Free Wisdom Online

The Berkeley Tree Sitter

Back in February some guy climbed the tree in the middle of the Berkeley campus as a protest. (Sadly, most people seem to have never figured out what exactly he was protesting for or against, but it seemed like a rather long list of issues, from Berkeley's plan to cut some ancient oaks to their ties with oil companies.) Berkeley police wasn't happy about this and wanted to arrest him for trespassing, but decided to not drag him down from the tree - for the fear of liability, I heard. (They did drag down the poster that he had - part of the reason nobody was quite sure what he was protesting against.) So, instead, they camped near the tree, while he camped in the tree. Yes, he had a hammock, so he slept in the tree and he had a bucket with him to do you-know-what. They were at it for quite some time - two and a half weeks. He then finally agreed to come down in mid March. The police then cited him, supposedly for "tresspassing" and "illegal lodging."

[slideshow] [complete album]

Comments

Please leave your comments.

Drive-by Tax Returns

(For non US-readers: Americans are supposed post mark their tax forms by April 15 and many post offices stay open late to accomodate.)

Berkeley post office workers standing out in the streets with boxes for people to drop off their returns without leaving their cars.

[slideshow] [complete album]

Please leave your comments.

My Photo Lab

"find ... | wc" tells me I've got 21365 photos on my computer. I am guessing that I must have taken at least 50,000, though, since I delete at least half of the photos I take. I've gone through several different tools for managing all of those photos and have been meaning to document what I do and share the scripts that I've written for this, in case someone else finds my approach useful. Well, I finally motivated myself to do that, which has become possible in part due to the fact that I've been in love with git and Gitorious, after migrating Sputnik to them. With Gitorious the task of releasing code somehow doesn't seem as daunting. So, I started a project on gitorious to publish my script collection: Yuri's Photo Lab.

The rest of the post draws on the README.txt that I included in the repository.

The repository contains a collection of scripts that I use to manage digital photos. I use those scripts in combination with F-Spot and my server-side application written in Django (running on this site), which I am not releasing since cleaning it up and documenting it would be too much work and I am about to abandon it anyway. (I am hoping to move to Sputnik in the next few months.) I use all of those tools on Linux (currently running Ubuntu Edgy). This all might work on OSX, parts might work on Windows.

After taking new photos, I go through the following steps:

Step 0: Get the photos off the camera into some directory.

I do this either by putting the card into a reader and mounting it, or by connecting my camera and using Digikam. I never let F-Spot import the photos from the camera, however, since I want to rename and triage them before importing them.

Step 1: Triage.

I use GQView to delete the unwanted photos. Of all the applications I've tried, GQView does the best job of allowing me to quickly go through hundreds of photos, deleting most of them.

Step 2: Rename

Once the photos are triaged, I organize them into directories by date. I name each directory with the date and a short description. For example: "2007.09.08-varanasi", "2007.09.09-varanasi-2", "2007.09.10-delhi", "2007.09.11-agra", "2007.09.12-delhi-again".

Where do I put those directories? Let's start from the top, actually. I keep all of my photo-related stuff under "~/photos/". The original photos go under "~/photos/main". Under "main", I have directories for each "quarter":

yuri@chai:~/photos/main$ ls
2000.07-Summer2000       2003.06-Summer2003        2006.06-Summer-2006
2000.09-Fall2000         2003.09-Fall-2003         2006.09-Fall-2006
2000.12-Winter2000-2001  2003.12-Winter-2003-2004  2006.12-Winter-2006-2007
2001.03-Spring2001       2004.03-Spring-2004       2007.03-Spring-2007
2001.06-Summer2001       2004.06-Summer-2004       2007.06-Summer-2007
2001.09-Fall2001         2004.09-Fall-2004         2007.09-Fall-2007
2001.12-Winter2001-2002  2004.12-Winter-2004-2005  2007.12-Winter-2007-2008
2002.03-Spring2002       2005.03-Spring-2005       2008.03-Spring-2008
2002.06-Summer-2002      2005.06-Summer-2005       rn.py
2002.09-Fall2002         2005.09-Fall-2005         todo.txt
2002.12-Winter2002-2003  2005.12-Winter-2005-2006
2003.03-Spring2003       2006.03-Spring-2006

So, I put my "2007.09.08-varanasi", etc. into "2007.09-Fall-2007". Then from this directory I run a script "run.py" (which sits in "main") to rename the photos from whatever the cameras named them into a uniform pattern:

yuri@chai:~/photos/main$ cd 2007.09-Fall-2007
yuri@chai:~/photos/main/2007.09-Fall-2007$ python ../rn.py 2007.09.11-agra

The "rn.py" script is included in the repository.

