Fluid Flow

For years, I have been bothered by a bug on my server where it tries to connect to a non-existent local IP address. I had searched though my root database but never found the IP address. It turns out it was stored in another root that I never thought to check.

Today I was walking through the code, trying to fix another problem when the IP address kept popping up even after I had deleted it. I dug a little deeper and found it sitting in some 10 year old ancillary software. It was one of those bits that I never figured out quite what it did, but knew that it was somewhat important.

Well one of the things that it did was store some original values from when I first tested it out. Ten years later those values were still there and they have been causing the server to do extra work, waiting for a server that would never respond.

So I fixed the old database, updated the values and reset the preferences. Now two things are happening. First I am not seeing the request to the non existent IP address, and second the average server response time (which has always hung around a bothersome 75 seconds) is dropping.

Yes, there are too many little pieces to keep track of. But it looks like I may have fixed a number of problems today.

For years now, I have been collecting satellite photos that give me an idea of what the weather is going to be like tomorrow. I have also been getting the USGS’s reports of magnitude 5 and larger earthquakes and NOAH’s tsunami reports hourly.

I want more.

Dave Winer has been building hoses where news flows out in real time. I want this, I want a hose that shoves the pulse of the planet down my throat.

I want to know the tides, I want to know the wave heights, I want to know the wind speed, I want the sea temperature, the air temperature, I want the barometric pressure. I want the current moon phase, sunrise and set. Wind speed, wave period, migration patterns…

I want to know when everything happens. I want to be overwhelmed by data so I can try and sort it out later.

Ctein started an interesting conversation over at The Online Photographer this week with on the “Fermi Paradox” which is essentially if there are infinite of opportunities for intelligent life to be created over many billions of years, why haven’t we seen any evidence of it. Ctein rightly points out that this isn’t a paradox because we can’t comprehend the question and what it means. We don’t understand ourselves, so how is it possible to understand what other intelligence would be like.

There were lots of interesting comments to the post, but only a few that bordered on my question above, is intelligence sustainable? What if intelligence and self awareness ultimately leads to bickering and name calling to the point where nothing can be done. We have certainly achieved a state were large populations stop listening to the other side of an argument because the “arguments” are little more than grade school taunts.

Our technology to date is the result of unsustainable practices. Our intelligence drives our technology and our technology drives our understanding. But it isn’t a sustainable model.

What happens when our internet connection fails because there isn’t enough cheap energy to keep it running? What happens when there isn’t enough clean water to cool our data centers or quench our populations thirst?

This is nothing new. People have been pointing this out for generations. But each generation seems more inclined to bicker than find solutions or even hold intelligent conversations. And currently, we seem to have decided that it is more fun to bicker than even try.

This has likely been played out billions of times already. Perhaps this is the fate of intelligence in the universe. Given the odds, I would guess that a few have gone beyond this point. To get there, they are no doubt employing magic that we can’t imagine.

I seriously doubt that they are paying any attention to us. Perhaps they will saying “Oops, there went another one”, but I doubt they care.

Tour of California cycling race will return to San Jose, Santa Cruz: “North America’s biggest cycling event will return to San Jose for the seventh consecutive year when the 2012 Amgen Tour of California is held in May throughout the state, organizers announced Thursday.”

(Via Mercury News: News.)

After last year’s hiccups, the organizers have selected a weather-safe and ultimately dull central valley course for the seventh running of the Tour. A little imagination could have gone a long way to coming up with a compelling course. This course appears to be a rehash of 2010, which by any standard was dull.

I am not even sure I can get excited enough to drive 40 miles to watch it come into Santa Cruz. It isn’t a stage where the Tour can be decided. Stage 4 will be interesting with a number of climbs before dropping into Clovis. And having another finish on Mt Baldy will be good. But the rest of it comes off a little flat.

Snowy Plover – 2011

Snowy plovers show encouraging signs of recovery along Oregon coast: “A record 154 snowy plover chicks have fledged — or survived long enough to learn to fly — so far this year.”

