Fibonacci Jacket

The beauty of Fibonacci deserves a jacket
http://www.mathstyle.com/sc/pc/viewPrd.asp?idcategory=19&idproduct=28.

Sybase guys know this number. Hmm, they used to include that spiral in their logo.

But yikes, I am NOT going to pay $300+.


The most fun numbers that I know of are π, the golden ratio φ and e... There must be other very fun things out there, but may be too hard for me to comprehend.

Tour de Flex

Flash has revolutionized the web from plain old HTML... but it wasn't so easy to learn. 1. the tool isn't free, 2. it seems so graphic oriented, it isn't write-compile-run like the typical programmer is used to.

Flex is a very cool Rich-Internet-Application tool. It is not so new anymore, now in version 3 (soon version 4). It also creates SWF files. What I like about Adobe is that it encourage you to learn its tools, with tutorials nicely available and Flex doesn't look so hard to learn. Its compiler is free, yea, the Flex Builder will cost you some money but you don't have to have it.

See the Tour de Flex to see its features.

It is much like HTML combined with javascript, so the web programmer should find it fairly easy to master. It's got all sorts of animation things that are hard to do built in, such as fading, glowing, zooming, etc

It is NOT just a sandbox like java applets, it can communicate to other urls or webservices, making rich application possible...

What's wrong with this chess set?

I saw the Barnes and Nobles' classic wooden chess set. (Here is the link).
Hmm, seems like a good looking set that is reasonably priced.

But what's wrong with the package?


This photographer NEVER played chess. The lower right hand corner should be WHITE!
I have seen more than 1 set that has the wrong set up.

Though I think an elegant chess set is a nice-to-have item, but no one plays with me && I can't afford a very elegant set.

Studying Spring

Just got the book Spring in Action. Short term goal is to read it and understand it. Spring/Hibernate is now a must have skill for Java developers. No Spring => no work => starvation.

Yes, there are plenty of resources on the web, but nothing beats in depth discussion on paper.

Spring has been around for a while and introduces 2 buzz terms: Aspect Oriented Programming and Inversion of Control. But the real accomplishment is acceptance. People want it.

Opinion: In the ideal world, there should be NO XML configs. Everything can be configured using a UI tool. Perhaps someone (ME perhaps) should come up with it and further simplify programming.

The Mαth βook

This Mαth βook is an awesome work. It is one-page-a-topic, listing milestones of discoveries. It is colorful and well laid out. Of course, given one page a topic, it can't go a lot in depth. This is a perfect gift item for math enthusiasts. I have only heard of perhaps half of what's in there when I skimmed through it.

Math does not have to be boring. Colorful pages helps. When is the last time you saw a colorful math book?

Real math often demand only 1 color: the chalk on the board (and often ugly looking notations and equations)

Goodbye Sam

Sad news: Patrick Swayne died. This is the news link.

I rarely watch any movies. Ghost was memorable and just was very very good.
You are a legacy, Mr. Swayne. His quote: "My work ... is my legacy."

Do YOU have a legacy item?

When human go, they want to leave behind name (legacy). Sparrows go, they leave behind their sound. 人去留名,雁去留聲

Virus Attack and Registry Corruption

A long time ago I may have got a boot sector virus and other evil things. McAfee is quite worthless (ok, although not completely worthless). It simply isn't adequate.

So I went to a list of free anti-virus software to see if anything that is free and effective.

I tried one of the anti-virus product AVAST. After I installed it, it whacked my IE.
I can't open IE, it says there are permission issue. Fine! I don't need IE. Firefox works for me. Then later on I *HAVE TO* use IE for a site that I must go to, ok, I'll try to fix it by installing new IE8. Nope, can't. Same permission issue. Then I clicked on the help html for IE8. ooh it tells me to clean my registry with a command. Ok I obey. I *trust* Microsoft. So Start->Run and paste in the command. It says it is cleaning up the registry... Then it says there is an error and must restart. Ok, fine, restart.

Then BOOM. Can't start Windows anymore. BLACK screen of death, just the mouse pointer can move. Safe mode you say?, BLUE screen of death with the error below:

*** STOP: 0x0000007B (0XF7C9B524,0XC0000034,0X00000000,0X00000000)

Safe Mode with previous working setting you say? BOOM. BLACK screen of death.

The theoretical solution of course is follow more crap such as
http://support.microsoft.com/?id=307545

How can I trust it? I am NOT going to follow! What will I do to the crippled machine?

I will buy a hard disk enclosure, back up the files I need on another computer, and do a clean new install on the crippled one! It is good that the file system isn't broken, just the windows registry.

Lessons Learned
1. Back up often, especially when you suspect you have virus.
2. Save your install CDs
3. Use something better than McAfee