This gives all photos in "2007.09.11-agra" names like: "20070911_392_8069.JPG". This includes: a date ("20070911"), a number within that date (392nd photo for 2007-09-11) and a random number. At this point I have over 20,000 photos all named this way. Having all the photos named the same way has helped on many occasions.

Sometimes photos from the same day fall into several different groups (e.g., two unrelated events) and sometimes there are just too many of them to display them all together. In those cases, I split them into several different directories after renaming them. E.g., I might split the photos of Agra (originally "2007.09.11-agra") into "2007.09.11-a-agra-red-fort", "2007.09.11-b-fatehpur", "2007.09.11-c-agra-streets", and "2007.09.11-d-taj".

Step 3: Load into F-Spot

F-Spot is a great application, once you tame it. In it's wild form, its a bit invasive, for my taste. I've configured my F-Spot to use "~/photos/main" as its photo directory, but I don't let it mess with the structure of that directory. Occasionally I import photos using F-Spot's GUI, always telling F-Spot to not copy the files but to just use the existing copies. But this gets very tedious. So, instead, I usually use a python script ("rn.py", included in the repository) to import the photos:

yuri@chai:~/gk/git/photolab/mainline$ cp /home/yuri/.gnome2/f-spot/photos.db
   ~/tmp/
yuri@chai:~/git/photolab/mainline$ python fspot.py import
   /home/yuri/photos/main/2007.09-Fall-2007/2007.09.11

Yes, I always make a backup of F-Spot's database file before doing this. I recommend that everyone does the same. Oh, and you need to make sure that F-Spot is not running while you do this.

Step 4: Add Tags using F-Spot

I then open F-Spot and use it's GUI to add tags to my photos.

Step 5: Generate Thumbnails and Smaller Images

I use ImageMagick to generate the thumbnails and mid-size versions of the images to display on the website. I use version "6.3.6", which supports "--autorotate". With this flag, ImageMagick will check each image's EXIF record for the camera orientation and rotate the image if necessary. As of January 2008, using version 6.3.6 on Ubuntu meant compiling ImageMagick by hand, which is a bit of a pain in the a#&: you need to make sure that you have JPEG libraries installed before you build ImageMagick. Oh, and if you build it with PNG support, then some things stop working in Gnome...

I keep my resized images in "~/photos/sized". When I need to resize images, I run "makethumbdir.py" (also included in the repository).

yuri@chai:~/photos/thumbscripts$ python makethumbdir.py
   /home/yuri/photos/main/2007.09-Fall-2007/2007.09.11-d-taj
   > make_thumbs.sh

This creates directories under "~/photos/sized" for each directory since 2007.09.11-d-taj and a shell script (make_thumbs.sh) which copies each file into the corresponding directory twice (once for a thumbnail and once for a mid-sized version for showing on the web), then calls ImageMagick's "convert" on it:

/usr/local/bin/convert "/home/yuri/photos/main/2007.09-Fall-2007/2007.09.11-d-taj/20070911_402_4296.JPG"
   -size 300x300 -auto-orient -thumbnail 150x150 
   /home/yuri/photos/sized/2007-09-11-d-taj/20070911_402_4296.thumb.jpg

I then run the shell script:

yuri@chai:~/photos/thumbscripts$ sh make_thumbs.sh

Step 6: Copy the Images to the Server.

I use "scp" to copy the images to my server. Nothing fancy about this. Perhaps the only trick is finding a host that is generous with disk space. I use DreamHost. (If you decide to open an account, use "YURI50BUCKS" promotion code to get $50 off.)

Step 7: Load the Images into My Web Application.

Again, the custom web application that I am using is too messy to release, but the basic idea is simple: I have F-Spot's database file which has tags among other things. I want to load this information into my web app. I again use "fspot.py" for this, but this time as a module called from another script (updatePhotos.py). I am including this script in the repository just as example.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

The Bestest Passw0rd

Update: You can now get a t-shirt with the best bestest password.

