andylockran’s blog

Using the Long Tail

Posted by Andy under BECTA, Control, Digital Freedom, Hypothesising, Linux, Marketing, Microsoft, Personal, Personal, Political, SBLUG Planet, Software, Tech Geek, Ubuntu

Clay Shirky provides a fascinating insight into how a collaborative approach utilises more skills, and empowers more people than the old institutional model. Rather than coming from an Open Source background, he uses the example of Flickr to convey his point (and then takes a stab at Ballmer). It’s an interesting presentation, and shows how you can make the most of the information/data available in a field.

However, there’s an angle to his talk which isn’t covered in this short presentation; which I imagine is due to time constraints. That’s the opportunity for cross-discipline collaboration, and what that means for us.

One of the more interesting points made by Clay, is that he poses the current ‘$1 million question’ - Are Bloggers Journalists? - and then turns it on its head.

Journalists, and journalism came about to fulfil a societal need. How to communicate with the majority of the population. Gutenburgs’s printing press was a percursor to European journalism, and for the last 400 years or so, journalism has been an integral part of mass communication.

However, we now have a little something called the internet - which, as Gutenburg’s printing press did all those years ago, revolutionise access to information. The infrastructure required to become a ‘messenger to the people’ is in place for people to with it as they wish - create facebook pages, youtube videos, or wordpress blogs. Once the infrastructure becomes freely accessible, the applications of it become massively varied.

In Clay’s talk, he mentions a ratio. 80% of people do 20% of the work, and vice versa, using a lovely graph of the long tail:

An Example of the Long Tail Graph

Though a graph illustrating a different set of data, the concept can be re-applied to Open Source Project contribution. The Green area applies to the ‘core’ developers, who may even be employed by the project. The Orange applied to the people directly involved with the project, and perhaps some power users, and the Red section applied to everyone else.

The wonderful thing about the Red section, is that you get lots and lots of people contributing very little. However, it’s these people who can really add value to a project.  With so many projects now existing across different distributions, each system becomes pretty unique.  Where bugfixes and irrationailities can be spotted and reported on by end-users running their unique system - the value added is huge.

There’s also a question of expertise.  The guys in the Red Section are the programming experts, who are commiting code.  Those in the Orange Section are the users/implementers of the code - so will typically have a clear understanding of the direction of the project and the needs that the project needs to fulfil. Whereas in the Red Section are people who use the package, but often alongside other packages of greater interest/relevance to their line of work.  It’s this cross-discipline collaboration that is unprecedencted.

Getting average non-geeky end users to use Open Projects is a massive challenge, but one that is going to bring massive benefits to Open Source Software.  Some people talk of the digital tipping point from a technical standpoint - “Woo, when we get this critical mass we’ll overtake Microsoft within the next 5 years.”  To be honest that doesn’t bother me. Judge MS as you wish, but that’s not why I’m here.  I’m here because the potential contribution that end users can make to Global Knowledge, through Open Projects.

It’s going to be possible for a biological scientist and and engineer to be reviewing the same problem for different purposes.  It’s unlikely that these two disciplines would ever communicate were it not be for this open project, and it’s also possible that only with the combined knowledge and expertise of these two disciplines, the problem can be solved.

This is what excites me most about free software, and to think we’re only just at the beginning.

Time to learn GPG

Posted by Andy under BBC, Conspiracy Theory, Control, Digital Freedom, Freedom, Personal, Political, Software, Tech Geek, Ubuntu

I think it’s about time that people became aware of the advantages of the GnuPrivacyGuard.

Why?

According the to BBC the government are considering keeping a database of every phone call made and every email sent. Now, it’s already possible to do this with your current email communications - and very few people bother to encrypt their mail to make sure that only the recipient can read it.

Email passes over a network in plain text - thereby anything sent in a email is easy to ’sniff’ out and read. With gpg - you encrypt the mail with a password - then the only person that can read the mail is the person that knows that password.. the recipient of the email.

It’s a clever system, so here’s a link to Red Hat Magazine’s article on GPG.

For a Windows-based solution, try WinGPG.

If we can’t change the system, then we at least need to protect ourselves from it.

Rest in Peace Guido

Posted by Andy under Africa, Digital Freedom, Freedom, Linux, Microsoft, Personal, Projects, Tech Geek, Ubuntu

What a surreal experience.

