We finally made the jump:
A 2G/80G MacBook Pro, with additional 2G RAM on its way.
The switch follows, although it’s not likely to be complete. We will however be using it with our Sony HDR-HC3, and for travelling.
Category Archives: Travelling
Digital Camcorder Considerations
We want to get a digital camcorder.
There’s a wedding coming up, some travelling, later perhaps more interesting “subjects”, and then of course there’s the gadget dimension.
Among the criteria for selection are:
- Relative ease of use: OK, I’m geeky, but devices with less than 85 keys are often impossible to figure out…
- Dependability: We’re prepared to back up to HD and other media, but we still want to be able to trust the media.
- Quality: The raw footage should be raw, not compressed. The images are more important than the sound.
- Future proof: I know, not possible in this world, but it seems it’d be OK to go for HD?
- Comfortable: Small and handy, likely to just be available and ready to go when needed.
Currently on the short list is the Sony HDR-HC3. Compared to its predecessor, the HC1, there are improvements as well as changes to the worse, but overall it seems it’s progress.
What to do?
ObSemWebAngle: Ideally, it should also include GPS integration and other ways of content description! ;-)
SFSW 2 and Reboot 8
The 2nd Workshop on Scripting for the Semantic Web (SFSW) is getting closer.
Deadline for submissions is March 30th, 2006.
Also, this year’s version of reboot, that’s 8.0, has been announced.
For reboot there really isn’t a deadline, but the planning has only just begun, and there’s a discount if you register before April 19th.
I likely won’t be able to attend either of them, although perhaps I might try to squeeze in a day of reboot and perhaps some meetups just before. As for SFSW, it’d be more than nice to go to Montenegro, and since I’m actually blessed to be on the preliminary program committee, I really should. I won’t be able to make the deadline though, and it seems the workshop itself doesn’t fit the calendar either…
Reboot
It’s now been more than a week since reboot 7.0, and I’m once again able to think somewhat straight.
‘Twas a great couple of days, with a lot of inspirational talks, chatter, and laughs, and even a beer thrown in here and there. Marc Canter wasn’t there this time, so nobody sang — at least as far as I know.
The Semantic Web didn’t get that much mention, but at least David Weinberger (depicted above) pointed out that knowledge isn’t tree-structured — hopefully that’ll take root (hah) with some XML folks!
It’s a good thing I’m too busy these days with projects at work and house-hunting the rest of the time, otherwise I wouldn’t know where to begin sorting out what to do next…
Reboot and paradigms
The first day of reboot 7.0 had a surprise up its sleeve for those of us that stayed throughout the day: Not only did we get to see the planned showing of Doug Engelbart‘s 1968 demonstration of the NLS system featuring among other novelties a mouse, hypertext, and a keyword-ranking search engine — he joined us via a/v link, and stayed for a conversation after the show:
A very enlightening experience, even if those of us born after the demonstration took place might not fully appreciate its significance. Engelbart later emphasized paradigms, and how the process towards fullfilment of the goals of his research will be evolutionary rather than revolutionary, a view I’m sure Tim Berners-Lee agrees on with regard to the SemWeb aspect (even if some might say that linking to individual objects sounds more like XLink).
Earlier in the day we heard about blogging, Wikipedia, 37signals’ development process, and Ruby on Rails (must… make… time… for… check…) — Jesper Balslev has notes and pointers.
All in all a day above average that started out slow, but picked up at the end — I’m looking forward to day 2, featuring always enjoyable Ben Hammersley.