Archive for December, 2005
I thought the last day of the year would be a good opportunity to share with you an article that I look forward to every year and that always appears in the last issue of the Linux Weekly News. If you don’t know that website, maybe it’s about time, at least if you’re interested in Linux and Free Software and especially if you are more than an average user. And if you like it, they have a subscription based model that gives you access to the weekly news features two weeks ahead of non-paying visitors. They are decent folks who use the money they make through subscriptions to pay the editors a very low salary – I guess if those folks weren’t so dedicated to the work they do at LWN, they might have easily found better paying jobs somewhere else.
So without further ado, here’s a link to the LWN 2005 Linux and Free Software timeline – it’s subscriber-only content made available to you through the “teaser” program which allows me as a subscriber to let you have a look at it… if you like it, do consider a subscription, they start at only $5/month.
Technorati : Linux, software, timeline
December 31st, 2005
Even having heard a few songs from their newest album at Soul Survivor this summer, “The Mission Bell” still managed to completely take me by surprise. If it wasn’t for the unmistakeable voice of Martin Smith, I would have had a hard time telling that this is indeed the work of Delirious? – and I’ve been following the band for the last almost ten years. Don’t get me wrong – I think it’s absolutely fantastic, the guys have managed to brilliantly reinvent themselves in many ways while still keeping that “special something” that makes their music so unique. Probably the best thing I’ve heard since “King of Fools”.
The thing that probably struck me most, apart from their fresh, sometimes daring new arrangements, is the lyrical depth of the new songs. Past albums have always seen a mix of a few songs going deeper and most never leaving the shallow (with the exception of “Glo” and the “Cutting Edge” compilation, but those were made for a different market) – this time, there is absolutely no doubt what the guys are singing about. And they are not afraid to take on today’s “hot topics” – “Our God Reigns” for example talks about abortion, HIV and our vanity culture. I love the honesty in some of the songs – there seem to be a lot more questions than answers this time.
Musically, the songs range from just great to bordering on brilliant. A song like “Solid Rock”, with guest vocalist Tobymac speaking the lyrics of a 19th century hymn to the very edgy backing loops is just something so totally unexpected that I had to listen to it twice to even recognize it as a Delirious? song. And my absolute favourite, “Miracle Maker” is sending shivers down my spine (in a very positive way) when I just think about it.
If you liked Delirious? before, this one is for you – but be prepared for some new twists and enjoy the freshness of their sound. And if you didn’t like them very much before, give them another try, you might be in for a positive surprise!
Technorati : CD, christian, music, review
December 24th, 2005
The question may sound a bit weird – but apparently more and more of the DVD producers of the world seem to think that if you buy a DVD, you must be a movie-pirate. Why else would they include anti-piracy trailers on the DVD? So if they think that’s what I do, should I just stop buying DVDs and resort to illegal copies instead?
No, that’s not what I’m going to do, so there’s no point in getting a search warrant and trying to find any illegal copies in my home. I don’t have any because I do believe that a movie I find worth watching is actually worth paying for (or else I can wait until it’s old enough to be shown on free TV). And I do realise that part of our economy depends on me buying DVDs… and that’s ok – unlike some other people I actually agree that it’s ok to pay for things even if you can (illegally) have them for free. But what really annoys me is that if I do that, I have to live with being treated like a criminal by those who provide music and video media to me. I don’t care how the media companies get their message out that piracy is wrong – but please send it to those who need to see it, not those owning legitimate copies of your works. The same goes for those lovely digital “rights” management tools that are finding their ways onto CDs these days. No, I do not want to keep the original copy of the CD in my car and at least in the jurisdiction I live in it’s perfectly legal to make a backup copy for this purpose. If I still can, that is. Copy protection on CDs is such a joke… the format wasn’t designed with that in mind and any solution I’ve seen so far can either be circumvented quite easily or (in the famous Sony way) is so intrusive that you’d be better off not buying the CD in question at all.
Maybe, just maybe record companies should stop complaining about the big, bad internet ruining their market and start producing decent music again. I personally don’t download music from the internet, but I must admit I can understand why people do. If there’s a maximum of two good songs on a CD these days, why would I even want to buy the entire disc? Let’s face it, most people who illegally download music would have never bought it on disc – so all the figures about those giant “losses” that record companies have because of illegal copying are totally exaggerated. You can’t lose something you never had…
Technorati : CD, DVD, ethics, legal, privacy
December 22nd, 2005
Well, well, well… it’s a few days before Christmas and I’m finishing up my work for the year. Working with OM has been and continues to be a great pleasure, even more so as I am still able to work from home, which is a great blessing. I feel that this year we have made some major progress with the Linux project – not all of it will be immediately visible in the next version of our internal Linux distro (which is due to be released next month), but we’ve put a lot of the infrastructure in place for the version of our distro that’s intended for release to the general public. The build system is such a great tool, nicely intergrated with our CVS and building new CD sets (and jigdo files) in about an hour whenever we need them. Reliable testers are great as well, thanks Mats, you’ve been great. And having Tom in the UK now coordinating our testing is a big answer to prayer as well.
On the personal side, it’s been a great year as well. Can’t really name it all… the trip to Mali in January, Soul Survivor with Mari and Steve in August, good friendships getting even better… yeah, I guess I can’t really complain 
. Life could be a lot more complicated than it is at the moment. Of course the one complication I wouldn’t be too unhappy about would be for that special lady to come into my life… but hey, I’m still looking 
.
The next year is promising to be busy… already have two trips booked before March, first to OM’s Global Orientation conference in January (which I’m very much looking forward to because I get to meet loads of people, not unimportant for someone working in the solitude of his living room most of the time) and then to my office in Carlisle in February, another meeting I’m quite looking forward to because it means getting together as a team again for a few days. And I’ve even managed to somehow make sure that none of my trips so far interferes with my leading the band in the “Service on Sunday” at my church…
Anyway, that’s all for now – just wanted to get something down before Christmas. Not sure if there’s gonna be anything else, so I’ll wish you a very great and blessed Christmas right now… take some time for a little break and think about what Christmas really means!
December 22nd, 2005
OK, here we go… the first post to my new blog. Nothing exciting here yet, except for new software. So I’m hoping to write some more here now, my old blog hadn’t been updated in years and it just felt like I needed a fresh new start. Hope you will like what you read, send me feedback if you like or link to posts here if you feel them to be beneficial to your readers as well…
December 22nd, 2005