This morning, I logged into Google Webmaster tools to check what people have been searching for when accessing my blog. One item stood out more than others.

Guido Sohne facebook

Guido Sohne has only been mentioned in my blog once, on an article he wrote entitled “Things have gone too far.” I guess in some ways this article is part of what inspires me to work with ‘free software.’

Guido’s philosophy re: free software

After clicking on the link on google to see whereabouts I came in the rankings, I was shocked to see that Guido has unfortunately passed away, 6 days ago aged only 34.

Rest in Peace Guido.

Obituary of a friend.

Can a cat survive falling from a plane?

Posted by Andy under Cat, Hypothesising, Personal, Terminal Velocity

Interesting discussion tonight on whether a cat can survive falling out of a plane.

Seriously.

Not one for boring discussions, this was initially proposed by me and -a first- seconded by another friend.  With two people objecting to the idea that a cat could survive, and lively debate ensued.  For survival TEAM A (indented). versus  “PETA’s not going to be happy” (TEAM B).

The first bone of contention was the terminal velocity.  TEAM B reckoned that the cat would hit the ground so fast it’s die for definate on impact.  TEAM A came up with the following:

The cat has a terminal velocity of 60mph, compared to a human’s T.V. of 120mph.

Ok, so we’ve got our first ‘fact’ agreed upon.  However, 60mph is still reckoned to be too fast for a cat to survive.

When the cat reaches it’s terminal velocity, it no longer sense that there are forces acting upon it and so relaxes.  We then end up with a ’spread eagled cat.’  This increases air resistance, so the cat does in fact slow down.

In what was probably a fair comment, TEAM B reckoned that even at 60mph a spread-eagled cat would have horrific internal injuries and still die.  Especially a spread-eagled cat whose stomach would hit the floor first.

TEAM A suggested that a spread eagled cat would infact be in a very good position to absorb alot of the impact.  The assumption by TEAM B that the spread eagled cat’s stomach would hit the ground first we hypothesised to be incorrect.  As the cat would not be able to put it’s legs perpendicular to the angle of descent (i.e. horizontal) they would provide the first point of contact, and absorb energy (unfortunately, likely breaking bones/tendons/muscle tissue) in the process.

TEAM B pounced at this point and suggested that a broken bone could quite easily be severe enough to cut an artery and kill the cat.

TEAM A responded saying that if the cat’s leg muscles were to absorb 20mph of velocity on impact (and not break), then there would be only a 30-40mph impact on the cat as a whole. Which spread out over the surface area of the cat should be enough to leave it stunned but not dead.

The night ended in a stalemate, with neither team wanting to concede defeat.  None of the debaters were prepared to test the hypothesis empirically, as none of us are interesting in cruelty to animals.  This debate was purely about the physical ability of a cat’s muscular and skeletal structure.  Something which is pretty amazing.

Please feel free to add your voice to the debate in the comment box below:

I did, however, find this rather shocking video.. I guess only the russians could get away with this.

Cat Jumps off a Plane and Lands on it’s legs

Who reads blogs?

Posted by Andy under BBC, Birmingham, CentOS, Chaos, Control, Debian, Digital Freedom, Freedom, Gentoo, Linux, Marketing, PCI DSS, Personal, Political, Projects, Python, SBLUG Planet, Software, Stupid, Tech Geek, Ubuntu, openLDAP

I was having a discussion with a few mates in the pub this evening about my blogging ‘antics.’ They’ve berated me for blogging before, but as it’s becoming more and more widespread I can see them getting more interested in my motivations for ‘blogging.’

One of the friends commented that it was purely the fact that he knew me that made the blog interesting. For someone that didn’t know me, the blog would be pretty dull and of no consequence. At this point, another chipped in saying - “Only bloggers read blogs.” Is this true? I don’t know, but I don’t think so.

My motivation for starting the blog was that it was a place where I could share my technical insights. Not profound insights such as the advent of structural-object-abstract programming methods that I’ve just decided are going to be the Web 3.0 - but short howto’s and the like, and to publish a few ‘Gotchas’ - problems that have few symptoms and a nice easy solution - but take hours of work to solve. I blog advice - There’s nothing quite comparable experience.

