Lost Rambler

I guess that’s it then…

LostRambler — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 12:10:49 +0000

I suspect that as I now work with computers, I don’t want to have such a computer-intensive hobby any more. That’s why I haven’t posted in over a year, though I have been sporadically working on the rewrite of the site…

Development Update

LostRambler — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 12:12:05 +0000

I was able to get about a quarter of the work done to relaunch the site last week, but since then we’ve all become sick. As I’m the least sick in the family, I’m tied up with looking after everyone else.

It may be a while before normal service resumes.

Watch This Space

LostRambler — Sun, 23 Dec 2007 23:27:47 +0000

I’ve decided to give up bl0gging with blog software. I’m going back to my own content management system. I simply got frustrated with not being able to do some of the things I could do easily before.

So, I’m going to relaunch my website soon.

Just how long…

LostRambler — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 15:33:41 +0000

…can you stare at the debug output of an infinite loop before you realise that it’s infinite. In this case, about half an hour.

It could so easily have been longer.

Nothing to see here

LostRambler — Sat, 01 Dec 2007 15:20:40 +0000

I have just been so busy at work and at home that I’ve had no time for fun. This is the first time time I’ve had five minutes of peace as everybody is in bed taking a nap.

So, without much to say, let me take a page from Paul’s book and just post a link to a clip I enjoyed recently:

What I do…

LostRambler — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 21:02:46 +0000

I’m sitting at work waiting for a script I wrote to finish running. I need to insert certain values into database records based on a text file that our customer sent us. Without giving anything away, here’s what I’m looking at at the moment.

~
[eprints@localhost bin]$ ./insert_impact_factors.pl
1264 -> 4.515 DONE
3409 -> 4.515 DONE
3412 -> 4.515 DONE
4298 -> 1.587 DONE
1295 -> 0.308 DONE
3604 -> 0.308 DONE
3988 -> 1.849 DONE
4732 -> 4.826 DONE
4747 -> 0.685 DONE
1003 -> 1.919 DONE
1176 -> 1.919 DONE
1413 -> 1.919 DONE
3958 -> 1.919 DONE
885 -> 1.832 DONE
886 -> 1.832 DONE
1186 -> 9.091 DONE
3929 -> 1.977 DONE
900 -> 2.711 DONE
76 -> 0.543 DONE
86 -> 0.543 DONE
87 -> 0.543 DONE
105 -> 0.543 DONE
126 -> 0.543 DONE
823 -> 0.543 DONE
276 -> 7.683 DONE
1092 -> 0.454 DONE
1142 -> 0.454 DONE
69 -> 1.727 DONE
2862 -> 0.327 DONE

There are several hundred of these lines yet to appear, and they’re appearing about once a second. I need to hang around and watch it in case there are problems…

I’d actually rather be at home changing nappies.

On Potty Training

LostRambler — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 14:13:15 +0000

The wife decided a couple of weeks ago that the time was ripe to potty train the son. Firstly, we needed to teach him some new words. It wasn’t long before he connected the words ‘wee-wee’ and ‘poo-poo’ with the concepts.

Next was to teach him how to use the potty. Initially this meant just sitting him on the potty and turning on the TV, then showing him the contents after half an hour (pointing out enthusiastically which part was wee-wee and which was poo-poo, while preventing him from playing with them).

The current task is now to get him to anticipate his bodily functions. There has been mixed progress on this. Sometimes he just doesn’t want to sit on the potty, and if there’s something interesting going on he only notices the wee-wee as it’s running down his leg. When that happens, he gets quite agitated and runs around shouting “wee-wee, wee-wee”, leaving a trail of unpleasant liquid in his wake. We can usually get him on his potty before too much mess is made.

This would be of little real consequence (we have disinfectant) if it weren’t for the fact that the daughter is now crawling and loves to follow the son around the house. She also grabs things and puts them in her mouth.

It’s a disgusting disaster just waiting to happen.

Hetty Develops

LostRambler — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 13:48:54 +0000

You know, one day you have a brand new baby, and then suddenly they’re crawling around, making a mess and trying to grab your camera.

Running a training course

LostRambler — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 09:27:01 +0000

After two days of mad preparation, I’m sitting in a room full of delegates that I will be training in EPrints, the project I am mainly involved on at the university. I love running training courses. There’s a certain buzz to public speaking that its me right in the pit of my stomach and makes me feel alive.

About 45 minutes to go until I am the centre of attention….

I want to post…

LostRambler — Sun, 21 Oct 2007 10:34:46 +0000

But I’m sick, and just don’t feel creative. Sorry.