close-ups) you need to have your effect to be close to perfect. Seems we’re not quite there yet. The skin, the wrinkles, small hair covering the face, freckles, moles, every face feature – those are things you see and appriciate the most when viewing good HD content. And they make the biggest impresion. I know they did on me. They say animating a face is the hardest thing to do. At HD it’s ten times harder.