(un)Fortunately, which ever way you personally look at it - my blogging has branched out to cover all sorts of things. From the time when some guy smashed the window of my car, to re-living and walking through my car accident in 1999, to a short article on why to avoid Red Hat’s bundled openLDAP implementation because it’s crap.

I think it’s an interesting concept, for non-bloggers and bloggers alike. Who reads blogs? If you have a regular commentator on your blog, do you add him to your blogroll as a thanks for lifting your self-esteem by having him visit your blog? Do you think you have a regular readership, or just random visitors popping in and out after being directed from Google?

I don’t think it’s a negative thing that bloggers read blogs. It’s great. From the attendance at the spontaneous meet-up last Friday, it’s clear to me that there’s a nice little community of bloggers in Birmingham. However, this is a meeting of a cross-section of the readership who it’s worth meeting face-to-face in order to better your own blog.

Is blogging journalism? Is it art? Is it a cry for help from some pathetic moron wanting to share his story with the world? Is it ‘new media’? Does it matter?

I blog tech because I think some people read it and it helps them - and also as an easy reference for me. I blog ‘about me’ as a way to vent some thoughts and get some feedback from an audience who I think would be interested. This audience is dynamic, therefore I categorise my posts different to respect that.

When doing my Psychology degree, one of the things we covered was ‘online personalities and freedom of information.’ This blog is in the public domain. If it were a diary, having it leaked would immediately bring headlines of ’scandal and gossip.’ My blog is sort of a base for my online identity. ‘andylockran’ lives here. I happen to pop up on a mailing list or a forum or IRC and you want to know more about me. Much of it is here. It’s a bit like ‘CV 2.0.’ The web is my field - if I don’t market myself well on the web, how the hell can I expect anyone to be able to trust me to market their products on the web?

The best thing about it for me is the feedback, both positive and negative. Setting up a blog exposes you to both - and it gives you the opportunity to have a voice.

FixMyStreet.com

Posted by Andy under Birmingham, Personal, Political

I first came across fixmystreet.com about 18 months ago.

It’s a simple idea. You report (and publish) issues with your local area on the internet, and FixMyStreet.com reports the problems to the council. The council then are both:

1. Notified of the Problem
2. Embarrassed by the publication on the internet
3. Under pressure to get the problem solved.

In my opinion this is a win-win situation for residents. I have so far made one report, and am seeing progress on getting it fixed. See my report here.

Especially for those of you in the Brummie area - let’s sign up and Fix Our Streets!

OOXML - Problems for the masses

Posted by Andy under Apple, BCS, BECTA, Control, Digital Freedom, Freedom, Gentoo, Gnome, Ingots, Linux, Marketing, Microsoft, NHS, Personal, Political, Projects, SBLUG Planet, Software, Stupid, Sun, Tech Geek, Ubuntu

It’s ironic really.  Tomorrow the ISO council are likely to vote OOXML to be fast-tracked to a standard.  There’s been good coverage on Groklaw and by Zeth Green.  One of the problems with technical decisions like this is that they really don’t get the average person in the street interested.  It’s only when problems occur that they realise there’s an issue - and they expect their IT guy/friend/consultant to be able to fix it for them.

Well, today I had a call from my mate - saying that he’d sent a company his CV, but they’d written back to request that he send it from Microsoft Word.  He did.  He was using Office 2007.  I smelt the problem right away.

He was using OOXML, and they weren’t.  At this juncture, one has two options.

a) Try and get the organisation you’re sending the document to to download the “OOXML Compatibility Pack.”   Your chances of success are small.

b) Save the file in a different format.  RECOMMENDED!

Here’s how:  See the list at the bottom of the page for recommended (and not-recommended) defaults.

To change default file save options in Office Excel 2007

1. Double-click Microsoft Office Excel 2007, double-click Excel Options, and click Save.
2. In the right pane, right-click Save Excel files as, and select Properties.
3. In Save files in this format, select Enabled.
4. In the drop-down box, select a default file save format.
5. Click Apply to save the settings.

To change default file save options in Office PowerPoint 2007

1. Double-click Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2007, double-click PowerPoint Options, and click Save.
2. In the right pane, right-click Save files in this format, and select Properties.
3. In Save files in this format, select Enabled.
4. In the drop-down box, select a default file save format.
5. Click Apply to save the settings.