Someone in my department forwarded a link to http://www.passwordmeter.com/ to our "noise" list. After we all entered out email and bank passwords into this site and evaluated them, I suggested that we use the site to find the bestest password - so that we could all use it. The bestest password of course would have to satisfy the following criteria: (1) be as short as possible, (2) get 100% on the passwordmeter.com, and (3) be totally cool. After improving on my committee members' email password "f33ltehtr0||z" (13 letters, 56% score), by turning it into "E3l.*|z!" (8 letters, 100% score), I came up with another one: "-:-|lI.!" Also 8 letters, still 100%, but so much more coolness. Let me show it off in all of it's l33titud3:

I later managed to improve on this a little by introducing Unicode:

Or, the same thing drawn by hand:

Here is the second password getting approval of passwordmeter.com:

To be clear, those are all valid characters: a pipe, capital Turkish I with a dot (İ), capital Roman I, lowecase L, lowercase Turkish I without a dot (ı), lowercase L with a dot underneath (ḷ, used in transliteration of HIndi among other things), upper case Cyrillic Ӏ, and finally a period. Note that the Ukrainian Ӏ looks just like the Roman capital I but is a different Unicode character. This is important, since simply re-using "I" incurs a "repeated letter" penalty and the resulting score is nowhere near 100%. Yes, this password is very hard to type. On Ubuntu Edgy I can type 7 of it's letters using the compose key (e.g., compose + . + i to enter the dotless Turkish ı), and the Ukrainian keyboard layout. I can't enter the ḷ and had to copy and paste it. However, is one of the things that makes this password so strong! I mean: I can't even type it myself easily!

So, here you have it: the world's two bestest passwords. I'll have to decide which one to use for my email and which for my bank.

2008.04.26 update: I drew a version of the bestest password by hand, since to ensure that the letters are perfectly balanced and don't come out as being of slightly different width. The new version is included above. I also entered it into the iSchool t-shirt contest for this year. If it doesn't win, we'll be making a run of the bestest password t-shirts anyway. (Joe is already wearing one, but his uses the early rendering, which doesn't look as pleasing to the eye.)

This is all a joke. Please don't actually use this password. And don't use http://www.passwordmeter.com - their ideas about what makes strong passwords are kind of silly. More importantly, it's not a good idea to put your passwords into random websites.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

Faking Domain with AdWords

I just saw this add in gmail:

Note the URL: "www.UCBerkeley.edu/Negotiations". Seems too good to be true, doesn't it. Also, why "ucberkeley.edu" and not "berkeley.edu"? Indeed, when you click on the link, you get taken to a different domain (galimagroup.com). The domain that is shown (ucberkeley.edu) is registered to UC Berkeley but is not live:

But I am worried about the implications here. It seems that AdWords allows the advertiser to show a domain that actually isn't theirs (or simply doesn't exist) in order to attract the viewer. Great. Note that since the actual link gets routed through Google, you actually have no idea where you'll end up after you click on the web. It's not often that I am tempted to click on an ad in gmail, but the next time this temptation arises, I'll make sure to resist it.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

Hi, Hillary, Calling You Back

Hi Hillary!

Sorry I didn't pick up the phone when you called this morning. I was still in bed and you called my house number, which I don't give to anyone and for which I pay an extra $2 a month to AT&T to not sell it out. So, I was guessing it was just telemarketers. And then I checked my messages the evening and realized it was you! Oh my god, you called me!

Listen, I disagree with you on many issues. I said before that it's not cool for you to run for your third term (or is it Bill that's running for his, I keep getting confused about this one). And I am still a little bothered by your thinking that destroying Iraq on false pretence was a great idea. (Same with your support for America's brain-dead embargo of Cuba, BTW.) But whatever, the personal call that woke me up this morning totally makes me think it's not such a big deal.

I think I forgot to mention that I am not a US citizen and I don't vote here. Nor would I have voted for you, even with this total change of heart thanks for your message. (Hey, no offence, but there is too much in the balance here.) But listen, let's get lunch or something, and sort out our differences.

You didn't leave a number for me to call you back at, so, call me again, just not as early in the morning.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

Go Obama!

If you get to vote in the elections next Tuesday (and remember that about 6.3 billion of us get no say in choosing the guy who will decide who gets bombed next), please vote for Obama. Not just because the Clintons already got to run the world for two terms. Not because the Clintons are willing to do anything for political gain, including telling Latino Americans to not vote to "a black candidate." But because the US has f**cked up way too much in the recent years and it would take a noticeable public U-turn for the US to regain any sort of moral authority. And the world needs United States with moral authority.