(Via Oregon Local News.)

Hopefully, this large fledging cohort will be matched in California and Washington.

I haven’t found current population numbers, but an extra 154 certainly helps.

Today’s haul

Originally uploaded by Tom Clifton.

The results of five people working for three hours pulling thistles out of Mound Meadow at Point Lobos State Reserve.

The sad thing is that we only got about 2/3rds of the way through. So we will be back on Friday to finish the job.

With the introduction of the Lion operating system, Mac OS X has run through the big cats. So what is next from Apple? DSH! Yes, Domestic Short Hair is the operating system of the future.

DSH introduces the new Insistent Interface. You will no longer be able to ignore emails, Tweets, Facebook notifications, rss updates, etc. by switching applications. You will have to deal with them NOW!

Poop Box – the trash can metaphor has always been limited by its unlimited nature. You could drop things into the can and forget about them. With Poop Box, items in the box will fester and spill out onto the desktop. Using the Insistent Interface, it will force you to keep the box clean.

Full Sleep mode – DSH will sit idle for hours, preserving battery life and saving electricity. At random intervals DSH will complete all requested operations, including filling the Poop Box at 3 times your processors capabilities. After which, it will drop back into Full Sleep mode.

Slash! – Apple’s newest high speed interface. Slash uses your own blood cells to ensure data security while transferring you photos, movies, and music over your local network and the internet. Random sampling keeps you secure and your files moving at top speed.

California Condor – 2011

Condors vs. power lines, and for once, the condors win – San Jose Mercury News: ”

Crews from Pacific Gas & Electric have begun a project to bury nearly three miles of power lines in the scenic wilds of Big Sur — not to improve the views, but to protect the endangered California condor.
The $4.2 million job involves removing 46 wooden power poles and roughly 13,000 feet of overhead utility lines between now and December in Monterey County on the south side of Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park”

(Via San Jose Mercury News.)

Anything that helps the condors is good news. Thank you PG&E.

If you make a curry and only you taste it, is it really that good?

Not sure, but I really enjoyed last night’s curry.

Let me start by saying it was not from scratch, I used TJ’s yellow Thai curry sauce. I think I could do it from scratch, but that is a later exercise where I get to play with coconut milk and various curry spices.

What I did was chop up half an onion and four or five cloves of garlic and half a jalepeno pepper and sautéed them in a bit of oil over a medium flame. I added about a half teaspoon of cumin and two teaspoons of curry powder.

After about 5 minutes I increased the heat and added about a pound of chicken cut into about inch sized chunks (I use thigh meat but…) and cooked until the chicken looked cooked on the outside (about 5 minutes).

My second cheat was that I bought a bag of washed, cut, ready to cook broccoli and cauliflower and nuked it in the bag for 3 minutes. Add this to the mix along with the curry sauce and a bit of water (used to clean out the jar). Bring to a boil and reduce heat, and let simmer until you like the consistency.

My third cheat was that I served it over pre-cooked wild rice, nuked for a minute.

With all the cheating, it was pretty quick dinner. Enough work to make you feel involved, but not so much to be a chore. And also quite tasty.

Opinion: For farmers, efficient water use can only go so far: “For years, some professors and think-tank environmentalists have preached a one-size-fits-all solution to the water shortages harming California family farmers.”

(Via Mercury News: Opinion.)

“Some San Diego County farmers have reduced or eliminated production of strawberries and fresh vegetables. Others wonder whether agriculture in the county is approaching the tipping point, where farming in one of the nation’s key production zones starts to become unsustainable.”

It is truly amazing that anyone would have the audacity to state this. Farming on a large scale in a desert has never been sustainable. It is only possible by transporting water long distances at a hugely subsidized rate.

Now that it is clear that water is a limited resource with a steep price, you see fighting over who gets the bigger subsidy. That just seems like a silly endeavor to me.