bluebones.net

It has long been my contention that a WHERE clause on a SQL statement should be mandatory. Even if it just forces the programmer to add “WHERE TRUE” to the end of the statement.

This site is currently a prime example of why a mandatory WHERE clause would be A Good Thing(tm): my new “edit story” page has just run an update with no WHERE clause and set every story to be exactly the same. If its fixed when you read this, that’s because I’ve got to my laptop and done a restore.

Of course, this is also an illustration of the fact that every web site needs a development version. I do have one, its just on my laptop and that’s not here right now!

While there is still no filesharing app as good as Napster was, the quality of the apps and networks out there is slowly improving despite the best efforts of advertisers and the RIAA.

The best recent improvement is the release of KaZaALite

KaZaALite is an ad-free, spyware-free version of KaZaA that runs on the same network. It subtitles itself “P2P as it should be” and with good reason (although its still missing simple UI ingredients like Ctrl+Left Click to select multiple items individually and Shift+Left Click to select groups on the Traffic page, meaning you have to cancel each download individually)

In fact, KaZaALite is so good and quite hard to find to download so I’ve decided to make it possible to download KaZaALite from this site

(These notes have also been added to my filesharing page.)

The current recording industry trend of swamping filesharing networks with looped versions of new songs (seen with Eminem’s ‘The Eminem Show’ and No Doubt’s single ‘Hella Good’) seems to have reached new heights with the Prodigy’s new record Baby’s Got a Temper

In an independent little survey I just ran, of the 20 files available for download on iMesh NONE were the correct, ROHYPNOL-mentioning real version. There were two or three non-looped versions but they were all radio/mtv versions with parts of the chorus dubbed out. There was even a version recorded with someone talking in Russian (?) over the top of it. Creative, eh?

So what next for the filesharers, is it off to sites like www.sharereactor.com and filesharing networks like eDonkey? Or will the unavailability of the latest singles merely deter the younger element?

We shall see.

My review of The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat by Oliver Sacks now online

Yesterday (22 June 2002) I ate in the Lucknow Tandoori Restaurant on Newington Green Road (tel. 020 7354
1078). The place itself is nothing special but the food is excellent. It does the best indian takeaway I’ve ever had and delivers too.

I just thought there ought to be something on the web about it as I couldn’t find anything except address/telephone number when I searched for it yesterday to show the people we were going with. I know it was mentioned in Time Out as John Hegley‘s favourite restaurant but I felt it needed a token online presence!

My review of Vintage Wodehouse by P.G. Wodehouse (ed. Richard Usborne) now online

Whistling is useless but being able to whistle loudly (for a taxi, to call your friend across the street, for help even) is very useful. In trying to learn this skill I’ve scoured the web. I found only one site that was helpful and that seems to have disappeared now so I have put its text up here for anyone else like me who was trying to find out how to do it without buying a book

My introduction to dogma a wickedly old school variant of d&d is now online. Run from the kobolds! Kill your friends! Worship Gygax!

I don’t know why I didn’t think of this earlier or hear about but you know those sites like The New York Times that force you to login but you gain no benefit by doing so? Well people have registered generic/generic or username/password so you can just tap that in and off you go.

I heard about this on slashdot or metafilter I can’t remember which.

This is the results of a quick survey I’ve done of some major websites to see how far this has gone. My suggestion is to register username/password as username and password if you ever have to register anywhere again (obviously excluding those sites which take credit card details or where registering brings an actual benefit).

Site	generic/generic?	username/password?
java.sun.com	No	Yes
newyorktimes.com	Yes	No
ibm.com	No	Yes

I was at Extreme Computing 2002 (Need to Know‘s 5th birthday party) the other day where stand.org.uk was launched. It seems that its already had (or helped with) a major success – the indefinite postponement of the RIP s22 Order that would have given access to traffic data to dozens of government departments. Their front page right now (June 19, 2002 story) has a very interesting piece on how its not so hard to influence your MP as you might think. Very heartening. If you’re American you can trundle off to eff.org who do similar good things for you guys (actually all over – they had a speaker at the ntk gig who was very good and I’ve sent them some money).