You might ask: why do I care. I don't have to put Canadian flag on my backpack when I travel around the world. (Of course, there are countries that hate Russia too, but that's a different story.) The reason is that while I am quite critical of many things in the US, I think many countries in the world need change more than US does, and Russia is one of them. Some years ago, one could point to something in Russia and say: "We've got to do it differently." We should have fair elections like in the United States. We should give people fair trial like in the United States. We should treat people of different races as equals, like in the United States. We need more transparency in the government, like in the US. Everyone knew that this image of the US was a bit of an idealization, but the US didn't go out of its way to show the world how silly it is to idealize it. Then came Rwanda, Monica and the war in Yugoslavia. Then Iraq, then Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib. Right now, to criticize something in Russia and point to the US as an example of how it could be done better is to make an utter fool out of oneself.

I think the world needs a bit more idealism, and this idealism needs to start in the US, as Europe is just a bit too cowardly and self-centered. US needs a president that would not just pledge to make less idiotic mistakes while bombing other countries and to lie more coherently to the UN. US needs a president that could say that US got problems and will be working to fix them and gain moral authority that could help make the world a better place.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

Alternative Subway Maps

I spent a week in NY around the New Years Eve, which gave me ample opportunities to complain about NY subway. Don't get me wrong, I wish San Francisco had something like that instead of the joke that we call "BART," but when I compare NY subway with real subway systems, like the one in Moscow, many flaws seem apparent. The main of those for me is utter lack of "user-friendliness." NY subway is with anyone but the first time user in mind. Consider, for example, that there are no maps in the stations, so you basically have to take your chances with a train, and then in the train find out that you got on an express. Not that the maps are any good. Which brings me to the main story. I mentioned my frustration with the NY subway map to a friend and he mentioned that one designer has been campaigning for an alternative.

It does seem to me that the "KICK" map since 2004. It's a big improvement, in my opinion, and brings a semblance of order to what at the base is a completely chaotic subway network.

Last night I run into an alternative map of Moscow subway on a Russian blog. The first below is a part of the official map, the second is the redesigned. Click on both images to see them full-size.

I agree with the author of the alternative diagram that his version is both easier to understand and is also more pleasing esthetically than the traditional "bike chain" version. As he says: "The diagram looks simple, clean and light. The subway appears to be what it should seem like to a person - a magic teleportation system."

So, I am glad the Moscow subway now also has a diagram worthy of being framed and put on a wall.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

I Already Hate AT&T

I finally managed to connect to the Internet in our new place at Berkeley and what better way to celebrate this than to rant about the company that got me online. The installation process leaves me with a feeling that AT&T have carefully thought about the different types of customers that might order its service and made sure that the installation process annoys every market segment.

You think you are a computer nerd who can set it up by yourself? We didn't think so: here is a CD that you'll guide you through the process one slow step at a time. You won't be able to connect without it.

Oh, you are the type who actually want to be walked through step by step? Well, we'll include just enough faulty equipment that our installation instructions won't work. So, you'll have to figure it out on your own, but we won't tell you how. BTW, you think you are so smart that you can tell apart a phone cable and an Ethernet cable? Guess what, we made sure to refer to the phone cable as the "gray data cable." And in case you are the type who likes to have things identified by colors, we made sure that the "gray data cable" is actually green!

Oh, your installation process didn't work? Just call us and someone who doesn't speak English will be happy to assist you. But guess what, among the faulty equipment we supplied you with is a full set of faulty phone filters - just to make sure that you can't use your phone and your DSL modem at the same time. So, think again, maybe trial and error is the way to go.

Oh, and now that we've convinced you that we are an incompetent bunch, give us the administrator password to your computer. We want to install a few things. Don't worry, we won't screw it up.

Comments

Please leave your comments.

Raspberry Caipirinhas

I've talked about passion fruit caipirinhas on the blog, as well as the various other fruits one can use. I forgot to mention in the latter post, but a focus group that we used to test caipirinhas made with lime, strawberry, passion fruit, kiwi, pine apple and persian lime concluded that Persian lime is the best fruit you can use. Persian lime is a bit larger than a "normal" lime ("key lime"), and is a less bitter. I've never seen Persian limes sold in US, the American readers are out of luck here.

That said, the Persian lime's position at the top did not last long. Having returned from Brazil in August and unable to find Persian lime (or passion fruit for that matter), I resorted to trying raspberries. And the conclusion is: nothing beats a raspberry caipirinha.

Comments

Please leave your comments.