To change default file save options in Office Word 2007

1. Double-click Microsoft Office Word 2007, double-click Word Options, and click Save.
2. In the right pane, right-click Save files in this format, and select Properties.
3. In Save files in this format, select Enabled.
4. In the drop-down box, select a default file save format.
5. Click Apply to save the settings.

The possible value for the default file save format include:

For Excel:

• Office Excel 2007 workbook (.xlsx), (NO)
• Office Excel 2007 macro-enabled workbook (.xlsm), (NO)
• Office Excel 2007 binary workbook (.xlsb), (NO)
• Web page (.htm, .html),
• Excel 97-2003 workbook (.xls), (YES)
• Excel 5.0/95 workbook (.xls)

For PowerPoint:

• Office PowerPoint 2007 presentation (.pptx), (NO)
• Office PowerPoint 2007 macro-enabled presentation (.pptm), (NO)
• PowerPoint 97-2003 presentation (.ppt) (YES)

For Word:

• Office Word 2007 document (.docx), (NO)
• Office Word 2007 macro-enabled document (.docm), (NO)
• Office Word 2007 macro-free template (.dotx), (NO)
• Office Word 2007 macro-enabled template (.dotm), (NO)
• Single file Web page (.mht), (NO)
• Web page (.htm, .html),
• Filtered Web page (.htm, .html),
• Rich text format (.rtf), (YES)
• Plain text (.txt),
• Word 97-2003 document (.doc), (YES)
• Word 97-2003 template (.dot),
• Flat XML document (.xml),
• Word 6.0/95 document (.doc),
• Word 6.0/95 Chinese (simplified) document (.doc),
• Word 6.0/95 Chinese (traditional) document (.doc),
• Word 6.0/95 Japanese document (.doc),
• Word 6.0/95 Korean document (.doc),
• Word 97-2002 and Word 6.0/95 rich text format (RTF) (.doc),
• Word 5.1 for Macintosh (.mcw),
• Word 5.0 for Macintosh (.mcw),
• Word 2.x for Windows (.doc),
• Works 4.0 for Windows (.wps),
• WordPerfect 5.x for Windows (.doc),
• WordPerfect 5.1 for DOS (.doc)

Of course, if you want to make sure you don’t come across this problem in the future - choose an open and free format - and ask your friends/colleagues/clients to do so too.  There’s already a documented format standard in *.odf.

Download your cross-platform Free Office Suite (completely legally) from OpenOffice.org 

It’s not always about the money.

Posted by Andy under AVFC, Personal

Aston Villa are finalising a shirt sponsorship deal with children’s charity, Acorns, that will see the club forfeit up to £2m to carry the name of the children’s hospice charity on their shirts next season.

News of the World

The Ingots

Posted by Andy under BECTA, Digital Freedom, Freedom, Ingots, Linux, Marketing, Microsoft, Personal, Projects, Software, Ubuntu, University

Want to do an ECDL but don’t run MS Office? There is an alternative.

The INGOTS

QCA accredited in the UK, and coming to countries all over the world - the InterNational Grades in Office Technology is a platform-agnostic approach to computer education.

It’s projects like this which will help the widespread adoption of non-MS products in both Education and Public Sector institutions. Please take a look and consider mentioning the benefits to your friends/relatives/neighbours/milkman/strangers.

Great Work.

I’m off on Holiday

Posted by Andy under Chaos, France, Funny, Insurance, Personal, Skiing, Tech Geek

Ah man.. It took some time to make this decision - but I’ve decided on my course of action.

I’m off on holiday from Saturday 9th, until Sunday 17th Feb.  I’m going skiing in the French Alps, and despite their being an internet connection - think it’s best if I don’t blog for the rest of the week.

Hopefully it’ll provide people with a nice break from my post on the relative planets - and hopefully wanting more when I return.

I’m really looking forward to my break, as I feel I need to go and recharge my batteries.  Working in the open source world isn’t a normal 9-5.  Many times I’ve been up past two doing random ‘generic’ FLOSS stuff - and it’s taken it’s toll.  I’ll probably have to start keeping timesheets for my general activities to stop me from going overboard.

If anyone has anything they’d like me to cover when I return - it’d be good to have some direction for when I get back.

I hope anyone else going on Holiday has a good time, and those of you at work - just wait until you’re on holiday and I’m not.

Peace.